| DESCRIPTION |
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|---|---|---|
Temple of Melqart in Tyre perso.wanadoo.fr/spqr |
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| Language: | Aramaic |
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| Medium: | basalt stele |
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| Length: | 5 lines |
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| Approximate Date: | 9th-8th cent. BCE |
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| Genre: | votive |
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| Place of Discovery: | Bredsh, a village north of Aleppo, Syria |
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| Date of Discovery: | c. 1939 |
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| Current Location: | National Museum Aleppo, Syria |
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| Inscription number: | KAI 201 | |
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(Albright 1942:23-29) |
(Adapted from Black 1958:239) |
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nsb' . zy . sm br . h |
1 | The monument which Bar-Hadad, son of Tab-Rimmon, |
dd. br'zr . dmsqy . 'br |
2 | son of Hadyan, king of Aram, set up for |
mlk 'rm . lmr'h lmlqr |
3 | his lord, Melqart. He vowed (this) to him, |
t . zy nzr . lh wsm' . lql |
4 | and he listened to his voice. |
h |
5 | |
Notes Bar-Hadad I was king of Aram 885-865 BCE. He was the son of Tab-Rimmon and grandson of Hezion. He was a contemporary of Kings Elah (885 BCE), Zimri (885 BCE), Omri (885-874 BCE), and Ahab (873-853 BCE) of Israel, and Kings Asa (911-871 BCE) and Jehoshaphat (871-848 BCE) of Judah. Tab-Rimmon was also an Aramean king, but his dates are unknown. Melqart was the patron god of the Phoenician city of Tyre on the eastern Mediterranean coast. | ||
| DISCUSSION QUESTIONS |
1. What is the importance of vows in the ancient Mediterranean World? (see Parker ) 2. What issues does Bar-Hadad's name raise in terms of ancient Israel's chronology? (See 1 Kings 15:18; 20:1; 2 Kings 13:24) 3. With what Greek hero was the god Melqart associated? (see Ribichini ) 4. With what Mesopotamian god of the underworld was Melqart perhaps associated? |
| SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY |
| Ahlström, Gösta. The History of Ancient
Palestine. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993.
Albright, W. F. "A Votive Stele Erected by Ben-Hadad I of Damascus to the God Melcharth." Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 87 (1942) 23-29. Biran, Avraham. "Sacred Spaces: Of Standing Stones, High Places and Cult Objects at Tel Dan." Biblical Archaeology Review 24.5 (1998) 38-45 + 70. Black, Matthew. "The Milqart Stele." In Documents from Old Testament Times. Edited by D. W. Thomas, 239-41. London: Thomas Nelson, 1958. Reprinted, Ancient Texts and Translations. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2005. Bonnet, Corrine. "Melqart." In Iconography of Deities and Demons. Edited by Karel van der Toorn. Leiden: Brill, forthcoming. Cross, Frank Moore. "The Stele Dedicated to Melcarth by Ben-Hadad." Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 205 (1972) 36-42. Dearman, Andrew J., and J. Maxwell Miller. "The Melqart Stele and the Ben-Hadads of Damscus: Two Studies." Palestine Exploration Quarterly 115 (1983) 95-101. de Vaux, Roland. "The Prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel." In The Bible and the Ancient Near East, 138-51. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1971. Dunand, M. "Stèle Araméenne Dédiée á Melqart." Bulletin du Musée de Beyrouth 3 (1941) 65-76. Katzenstein, Hannah J. "Phoenician Deities Worshipped in Israel and Judah during the Time of the First Temple." In Phoenicia and the Bible, edited by E. Lipinski, 187-91. Studia Phoenicia 11. Leuven: Peeters, 1991. Morgenstern, Julius. "The King-God among the Western Semites and the Meaning of Epiphanies." Vetus Testamentum 10 (1960) 138-97. Parker, Simon B. "The Vow in Ugaritic and Israelite Narrative Literature." Ugarit Forschungen 11 (1979) 693-700. Peckham, Brian. "Israel and Phoenicia." In Magnalia Dei: The Mighty Acts of God. Essays on the Bible and Archaeology in Memory of G. Ernest Wright, edited by Frank M. Cross et al., 224-48. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1976. Peckham, Brian. "Phoenicia and the Religion of Israel: The Epigraphic Evidence." In Ancient Israelite Religion: Essays in Honor of Frank Moore Cross. Edited by Patrick D. Miller Jr. et al., 79-99. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987. Pitard, Wayne T. "Ben-Hadad." In Anchor Bible Dictionary, edited by David Noel Freedman, 1:663-65. New York: Doubleday, 1992. Pitard, Wayne T. "The Identity of the Bir-Hadad of the Melqart Stela." Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 272 (1988) 3-21. Reinhold, Gotthard G. G. "The Bir-Hadad Stele and the Biblical Kings of Aram." Andrews University Seminary Studies 24 (1986) 115-26. Ribichini, Sergio. "Melqart." In Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, edited by Karel van der Toorn et al., 563-55. 2nd ed. Leiden: Brill, 1999. Rosenthal, Franz. "Canaanite and Aramaic Inscriptions." In Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament, edited by James B. Pritchard, 653-62. 3d ed. Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press, 1969. |
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