| Traditional studies on the history of the Phoenician cities maintain that Phoenicia was assimilated to the rest of the Greek world by the early Hellenistic period, a process that began early under Achaemenid Persian rule. This project reexamines the question of this supposed 'Hellenization' of Phoenicia, through a reevaluation of the literary, epigraphic, and material evidence, with a particular concern for how we study and interpret 'culture change' resulting from foreign contact as it appears in the ancient record.;A closer inspection of the evidence reveals a variety of foreign input and 'styles' in Phoenicia in both the Persian and Hellenistic periods, including Cypriot, Persian, Greek, and Egyptian, traits, as well as continuing Phoenician traditions. These were juxtaposed in institutions, religion, personal names, arts, and other aspects of society, in a much more complex way than is normally acknowledged. It emerges from the evidence that the Phoenicians had great familiarity with, access to and taste for a range of foreign trends and traits, not just Greek ones. In some cases they chose to incorporate and transform certain aspects of these foreign traditions in their institutions, their religion, their cities, their architecture, and their art, and in some cases they did not. Regarding "Hellenism" specifically, the adoption of traits and institutions of Greek culture was a slow process with limits, and Greek culture never wholly replaced Phoenician cultural traditions.;The first chapter sets forth the background of the question of "Hellenism" and culture contact in the East broadly and in Phoenicia specifically. The second chapter presents the evidence for culture-contact in Persian-period Phoenicia. The third chapter concerns the site of the Sanctuary of Eshmun near Sidon. The fourth chapter examines the evidence from the Hellenistic period. The conclusion argues that the material evidence, interpreted alongside the limited written and documentary material, does not support the idea of a "hellenized" Phoenicia as traditionally described, but argues for a continued vitality of Phoenician cultural identity. |
