DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.10358#0082
58
PICTURESQUE PALESTINE.
federation. What does not Europe owe in the way of civilisation to these decaying villages ?
We have but to look to the flowing denunciations of Ezekiel to see how vast and how varied
was their trade. Tyre was the inventress and the cradle of glass manufactory, and for
centuries she retained her pre-eminence. It was from Tyre that some adventurous monks,
pilgrims from the coasts of Northumbria, brought into England the secret of the manufacture,
and planted on the banks of the Wear the first glass works of the West in the days of the Saxon
heptarchy. Hence came the brilliant dyes which made resplendent the royal robes of kings,
hence the bronze and metal which equipped the armies of antiquity. The tiny crafts of
Phoenicia penetrated into unknown seas, and brought back to the East the news of a world
beyond the Pillars of Hercules. Tyre worked the mines of Spain, and freighted her ships with
the tin of Cornwall. From this little rock sprang the men who dotted the western shores of the
Mediterranean with their colonies. She was the mother of that Carthage which succeeded her
as mistress of the seas, and all but wrested the empire of the world from her rival, Rome.
But chief of all, to Phoenicia we owe our alphabet. Hence Cadmus borrowed those characters
which have enshrined the strains of Homer, and have become the framework for the expression
of every language of Europe.
When this marvellous city rose we know not, for its indigenous literature has perished, and
we have but a few inscriptions and a few characters on coins to tell us what was its language.
But at the time of the Exodus, 1450 b.c., it was a strong city (Joshua xix. 29), and in the reign
of David it was famous, not only for its maritime prowess, but for its arts and skill ; its seamen
brought him cedars from Lebanon, its masons and carpenters built his palace. Still closer was
the intercourse between Hiram and Solomon, who formed a treaty of alliance and commerce.
Israel fed the great city, which supplied the architect, the workmen, and many of the materials
for the Temple. But of the Tyre of that day we can trace nothing, unless it be the massive
substructions of the harbour. Yet throughout the long period of Persian supremacy, Tyre and
her sister cities escaped all molestation. Careful to maintain their trade, the men of Tyre
always made judicious alliances, and having no ambition for territory on shore, were voluntary
allie's rather than vassals, and though Sidon was conquered by Ochus, Tyre remained until its
capture by Alexander after a seven months' siege. The numberless granite columns, which
strew the shore and form the bed of the sea, all belong to the second Tyre, which soon rose
from its ashes, and continued to flourish till destroyed at the end of the second century by
Pescennius Niger. Again it rose and maintained its prosperity till the time of the Crusades.
It was long held by the Christians, and in its cathedral was celebrated one of the last religious
services held before the final embarkation of the last remnant of the chivalry of Europe. The
final blow to its prosperity was given by the conquest of Syria by the Ottomans, in 1516 a.d.
But we must not run on into a history of Tyre. We have been led to muse on the past, as
we wonder how she has become so utterly ruined, and where her ruins are. Perhaps they have
served as a quarry for the whole coast, and her stones may now be for the most part in Acre
and Beirut. It has been the fate of places which have been continuously inhabited to have far
PICTURESQUE PALESTINE.
federation. What does not Europe owe in the way of civilisation to these decaying villages ?
We have but to look to the flowing denunciations of Ezekiel to see how vast and how varied
was their trade. Tyre was the inventress and the cradle of glass manufactory, and for
centuries she retained her pre-eminence. It was from Tyre that some adventurous monks,
pilgrims from the coasts of Northumbria, brought into England the secret of the manufacture,
and planted on the banks of the Wear the first glass works of the West in the days of the Saxon
heptarchy. Hence came the brilliant dyes which made resplendent the royal robes of kings,
hence the bronze and metal which equipped the armies of antiquity. The tiny crafts of
Phoenicia penetrated into unknown seas, and brought back to the East the news of a world
beyond the Pillars of Hercules. Tyre worked the mines of Spain, and freighted her ships with
the tin of Cornwall. From this little rock sprang the men who dotted the western shores of the
Mediterranean with their colonies. She was the mother of that Carthage which succeeded her
as mistress of the seas, and all but wrested the empire of the world from her rival, Rome.
But chief of all, to Phoenicia we owe our alphabet. Hence Cadmus borrowed those characters
which have enshrined the strains of Homer, and have become the framework for the expression
of every language of Europe.
When this marvellous city rose we know not, for its indigenous literature has perished, and
we have but a few inscriptions and a few characters on coins to tell us what was its language.
But at the time of the Exodus, 1450 b.c., it was a strong city (Joshua xix. 29), and in the reign
of David it was famous, not only for its maritime prowess, but for its arts and skill ; its seamen
brought him cedars from Lebanon, its masons and carpenters built his palace. Still closer was
the intercourse between Hiram and Solomon, who formed a treaty of alliance and commerce.
Israel fed the great city, which supplied the architect, the workmen, and many of the materials
for the Temple. But of the Tyre of that day we can trace nothing, unless it be the massive
substructions of the harbour. Yet throughout the long period of Persian supremacy, Tyre and
her sister cities escaped all molestation. Careful to maintain their trade, the men of Tyre
always made judicious alliances, and having no ambition for territory on shore, were voluntary
allie's rather than vassals, and though Sidon was conquered by Ochus, Tyre remained until its
capture by Alexander after a seven months' siege. The numberless granite columns, which
strew the shore and form the bed of the sea, all belong to the second Tyre, which soon rose
from its ashes, and continued to flourish till destroyed at the end of the second century by
Pescennius Niger. Again it rose and maintained its prosperity till the time of the Crusades.
It was long held by the Christians, and in its cathedral was celebrated one of the last religious
services held before the final embarkation of the last remnant of the chivalry of Europe. The
final blow to its prosperity was given by the conquest of Syria by the Ottomans, in 1516 a.d.
But we must not run on into a history of Tyre. We have been led to muse on the past, as
we wonder how she has become so utterly ruined, and where her ruins are. Perhaps they have
served as a quarry for the whole coast, and her stones may now be for the most part in Acre
and Beirut. It has been the fate of places which have been continuously inhabited to have far