The Oxford Handbook of the Phoenician and Punic Mediterranean

by Carolina Lopez-Ruiz

  Farther west lies Tavira, on the right bank of the final course of the Gilão River, widening the limits of the “Phoenician geography” of Portugal. During the last fifteen years, archaeological interventions in the historical center of modern Tavira, more precisely on the hill of Santa Maria, have considerably changed the known panorama. Certain findings have made it clear that the Iron Age occupation of Tavira, which began at the beginning of the seventh century bce (according to the Mediterranean Chronology), is profoundly linked to the western Phoenicians expansion (Maia 2000; Maia et al. 2003). The defensive wall with casemates and gangways has clear parallels with the Phoenician colonies of the central and western Mediterranean. Concerning material remains, these included painted ceramic vases with Levantine decoration and morphology, more precisely pithoi, mushroom-rim jugs, red-slip plates and cups, dipper juglets, R1 amphorae, and even painted ostrich eggs and ivory artifacts (Maia 2000; Maia et al. 2003).

  The discovery at Tavira of a ceramic fragment with an inscription in Phoenician characters is of great importance. The use of an ostracon in this case, a type of document generically used in economic transactions, shows knowledge and use of the Phoenician script and hence the language in ordinary tasks. It dates to the sixth century bce (Amadazi-Guzzo and Zamora López 2008). This kind of document is rare in Phoenician epigraphy, being very scarce in the west, particularly in the Iberian Peninsula where it is only known at Castillo de Doña Blanca (Zamora López 2013: 362).

  A necropolis was identified at the foot of the western slope of the hill, where incinerations in “Cruz del Negro”-type urns were undertaken. The urns and the associated remains date from the seventh century bce and belong to the Mediterranean world (Arruda et al. 2008).

  Mértola, located on the lower stretch of the Guadiana River, seems to be far inland, but its fluvial route gives it easy access to the littoral zone. In the nineteenth century, two urns were found here. They are of “Cruz del Negro” type, and suggest the existence of an Orientalizing necropolis (Barros 2008). The Orientalizing process at Mértola is also visible in other ceramic remains, such as red-slip plates with wide and flattened lips (Barros 2008) and, above all, in a graffito found on a piece of ceramic, most probably Phoenician, that seems to be a property mark (Zamora López 2013: 262–63). Mértola’s remains seem to belong to a traditional chronology of the seventh century bce, but unfortunately they were found without any associated context.

  Other clearly Orientalizing remains were found in the interior of the Alentejo, on several necropoleis of the Beja and Ourique regions (e.g., figure 39.2). They date from the sixth century bce and are better contextualized. It is important to stress that the architecture seems to be linked with the indigenous world, even though some funerary rituals and the cult to the dead can be of Mediterranean origin (Arruda 2014). The scarabs, glass collar beads, and Egyptian faience, as well as gold and silver jewelry discovered, there reveal similarities with other necropoleis of Levantine type.

  Figure 39.2 Vinha das Caliças necropolis (Beja region).

  Source: A. M. Arruda.

  Further Discussion

  The presence and settling of Phoenicians on the Portuguese littoral zone started at a considerably early date. It is well known that the radiocarbon dates (ninth century bce) and the Mediterranean Chronology based on the material culture (eighth century bce) do not coincide. This lack of concordance exists both on the Iberian Peninsula (Arruda 1999–2000: 16; Núñez 2015) and in the central Mediterranean (López Castro et al. 2016) (on the Phoenicians in Iberia, cf. chapter 38, this volume). But it is by now accepted that the presence and settling of Phoenicians in today’s Portuguese territory occurred several decades following those that occurred in the Andalusian regions of Huelva and Málaga in today’s southern Spain, and in what is today Tunisia, where the oldest colony was Utica. Some of the Mediterranean imports—for example, Greek, Sardinian, and Villanovan ceramics, typical of archaic Phoenician sites—are absent from the older Portuguese contexts; this is an absence that cannot be ignored. This phase could be defined as the “third wave” of colonization, also corresponding to the foundation of Carthage and other colonies along the coast of the Iberian Peninsula, like Toscanos and Cerro del Villar. It can be dated to the ninth or eighth century bce, depending on the type of chronologically acceptable data used. But, as the white rabbit said to Alice, “Sometimes, forever is just one second.”

  Given the geographical and chronological data now available, it seems that the Phoenician expansion into the Atlantic western littoral zone was undertaken by Phoenicians settled along the Straits of Gibraltar and Huelva area since the tenth century bce. As already mentioned, these phenomena were at first tied to the littoral zone, but they reached the interior early on, as exemplified by the “Santuário dos Ratinhos” (Ratinhos sanctuary) in Moura.

  The Phoenician communities settled in the far west were not in themselves homogenous groups. They were in fact probably socioeconomically diverse, representing different groups among the colonizers, ranging from those who planned the settlement, to artisans like potters and glass makers. This social stratification probably found a parallel in the indigenous hierarchy, and we can imagine that the details of the process were negotiated by the upper echelons of both societies.

  It seems that following an initial failure to settle the interior of the Alentejo (as exemplified by the case of Castro dos Ratinhos, abandoned after a mere fifty years following the construction of its sanctuary), the process of Orientalization of the region really started ca. the seventh century bce (in historical chronology) and began on the coast. It is in its relation to the treatment of the dead that this Orientalizing culture is most visible in the hinterland, especially in the votive remains. Some rituals were also quite possibly adopted: pieces like sculptures of bulls and vases decorated with modeled birds on the rim indicate the practice of a cult dedicated to religious entities related to the divine Mediterranean pair Baal-Astarte (Arruda 2016a, b).

  The funerary architecture remained linked with indigenous models. This might be explained by a need to legitimize ownership of the land in these territories, funerary monuments acting as existential maps of the autochthonous community (Lewis-Williams and Pearce 2015: 193). They might have stood as places of memory and resistance, guaranteeing the perpetuation of the ancestors’ image. It is therefore possible to conclude that penetration of the interior was slow and did not include the entire “Oriental package.”

  The Phoenician colonial sites in what is now Portuguese territory were, in a first phase, concentrated along the estuaries of the large rivers. They functioned within a dynamic network defined by the river itself, and were oriented toward the exploration and control of specific regions. This reality is similar to situations observed in other peninsular areas—for example, on the coast of Málaga or in the Bay of Cádiz. These settlements were no doubt the scene of negotiations, in a process that surely included inevitable ruptures and discontinuities. These sites were surely places of encounters, but not necessarily of embraces.

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  Chapter 40

  The Gadir–Tyre Axis

  Manuel Álvarez Martí-Aguilar

  The close relationship between Tyre and its colonies is one of the most notable aspects of the phenomenon of Phoenician colonization. This relationship was mediated by the figure of its chief god Melqart, identified with Herakles and Hercules by the Greeks and Romans. In her seminal work on the figure of the Tyrian Herakles, Corinne Bonnet (1988) pointed out the special bond that existed between the metropolis and Gadir, the oldest Tyrian colony in the west, whose sanctuary to Melqart-Herakles was characterized by “l’omniprésence du modèle tyrien.”

  The city of Gadir/Gades, and particularly its Herakleion (of which sadly we have preserved no archaeological trace), inspired a notable amount of discussion and information handed down via the literary tradition of antiquity. In those times, the city and its temple constituted a well-known point of reference as the world’s farthest western point, as well as a place of religious importance and international prestige. It is through this continuous discussion that we can begin to understand the deep symbolic and religious connection between Gadir and Tyre.

  The bond between the two cities, forged at the founding of Gadir in the ninth century bce, existed until the sixth century bce, a time when there was a general disruption of the link between Tyre and its ancient colonies in the political and economic spheres (Aubet 2001). However, the following discussion will show that the religious and cultural sway held by Tyre over Gadir, as well as the links between the respective temples of Melqart continued to be strong throughout the history of both cities.