unmistakably conveys their meaning, and proves in
addition that circumcision was practised by this
primitive race ; ‘ its origin both amongst the Egyptians
and Ethiopians,’ says Herodotus, ii. 37, 104,
* may be traced to the most remote antiquity.’ We
M IN IA TU R E B IR D S ON P E D E S TA L S
have seen in the previous description of the tower
the parallel to Lucian’s description of the phalli in
the temple at Hierapolis. Here, in the upper temple,
we found no less than thirty-eight miniature representations
of the larger emblem ; one is a highly
ornate object, with apparently a representation of a
winged sun on its side, or perchance the winged
Egyptian vulture, suggesting a distinct Semitic
influence. There is a small marble column in the
Louvre, twenty-six inches in height, of Phoenician
origin, with a winged symbol on the shaft like the one
before u s ; it is crowned by an ornament made of
four petalled flowers. This winged
globe is met with in many Phoenician
objects, and MM. Perrot and Chipiez,
in their work on Phoenicia, thus speak
of it as ‘a sort of
trade-mark by which
we can recognise as
Phoenician all such
objects as bear it,
whether they come
from Etruria or Sardinia,
from Africa or
Syria.’ And of the
stele in the Louvre
the same authors say,
‘ We may say that it
is signed.’ A carefully
executed rosette
O RN A TE PHALLUS
ZIMBABWE
PHOENICIAN COLUMN
IN THE LOUTRE
with seven petals
forms the summit of our object found in the temple.
Now the rosette is also another distinctly Phoenician
symbol used by them to indicate the sun. We have
the rosette on Phoenician sepulchral stela' in the
British Museum in conjunction with the half-moon
to indicate the heavenlv luminaries, and here at