Scripturae Linguaeque Phoeniciae

1837 study of the Phoenician language From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Scripturae Linguaeque Phoeniciae (in English: "The writing and language of Phoenicia"), also known as Phoeniciae Monumenta (in English: "Phoenician remains") was an important study of the Phoenician language by German scholar Wilhelm Gesenius.

AuthorWilhelm Gesenius

LanguageLatin

GenrePhoenician language

Publication date

1837

Quick facts Author, Language ...

Scripturae Linguaeque Phoeniciae
Cover of part one (Pars Prima)
Author	Wilhelm Gesenius
Language	Latin
Genre	Phoenician language
Publication date	1837
Publication place	Leipzig

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Precededed by his prelimary treatise Paläographische Studien, his full publication was originally intended to be published under the name Marmora Phœnicia et Punica, quotquot supersunt, edidit, et prœtnissâ commentatione de litteris et linguâ Phœnicum et Pœnorum explicuit G. Gesenius (In English: "The Phoenician and Punic surviving inscriptions, published and explained with an excellent commentary on the letters and language of the Phoenicians and the Punics by W. Gesenius").^[1]

It was written in three volumes, combined in later editions.^[2] It was described by Reinhard Lehmann as "a historical milestone of Phoenician epigraphy".^[3]

It published all c.80 inscriptions and c.60 coins known in the entire Phoenicio-Punic corpus at the time.^[4]

Many of the Latin names that Gesenius gave to the inscriptions have remained foundational to the study of Phoenician-Punic. Gesenius listed the inscriptions by geographic findspot and in chronological order of their discovery.^[5]

History

In preparing for his publication, Gesenius traveled to Leiden, London, and Paris to inspect original inscriptions and coins, correcting prior scholarly errors based on casts or copies.^[1]

Gesenius' preliminary treatise, Paläographische Studien (1835), began by translating and annotating a 1772 Spanish treatise by Francisco Perez Bayer, enhancing it with his own corrections.^[1]

Contents

Paläographische Studien (1835)

Paläographische Studien established two categories of Punic writing — Scriptura Urbana, found near Carthage and resembling classical Phoenician script known from Malta, Sardinia, Cyprus and Athens, and Scriptura Rustica (or Numidica), a looser, provincial script from inland Numidia.^[6] Gesenius reconstructed a “Numidian alphabet” to aid future decipherments.^[7]

Scripturae Linguaeque Phoeniciae (1837)

Full Title: The writing and language of all the surviving Phoenician remains, published and unpublished copies of the best examples, illustrated and explained by Wilhelm Gesenius.
First part: Containing the first two books on Phoenician letters and inscriptions [p. i–xxviii, 1–260], therein:
- First book: containing Phoenician palaeography [p. 1–89]
- Second book: illustrating the Phoenician inscriptions [p. 90–260]
Second part: Containing two later books on the gods and the language of the Phoenicians [p. 261–482], therein:
- Third book: On the Phoenician gods [p. 261–328]
- Fourth book: Illustrating the Phoenician language [p. 329–482]
Third part: containing forty-six inscribed stone tablets [Tab. 1–48 (sic)]

List of inscriptions

More information Gesenius (1837), Hamaker (1828) ...

	Gesenius (1837)	Hamaker (1828)	CIS (1880s)	KAI (1960s)	Other
Malta
Cippi of Melqart	1		I 122	47
Benhisa inscription	2		I 124	-
Mdina steles	3-4	III 1-2	I 123	61
Athenian Greek-Phoenician inscriptions	5-7		I 116, 117, 120	53, 55
Pococke Kition inscriptions	8-40	IV	I 11, 46, 57-85	33, 35
Nora Stone	41		I 144	46
Carthaginian
Humbert Carthage inscriptions	46-49, 51-53	I 1-3	I 173, 186-187, 240, 439-440
Falbe Punic inscriptions	50, 54		I 199
Reade Punic inscriptions	81-83		I 179, 441-442
Punic-Libyan bilinguals	56	II 3		100
Numidia
Temple Punic inscription (BM 125044)^[8]^[9]^[10]^[11]	57				NP 7
Falbe Punic inscriptions	58				NP 8
Hamaker?^[12]^[13]^[14]^[15]	59-60	II 1-2			NP 9-10
BM 125056 ^[16]^[17]	61				NP 11
Humbert Neo-Punic inscriptions (?)^[18]^[19]^[20]	62-63				NP 12-13
Reade Punic inscriptions	84				NP 14
Tripolitania Punic inscriptions	64-65	III 4-5			IPT 9-10
Gems and stamps	67-70		II 79, 81

Non-Phoenician:
Carpentras Stela	71		II 141
Stela Saltiana^[21]	72		II 143		TAD D22.54
Turin Aramaic Papyrus	73	III 3	II 144
Blacas papyri	74-75		II 145		TAD C1.2

Pseudo-Phoenician or forgeries:
[Other]	76-80		II 54

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Editions

Gesenius, F.H.W. (1837). Scripturae linguaeque phoeniciae monumenta quotquot supersunt edita et inedita ad autographorum optimorumque exemplorum fidem edidit additisque de scriptura et lingua Phoenicum commentariis illustravit Guil. Gesenius: Duos priores de litteris et inscriptionibus phoeniciis libros continens. 1 (in Latin). Vol. 1. sumptibus typisque Fr. Chr. Guil. Vogelii.
- Scripturae linguaeque phoeniciae (in Latin). Vol. 2. 1837.
- Scripturae linguaeque phoeniciae (in Latin). Vol. 3. 1837.

Notable preceding works

Gesenius, Wilhelm; Bayer, Francisco Pérez; Hollmann, Hermann (1835). Paläographische Studien über phönizische und punische Schrift (in German). F. C. W. Vogel.

References

[1]
Yates 1837, p. 138.
[2]
Lehmann 2013, p. 240: "Basically, its core consists of the comprehensive edition, or re-edition of 70 Phoenician and some more non-Phoenician inscriptions... However, just to note the advances made in the nineteenth century, it is noteworthy that Gesenius' precursor Hamaker, in his Miscellanea Phoenicia of 1828, had only 13 inscriptions at his disposal. On the other hand only 30 years later the amount of Phoenician inscribed monuments had grown so enormously that Schröder in his compendium Die phönizische Sprache. Entwurf einer Grammatik nebst Sprach- und Schriftproben of 1869 could state that Gesenius knew only a quarter of the material Schröder had at hand himself."
[3]
Lehmann 2013, p. 238.
[4]
Foreign Quarterly Review 1838, p. 245: "What is left consists of a few inscriptions and coins, found principally not where we should a priori anticipate, namely, at the chief cities themselves, but at their distant colonies... even now there are not altogether more than about eighty inscriptions and sixty coins, and those moreover scattered through the different museums of Europe."
[5]
"ASOR PUNIC PROJECT :: 1825 BICENTENNIAL". ASOR PUNIC PROJECT. Retrieved 2025-05-25. Two years later he published his survey, Scripturæ linguæque phoeniciæ monumenta (or Monumenta 1837), which gave sequential Latin numeration, site-by-site in order of discovery, and thereby assigned to these inscriptions what would become their vulgate names. In Leiden he was able to study nine of the first thirteen Punic inscriptions known from Carthage (Carthaginensis) and five of eight Neo-Punic inscriptions from North Africa (Numidica). The correspondence between Gesenius' common names and later catalogs is consistent but not always precise (in part because his Carthaginensis decima would be omitted as Libyan/Numidian rather than Punic)… For the next five decades and beyond, inscriptions that Gesenius had cataloged in Leiden remained foundational for the study of Phoenician-Punic.
[6]
Yates 1837, p. 150.
[7]
Yates 1837, p. 153.
[8]
Temple, Grenville (1834). "Copy of a Letter from Sir Grenville Temple, Bart., to Lieut.-General Benjamin Forbes, M.R.A.S., Relative to a Phœnician Tombstone Found at Maghráwah in Tunis, and Presented to the Royal Asiatic Society". Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland. 3 (3). [Cambridge University Press, Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland]: 548–549. ISSN 0950-4737. JSTOR 25581778. Retrieved 2025-05-26.
[9]
"stela". The British Museum. Retrieved 2025-05-26.
[10]
Temple, Sir Grenville (1835). Excursions in the Mediterranean: Algiers and Tunis. Saunders and Otley, Conduit Street. p. Between pages 352-353. Retrieved 2025-05-27.
[11]
Gesenius p.196 (English translation): “LVII. NUMIDICAN FIRST. And the first indeed, now especially to be explained, was found in the year 1833 by Sir GRENVILLE TEMPLE in the village of Maghrawa (مغراوة), not far from the place where ancient Tucca Terebinthina was, in a certain small hut (“in a small hovel”), was purchased and sent to the Asiatic Society of London, in whose museum the stone is still preserved.”
[12]
"ASOR PUNIC PROJECT :: STELA H AA 1". ASOR PUNIC PROJECT. Retrieved 2025-05-26.
[13]
"ASOR PUNIC PROJECT :: STELA H III S 1". ASOR PUNIC PROJECT. Retrieved 2025-05-26.
[14]
Gesenius p.204 (English translation): “LIX. NUMIDICAN THIRD. This stone also, very similar to the previous ones but of slightly rougher workmanship, was found near the end of the year 1823 in the vicinity either of Bedja (i.e. Vacca) or the town of Kef (i.e. Sicca), was purchased by Humbert, an agent among the Tunisians, and brought to the Museum of Leiden, where it is still preserved. A drawing of it, which reflects half the actual size, was given by HAMAKER in Miscellanea, table 2 no. 1. LX. NUMIDICAN FOURTH. An inscription similar to the previous three and without doubt dug up in the same place, where a large quantity of similar monuments seems to have lain buried (see below no. 3), once in the collection of TULINIUS, British consul among the Tunisians, was purchased in 1828 by the King of the Netherlands and brought to the Leiden Museum. A copy of it, made by Humbert before he saw the stone, was published by HAMAKER in Miscellanea, table 2 no. 2”
[15]
Hamaker, pages 11 and 21 (English translation): “§. 2. A very remarkable monument, to which in our second lithographic plate we assigned first place, was discovered in the year turning 1823, in the province of Zeugitania, in the vicinity either of the city of Bedja (i.e., as it later appears, the ancient Vaga) or of Keff, which they once called Sicca Veneria. For the location is not sufficiently certain, since the relics of antiquity were not discovered by Humbert himself, but were offered while he was staying among the Tunisians… §. 3. A distinguished monument of Punic antiquity, which in our second plate we have represented in second place, is counted among the foremost kēimēlia (treasured relics) of antiquity, (having been) collected at the expense of the illustrious man Tulin, who, in the name of the English, acts as vice-consul among the Tunisians, but now redeemed by the generosity of the Most Excellent and Most August King and added to the collections of the antiquarian museum of the Lugduno-Batavian Museum. The stone itself, however, we have not yet seen with our own eyes, since it, along with the rest of the ancient relics, is still being kept at Liburni by Humbert, awaiting an opportunity to be brought to our shores. Indeed, I would not have ventured to publish that inscription—sent to us from Humbert’s copy late last year—if it had not already been well established for me through many examples, that in surveying such monuments this man’s eyes are exceedingly sharp, his hand trustworthy in drawing, and his effort exceptional. The material of the stone is the same as that of the other African stones preserved in the museum, namely limestone; but concerning the place where it was found, we have not yet discovered anything—except that from the nature of the stone, I suspect it comes from within the territory of the Tunisians, and I seek some indication by close investigation. For what could contribute more effectively to confirming or refuting my interpretation than a clue about that location—especially since, as will appear below, I have concluded from the Punic words that the stone was placed under the name of the Zeugitanian town of Vaga?”
[16]
"stela". The British Museum. Retrieved 2025-05-26.
[17]
Gesenius p.210-211 (English translation): “LXI. NUMIDICAN FIFTH. This excellent monument, until now unpublished, seems to have long lain hidden in the underground chambers of the British Museum, where it still exists among other inscriptions from the Sloane collection. It was seen there and hastily copied by Odofredus Müller, V[ir] Ill[ustris], who sent it to me; I recently examined it more thoroughly myself and I present two examples of it: one smaller, of the whole monument, which is finely crafted from a whitish-grayish marble, very hard and well polished; the other shows only the letters, but at actual size. Nothing is known by the museum officials about the location where the stone was found; but it is judged to be Numidian both from the Numidian-like shape of the letters and the subject matter of the inscription.”
[18]
"ASOR PUNIC PROJECT :: STELA DRAWING HTC 61a". ASOR PUNIC PROJECT. Retrieved 2025-05-26.
[19]
"ASOR PUNIC PROJECT :: STELA DRAWING HTC 61b". ASOR PUNIC PROJECT. Retrieved 2025-05-26.
[20]
Gesenius (English translation): “FIRST APPENDIX. ON THE SIXTH AND SEVENTH NUMIDICAN INSCRIPTIONS These two unpublished inscriptions, very similar to each other both in the type of script and in their formulas, were recently brought from the Tunisian dominion to Italy by a man, if I am not mistaken, a Jew, a dealer in antiquities; and after they had been offered in vain for sale to the king of Holland, they were taken to the Bourbon Museum, which is in Naples. A copy of them, obtained from Italy, was first given to me from the records of the Leiden Museum by the distinguished Leemans. Since I doubted this copy in some respects, I endeavored to obtain plaster casts of them, and at last I succeeded. But since the box sent to me was long delayed on the journey, and I did not want my commentary to depend only on the authority of the copy, I was forced to relegate these matters to the appendix. The stone on which both monuments are inscribed is travertine, fairly common in those regions. The first (no. 6) is sixteen Berlin inches high, eleven wide; the latter (no. 7) is eighteen high, twelve wide: the thickness of both is nearly equal to the width. The stone with the cow engraved is broken in the middle; but the seller of the stone testified that these are fragments of one monument, and there is no reason to doubt this. One thing may be doubted: whether a third and upper part of the stone, perhaps containing a human figure, has perished. This conjecture might be supported both by our Numidic stones 4 and 7, and by certain uninscribed monuments from that region (cf. page 210). That these monuments are genuine and brought from Numidia itself, scarcely anyone would doubt who knows the nature of the script and compares the images of these stones with the Leiden monuments found near Vacca and Sicca. To this is added that the type of stone (a small specimen of which was sent to me) is exactly the same as in the Leiden examples.”
[21]
Society of Biblical Archæology (London, England) (1878). Proceedings. Getty Research Institute. London. p. 34.

Bibliography

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