The Ahiram sarcophagus (also spelled Ahirom, in Phoenician) was the sarcophagus of a

Phoenicia Phoenicia () was an ancient thalassocratic civilization originating in the Levant region of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily located in modern Lebanon. The territory of the Phoenician city-states extended and shrank throughout their histor ...

King of Byblos The Kings of Byblos were the rulers of Byblos, the ancient Phoenician city in what is now Lebanon. Scholars have pieced together the fragmented list from various archaeological finds since the 19th century. Early period * c.1800s BC Abichemou I ...

(c. 850 BC), discovered in 1923 by the French excavator

Pierre Montet Jean Pierre Marie Montet (27 June 1885 – 19 June 1966) was a French Egyptologist. Biography Montet was born in Villefranche-sur-Saône, Rhône, and began his studies under Victor Loret at the University of Lyon. He excavated at Byblos ...

in tomb V of the

royal necropolis of Byblos The royal necropolis of Byblos is a group of nine Bronze Age underground shaft and chamber tombs housing the Sarcophagus, sarcophagi of several Kings of Byblos, kings of the city. Byblos (modern Jbeil) is a coastal city in Lebanon, and one of t ...

. The sarcophagus is famed for its bas relief carvings, and its Phoenician inscription. One of five known Byblian royal inscriptions, the inscription is considered to be the earliest known example of the fully developed

Phoenician alphabet The Phoenician alphabet is an alphabet (more specifically, an abjad) known in modern times from the Canaanite and Aramaic inscriptions found across the Mediterranean region. The name comes from the Phoenician civilization. The Phoenician a ...

.Cook, p1 The Phoenician alphabet is believed to be the parent alphabet for a wide number of the world's current writing systems; including the

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

and Cyrillic Alphabets, and the

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

and

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' terminus post quem ''Terminus post quem'' ("limit after which", sometimes abbreviated to TPQ) and ''terminus ante quem'' ("limit before which", abbreviated to TAQ) specify the known limits of dating for events or items.. A ''terminus post quem'' is the earliest da ...

'' of the transmission of the alphabet to Europe. Ahirom is not attested in any other Ancient Oriental source, although some scholars have suggested a possible connection to the contemporary King Hiram mentioned in the Hebrew Bible (see

Hiram I Hiram I ( Phoenician: 𐤇𐤓𐤌 ''Ḥirōm'' "my brother is exalted"; Hebrew: ''Ḥīrām'', Modern Arabic: حيرام, also called ''Hirom'' or ''Huram'') was the Phoenician king of Tyre according to the Hebrew Bible. His regnal years have b ...

Discovery

The sarcophagus was found following a landslide in the cliffs surrounding

Byblos Byblos ( ; gr, Βύβλος), also known as Jbeil or Jubayl ( ar, جُبَيْل, Jubayl, locally ; phn, 𐤂𐤁𐤋, , probably ), is a city in the Keserwan-Jbeil Governorate of Lebanon. It is believed to have been first occupied between 8 ...

(in now modern-day Lebanon) in late 1923, which revealed a number of Phoenician royal tombs. The tomb of Ahirom was ten metres deep.

Sarcophagus

The sarcophagus of Ahiram was discovered by the French archaeologist

in 1923 in

. Its low relief carved panels make it "the major artistic document for the

Early Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...

" in Phoenicia. p. 13, 19-22/ref> Associated items dating to the

Late Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second prin ...

either support an early dating, in the 13th century BC or attest the reuse of an early shaft tomb in the 11th century BC. The major scene represents a king seated on a throne carved with winged sphinxes. A priestess offers him a lotus flower. On the lid two male figures face one another with seated lions between them. These figures have been interpreted by Glenn Markoe as representing the father and son of the inscription. The rendering of figures and the design of the throne and a table show strong Assyrian influences. A total absence of Egyptian objects of the 20th and 21st dynasties in Phoenicia contrasts sharply with the resumption of Phoenician-Egyptian ties in the 22nd Dynasty of Egypt.

Inscriptions

An inscription of 38 words is found on parts of the rim and the lid of the sarcophagus. It is written in the Old Phoenician dialect of Byblos and is the oldest witness to the

of considerable length discovered to date: According to the recent re-edition of the Ahirom inscriptions and a some years later new reconstruction of a lacuna within the inscription (both by Reinhard G. Lehmann,Reinhard G. Lehmann, Wer war Aḥīrōms Sohn (KAI 1:1)? Eine kalligraphisch-prosopographische Annäherung an eine epigraphisch offene Frage, in: V. Golinets, H. Jenni, H.-P. Mathys und S. Sarasin (Hg.), ''Neue Beiträge zur Semitistik. Fünftes Treffen der ArbeitsgemeinschaftSemitistik in der Deutschen MorgenländischenGesellschaft vom 15.–17. Februar 2012 an der Universität Basel'' (AOAT 425), Münster: Ugarit-Verlag 2015, pp. 163-180) the translation of the sarcophagus inscription reads:

A coffin made it ilibaal, son of Ahirom, king of Byblos, for Ahirom, his father, lo, thus he put him in seclusion. Now, if a king among kings and a governor among governors and a commander of an army should come up against Byblos; and when he then uncovers this coffin – (then:) may strip off the sceptre of his judiciary, may be overturned the throne of his kingdom, and peace and quiet may flee from Byblos. And as for him, one should cancel his registration concerning the libation tube of the memorial sacrifice.

The formulas of the inscription were immediately recognised as literary in nature, and the assured cutting of the archaic letters suggested to Charles Torrey a form of writing already in common use. A 10th-century BC date for the inscription has become widely accepted. Halfway down the burial shaft another short inscription was found incised at the southern wall. It had been first published as a warning to an excavator not to proceed further, but now is understood as part of some initiation ritual which remains unknown in detail. It reads:

Concerning knowledge: here and now be humble (you yourself!) ‹in› this basement!"

King Ahiram

Ahiram himself is not titled a king, neither of Byblos nor of any other city state. It is said that he was succeeded by his son Ithobaal I who is the first to be explicitly entitled King of Byblos, which is due to an old misreading of a text lacuna. According to a new reconstruction of the lacuna the name of Ahiram's son is to be read ilibaal, and the reading Ithobaal should be disregarded. The early king list of Byblos is again subject to further study.

Literature

*Pierre Montet: ''

et l'Egypte, Quatre Campagnes des Fouilles 1921-1924'', Paris 1928 (reprint Beirut 1998: )): 228–238, Tafel CXXVII-CXLI *Ellen Rehm: ''Der Ahiram-Sarkophag'', Mainz 2004 (Forschungen zur phönizisch-punischen und zyprischen Plastik, hg. von Renate Bol, II.1. Dynastensarkophage mit szenischen Reliefs aus Byblos und Zypern Teil 1.1) *Reinhard G. Lehmann: ''Die Inschrift(en) des Ahirom-Sarkophags und die Schachtinschrift des Grabes V in Jbeil (

)'', Mainz 2005 (Forschungen zur phönizisch-punischen und zyprischen Plastik, hg. von Renate Bol, II.1. Dynastensarkophage mit szenischen Reliefs aus Byblos und Zypern Teil 1.2) *

Jean-Pierre Thiollet Jean-Pierre Thiollet (; born 9 December 1956) is a French writer and journalist. Primarily living in Paris, he is the author of numerous books and one of the national leaders of the European Confederation of Independent Trade Unions (CEDI), a ...

: ''Je m'appelle

''. Paris 2005. *Michael Browning "Scholar updates translation of ancient inscription", in: The Palm Beach Post, Sunday, July 3, 2005 p. 17A. *Reinhard G. Lehmann: Wer war Aḥīrōms Sohn (KAI 1:1)? Eine kalligraphisch-prosopographische Annäherung an eine epigraphisch offene Frage, in: V. Golinets, H. Jenni, H.-P. Mathys und S. Sarasin (Hg.), ''Neue Beiträge zur Semitistik. Fünftes Treffen der ArbeitsgemeinschaftSemitistik in der Deutschen MorgenländischenGesellschaft vom 15.–17. Februar 2012 an der Universität Basel'' (AOAT 425), Münster: Ugarit-Verlag 2015, pp. 163–180

References

External links

Press release on new deciphering and translation
(in German) {{Authority control 9th-century BC works 1923 archaeological discoveries Phoenician inscriptions Sarcophagi Byblian royal inscriptions KAI inscriptions Kings of Byblos Phoenician sarcophagi Collections of the National Museum of Beirut