Note 763 — Chapter II · THE ROMAN EMPIRE UNDER ANASTASIUS: THE INHERITANCE OF JUSTINIAN
Reading edition
Phoenician trade is summarized with considerable detail by Ezekiel, xxvii; cf. Genesis, xxxvii, 25. But a couple of centuries earlier the race was well known to Homer, who often adverts to their skill in manufactures, as also to their knavery and chicanery:
Αὐτὴ δ’ ἐς θάλαμον κατεβήσατο κηώεντα, Ἔνθ’ ἔσαν οἱ πέπλοι παμποίκιλοι, ἔργα γυναικῶν Σιδονίων. κ.τ.λ. Iliad, vi, 288.
Ἔνθα δὲ Φοίνικες ναυσίκλυτοι ἤλυθον ἄνδρες Τρῶκται, μυρί’ ἄγοντες ἀθύρματα νηῒ μελαίνῃ ... Τὴν δ’ ἄρα Φοίνικες πολυπαίπαλοι ἠπερόπευον. κ.τ.λ. Odyssey, xv, 415.
The recently discovered ruins in Mashonaland (Rhodesia) prove, perhaps, that their unrecorded expeditions reached to S. Africa; see works by Bent, Neal and Hall, Keane, etc.