Reconsidering a Phoenician inscribed amulet from the vicinity of Tyre (1).

• Author: Schmitz, Philip C.
• Position: Brief Communications

THE AMULET

The purpose of this brief paper is to reconsider the form, iconography, and text of a bronze amulet with a Phoenician inscription published by Helene Sader. (2) The amulet, from a private collection in Beirut, (3) is a thin (1 mm) square (28 x 27 mm) of bronze. A cylinder centered on the top edge was apparently formed from a tongue or flap of thin metal bent into a tube and welded to the recto. From this tube the amulet could be suspended with a cord or thong. The amulet's form imitates Egyptian "writing-tablet" amulets. (4) On its recto is incised a fairly clear image of the infant Horus seated on a lotus. The verso carries a different image, far more difficult to interpret. On the upper right side of the verso is a Phoenician inscription of at least two lines. The amulet was purchased on the antiquities market and probably came from the region of Tyre. (5)

In the present study, I will offer further iconographic comparisons to supplement the initial publication before turning to the Phoenician inscription, which is the main focus of my comments. My argument is intended to demonstrate that the amulet is of Phoenician origin, Egyptianizing (6) in form, and employing iconography whose closest parallels are with the "Phoenician" school of ivory carving. (7) Concerning its inscription, I will demonstrate that the text has a Phoenician parallel and is consistent with Punic texts from other inscribed amulets of Mediterranean provenience decorated with Egyptianizing imagery.

THE RECTO

The image incised on the recto portrays the naked child Horus seated on a lotus flower, facing to the right. On his head he wears the atef-crown, and his hair is gathered in a sidelock that falls to his right shoulder. His knees are drawn up to this chest. In his right hand, which rests on his chest, the young Horus holds a flail. His left elbow rests on his right knee, and he touches or points to his mouth with his extended index finger. (8) The lotus blossom on which the boy is seated has five petals, three in an outer row and two partially visible behind them. The lotus is flanked by a bud or leaf on either side of its stem. A horizontal line incised across the tips of the lotus petals forms the plane upon which the young boy is seated. (9)

ICONOGRAPHIC COMPARISON

Most of the features of this image are to be found--executed with considerably greater care and technical sophistication--in a carved ivory image of the infant Horus among the Samaria ivories. (10) The small (6.1 cm) carving combines champleve and cloisonne techniques. The figure of the infant Horus has been executed in exquisite detail. The atef-crown is more elaborate and the disk considerably smaller on the ivory from Samaria. The child appears to wear a pectoral around his neck, an armband around his right bicep, and a bracelet around his left wrist. Anatomical details, such as the right ear, the right eye and eyebrow, fingers, toes, navel, and nostril have been clearly articulated. A pair of incurved volutes whose lower edge forms the horizontal plane on which the child is seated encloses the scene. The horizontal plane rests on the tips of the lotus flower, whose five largest petals are most prominent. A pair of large oval buds or leaves flanks the lotus. (11)

Fragments of two additional very similar renditions of the scene were found at Samara. (12) One of these clearly shows the horizontal plane on which the child is seated, although there are no corresponding volutes. (13) From the Layard group of the Nimrud ivory corpus comes another example, also very similar. (14) Once again, the horizontal plane is visible in the absence of volutes.

The correspondence of unmotivated details among the Samaritan and Nimrud ivory carvings on the one hand, and the bronze amulet from Tyre on the other--particularly the plane on which the child sits--suggests a common iconographic source. The Nimrud example links that source to the "Phoenician" school of ivory working. (15)

Several variant forms of the scene are to be found in western Phoenician glyptic. The child Horus seated on a lotus as depicted on a pseudo-egyptian scaraboid from the necropolis of Puig des Molins, Eivissa (Ibiza) shows the child facing left. (16) The exergue, in the shape of a neb hiegroglyph decorated with simple crosshatch engraving, forms the plane on which the child is seated. There is no lotus flower. Tall papyrus stalks surround the child. (7)

The image of the child Horus--Horpakhered/Harpocrates--seated on a lotus flower appears to have developed during the Third Intermediate Period in Egypt. (18) It is one of a set of images involving Osiris, Isis, and Horus that became popular decorative motifs in jewelry and amulets. (19) The image is relatively frequent in the iconographic repertoire of Phoenician jewelry, amulets, and decoration. (20) It appears in Phoenician and Punic ivory work, (21) in metalwork, (22) and in glyptic. (23) The Harpocrates figure may appear alone, surrounded by papyrus stalks, or facing one or two protective beings, usually winged. (24)

Returning to the bronze amulet from the vicinity Tyre under consideration here, the image appears to in volve a variant theme in which Harpocrates faces dan gerous animals. From the late period come numerous portrayals of Harpocrates standing on crocodiles holding dangerous animals. (25) Egyptian artists sometimes composed a variant scene so that the child Horus seated on a lotus is flanked by two large uraei. (26) In a late fourthf century pseudo-Egyptian scarab from Almunecar, Harpocrates seated on a lotus blossom is flanked by a uraeus behind him, and a larger snake extended vertically in front of him. (27) Egyptian iconography of the Hellenistic period sometimes depicts a pair of serpents representing Isis-Thermoutis and Serapis-Agathodaimon protecting the infant Horus. (28)

The bronze amulet considered in this study depicts a bulbous vertical form facing the infant Horus. The form might...