Chapter 10 - Phoenician and Related Canaanite Names

Summary

The Neo- and Late Babylonian text corpus, from the time of the Assyrian (Sargonid) rule until the Seleucid period, contains a very small number of Phoenician anthroponyms. Their patterns and theophorous elements generally correspond to those recorded in the general Phoenician–Punic onomasticon. They are discernible mainly by two criteria, namely theological – the typical Phoenician theophorous elements – and phonological – the Phoenician shift of á to ó. A hybrid Phoenician name is Aštartu-šezib, with the Phoenician–Punic theophorous element ˁAštart followed by an Aramaic–Akkadian predicative element. The identification of two individuals as Moabites and one as Ammonite is based on the fact that the theophorous elements of their names are Moabite (Kemosh) and Ammonite (Milkom). The Ammonite and one of the Moabites bear hybrid names, as their predicative element (in both cases) is Akkadian, viz. (DN-)šarru-uṣur, thereby being also basilophoric names, a fact betraying their link to the palatial sector. The occurrence of hybrid names is due to the Akkadian and Aramaic dominant linguistic milieu of Babylonia in the aforementioned periods.

Introduction

There is a very restricted number of anthroponyms which can be defined as Phoenician and fringe Canaanite (practically, Moabite and Ammonite) in Neo-Babylonian and Late Babylonian sources. ¹ No more than twenty-three individuals bore Phoenician names, with various degrees of plausibility. There is only one individual among them whose name is not strictly speaking purely Phoenician, as it ends with the Akkado-Aramaic gentilic suffix (Ṣūrāya ‘Tyrian’, a man of undoubtedly Phoenician extraction; see [33]). In addition, there are two Moabites and one Ammonite.

The sample is not only very small but also very dispersed, as it covers over 300 years and originates from almost all the Babylonian regions and documentation centres.² Relying on such a limited sample, which is almost entirely reconstructed (the only person explicitly said to be Phoenician is the aforementioned Tyrian), necessitates maximum contextualisation – namely, thorough analysis and evaluation of the pertinent prosopographical pool.

The main criteria for distinguishing Phoenician names from other Canaanite corpora, in the first place the onomasticon of the Old Testament, are (1) phonological, viz. the shift of á to ó, and (2) theological: the Phoenician onomasticon preserved the old Canaanite theophoric elements (with several individual modifications), whereas most of the theophoric anthroponyms of the Old Testament contain Yhw and kinship terms. Like Hebrew, the residual onomastica of Moab and Ammon lack the shift of á to ó, whereas their main theophoric elements differ from the other Canaanite onomastica due to the popularity of their main local gods, viz. Moabite Kemosh and Ammonite Milkom. Of course, the distinction and delimitation among the various Canaanite dialects, as well as between Phoenician and Aramaic, is not always clear-cut. Cases where disambiguation is not possible are discussed where applicable.

Phoenicians in Babylonian Sources

The earliest Phoenician person attested in Babylonian sources is Ašid-rummu (^Ia-šid-ru-um-mu, [9]). His three sons, viz. Nūr^?-gumê, Iqīšāya, and Šūzubu, sold a palm grove in the Bīt-Dakkūri region at the end of 624 BCE.³ It is not explicitly stated that the three sellers were his sons, but this is implied by the fact that they belonged to the ‘house’ (bītu) of Ašid-rummu and Kaššâ (^Ikaš-šá-ˀ) < Kaššāya. The latter is preceded by a ‘Personenkeil’, which defines male names, but Kaššāya was a common female name in Babylonia. Therefore it is very likely that she was Ašid-rummu’s wife. From the fact that the alienation of the property was by his sons, it stands to reason that he had passed away some time before late 624 BCE. He or his ancestors were very probably deported to Babylonia by the Assyrians.

The next person with a Phoenician name, Ḫaru-Ṣapūnu (^Idḫa-ru-ṣa-pu-nu, [15]), is recorded in 617 BCE (i.e., more than a decade before the campaigns of Nebuchadnezzar II to the Levant). The Akkadian name of his brother, Nabê-ṣīru, may be an indication that the family was established for at least two generations in Babylonia. Therefore, it can be hypothesised that his ancestors were deported to Babylonia by the Assyrians.

As is expected, most Phoenician individuals are recorded in the long sixth century BCE, which has an abundant documentation, whereas only three are attested in the late-Achaemenid period, with its more restricted textual corpus [4, 5, 23], and just two in the dwindling documentation from the beginning of the Hellenistic period [28 and his brother].

Unfortunately, almost all the numerous Phoenician prisoners of war (mostly sailors) of Nebuchadnezzar II’s campaigns are recorded anonymously at the beginning of the sixth century BCE.⁴ They are mentioned in the N1 archive which was unearthed in the Southern Fortress of Babylon and concerns the palatial sector.⁵

Several of the few Phoenicians, who are recorded by name in later sources from the sixth century, belong to that same, palatial sector. One of them, Yatūnu (^Iia-a-tu-nu, [17]), held the prominent position of royal resident (qīpu) of a Babylonian temple about 50 to 60 years later – that is, no more than two generations after the military campaigns which resulted in the deportation and resettlement of Phoenicians and other Levantines in Babylonia.⁶ The Neo-Babylonian rulers and their Persian successors generally nominated individuals who were not members of the urban elite for inspecting the temples. This is a unique case where a person of foreign extraction was nominated to this office by the native rulers.

Itti-šarri-īnīa, who is mentioned a decade earlier, bore an anthroponym which is typical of members of the palatial sector (see Chapter 5). He was probably born in Babylonia to a father bearing the very common Phoenician name bˁlytn [1]. Itti-šarri-īnīa was a business partner of a royal courtier (ša rēš šarri).

Five to six individuals belonged to, or had links with, Babylonian temples rather than with the palace.⁷ They might initially have been donated to the temples by the Neo-Babylonian rulers. On the whole, foreigners and outsiders were absorbed in the public rather than in the private sector in first-millennium Babylonia.

None of the very few named inhabitants of the Tyrian colony near Nippur bore a Phoenician anthroponym.⁸ Even the only explicitly Tyrian filiation from there consists of an Akkadian paternal name and a common West Semitic given name (Zadok 2015, 107–8).

The three (or four) named ‘carpenters of Lebanon’, who are mentioned in the archive of the Ebabbar temple, were sent from there to Mt. Lebanon in order to hew cedar wood and transport it to Sippar. Since they had Akkadian filiations as early as 582 BCE,⁹ they were very probably Babylonians and not Phoenicians: if they were Phoenicians, one would expect their fathers, who lived around 600 BCE, when the Phoenician deportees arrived in Babylonia, to bear Phoenician names.

Ammonites and Moabites in Babylonian Sources

The only person with an Ammonite filiation and one of the two individuals with Moabite filiations were probably linked to the palatial sector in view of the predicative element of their names, viz. DN-šarru-uṣur, referring to an earthly king, in all likelihood their ultimate employer [35, 37; see Chapter 5 on this type of name]. Strictly speaking, both names are not purely Ammonite–Moabite but hybrid – that is, Ammonite/Moabite–Akkadian. Their characterisation as such is due to the fact that their theophoric elements are Ammonite (Milkom) and Moabite (Kemosh). Settlements named after Philistines are recorded in Neo- and Late Babylonian sources (Ḫazatu and Išqillūnu; i.e., Gaza and Ashkelon),¹⁰ but no named Philistines appear in these texts.

Classification of the Phoenician Anthroponyms

Due to the limited number of Phoenician names attested in the Babylonian text corpus, we offer only a very basic classification of their structure here, viz. twenty-two compound and non-compound names (respectively, thirteen and nine names each). This sample represents the names with a high degree of plausibility; the maximum is thirty-four names, which are all classified herein. One of the simplex names can be regarded an isolated predicate [17]. Both members of the only purely Phoenician filiation (father and son [12, 13]) have the same initial component.

Compound Names

Verbal Sentence Names

The pattern subject + predicate (G perfect 3.sg. m.) is represented by [1] Bēl-yatūnu (^IdEN-ia-a-tu-nu), father of Itti-šarri-īnīa, which renders the Phoenician name bˁlytn ‘Baal has given’.¹¹ The Akkadian scribe had no difficulty in identifying Akkadian Bēl (^dEN) with his Phoenician divine cognate, seeing that the latter is transcribed not only ba-al (/baˁl/) but also ba-ˀ-il, even in the name of one and the same individual (see [8]).

Another instance of the same name pattern is possibly [2] Ab-ḫalalu (^Iab-ḫa-la-lu₄), recorded in the archive of the Eanna temple of Uruk, possibly at the end of the seventh or the beginning of the sixth century BCE.¹² His name is apparently identical to the Phoenician anthroponym ˀbḥll. The latter seems to consist of ˀb- ‘(divine) father’ and a form, apparently qatal (G perfect 3.sg. m.), deriving from Ḥ-L-L (eventually ‘to fear’).¹³ However, doubt is cast on Ab-ḫalalu’s Phoenician descent in view of his milieu, viz. that of shepherds, who generally bore Akkadian and Arameo-Arabian names in first-millennium BCE Babylonia. Therefore, an identification with Safaitic ˀbˁll (two occurrences) is an alternative (Harding 1971, 14).

The pattern predicate + subject is presumably represented by [3] Azabtī-il (^Ia-zab-tì-ìl), father of Gūsāya,¹⁴ which ends with the theophoric element ˀl ‘god, El’ and begins with a G perfect 1.sg. of ˁ-Z-B, viz. *̔azab-tī- (i.e., ‘I have entrusted to god’).¹⁵ Alternatively, this name may be Hebrew or Transjordanian. Another instance of this name pattern is [4] Ḫašb-ilīm, rendering Phoenician *ḥšb-ˀlm, contained in the toponym Bīt (É) ^Iḫaš-bi-il-li-im-ma in the Nippur region:¹⁶ ‘The gods have thought, reckoned’ (Ḥ-Š-B with qátal- > qatl-; the subject is morphologically plural but syntactically singular, as it is a pluralis maiestatis).¹⁷

The following name, borne by a slave of the Murašû firm of Nippur, is of the same pattern but uses a D short-imperfect 3.sg. m.: [5] Yāḫû-lūnu (^Iia-a-ḫu-lu-ni/nu).¹⁸ This name renders yḥw(ˀ)ln, extant in Punic,¹⁹ ‘May god keep alive’.²⁰ The spelling ia-a- does not indicate a long /a/, as its -a is inserted in order to confirm the reading /ia/ of the polyphonic sign IA. This is the only attestation of ˀln outside Punic, and actually its earliest occurrence. Hence, Yāḫû-lūnu is a rendering of the Phoenician forerunner of the Punic anthroponym.

Nominal Sentence Names

Two names possibly display the pattern substantive + substantive. [6] Milki-izirî (^Imil-ki-i-zi-ri^!) ‘Milki is (my) support’ corresponds with the Phoenician name mlqrtˁzr.²¹ The latter, like other names of the type DN-ˁzr, may alternatively be a verbal sentence name with a G perfect 3.sg. m. of ˁ-Z-R: ‘Milqart has helped’.²² The Phoenician name mlkyˁzr consists of Mlk and an imperfect verb;²³ -y- as a plene spelling of a connecting vowel (-i-, the equivalent of Bibl. Heb. hiriq compaginis) is not recorded in the Phoenician onomasticon. The name is explicable also in Hebrew or fringe Canaanite – that is, Moabite or Ammonite, but not in Aramaic.

In the female name [7] ^fNīr-ˀimmî (^fni-ri-ˀ-im-mi-ˀ),²⁴ the theophoric element is originally an epithet ‘light’ which is exclusively Canaanite–Hebrew (nyr). Its Aramaic equivalent nr (nūr) is paired with the sun god in the Sefire inscription (šmš wnr).²⁵ The second member of each preserved divine pair in that inscription from northern Syria (there are four such pairs in addition to damaged ones) is a female deity (at least in this Aramaic milieu). This accords well with the predicative element -im-mi-ˀ. Hence, this female name would denote ‘Nyr is my mother’. The predicative element ˀm ‘mother’ is recorded as the first component in Phoenician names.²⁶ A seemingly alternative interpretation, viz. ‘Nyr is with me’, is less likely if the name is Phoenician, as the preposition ˁm ‘with’ is not recorded in Phoenician–Punic.²⁷ This alternative interpretation is possible if the name refers to a Judean or a Transjordanian woman.

The pattern substantive + adjective is represented by at least two names. [8] Baal-rūm (^Iba-al-ru-um) ‘Baal is exalted’, referring to a Tyrian boatman (var. ^Iba-ˀ-i[l-r]u-um-mu),²⁸ is the same name as Phoenician bˁlrm.²⁹ Comparable is [9] Ašid-rummu (^Ia-šid-ru-um-mu) ‘Aš(a)d is exalted’.³⁰ The theophoric element ˀšd ‘lion’ is recorded in Punic.³¹ [10] Milki-rām ‘Milki is exalted’, the name of a boatman recorded in the Ebabbar archive from Sippar in the early Neo-Babylonian period,³² can be either Phoenician or Aramaic.

Interrogative Sentence

[11] Ayy-mitūnu (^Ia-a-mi-tu-nu) ‘Where is Mitōn?’, a shepherd of the Eanna temple, is recorded in Uruk in the fourteenth year of an unknown ruler – that is, either Nabopolassar, Nebuchadnezzar II, or Nabonidus (612, 591, or 542 BCE).³³ This name is recorded as ^Ia-a-mì-tu-nu in the Neo-Assyrian text corpus.³⁴

Genitive Compound

[12] Abdu-Ḫmūnu (^Iab-du-uḫ-mu-nu), son of [13] Abdu-Milki (^Iab-du-mi-lik), acted as the second witness in a deed of Sîn-qitri, son of a Moabite father [35], which was issued in Babylon in the sixth year of Cambyses (524 BCE).^{35 I}ab-du-uḫ-mu-nu renders Phoenician ˁbdḥmn ‘Servant of Ḥamōn’ with dropping of the short unstressed vowel of the theophoric element. The father’s name renders Phoenician–Punic ˁbdmlk ‘Servant of Milki’.³⁶ It is not necessarily an anaptyctic form, as the CVC-sign LIK is indifferent to vowel quality and may render CøC (i.e., <mi-lik> = /milk/).

The name spelled [14] Aḫ-ˀabi (^IŠEŠ-ˀ-bu; i.e., ˀḥˀb ‘The father’s brother’) is not recorded in Phoenician–Punic, but it is explicable in Phoenician terms; cf. Phoen. ˀḥˀm ‘The mother’s brother’ (Pun. ḥˀm with aphaeresis).³⁷ This man is mentioned as the father of Nidintu, the fourth of six debtors in a receipt of 55 kors of barley delivered at Duqulān in the reign of Darius I (496 BCE).³⁸ The fifth debtor mentioned in this text is Aštartu-šēzib, son of Šillimu (^Išil-li-mu), who was very probably of Phoenician extraction [26]. The second debtor bore a hybrid Akkadian–Aramean paternal name Rammān-šarru-uṣur – that is, with the Aramaic theophoric element Rammān (spelled ^dKUR^an) and an Akkadian predicative element linking him with some probability to the palatial sector (see Chapter 5). The guarantor bore a similar Akkadian–Aramaic paternal name: Rammān-(mu)kīn-apli. The creditor, a courtier who acted via his slave as proxy, belonged to the palatial sector. Three of the six debtors and two out of the six witnesses have Akkadian filiations. The fourth witness bears the paternal name Munaššê (^Imu-na-še-e) which is common in Canaanite (Phoenician)–Hebrew [29]. It seems more likely that its bearer was a Phoenician, in view of the absence of recognisable Judeans in this deed. This is stated with all due reserve in view of the very restricted statistical pool of this isolated document. The remaining three witnesses have mixed Aramaic–Akkadian filiations. The fifth witness, Sūqāya, son of Iddin-Nabû, who follows Iddin-Nabû, son of Munaššê, was perhaps a son of the preceding witness. The place of issue, Duqulān (du-qu-la-an), is not recorded elsewhere and its location is unknown. It is apparently a rural settlement, whose name (written without a determinative) is explicable in Aramaic terms. As is typical of rural settlements, the only individual who bears a family name is the scribe. Hence, he was not necessarily a resident of this village, but originated from a town. He might have been brought by the creditor, who was in all probability external to the village.

Toponym

The name [15] Ḫaru-Ṣapūnu (^Idḫa-ru-ṣa-pu-nu) is an oronym, viz. ‘Mt. Zaphon’ (*Harr-Ṣapōn, on the north Syrian coast where Phoenician colonies were located), used as an anthroponym.³⁹ The interpretation of Lipiński (1995, 247, n. 184) – namely, that this anthroponym consists of two theophoric elements (Horus and Zaphon) – seems less likely. Ḫaru-Ṣapūnu belonged, together with his father Uggâ (^Iug-ga-a) and brother Nabê-ṣīru, to a group of nine individuals of the same profession (presumably ^lúMUŠEN.[DÙ.MEŠ] ‘bird-catchers’). They are subsumed as ten individuals and probably formed a decury, a unit which by definition consisted of ten people, but exceptionally it may include slightly fewer or more individuals. In addition to Uggâ and his sons, the decury included two more individuals with two-tier filiations and two individuals without filiations. Six out of the nine individuals, including Nabê-ṣīru, bear Akkadian names, and one has an Aramaic anthroponym (Reḫīm-Adad). Ḫaru-Ṣapūnu’s paternal name (Uggâ) is explicable in West Semitic terms,⁴⁰ but is not exclusively Phoenician. Still, in view of his son’s name there is no doubt about the father’s Phoenician connection. The document was issued in the ninth year of Nabopolassar (617 BCE). The place of issue is not indicated, but from the format of this administrative record it may be surmised that it belongs to the archive of the Ebabbar temple of Sippar. However, so far, no prosopographical links with the rich documentation of this archive can be demonstrated.

Compound or Simplex Names

[16] Šalūma-x ([…] ^Išá-lu-ma-x-([…]) was in charge of sailors from Maḫazīn on the North Syrian coast, where some Phoenician colonies and outposts were located.⁴¹ It is based on Canaanite šlm ‘peace’; cf. Phoenician–Punic šlm.⁴² The context strongly suggests that he was a Phoenician.

Simplex Names

Isolated Predicate

[17] A man named Yatūnu served as the royal resident (qīpu) of a Babylonian temple.⁴³ His name renders Phoenician ytn ‘He has given’. This is a short version of names of the type DN-ytn,⁴⁴ as seen in name [1].

qatl (optional)

[18] Abdūnu (^IAD-du-ú-un, ^Iab-du-ú-nu) ‘Little slave, servant’, son of Abī-râm, was either a Phoenician/Philistine or a Judean.⁴⁵ He collected the annual rent of a house, apparently acting as co-agent of an Assyrian house owner (Kīnāya, son of Tarībi-Iššar or Erība-Aššur). The first witness of the deed is Šalam-aḫi, son of Dūrāya, perhaps originally from Dor (or the patronym may be understood as a gentilic based on Dūru, which is common in Mesopotamian toponymy). A homonymous individual (^Iab-du-nu) is the father of a certain Nabû-nāṣir from Ālu-ša-^lúxx[x].MEŠ.⁴⁶

qitl (optional)

[19] The name Izirî (^Ii-zi-ri-ˀ, son of ^Ibi-ˀ-ú-e),⁴⁷ which ends in the hypocoristic suffix -ī, derives from Canaanite–Hebrew ˁ-Z-R ‘to help, to support’; cf. OT ˁzry and related names.^{48 I}i-zi-ri-ˀ is with anaptyxis; its bearer may alternatively be a Judean or a Transjordanian.

[20] A woman named ^fḪilb/punnu (^fḫi-il-b/pu-un-nu), whose father bore the Egyptian name ^IPA-TAR-^de-si, adopted a three-month-old female baby ^fLillidu (^flil-li-di) in the city of Borsippa in 489 BCE.⁴⁹ The baby’s mother had died and she was given up for adoption by her grandmother, ^fAmtia, who belonged to the Borsippean clan of Bāˀiru. The adoptive mother ^fḪilb/punnu was married to Bēl-ēṭir, a member of the Itinnu family and likewise an urbanite Borsippean, as can be inferred from his family name. ^fḪilb/punnu herself bore in all probability a West Semitic name which is explicable in Phoenician, Transjordanian, or Levantine Aramaic terms, since it ends with -ōn < -ān and is based on Ḫ-L-P ‘to substitute’ (common West Semitic).⁵⁰ Typically, a woman of foreign extraction, married to an urbanite Borsippean, was of lower status. This impression is strengthened by the fact that two of the five witnesses to the deed are oblates of Nabû (i.e., of the Ezida temple of Borsippa), including one with an Egyptian name like that of ^fḪilb/punnu’s father. As is well-known, Babylonian urbanites married foreign women, but did not give their daughters in marriage to men who did not belong to their constituency.

qatal (optional)

[21] A man called Amanūnu (^Iam-ma-nu-nu), son of Marduk-ibni, is attested as a witness in the time of Nabonidus.⁵¹ His name, ending in the adjectival suffix -ōn < -ān, derives from ˀ-M-N,⁵² in which case it is related to OT ˀmnwn ‘faithful’ (based on a qatl-formation; Zadok 1988, 75). He might alternatively be a Judean or a Transjordanian.

The same applies to [22] Ḫaraṣīnu (^Iḫa-ra-ṣi-nu), son of Gūzūnu (^Igu-zu-nu), who is mentioned in the archive of the Ebabbar temple from Sippar.⁵³ His name may consist of Ḫ-R-Ṣ ‘to cut in, carve’ (Phoen., Heb.) and a rare suffix -īn,⁵⁴ while the paternal name, which ends in -ōn < -ān, is based on a qūl-formation of G-W/Y-Z ‘to pass’ (Heb., Aram.).

qatál > qatól

The name [23] Adūmê (^Ia-du-me-e), father of Ṣiḫā (^Iṣi-ḫa-ˀ),⁵⁵ is based on ˀdm ‘man’⁵⁶ and ends with the suffix -ē < -ī < -iy,⁵⁷ which can be either adjectivising (‘man-like, human’), a gentilic (nisbe ‘belonging to Adam’),⁵⁸ or a hypocorism (short for a compound name with the theophoric element ˀdm). His son’s name is Egyptian.

qatīl (optional)

[24] Arīšu (^Ia-ri-iš-šú), father of Abdia, a witness in the Egibi archive from Babylon,⁵⁹ may render the common Phoenician–Punic name ˀrš ‘desired, requested’ (Latin Arisus).⁶⁰ For an alternative (Arabian) interpretation, see Zadok 1981, 70 (no. 15).

qātil > qōtil (G active participle)

The name of [25] Sūkinni (^Isu-ki-in-ni), son of Bēl-uballiṭ, who acted as a witness in a deed from Uruk,⁶¹ renders /Sōkin/ ‘inspector, prefect, steward’.⁶² The doubling of the n is unexpected, but is also recorded in Middle Babylonian transcriptions of this title from Ugarit.⁶³

qittīl

The name of [26] Šillimu, who is attested as the father of Aštartu-šēzib [34] in the text from Duqulān discussed earlier [14],⁶⁴ renders Phoenician–Punic šlm,⁶⁵ which is either a substantive (‘Recompense’) or an isolated predicate, viz. D perfect 3 sg. m. of Š-L-M (‘He has paid’).⁶⁶ It is a substitute name (i.e., an anthroponym whose bearer is named after a deceased family member).⁶⁷

maqtal

Two names of this type are attested in the Babylonian text corpus:⁶⁸ [27] Mattanu (^Ima-at-ta-nu) and [28] Mattannāya (^Ima-tan-na-a-a).⁶⁹ Both names have the same base (mtn ‘gift’), the second one ending in the hypocoristic suffix -ay.⁷⁰ They are explicable in any Northwest Semitic dialect and therefore not necessarily Phoenician.⁷¹ The second vowel of the first name is -a- conforming to the rendering of the initial component of the name of the king of Arwad in an inscription of Esarhaddon (^Ima-ta-an-ba-ˀ-al)⁷² and the second vowel of the defective spelling Mαθαν in Josephus (both Phoenician names).⁷³ On the other hand, the CVC-sign TAN in ^Ima-tan-na-a-a is indifferent to vowel quality and can render either á or ó < á, like most of the comparanda.⁷⁴

muqattil (optional)

The name of [29] Munaššê (^Imu-na-še-e), father of Iddin-Nabû,⁷⁵ can render Phoenician mnšy.⁷⁶ Similarly, with attenuation u > i, [30] Minaššê (^Imi-na-áš-še-e), father of Dādia.⁷⁷ This anthroponym, which is also common in Hebrew, is a substitute name (D active participle of N-Š-Y ‘to forget’, cf. ad [26]).

qūl

The name of [31] Ṣūlūa (^Iṣu-lu-ú-a), father of [11]), apparently ending in –ūa, may be based on a cognate of Biblical Hebrew ṣwlh ‘ocean-deep’ (possibly a numen).

qill (optional)

[32] Giddâ (^Igi-id-da-a), father of a messenger of an alphabet scribe,⁷⁸ is a hypocorism of *gadd (variants: *gedd, *gidd) ‘fortune, good fortune’, which is also extant in Phoenician.⁷⁹ Alternatively, the name can be an Aramaic dialectal form.

Gentilic

[33] Ṣūrāya (^Iṣu-ra-a-a) ‘Tyrian’ is the name of a Phoenician inhabitant of Yāhūdu, a colony of Judeans in or near the Nippur region. In a similar vein, the Tyrian colony of Bīt-Ṣūrāyi near Nippur had Judean inhabitants.⁸⁰ He is mentioned in a list of sixteen holders of fractions of bow-fiefs whose names are preserved.⁸¹ The majority of the names (eleven) contain the theophoric element Yhw, hence referring to Judeans. The remaining four names are all explicable in Canaanite–Hebrew terms. It can be surmised that few Tyrians were settled by the Babylonians in the Judean settlement after the conquest of Tyre, which had taken place just a few years after the earliest occurrence of Yāhūdu. It is well known that Judeans and Lycians lived in the settlement of the Tyrians (Bīt-Ṣūrāyi) in the Nippur region during the late-Achaemenid period.

Hybrid Names

A hybrid Phoenician name is [34] Aštartu-šēzib (^Idáš-tar-tu₄-še-zib), borne by the son of [26] Šillimu.⁸² Anthroponyms with the theophoric element ˁAštart are common in Phoenician and Punic, where all their predicative elements are explicable in Phoenician-Canaanite terms.⁸³ However, here the predicative element is Aramaic–Akkadian (‘ˁAštart save!’) due to the Babylonian–Aramaic milieu. The predicative element is masculine because the name-bearer is male, despite the fact that the subject is a female deity (see also Chapter 3 n. 1 on this practice).

Moabite Anthroponyms

Only two Moabite personal names are attested in the Babylonian text corpus so far. In a deed concerning an Egyptian slave woman, two brothers (Sîn-qitri and Itti-Nabû-balāṭu) bear the Moabite patronym [35] Kamuš-šarru-uṣur (^Idka-mu-šú-šarru-uṣur) ‘Kemosh protect the king!’.⁸⁴ The same text mentions the Phoenician Abdu-Ḫmūnu, discussed earlier [12]. The second Moabite anthroponym is [36] Kamuš-il ‘Kemosh is god’ (^Ika-mu-šu-i-lu, ^Ika-am-mu-šú-DINGIR.MEŠ). The person bearing this name is recorded as the father of Ḫanṭušu, a witness in Susa in 505 BCE.⁸⁵

An Ammonite Anthroponym

The only Ammonite name attested in the Babylonian text corpus so far is [37] Milkūmu-šarru-uṣur (^Imil-≪ki≫ku-mu- …) ‘Milkom protect the king’, who is recorded in a text dated to Nabonidus.⁸⁶ This person’s presence in Babylonia accords well with the assumption that Ammon was transformed from a vassal kingdom to a Babylonian province in c. 582 BCE⁸⁷ (i.e., one generation earlier). The Neo-Babylonian Empire pursued the Assyrian policy of deporting members of the local elite as well as experts following such an administrative transformation.

Statistical Evaluation and Some Conclusions

The percentage of bearers of names deriving from Phoenician and fringe Canaanite in the abundant prosopographical record from first-millennium Babylonia is negligible. Almost half of the thirty-four Phoenician names are undoubtedly such, the other half is optional – that is, either Phoenician or belonging to other Northwest Semitic dialects, mostly fringe Canaanite or Hebrew; two are alternatively Arabian.

Most individuals bearing these names have filiations. All the filiations are two-tier: a son’s and a father’s name are combined. Two-tier filiation is typical of foreigners in the Babylonian documentation, where only Babylonian urbanites bore three-tier filiations (son, father, and remote ancestor). This is an indication that the Phoenicians did not marry members of the segregated urbanite elite. Like other foreigners, they assimilated to the less prestigious classes of the Babylonian society. However, members of these classes did not necessarily form a poorer layer of the Babylonian society: a clear case in point are prominent members of the palatial sectors and entrepreneurs lacking family names.

Eleven individuals are recorded without filiations. There are several reasons for this omission. One anthroponym [4] is derived from a toponym, where no patronyms are expected. Slaves or people having a title (as in [5, 17]) bear an identifier and therefore do not need to be presented with a paternal name which is an additional, superfluous, identifier. Filiations are not required in non-legal documents, which supplies the context of several attestations [6, 8, 16]. Ṣūrāya [33] is mentioned in a deed where only recurrent and homonymous individuals are listed with their paternal names. Another one is recorded in a deed without witnesses [2].

Only one purely Phoenician filiation is attested [12, 13]. All the other filiations are mixed – that is, with members bearing Akkadian or West Semitic, mostly Aramaic, names. This is expected in first-millennium Babylonia where people bearing Akkadian and Aramaic names belonged to the local scene. Cases where the father bore a Phoenician name but the son had a local (Akkadian or Aramaic) anthroponym are recorded in the earliest occurrences (624 and 617 BCE [9, 15]) and in 548 BCE [1] (i.e., about one generation after the deportations of the Phoenicians by Nebuchadnezzar II). These are clear cases of acculturation that, to some extent, hint at assimilation. The earliest inverted case – a father with an Akkadian name and a son with an undoubtedly Phoenician anthroponym – is from 556 BCE [25]. Such cases are also encountered slightly later in the reign of Nabonidus [21], one or two generations after these deportations. The Akkadian names are either typical of members of the palatial sector or very common.

As stated earlier, there are also cases where the other member of the filiation has a West Semitic name. Such cases are recorded in 547 and 503 BCE [3, 24]. The paternal name of [19] (^Ibi-ˀ-ú-e) is too short for an unambiguous linguistic affiliation; it may be common West Semitic. The last-recorded filiation has members with Akkadian and Aramaic names [28].

Exceptionally, an individual with an Egyptian name has a Phoenician paternal name (421 BCE [23]). An analogous case from 489 BCE is [20], where a common Canaanite anthroponym is combined with an Egyptian paternal name. Two waves of Egyptian deportees arrived in Babylonia, notably due to Nebuchadnezzar II’s western campaigns around 600 BCE and the conquest of Egypt by Cambyses about 80 years later. An influx of Egyptians into Babylonia continued in the late-Achaemenid period. Phoenicia itself, like the whole coast of the southern Levant, was under Egyptian cultural influence. The purely Phoenician filiation from 524 BCE [12–13], slightly less than forty years after Nebuchadnezzar II conquered Tyre, is a remarkable but isolated case of keeping Phoenician identity during two generations. However, there is no telling when their ancestors arrived in Babylonia. Still, there is a possibility that both members enjoyed a long life-span, in which case the father arrived as early as 600 BCE. Like in their motherland, several Phoenicians in Babylonia are related to individuals with Egyptian names. On the whole, within few generations the Phoenicians intermarried with non-urbanite Babylonians and assimilated.

Very few Phoenicians occupied prominent positions (at least two [1, 17]), but most of them are recorded in a rural milieu, notably the earliest ones: the individuals from Duqulān [14, 26, 29, 34], the Tyrian from Yāhūdu [33], and the shepherds [2, 11]. Several Phoenicians were absorbed by the temples. As expected, some played the passive role of witnesses, like most individuals who are recorded in deeds from the Neo-Babylonian and Late Babylonian periods.

The Ammonite person [37] has an Aramaic paternal name (‘Hammatean’; i.e., North Syrian). One of the Moabites has an Aramaic given name [35]. The other Moabite has a West Semitic anthroponym common in first-millennium BCE Babylonia [36].