PH(ENICIA (AV ' Phenice,' iou-kT,). —Phoenicia, the coast-laud between Mt. Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea, was about 120 miles in length and rarely more than 12 in breadth. It presented to the eye a succession of hills and valleys, well- watered and fruitful ; and it had the best harbours in the whole Syrian coastline. It became the home of one of the great civilizations of the ancient world, achieving success chiefly owing to the skill
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of its people in the art of navigation, 'in whicli the Phoenicians in general have always excelled all nations ' (Strabo, xvi. ii. 23). The OT (like Homer) styles them ' Sidonians,' from the name of their principal town (Jg 3^ Dt 3", etc.). They established colonies and commercial agencies all along the Mediterranean, and exerted a great inHii- ence on Western culture. l<"rom the time of Alex- ander the Great onward, the country was one of the stakes in the chronic warfare between the Seleucida and the Ptolemys. In 65 B.C. Pompey made Syria-Phoenicia a Koman province under a proconsul or proprastor. He did not, however, deprive of autonomy the ancient cities of Tyre and Sidon, or the recently founded Tripolis. For centuries the people had been gradually adopt- ing the language, manners, and customs of Greece. ' From the beginning of the imperial period the sole rule of Greek is here an established fact ' (T. Mommsen, The Provinces of the Roman Empire, Eng. tr., 1909, ii. 122J.
No detailed account is given in the NT of the introduction of Christianity into Phoenicia, but hints are not wanting. The dispersion which followed Stephen's death brought travellers thither, 'speaking the word to none save only to Jews' (Ac 11"). St. Paul and Barnabas at the end of their first missionary tour ' passed through Phoenicia and Samaria, telling the whole story (iK&iTiyoitiivoi) of the conversion of the Gentiles' (15^). At the end of the third journey St. Paul sailed for Phoenicia and spent a week among ' the disciples ' of Tyre (21='' ; see Tyre and SiDON). It should not be forgotten that many Phoenicians had come to Galilee to hear Christ Himself (Mk 3"), that He returned their visit by going into ' the borders of Tyre and Sidon ' (7^), and that He expressed the conviction that the people of this country could have been more easily moved to re- pentance than those of the most highly favoured cities of His native land (Mt 11'-').
Phoenicia continued to flourish under the Romans, but ceased to have any political import- ance, and gradually lost its national identity. The conflict between the old and the new civiliza- tions lasted long, and down to the 2nd cent. a.d. Greek and Phoenician characters sometimes appear together on coins, while Latin was the language of government and law. In the end, however, it was neither of the Western tongues, but Aramaic, that displaced Phoenician, which was still spoken in North Africa till the 4th or 5th century. The fragmentary writings of Philo of Byblos — of the time of Hadrian — contain an inter- esting attempt to trace the mythology of Greece to that of Phoenicia, which was itself largely Baby- Ionian.
LiTERATtmE.— F. C. Movers, Die Phimizier, 1841-66 ; G.
Rawlinson, Phoenicia, 1889 ; G. Maspero, HiUoire anciently dea pt^uptes de Vorienti, 1886 ; E. Meyer, Geschichte des Alter- thums, 1S84 ff. ; W. von Landau, Die liedeutung der Pkmiizier 17/1 y'olkerteben, 1906 ; K. Baedeker, Palestine and Si/ria% 1906.
James Strahan.
PH(ENIX (^ofi-il).— When the lateness of the season made it dangerous for an Alexandrian corn- ship, which had lain weather-bound for ' much time ' in Fair Havens, to continue her voyage to Italy, the question of a wintering-place arose (Ac 27'-). Following the advice of the majority (ol TrXelous), who had the experts — the captain and the ship-master ('owner' [IIV] conveys a wrong idea) — on their side, and disregarding that of St. Paul, who thought it would be more prudent to remain where they were, the centurion, who was the senior officer in an Imperial corn-ship, decided to make a run for tlie haven of Phoenix in order to winter there. Taking advantage of a soft south wind, they set sail, but had no sooner rounded Cape
Matala, and entered the Gulf of Messara, than they were caught by a hurricane, which drove them far out of their cour.se and ultimately wrecked them on the coast of Malta. The harbour which they thus failed to reach has to be identified from data supjilied by ancient geographers and modern navigators.
Strabo says : ' Then there is an isthmus of about 100 stadia [the narrow part of Crete to the west of Mt. Ida], having the settlement of Amphimalia on the northern shore, and Pliccnix of the Lampeans on the southern ' (X. iv. 3). Ptolemy names a harbour, Phoenikous, and a town. Phoenix, on the S. coast (III. xvii. 3); and Hierocles {Hynecdemus, 14) speaks of Phoenix as near Aradena, which still retains its name, while Stephanus Byzantinus makes Aradena synonymous with AnopolisC Upper City'), a name which is now attached to rums slightly farther north. As Aradena is a little over a mile, and Anopolis about 2 miles, from the harbour of Loutr6, the latter is naturally identified with the haven of Phoenix. It is on the east side of the neck of land which ends in Cape Muros. Captain Sjuatt maintains that it is ' the only hay to the westward of Fair Havens in which a vessel of any size could find any shelter during the winter months' (J. Smith, The Voyage and Shipwreck of St. Paul*, 1880, p. 92) ; and' G. Brown, the dis- coverer of Lasea, also convinced himself that Phoenix ' is the only secure harbour in all winds on the south-coast of Crete' (ib. p. 261). Brown found at Loutr6 an inscription of the time of Trajan, containing a record of some work done by the crew of a ship which evidently wintered in the haven. The inscrijition contains the words guber- nator and parasemum, corresponding to xv^cpv/p-ns and TropdffTj/uox, which are used by St. Luke (Ac 27" 28").