In several
ancient Semitic-speaking cultures and associated historical regions, the shopheṭ or shofeṭ (plural shophṭim or shofeṭim; he, שׁוֹפֵט ''šōfēṭ'', phn, 𐤔𐤐𐤈 ''šōfēṭ'', xpu, 𐤔𐤐𐤈 ''šūfeṭ'', uga, 𐎘𐎔𐎉 ''ṯāpiṭ'') was a community leader of significant civic stature, often functioning as a chief
magistrate
The term magistrate is used in a variety of systems of governments and laws to refer to a civilian officer who administers the law. In ancient Rome, a '' magistratus'' was one of the highest ranking government officers, and possessed both judici ...
with authority roughly equivalent to
Roman consul
A consul held the highest elected political office of the Roman Republic ( to 27 BC), and ancient Romans considered the consulship the second-highest level of the ''cursus honorum'' (an ascending sequence of public offices to which politic ...
ar powers.
Etymology
In
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 ...
and several other
Semitic languages
The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. They are spoken by more than 330 million people across much of West Asia, the Horn of Africa, and latterly North Africa, Malta, West Africa, Chad, and in large immigra ...
, shopheṭ literally means "Judge", from the
Semitic root
The roots of verbs and most nouns in the Semitic languages are characterized as a sequence of consonants or " radicals" (hence the term consonantal root). Such abstract consonantal roots are used in the formation of actual words by adding the vowel ...
''Š-P-Ṭ'', "to pass judgment". Cognate titles exist in other Semitic cultures, notably
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 ...
.
Hebrew
In the
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;["Tanach"](_blank)
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. Hebrew: ''Tān ...
, the shofṭim were
chieftain
A tribal chief or chieftain is the leader of a tribe, tribal society or chiefdom.
Tribe
The concept of tribe is a broadly applied concept, based on tribal concepts of societies of western Afroeurasia.
Tribal societies are sometimes categori ...
s who united various
Israelite
The Israelites (; , , ) were a group of Semitic-speaking tribes in the ancient Near East who, during the Iron Age, inhabited a part of Canaan.
The earliest recorded evidence of a people by the name of Israel appears in the Merneptah Stele o ...
tribes in time of mutual danger to defeat foreign enemies.
Phoenician
In the various independent Phoenician city-states—on the coasts of present-day
Lebanon
Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to the north and east and Israel to the south, while Cyprus li ...
and western
Syria
Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...
, the
Punic
The Punic people, or western Phoenicians, were a Semitic people in the Western Mediterranean who migrated from Tyre, Phoenicia to North Africa during the Early Iron Age. In modern scholarship, the term ''Punic'' – the Latin equivalent of the ...
colonies on the
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ea ...
, and in
Carthage
Carthage was the capital city of Ancient Carthage, on the eastern side of the Lake of Tunis in what is now Tunisia. Carthage was one of the most important trading hubs of the Ancient Mediterranean and one of the most affluent cities of the classi ...
itself—a shofeṭ (
Punic
The Punic people, or western Phoenicians, were a Semitic people in the Western Mediterranean who migrated from Tyre, Phoenicia to North Africa during the Early Iron Age. In modern scholarship, the term ''Punic'' – the Latin equivalent of the ...
: ''šūfeṭ'') was a non-royal magistrate granted control over a city-state, sometimes functioning much in the same way as a
Roman consul
A consul held the highest elected political office of the Roman Republic ( to 27 BC), and ancient Romans considered the consulship the second-highest level of the ''cursus honorum'' (an ascending sequence of public offices to which politic ...
; for example, both offices served a one-year term in pairs of two.
The officeholder's role as a diplomatic executive, representative of a collective citizenry, is evidenced by an inscription written by the ''sufet'' Diomitus at
Sidon
Sidon ( ; he, צִידוֹן, ''Ṣīḏōn'') known locally as Sayda or Saida ( ar, صيدا ''Ṣaydā''), is the third-largest city in Lebanon. It is located in the South Governorate, of which it is the capital, on the Mediterranean coast. ...
in the late third century BCE. He boasts of his chariot race victory at the
Nemean Games
The Nemean Games ( grc-gre, Νέμεα or Νέμεια) were one of the four Panhellenic Games of Ancient Greece, and were held at Nemea every two years (or every third).
With the Isthmian Games, the Nemean Games were held both the year before ...
in Greece, perpetuating political favor as "the first of the citizens" to do so.
Punic
By the time of the
Punic Wars
The Punic Wars were a series of wars between 264 and 146BC fought between Roman Republic, Rome and Ancient Carthage, Carthage. Three conflicts between these states took place on both land and sea across the western Mediterranean region and i ...
, the government of
Ancient Carthage
Carthage () was a settlement in modern Tunisia that later became a city-state and then an empire. Founded by the Phoenicians in the ninth century BC, Carthage reached its height in the fourth century BC as one of the largest metropolises in t ...
was headed by a pair of annually elected ''sufetes''.
Livy
Titus Livius (; 59 BC – AD 17), known in English as Livy ( ), was a Ancient Rome, Roman historian. He wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people, titled , covering the period from the earliest legends of Rome before the traditiona ...
's
account of the Punic Wars affords a list of the procedural responsibilities of the Carthaginian ''sufet'', including the convocation and presidency of the senate, the submission of business to the People's Assembly, and service as trial judges. Their number, term, and powers are therefore similar to those of the
Roman consul
A consul held the highest elected political office of the Roman Republic ( to 27 BC), and ancient Romans considered the consulship the second-highest level of the ''cursus honorum'' (an ascending sequence of public offices to which politic ...
s, with the notable difference that Roman consuls were also commanders-in-chief of the Roman military, a power apparently denied to the ''sufetes''.
The term ''sufet'' was not, however, reserved for the heads of the Carthaginian state. Towards the end of their Western Mediterranean dominance, political coordination between local and colonial Carthaginians was likely expressed through a regional hierarchy of ''sufetes.'' For example, some epigraphic evidence from Punic-era
Sardinia
Sardinia ( ; it, Sardegna, label=Italian, Corsican and Tabarchino ; sc, Sardigna , sdc, Sardhigna; french: Sardaigne; sdn, Saldigna; ca, Sardenya, label=Algherese and Catalan) is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after ...
is dated with four names: the years' magistrates not only on the island, but also at home in North Africa.
Further inscriptional evidence of ''sufetes'' found in the major settlements of
Roman Sardinia
The Province of Sardinia and Corsica ( la, Provincia Sardinia et Corsica) was an ancient Roman province including the islands of Sardinia and Corsica.
Pre-Roman times
The Nuragic civilization flourished in Sardinia from 1800 to 500 BC. The a ...
indicates that the office, having endured there for three centuries under Carthaginian sovereignty, was utilized by the descendants of Punic settlers to refuse both cultural and political assimilation with their mainland Italian conquerors. Punic-style magistracies appear epigraphically unattested only by the end of the first century BCE, although two ''sufetes'' wielded power in
Bithia as late as the mid-second century CE.
Later use
Official state terminology of the
late Republic and
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterr ...
repurposed the word ''sufet'' to refer to Roman-style local magistrates serving in
Africa Proconsularis
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
, although a ''sufet'' appears as far-flung as
Volubilis
Volubilis (; ar, وليلي, walīlī; ber, ⵡⵍⵉⵍⵉ, wlili) is a partly excavated Berber-Roman city in Morocco situated near the city of Meknes, and may have been the capital of the kingdom of Mauretania, at least from the time of Kin ...
in modern-day
Morocco
Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to ...
. The institution is attested in more than forty post-Carthaginian cities, ranging from the
Third Punic War
The Third Punic War (149–146 BC) was the third and last of the Punic Wars fought between Carthage and Rome. The war was fought entirely within Carthaginian territory, in modern northern Tunisia. When the Second Punic War ended in 201 ...
to the second century CE reign of
Commodus
Commodus (; 31 August 161 – 31 December 192) was a Roman emperor who ruled from 177 to 192. He served jointly with his father Marcus Aurelius from 176 until the latter's death in 180, and thereafter he reigned alone until his assassination. ...
. Settlements governed by ''sufetes'' included
Althiburos
Althiburos ( xpu, 𐤏𐤋𐤕𐤁𐤓𐤔, ʿ or xpu, 𐤀𐤋𐤕𐤁𐤓𐤔, label=none, ʼ) was an ancient Berber, Carthaginian, and Roman settlement in what is now the Dahmani Delegation of the Kef Governorate of Tunisia. During the rei ...
,
Calama,
Capsa
Gafsa ( aeb, ڨفصة '; ar, قفصة qafṣah), originally called Capsa in Latin, is the capital of Gafsa Governorate of Tunisia. It lends its Latin name to the Mesolithic Capsian culture. With a population of 111,170, Gafsa is the ninth-la ...
,
Cirta
Cirta, also known by various other names in antiquity, was the ancient Berber and Roman settlement which later became Constantine, Algeria.
Cirta was the capital city of the Berber kingdom of Numidia; its strategically important port city w ...
,
Gadiaufala
Ksar Sbahi is a town and commune in Oum El Bouaghi Province, Algeria and the site of Ancient Gadiaufala, a Roman city and former bishopric, now a Latin Catholic titular see.
According to the 1998 census it has a population of 11,095.
History
...
, Gales,
Limisa
Limisa (today Aïn-Lemsa) is a town and archaeological site in Kairouan Governorate, Tunisia. It is located 50 kilometers west of kairouan. The town was a Roman Catholic diocese.
The street pattern of the village is fairly regular in its layout an ...
,
Mactar
Maktar or Makthar ( ar, مكثر), also known by other names during antiquity, is a town and archaeological site in Siliana Governorate, Tunisia.
Maktar was founded by the Berber Numidians as a defense post against Carthaginian expansion. At t ...
,
Thugga
Dougga or Thugga or TBGG was a Berber, Punic and Roman settlement near present-day Téboursouk in northern Tunisia. The current archaeological site covers . UNESCO qualified Dougga as a World Heritage Site in 1997, believing that it represents " ...
, and Volubilis.
Unlike the continuity of Punic inhabitance in Sardinia, the ''sufets prevalence in interior regions of Roman Africa, which were previously unsettled by Carthage, suggests that settlers and Punic refugees endeared themselves to Roman authorities by adopting a readily intelligible government.
Three ''sufetes'' serving simultaneously appear in first century CE records at Althiburos, Mactar, and Thugga, reflecting a choice to adopt Punic nomenclature for Romanized institutions without the actual, traditionally balanced magistracy. In those cases, a third, non-annual position of tribal or communal chieftain marked an inflection point in the assimilation of external African groups into the Roman political fold.
The Roman approximation of the term, ''sufes'', appears in at least six works of Latin literature. Erroneous references to Carthaginian "kings" with the Latin term ' betray the translations of Roman authors from Greek sources, who equated the ''sufet'' with the more monarchical
basileus
''Basileus'' ( el, ) is a Greek term and title that has signified various types of monarchs in history. In the English-speaking world it is perhaps most widely understood to mean "monarch", referring to either a "king" or an "emperor" and al ...
( el, βασιλεύς).
See also
*
Hakham
''Hakham'' (or ''chakam(i), haham(i), hacham(i)''; he, חכם ', "wise") is a term in Judaism, meaning a wise or skillful man; it often refers to someone who is a great Torah scholar. It can also refer to any cultured and learned person: "He ...
*
Zemene Mesafint
The Zemene Mesafint ( gez, ዘመነ መሳፍንት ''zamana masāfint'', modern: ''zemene mesāfint'', variously translated "Era of Judges," "Era of the Princes," "Age of Princes," etc.; named after the Book of Judges) was a period in Ethiop ...
*
Bomilcar (suffete)
References
*{{Catholic, title=Judges}
Judges
Carthage
Heads of government
Heads of state
shofet
Government of Phoenicia
Titles of national or ethnic leadership