The Phoenicians were an enterprising maritime trading culture based in Canaan (modern Lebanon) between 1550 BC and 300 BC. They established major coastal cities and spread across the Mediterranean, gaining fame for their monopoly on purple dye and spread of the alphabet. The Phoenician alphabet, one of the first with a consistent linear form, likely originated from Egyptian hieroglyphs and lacked vowels. It was adopted by the Greeks and evolved into its current form. Phoenicia was later conquered by Persia and divided into vassal kingdoms, and Phoenician influence declined as many migrated to colonies like Carthage.
2. Ancient Phoenicia was located in Canaan, in current Lebanon. It covered most
of the western, coastal part of the fertile Crescent . Several major Phoenician
cities were built on the coastline of the Mediterranean. It was an enterprising
maritime trading culture that spread across the Mediterranean from 1550 BC
to 300 BC. They were famed in Classical Greece and Rome as 'traders in
purple', referring to their monopoly on the precious purple dye of the Murex
snail, used, among other things, for royal clothing, and for their spread of
the alphabet, upon which all major modern alphabets are derived
4. Phoenicians are mostly remembered for their ‘‘gift’’ to
humanity, the written language. The Phoenician
alphabet was one of the first alphabets with a strict
and consistent form. It is assumed that it adopted its
simplified linear characters from an as-yet unattested
early pictorial Semitic alphabet developed some
centuries earlier in the southern Levant. The precursor
to the Phoenician alphabet was likely of Egyptian
origin as Middle Bronze Age alphabet from the
southern Levant resemble Egyptian hieroglyphs, or
more specifically an early alphabetic writing system
found in central Egypt.
5. First inventions are sometimes a little rough and need to get
the bugs worked out, and so it was with this new alphabet
which the Phoenicians made popular. It consisted of 22
consonants . . . but no vowels. The reader was assumed to
speak the language, so they would know what sound to put
between the consonants. Of course, looking back at their
inscriptions a few thousand years later, it is not so obvious.
That is one reason why you will see different spellings for
the same word or name. The Greek took the alphabet and
put vowels in it. Then the Phoenician alphabet started to
change and took its current form.
7. Cyrus the Great conquered Phoenicia in
539 BC. The Persians divided Phoenicia
into four vassal kingdoms. They
prospered, furnishing fleets for the
Persian kings. Phoenician influence
declined after this. It is likely that
much of the Phoenician population
migrated to Carthage and other colonies
following the Persian conquest. In 350
or 345 BC a rebellion in Sidon led by
Tennes was crushed by Artaxerxes III.