The Oxford Handbook of the Phoenician and Punic Mediterranean

by Carolina Lopez-Ruiz

  From Hellenization to the “Middle Ground”

  Let us return to the notion of “Hellenization,” which should probably be rejected as far too one-sided. Moreover, for this period the concept of universalism seems premature and otherness is no longer applicable. The paradoxical fabric of this time of considerable interaction makes the historian’s job difficult. What is clear is that to reduce the Hellenistic period to the tyranny of Hellenism is to go astray. Certainly, at this time Greek language, customs, cults, and institutions expanded everywhere, although they had also been widely known and partially adopted in previous periods. But rather than covering over and irremediably drowning Phoenician culture, these Greek influences triggered new, creative responses. Despite the real bite of Greek imperialism, what we observe is a Phoenicia in motion, neither frozen in nostalgia for the past nor stubbornly resisting threats to its heritage—a Phoenicia looking outward, long accustomed to transactions and to networks, to transfers and to compromise.

  Moreover, in the eyes of the Greeks, the Phoenicians were the closest and most familiar of the “barbarians.” They were the cousin on the other shore, the partner and competitor in the Mediterranean. As Isocrates’s speeches show, with the Hellenistic expansion, Hellenism considered as a way of living and thinking had long irrigated the Phoenician landscape without disfiguring it and without making local culture obsolete. Therefore, Alexander’s conquest in 332 bce did not mark a sharp break but, rather, a quantitative and qualitative threshold that affected ways of doing, living, speaking, and presenting oneself. To describe the multiple drivers working in Hellenistic Phoenicia, the concept of “middle ground” borrowed from Richard White (1991) seems much more accurate and fertile than that of “Hellenization.” Middle ground focuses on the spaces and actors of mediation and the creative in-betweens where cultures meet, learn to understand each other, and intertwine their destiny, without ignoring the harshness of power relations that conditioned the processes of cultural adaptation on both sides.

  References

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  • Translated from the French by Cynthia J. Johnson.

  Chapter 9

  Phoenicia in the Roman Empire

  Julien Aliquot

  In the first book of his treatise On Censuses, written in 213 ce and partly preserved in Justinian’s Digest, the renowned jurist Ulpian of Tyre sketches a praise of his motherland, as well as a ranking of the most important Phoenician cities under the reign of Caracalla (Dig. 50.15.1.1–3):

  One must realize that there are some colonies with ius Italicum, as, in Syria Phoenice, the most splendid colony of the Tyrians, which is my place of origin, outstanding in its territories, of very ancient foundation, powerful in war, always loyal to the treaty it made with the Romans; for the divine Severus and our emperor granted it ius Italicum because of its great and conspicuous faithfulness toward the Roman state and empire. But the colony of Berytus, also in the same province, was raised up by favor of Augustus and is, as the divine Hadrian says in a speech, an Augustan colony which possesses ius Italicum. There is also the colony of Heliopolis, which received from the divine Severus on the occasion of the civil war the status of an Italian colony.…But the colony of Ptolemais, which lies between Phoenice and Palestine, has nothing but the name of a colony.

  (Watson 1998: 4:445; translation modified)

  In Ulpian’s eyes, obviously, the best roads were those that led to Rome. In what follows, this guiding thread will be used to trace the history of Phoenicia from the advent of Rome in Syria at the beginning of the first century bce to the foundation of the Christian empire of Byzantium in the fourth century ce (on the overall context, see Millar 1993; Butcher 2003; Sartre 2005). Special attention is paid to the establishment of Roman rule and its impact on society, culture, and religion. The focus is on provincial institutions and cities, which provided a b
asis for the new order. However, side trails are also taken to assess the flowering of Hellenism and the revival of local traditions in the light of the Romanization of Phoenicia and its hinterland.

  Roman Rule in Phoenicia

  Phoenicia was in trouble on the eve of its annexation to the Roman Empire in 64/63 bce. The decay of the Seleucid state had fostered political autonomy and violence. Following the example of Arados, upon obtaining grants of autonomy, the major Phoenician cities had started to strike coins in their own names and dated by their own eras (Tyre in 126/125, Sidon in 111/110, Tripolis between 105/104 and 96/95, Berytus in 81/80 bce). The Ituraeans had seized power in the hinterland, and these mountain dwellers, who had been identified to Arab robbers since antiquity, were indeed able to plunder with impunity the neighboring towns from the heights of Lebanon and Antilebanon (Aliquot 1999–2003). Here as everywhere in the province of Syria that he had just created, Pompey solved the problems in his way with the assent of the Senate. On the one hand, he drove local tyrants out of Tripolis and Byblos; on the other, he negotiated the submission of Ptolemaeus son of Mennaeus (ca. 85–40 bce), tetrarch and high priest of a principality formed around Chalcis ad Libanum (Majdal ‘Anjar?) and Heliopolis (Baalbek), in the Bekaa Valley. In many respects this was the beginning of a new epoch. Until the end of the first century ce, and even after the demise of Zenodorus, the last prince of Chalcis, Rome still ruled over inland parts of Phoenicia through allied kings (Cleopatra of Egypt, Herod the Great and his heirs, Cotys IX of Armenia Minor), while building on the Hellenized cities along the coast. The adoption of “Pompeian” eras from Tripolis to Dora, the honors paid to Pompey’s former legates (M. Aemilius Scaurus at Tyre, D. Laelius in Arados), and the legend of the foundation of Byblos by M. Calpurnius Bibulus (Aliquot 2015) show how grateful the ruling elites of these towns could be to their new masters.

  Under Roman rule, Phoenicia remained as divided as before. However, once the page of the Roman civil wars was turned, the country generally benefited from the Pax Romana without hosting any legion. Some changes occurred under Hadrian, when Syria Palaestina was created and included parts of southern Phoenicia, and even more under Septimius Severus. In 194 ce, the African emperor drew the lessons of Pescennius Niger’s unsuccessful bid for imperial investiture, and decided to grant less power to the consular governor of Syria by splitting the province in two, with Coele Syria in the north and Syria Phoenice in the south. As a result, the core of Phoenicia from Arados to Ptolemais was then administered by a senator of praetorian rank perhaps settled at Tyre, while Gabala, Paltos, and Balanea (Claudia Leucas) were kept within the jurisdiction of the proconsul of Coele Syria. Syria Phoenice was “Phoenician” in name only, for its territorial jurisdiction included the camp of the third legion Gallica at Raphaneae, as well as the cities of Damascus, Emesa, and Palmyra up to the Euphrates. Nonetheless, every inhabitant of the province was liable to be described as “Phoenician”—like, for instance, the Severi from Emesa and Arca, or the Palmyrene queen Zenobia.

  Among the most conspicuous signs of the establishment of Roman rule in Phoenicia, a series of epigraphical documents, mostly written in Latin, testify not only to the repression of the Ituraeans on Mount Lebanon and to the recruitment of auxiliary units among the Ituraeans and the Tyrians but also to road renovation and land survey. Between Byblos and Berytus, the mouth of the Lycus River (Nahr al-Kalb) was a lieu de mémoire where the Roman authorities, following the example of Egyptian pharaohs and Assyrian kings before them, displayed inscriptions that commemorated their work along the public highway from Antioch to Ptolemais and beyond (Maïla-Afeiche 2009). In northern Lebanon, under Hadrian, two procurators were responsible for carrying out the “delimitation of forests” (definitio silvarum) within a vast imperial estate where the emperor reserved the exploitation rights of four timber species (Breton 1980). Similar operations seem to have occurred later, possibly under Caracalla. While reminiscent of Lebanon’s lumbering by the Achaemenids and the Seleucids, they also reflect an unprecedented policy of rationalization in terms of scale, consistency, and display.

  From Greek Cities to Roman Colonies

  In addition to provincial institutions, Rome could rely in Phoenicia on cities of various statuses. At the dawn of the empire, most of these towns had come to adopt Greek constitutions inherited from the Hellenistic past (for the Hellenistic period, see chapter 8, this volume). All but the “allied” (foederata) city of Tyre were liable for the tribute assessed on cultivated land (tributum soli) and the head tax (capitatio), as well as tolls and shipping taxes (portoria). The cities were allowed to levy local taxes and to strike coins with the portraits of the emperors on the obverse (on Phoenician coins, see also chapter 25, this volume). They were also free to reform their chronological systems and to manage autonomously municipal affairs at home, within the limits of their territory, and even in the overseas communities, like those of the Tyrian traders gathered in stationes at Rome and Puteoli (Aliquot 2011: 80–81). Above the people (δῆμος), the civic council (βουλή) was now a permanent body in which the local elites were co-opted to hold in turn the main offices (ἀρχαί, plural of ἀρχή), from market or harbor oversight by the agoranomos or the limenarch to the supervision of schools and athletic contests by the gymnasiarch. In consideration for the monopoly of local power, the leading families had to assume expensive burdens and honors, such as priesthoods, embassies, or the presidence of Greek-style games (ἀγῶνες) by the agonothetes. In such a system, internal disputes were the counterpart of civic competition, and Augustus still had to stop factional fightings in Sidon and Tyre (Cassius Dio 54.7.6).

  Not surprisingly, the Phoenician towns thrived under the empire primarily thanks to their agricultural and craft products, including wine (especially from Berytus and Tyre), oil, ceramics, glass, purple, silk and other textiles, which were now exported by maritime trade to Rome, Italy, and beyond. They also developed through the generous (but of course not disinterested) initiatives of wealthy citizens and foreign benefactors. The Herods were certainly the most active donators in this case. The list of their contributions, as summarized by Flavius Josephus (BJ 1.422; AJ 19.335–337; 20.211–212), gives an overview of urban development in early Roman Phoenicia. It also draws attention to the introduction of typically Roman buildings in the area (e.g., amphitheater, circus, imperial baths), particularly at Berytus. Alongside the impressive Herodian achievements, other princes look a bit lackluster. The honors for an Emesan dynast at Heliopolis (Baalbek) and the refounding of Arca (Tell ‘Arqa) as a “Caesarea of the Ituraeans” (Caesarea Ituraeorum) hardly balance the picture. Herod himself built gymnasia in Tripolis and Ptolemais, a rampart for Byblos, exedrae, porticos, temples, and public places at Berytus, theaters in Tyre and Sidon, and a temple of Augustus near the Panion, where his grandson Philip soon founded the city of Caesarea Paneas (Banias). Agrippa I then gave baths and porticos to Berytus, plus a theater and an amphitheater where he offered musical events and gladiatorial shows. Eventually, Agrippa II enlarged Paneas, which he called Neronias in honor of Nero, and made such splendid donations (annual shows, wheat, oil, statues) to Berytus that hate and jealousy rapidly flared up among his subjects.

  The fortune of Berytus, which emerges from Josephus’s account, contrasts sharply with the marginal role to which this town had been previously confined. After being besieged by the Seleucid competitor Diodotos Tryphon in 143 bce, the city had experienced Ituraean lootings. In 27 bce, Augustus chose it to settle veterans from the legions V Macedonica and VIII Gallica and to found the first Roman colony in Syria (Hall 2004; Sawaya 2009). Around 15 bce, his son-in-law Marcus Agrippa extended its territory far in northern Bekaa up to Heliopolis and the sources of the Orontes River. Eventually rewarded with the ius Italicum, statutorily exempt from tribute, the new colonia Iulia Augusta Felix Berytus soon became a little Rome in Phoenicia and a Latin island in a Graeco-Aramaic environment. This privileged status was conducive to the development of a strong tradi
tion of juristic studies (Collinet 1925). The jurists present at Berytus were able to interpret equally Greek and Roman laws, as well as local legislative traditions from the Near East, so that the imperial legislation, once translated from Latin into Greek, was released from there throughout the Orient. In the third century ce, a school was formed around a kernel of professional lawyers and teachers. It gave Berytus the opportunity to be designated as the “mother of the laws” or the “nurse of the laws” (legum nutrix), and to supersede in that regard not only Tyre, homeland of the jurist Ulpian, but also Caesarea Maritima, Alexandria, Athens, and even both other cities where the emperor Justinian later left similar state institutions: Rome and Constantinople. The Berytan school continued to thrive until the tsunami of 551 ce, which destroyed the city and forced the masters and students to seek refuge in Sidon, before migrating to Constantinople.

  After Berytus, five Phoenician cities were granted the status of Roman colony and adorned with imperial epithets. Toward the end of his reign, the emperor Claudius (41–54 ce) founded the colonia Claudia Stabilis Germanica Felix Ptolemais and dispatched veterans to it. In 194 ce, Heliopolis was probably separated from Berytus and given the name of colonia Iulia Augusta Felix Heliopolis. Its inhabitants received the ius Italicum from Septimius Severus for their support during the war against Pescennius Niger, while the citizens of Berytus were punished for their defection. Around 198 ce, the colonia Septimia Tyrus was honored in the same way. Under Elagabalus (218–222 ce), Sidon (colonia Aurelia Pia metropolis Sidoniorum) and Arca (colonia Caesarea Libani/Ituraeorum) also became colonies. The implications of such promotions must be considered in the broader perspective of the trivialization of colonial status, especially from the Severi onward. Yet, the idea of purely honorific designations does not seem unquestionable in this case. The coins of the new colonies usually bear legionary insignia that refer to military colonization or resettlement, while others types and Latin legends express pride of being Roman (Dąbrowa 2012). As regards Heliopolis and Tyre, the granting of ius Italicum meant full remission of tributum. In the first case at least, it was followed by the inauguration of a contest modelled on the Roman Capitolia (Sawaya 2009: 274–77).