Phoenicia

Also known as Canaan

Phoenicians were an ancient Semitic people who inhabited city-states in Canaan along the Levantine coast of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily in present-day Lebanon and parts of coastal Syria. Their maritime civilization expanded and contracted over time, with its cultural core stretching from Arwad to Mount Carmel. Through trade and colonization, the Phoenicians extended their influence across the Mediterranean, from Cyprus to the Iberian Peninsula, leaving behind thousands of inscriptions.

AI overview

Phoenicians were an ancient Semitic people who built a maritime civilization in Canaan along the eastern Mediterranean coast (in what is now Lebanon and Syria), from which they expanded their influence across the Mediterranean through trade and colonization. They matter historically because of their widespread cultural impact, demonstrated by thousands of inscriptions they left behind across regions stretching from Cyprus to the Iberian Peninsula.

AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.

Key facts

Country.conventional_long_name: Phoenicia
Country.common_name: Phoenicia
Country.life_span: – 64 BC
Country.image_map: Phoenicia map-en.svg
Country.image_map_caption: Phoenicia and its major cities
Country.capital: None; dominant cities were Byblos, Sidon, and Tyre
Country.common_languages: Phoenician
Country.religion: Canaanite religion
Country.demonym: Phoenicians
Country.government_type: City-states ruled by kings, with varying degrees of oligarchy or plutocracy; oligarchic republic in Carthage after
Country.title_leader: Major kings of Phoenician cities
Country.leader1: Abishemu I
Country.leader2: Hiram I
Country.year_leader2: 969–936 BC
Country.leader3: Pygmalion of Tyre
Country.year_leader3: 820–774 BC
Country.era: Archaic period to Classical antiquity
Country.year_start: 2500 BC

via Wikipedia infobox

Wikidata facts

Instance of: style
Demonym: פיניקים
Country: Turkey
Continent: Asia
Form of government: republic
Follows: Canaan

Show 7 more facts

Commons category: Phoenicia
topic's main category: Category:Phoenicia
language used: Phoenician
inception: 2500-00-00
native label: 𐤊𐤍𐤏𐤍
on focus list of Wikimedia project: Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/4
dissolved, abolished or demolished date: 0064-00-00

Sources (8)

via Wikidata · CC0

~58 min read

Encyclopedic overview

35 sections

Contents

Etymology
History
Origins
Emergence during the Late Bronze Age (1479–1200 BC)
Ascendance and high point (1200–800 BC)
Foundation of Carthage
Vassalage under the Assyrians and Babylonians (858–538 BC)
Persian period (539–332 BC)
Hellenistic period (332–152 BC)
Demographics
Genetic studies
Economy
Trade
Industry
Tyrian purple
Mining
Viticulture
Shipbuilding
Important cities and colonies
Phoenician colonization
Society and culture
Politics and government
Law and administration
Military
Language
Alphabet
Art
Women
Religion
See also
References
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links

The Phoenicians emerged directly from the Bronze Age Canaanites, and their cultural traditions survived the Late Bronze Age collapse, continuing into the Iron Age with little interruption. They referred to themselves as Canaanites and their land as Canaan, though the territory they occupied was smaller than that of earlier Bronze Age Canaan. The name Phoenicia is a Greek exonym that did not correspond to a unified native identity. Modern scholarship generally views the distinction between Canaanites and Phoenicians after as artificial.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Phoenicia” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.