Anthony J. Frendo

Two Long-lost Phoenician Inscriptions and The Emergence of Ancient Israel

The Hebrew Bible indicates that in the process if settling down in Canaan) the Israelites had engaged militarilY with the local inhabitants. On the other hand) archaeological research is showing that the Israelites had settled there mainly in a peaciful manner) without disproving that some military activity had been THE EMERGENCE OF ANCIENT ISRAEL 43 undertaken at some point. It is usiful to examine whether there is any explicit extra-biblical evidence in support oj the tradition that what we commonly call Early Israel could indeed have emerged at least partially on the basis oj military operations. Such evidence does exist) and it comes ftom an unexpected quarter) namely the History ojthe Wars ojJustinian written by Procopius ojCaesarea) a Greek historian (deemed by scholars to be reliable) oj the sixth century A.D. He mentions two columns (possibly of the sixth century A.D. and which he saw at Tigisis in Numidia) which were inscribed in Phoenician and in which the Canannites who had erected them claim that they had fled ftom Joshua the son of Nun. These Canaanites were appealing to an age-old tradition that is alreadyfound in another extra-biblical source dating to 234 B.C.