Page:History of Art in Phœnicia and Its Dependencies Vol 1.djvu/282

 262 HISTORY ov ART IN PIKKNK IA AND ITS DEPENDENCIF.S. made of bronze, or of wood cased in bronze, they were predestined to certain destruction. Their existence, therefore, is only known to us through the ancient writers and their forms through coins and reliefs; we may say the same of the tripods, candelabra, and other objects of the same kind which made up the furnishing of the temples (Figs. 8 1, 82 and 83). This furnishing must have been rich The crowded cities and narrow territory of Phoenicia left no room for colossal constructions like those of Egypt and Mesopotamia, but, on the other hand, a nation of skilful workers and of merchants through whose hands passed all the commerce of the Mediterranean, had every facility for accumulating precious objects of every kind in her sanctuaries. The Phoenicians were very pious. When we attempt a classification in order of subject of the epigraphic texts they have left us, we find that by far the fullest category is that which is made up of votive inscriptions. These all conclude with the same formula, they are all constructed after the following model, which comes from the Maltese monument represented in our Fig. 28. " To our Lord Melkart, master of Tyre ; the offering of thy servants Abdosir and his brother Osirsamar, both sons of Osirsamar, who was the son of Abdosir ; because he has listened to their voice ; may Jie bless them" These steles, like the stele of Jehaw-Melek (Fig. 23) and more than one stele from Carthage (Figs 13, 15, 16 and 192) often bear on their upper part, above the inscription, a bas-relief representing sometimes a group of worshippers making offerings to a god, sometimes a worshipper alone ; in most cases, however, the latter is understood and the sculptor has been content to figure the deity only. 1 At the apex of the stele appears an open hand, the symbol of prayer. Some of these steles have no inscriptions (Figs. 193 and 194). Sometimes they were not content with a simple stele. The discoveries which have been made in Cyprus in these latter years have furnished the elements of instructive comparisons and have helped us to come to a right opinion on certain monuments which have been found at intervals on the coast of Syria. In 1873, m a small grotto near the Maabed of Amrit, among the remains of a con- struction in which M. Renan recognised all that was left of a 1 One of the most interesting monuments of this class is the stele of Lilybaeum. Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum, pars i. No. 138.