The Hellenistic World and Rome
teristic of Judaea. In other words if our evidence will tell us anything, it is
only at the level of conscious, formal expression.
If we were to set out laboriously to collect the epigraphic references to,
or by, citizens of the Phoenician cities abroad in the Hellenistic world, we
know anyway what we would find: that the majority appear as Greek in lan-
guage and nomenclature.^23 Nor would we learn anything significant if we
collected all the examples of Semitic names in use among these people, as
they certainly were throughout the classical period. It does, however, have
some significance, if only illustrative, that at least some Phoenicians abroad
continued to compose and inscribe texts in Phoenician. At Demetrias, for
example, three men from the third century.., all with Greek names—
one from Sidon, one from Arados, and one from Kition—have left brief in-
scriptions in Phoenician.^24 In Athens we have a bilingual Greek-Phoenician
inscription giving a fine example of equivalence, or semi-equivalence, in
theophoric names. Artemidorus son of Heliodorus, a Sidonian, appears in his
Phoenician form as ‘BD TNT BN ‘BDŠMŠ. Tanit therefore equals Artemis,
as Shemesh (the Sun) certainly does Helios. But the root ‘BD means ‘‘slave,’’
not ‘‘gift’’ (as ‘‘-dorus’’ in ‘‘Heliodorus’’ does).^25 On another bilingual inscrip-
tion, probably of the third century, from the Peiraeus, the female name ’SPT
daughter of ’ŠMNŠLM is transliteratedἈσεπτἙσυμσεληουand a Phoeni-
cian dedication of an altar, perhaps of the second or first century, mentions
a man who was son of B‘LYṬWN, the ŠPṬ (shofet, i.e., ‘‘judge’’; see text to
n. below).^26 There is also a substantial eight-line Phoenician inscription,
accompanied by a one-line Greek text, from the Peiraeus, probably of the
mid-third century, and dated by ‘‘the th year of the people of Sidon,’’ which
shows thekoinon(community) of the Sidonians there crowning a religious
official. Once again his Greek name, ‘‘Diopeithes,’’ is vaguely equivalent to
his Phoenician one, ŠMB‘L—‘‘God has heard.’’^27 There are also, for instance,
three brief Phoenician-Greek bilingual inscriptions from Rhodes, probably
of the early third century.^28
Taken together, this scatter of inscriptions is of some significance. Citi-
. For the case of Arados, see the collection by J.-P. Rey-Coquais,IGLSVII, –.
. O. Masson, ‘‘Recherches sur le Phéniciens dans le monde hellénistique,’’BCH
(): .
.KAI, no. : J. C. L. Gibson,Textbook of Syrian Semitic inscriptionsIII:Phoenician in-
scriptions(), no. .
. G. A. Cooke,Textbook of North Semitic Inscriptions(), nos. , .
. Cooke (n. ), no. ;KAI, no. ; Gibson (n. ), no. .
. P. M. Fraser, ‘‘Greek-Phoenician Bilingual Inscriptions from Rhodes,’’ABSA
(): .