Ahiram sarcophagus

The Ahiram sarcophagus was the sarcophagus of a Phoenician King of Byblos, discovered in 1923 by the French excavator Pierre Montet in tomb V of the royal necropolis of Byblos.
The sarcophagus is famed for its bas relief carvings, and its Phoenician inscription. One of five known Byblian royal inscriptions, the inscription is considered to be the earliest known example of the fully developed Phoenician alphabet. The Phoenician alphabet is believed to be the parent alphabet for a wide number of the world's current writing systems; including the Greek, Latin and Cyrillic Alphabets, and the Hebrew, Arabic and Urdu Abjads. For some scholars it represents the terminus post quem of the transmission of the alphabet to Europe.
Ahirom is not attested in any other Ancient Oriental source, although some scholars have suggested a possible connection to the contemporaneous King Hiram mentioned in the Hebrew Bible.

Discovery

The sarcophagus was found following a landslide in the cliffs surrounding Byblos in late 1923, which revealed a number of Phoenician royal tombs. The tomb of Ahirom was ten metres deep.

Sarcophagus

The sarcophagus of Ahiram was discovered by the French archaeologist Pierre Montet in 1923 in Byblos. Its low relief carved panels make it "the major artistic document for the Early Iron Age" in Phoenicia. Associated items dating to the Late Bronze Age either support an early dating, in the 13th century BC or attest the reuse of an early shaft tomb in the 11th century BC.
The major scene represents a king seated on a throne carved with winged sphinxes. A priestess offers him a lotus flower. On the lid two male figures face one another with seated lions between them. These figures have been interpreted by Glenn Markoe as representing the father and son of the inscription. The rendering of figures and the design of the throne and a table show strong Assyrian influences. A total absence of Egyptian objects of the 20th and 21st dynasties in Phoenicia contrasts sharply with the resumption of Phoenician-Egyptian ties in the 22nd Dynasty of Egypt.

Dating

The date remains the subject of controversy, according to Glenn E. Markoe, "The Emergence of Phoenician Art". The Ahiram inscription is generally dated to ca. 1000 BCE, as Edward M. Cook notes: "Most scholars have taken the Ahiram inscription to date from around 1000 B.C.E.". Cook analyses and dismisses the date in the thirteenth century adopted by C. Garbini, which was the prime source for early dating urged in Bernal, Cadmean Letters. Also, traces of an erased early Proto-Byblian inscription are visible on the monument.
Others, on the basis of objects found near the sarcophagus, think of a later date, around 850 BCE.
Arguments for a date in the mid-9th to 8th century BC for the sarcophagus reliefs themselvesand hence the inscription, toowere made on the basis of comparative art history and archaeology by Edith Porada, and on the basis of paleography among other points by Ronald Wallenfels.

Inscriptions

An inscription of 38 words is found on parts of the rim and the lid of the sarcophagus. It is written in the Old Phoenician dialect of Byblos and is the oldest witness to the Phoenician alphabet of considerable length discovered to date:
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Text	Transliteration	Translation
	ʾrn ? z pʿl ? sbʿl ? bn ʾḥrm ? mlk gbl ?	This coffin sibaʿal has made, the son of Aḥirom, King of Byblos,
	lʾḥrm ? ʾbh ? k šth ? bʿlm ?	for Aḥirom, his father, as he laid him down for eternity.
	wʾl ? mlk ? bmlkm ?	And when a king among the kings
	wskn ? bsnm ?	or a governor among the governors
	wtmʾ ? mḥnt ? ʿly ? gbl ?	or a commander of the army over Byblos,
	wygl ? ʾrn ? zn ?	and would remove this coffin,
	tḥtsp ? ḥṭr ? mšpṭh ?	then his imperial scepter shall break,
	thtpk ? ksʾ ? mlkh ?	the throne of his kingship shall overturn,
	wnḥt ? tbrḥ ? ʿl ? gbl ?	and peace shall depart from Byblos.
	whʾ ? ymḥ spr z ?	And as to him, he shall erase this inscription,
	lpp ? šbl ?	torn shall be royal robe.

The formulas of the inscription were immediately recognised as literary in nature, and the assured cutting of the archaic letters suggested to Charles Torrey a form of writing already in common use. A 10th-century BC date for the inscription has become widely accepted.
Halfway down the burial shaft another short inscription was found incised at the southern wall, the Byblos Necropolis graffito. The three-line graffito reads:
It is usually interpreted as a warning not to proceed further:
Recently it has been proposed that it is part of some initiation ritual which remains unknown in detail:

Concerning knowledge:
here and now be humble
‹in› this basement!"

King Ahiram

Ahiram himself is not titled a king, neither of Byblos nor of any other city state. It is said that he was succeeded by his son Ithobaal I who is the first to be explicitly entitled King of Byblos, which is due to an old misreading of a text lacuna. According to a new reconstruction of the lacuna the name of Ahiram's son is to be read sibaal, and the reading Ithobaal should be disregarded. The early king list of Byblos is again subject to further study.

Heritage designation

The sarcophagus is on public display in the National Museum of Beirut. The General Directorate of Antiquities of Lebanon assembled a list of inscribed objects from different time periods that together illustrate the evolution of the Phoenician alphabet; the sarcophagus is the oldest of these. This list was the basis of a nomination of the alphabet to the Memory of the World International Register maintained by UNESCO. This was accepted in 2005, recognising the objects as documentary heritage of global importance.

Literature

Pierre Montet: Byblos et l'Egypte, Quatre Campagnes des Fouilles 1921–1924, Paris 1928, pp. 228–238, tables CXXVII–CXLI
Ellen Rehm: Der Ahiram-Sarkophag, Mainz 2004
Reinhard G. Lehmann: Die Inschrift des Ahirom-Sarkophags und die Schachtinschrift des Grabes V in Jbeil , Mainz 2005
Jean-Pierre Thiollet: Je m'appelle Byblos. Paris 2005.
Michael Browning "Scholar updates translation of ancient inscription", in: The Palm Beach Post, Sunday, July 3, 2005, p. 17A.
Reinhard G. Lehmann: Wer war Aḥīrōms Sohn ? Eine kalligraphisch-prosopographische Annäherung an eine epigraphisch offene Frage, in: V. Golinets, H. Jenni, H.-P. Mathys und S. Sarasin, Neue Beiträge zur Semitistik. Fünftes Treffen der ArbeitsgemeinschaftSemitistik in der Deutschen MorgenländischenGesellschaft vom 15.–17. Februar 2012 an der Universität Basel, Münster: Ugarit-Verlag 2015, pp. 163–180