Page:History of Art in Sardinia, Judæa, Syria and Asia Minor Vol 1.djvu/335

 Religious Architecture. 305 nice and capital have been uncovered, it is impossible to deter- mine the date of this colonnade, save that the building to which it belonged was in existence long before the composite style in- troduced by the Nabataean dynasty ; abundantly proved by the tombs of Medain-Salih, and the annexed woodcut (Fig. 206). 1 It is a large stela, with an inscribed slab towards the bottom to record a kind of compact between the local deities and Tsalm Hagan, an alien god, introduced for the first time to Te'ima, along with the priest attached to his service. The inscription is much damaged — ten lines having gone — but enough remains to enable the learned in such matters to determine its date, which they place four or six hundred years before our era. It is interesting, too, in that it adds another member to the Semitic pantheon. The details about the bas-relief seen on the two divisions of the stela are of peculiar interest. The upper figure evidently represents Tsalm ; he wears a tall pointed cap, or tiara, and above his head 1 The oversight which occurs in the text, namely of making Tsalma a local god, was left out ; but, in so doing, the account was deprived of much interesting matter, which will be found in the following note, brought too late to my notice to be inserted in the text. " The Te'ima inscription is not merely, as the first interpreters believed, the dedica- tion which accompanied the statue of a king or priest of Te'ima ; it commemorates the introduction of the cult of an alien deity, a kind of compact between the gods of Te'ima on the one hand, and the new god Tsalm of Hagan with the priest attached to his service on the other. The beginning of the inscription, consisting of ten lines, has almost entirely disappeared, an irreparable loss, for they doubtless contained the list of the gods of Te'ima and perhaps an inscription. The lacunes permit of but one or two names being recovered, whilst the reason for the importa- tion of a novel deity is utterly lost. However that may be, the central portion remains ; it is brimful of new matter, interesting in the highest degree. To distinguish one Tsalm from another — for there was a host of them — forming a family like the Ba'alîm, the Molochs, etc., the locality where a particular Tsalm was worshipped was added to the name, Tsalm of Hagan, Tsalm of Mahar, and so forth. This god is not altogether unconnected with Hebrew antiquity. The prophet Amos, in an obscure passage which has exercised the sagacity of scholars, exclaims : ' Ye carried (in the wilderness) Tsikkût your Moloch, and Khum your Tsalm, the star of the gods ye have made for yourselves ; ' whilst King Manasseh is represented as invoking the whole host of Tsalms from his prison : ' Tza'ibeni, help me ! ' The manner in which this god is introduced to the gods of Teima, and for us into the Semitic pantheon, agrees with the genius of ancient religions. Side by side with the "superi," who are always local deities, alien gods were admitted in a subordinate position in the same cities, sometimes in the same temple. Such deities had their special worshippers, but as a preliminary they had to be on good terms with the local gods. The Te'ima stela was put up to commemorate a similar compact. So under- stood, it is nearly related to the Byblos and the Mesa inscriptions." — Berger, be. cit. vol. 1. x