Tyre

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strength; rock; sharp
(same as Tyrus)
Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary


TYRE (Tsôr—‘rock,’ Jos_19:29) was situated on the coast of Palestine about half-way between Carmel and Beyrout. The narrow strip of land between the sea and the background of mountains was almost inaccessible owing to massive rocky promontories (the most famous being ‘the Ladder of Tyre’), which barred the approach of invaders. The date of the foundation of Tyre is unknown. That given by Herodotus is b.c. 2740, by Josephus about b.c. 1217. Isaiah (Isa_23:7) calls her ‘the joyous city whose antiquity is of ancient days’; Strabo, ‘the most ancient of all Phœnicla.’ Her original inhabitants probably came from the Semitic homeland near the Persian Gulf. But Tyre was not ‘the most ancient.’ Isaiah (Isa_23:2; Isa_23:12) calls her ‘daughter of Sidon’ (cf. Gen_10:15); Homer mentions ‘Sidonian wares,’ but ignores Tyre. Justin says Sidon suffered so severely at the hands of Ascalon that her trade passed to her daughter Tyre. The Tell el-Amarna letters (c [Note: circa, about.] . b.c. 1430) reveal Abi-milki, king of Tyre, sending appeals to his lord Amenhotep iv. for assistance against the swarms of Khabiri, who were ravaging the land, while the citizens were dying of want on the islets off the coast. At the conquest of Canaan, Joshua assigned the Tyrian territory to Asher, though it was perhaps never occupied (Jos_19:29, but cf. 2Sa_24:7).
For the next 430 years the city’s history is a blank. It was Hiram, David’s contemporary, who raised Tyre to fame. Old Tyre (Palætyrus), on the mainland, he strongly fortified, its walls being 15 miles in circumference. Hiram now built New Tyre by uniting the scattered islands, half a mile out to sea, till they enclosed an area 21/2 miles in circumference. At the N. end, two stone piers, about 100 ft. apart, extended E. and W. for 700 ft. These with the shore line embraced an area (the ‘Zidon Harbour’) of 70,000 sq. yds. At the S. end a similar harbour (the ‘Egyptian’), 80,000 sq. yds. In area, was enclosed by a vast pier 200 yds. long, and a breakwater 35 ft. wide and nearly 2 miles in length. The two harbours were united by a canal across the island. The city rose up in tiers of houses, gardens, orchards, and vineyards, and was embellished by a new and splendid temple of Melkarth, a royal palace, and a great piazza (the ‘Eurychorus’) for national assemblies. The city’s wealth was furnished largely from the trade in purple dye, the secret of the extraction of which from two species of murex the Tyrians possessed. The gradual failure of the supply of these shellfish on their own shores led the citizens to become great explorers. Every island and coastline were searched for these precious molluscs. Trade naturally followed. They trafficked up the Nile as far as Memphis; worked copper mines in Cyprus and Crete (cf. Phenice, Act_27:12); erected stations on the Bosporus, the Euxine, and the Crimea; established colonies on the N. African shores, Malta, Sicily, Sardinia, Marseilles, etc., and exploited the gold, silver, lead, and other mines of Spain from their emporium Tartessus (prob. the Tarshish of Gen_10:4, Psa_72:10, Isa_66:19). Even the Atlantic was braved, and they worked the tin deposits of Cornwall, and had depôts in the Scilly Isles and the Isle of Wight. Hiram co-operated with David in the erection of the latter’s palace in Jerusalem, sending cedars from Lebanon (1Ch_14:1). Under Solomon, Tyrian artizans built the Temple on Phœnician models (2Ch_2:1-18). Hiram and Solomon had joint maritime adventures, Jewish ships with Tyrian seamen trading to Ophlr every three years (1Ki_9:26; 1Ki_10:22). ‘Hiram’s Tomb,’ a massive limestone sarcophagus, is still shown on the shore 6 miles S. of Tyre.
The years following Hiram’s death were very troubled, changes of dynasty occurring through repeated assassinations. At length Eth-baal, by the murder of his brother, seized the throne, and married his daughter Jezebel to Ahab (1Ki_16:31). Some time after the death of Eth-baal a domestic rebellion led to the emigration of the Tyrian princess Elissa, who is said to have fled from Tyre with her murdered husband’s riches and to have founded Carthage, thereby winning fame for herself as the Dido of Virgil’s Æneid. About b.c. 880 Assyria began to interfere with Western politics. Tyre purchased her liberty from Assur-nazir-pal by a heavy indemnity. In d.c. 726 Shalmaneser iv. came against the city, but, having no ships, could not reach the island fortress till he had bribed Sidon to furnish 60 vessels. These the Tyrians, with only 12 ships, easily routed. Shalmaneser retired, leaving a garrison in Old Tyre, which kept up a fruitless blockade for five years. At the next attack, under Sennacherib, Elulæus, the king, fled in despair to Cyprus, the Assyrians appointing a tributary king, Tubaal, in his stead (b.c. 705). Under Esarhaddon, Tyre rebelled. The Assyrians held the shore, and captured Sidon, but Tyre again escaped. In b.c. 664 it submitted to Ashurbanipal on honourable terms. On the decline of Nineveh, Tyre again proclaimed her independence (b.c. 630), and after Nineveh fell (b.c. 606) she reached the zenith of her glory. Ezekiel (27–28) gives a marvellously vivid picture of the island city at this period, yet prophesies her fall on account of her colossal sins.
In the early unsettled days of the New Babylonian Empire the Tyrians entered into a league with Pharaohnecho of Egypt. They were invited to make a canal from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea, and even to circumnavigate Africa. The latter feat they accomplished in three years, the voyagers sailing down the E. coast, and reaching the Pillars of Hercules after a feat of unheard-of daring. Nebuchadnezzar II. attacked Tyre, and besieged it for 13 years. Old Tyre was destroyed (Eze_26:7-12), but the Babylonian army in vain wearied itself in trying to subdue the island (Eze_29:18). It is probable that the city finally capitulated on favourable terms. The long siege, however, had ruined her commerce, and for 50 years Tyre was a poverty-stricken town. An attempt at a republic did not improve her fortunes. She was involved in the struggle between Nebuchadnezzar II. and Pharaoh-hophra (Jer_44:30). was for a time under Egypt, but finally fell to Babylon, and remained a dependency until the overthrow of the Babylonian Empire. Her humbled state did not change her people’s temper. Their pride (Eze_28:2), their contempt for the rights of man (Amo_1:9), their slave-trading propensities (Joe_3:4-8) are denounced by the Hebrew prophets. In b.c. 538 Cyrus II., the founder of the Persian Empire, ordered Tyrian workmen to assist with Lebanon cedars in the re-building of the Jewish Temple (Eze_3:7). Cambyses II. engaged the Tyrians to supply a fleet for his invasion of Egypt. On his proposing to send them to subdue Carthage they refused, on the score of their blood relationship with the daughter colony of Tyre. Under Artaxerxes Longimanus (b.c. 430) we read of Tyrian fish-merchants at the gates of Jerusalem (Neh_13:16). In the Persian-Greek wars Tyrian fleets fought on the Persian side, till, after the Peace of Antalkidas (b.c. 387), Tyre transferred her allegiance to Persia’s enemies. Artaxerxes III. (Ochus) took fearful vengeance. Sidon disappeared in flame and torrents of blood. Tyre in horror opened her gates, and was spared. In b.c. 332 Alexander the Great appeared in front of the city. The Tyrians declined to allow him to sacrifice personally to Melkarth in their fortress. The memorable siege began. Alexander built a mole 200 ft. wide out towards the island. It was repeatedly destroyed. The defence was desperate and successful, till Alexander invested the city with a fleet of 224 ships. Tyre was stormed, 8000 of her inhabitants massacred, 2000 crucified on the shore, and 30,000 sold into slavery. Tyre ceased to be an island, and henceforth was permanently joined to the mainland. Only a blunt headland to-day suggests the existence of the former island fortress. The mole is now 1/2 mile broad.
Tyre was again re-peopled. She figured in the wars of the Ptolemys and Seleucldæ. In b.c. 314 Antigonus besieged her for 15 months. After 70 years’ subjection to Egypt she was under Antioch till b.c. 65, when the Romans made her a free city. Some of her citizens came to hear the preaching of Jesus (Mar_3:8). Christ visited the neighbourhood (Mar_7:24-31), and got a favourable reception (Luk_10:13). Tyre figured in connexion with St. Paul in Apostolic times (Act_12:20; Act_21:3-7). Was the Church in Tyre not a fulfilment of Psa_87:4? A Christian church was built on the site of the Melkarth temple. Origen found refuge in Tyre, and died there. Jerome (4th cent.) speaks of it as the ‘most noble and beautiful city of Phœnicia.’ Captured by the Saracens (a.d. 638), it was recovered (a.d. 1124), and William of Tyre celebrates its fame under the Crusaders. Here was burled Frederick Barbarossa. Saladin was repelled in 1187, but the spot was abandoned in 1291, and the Moslems took possession of it. Tyre has since sunk to a miserable stagnant village, where the waves mournfully crash amid the ruins of her former magnificence.
G. A. Frank Knight.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
Edited by James Hastings, D.D. Published in 1909

Jos_19:29; 2Sa_24:7; Isa_23:1; Ezekiel 26-28. In Phoenicia, E. of the Mediterranean, 20 miles S. of Sidon. Justin says the Sidonians founded Tyre after having been defeated by the king of Ascalon, 1209 B.C. according to the Parian marble. A double city, part on the mainland, part on an island nearly one mile long, and separated from the continent by a strait half a mile broad. Justin (xi. 10) records the tradition of the inhabitants that there was a city on the mainland before there was one on the island. Ezekiel represents the mainland city as besieged by Nebuchadnezzar's horses and chariots, and its walls assailed with "engines of war, forts, and mounts," and its towers broken down with axes; but the island city as sitting "in the heart of the seas" (Eze_28:2, margin). The former, Old Tyre, stretched along the shore seven miles from the river Leontes on the N. to the fountain Ras el ain on the S., the water of which was brought into the city by aqueducts.
Pliny (N. H., v. 17) says the circuit of both was 19 Roman miles, the island city being only 22 stadia. The difficulty is that the name "Tyre," meaning a "rock," belongs properly to the island city, there being no "rock" in the mainland city to originate the name; yet the mainland city is called "Old Tyre." Probably the Phoenician name of the mainland city resembled in sound but not sense the Greek Palaeo-Tyrus, and the latter name was given from a misunderstanding. Tyre is not mentioned in the Pentateuch, but first in Jos_19:29 "the strong city Tyre." From tsor came its two names, Tyre, and Sara, now Sur (Arabic). Joshua implies it was on the shore, but the city and chief temple of Hercules (Melkarth, the tutelary god of Tyre) was probably on the island. Unlike other oriental cities, space being limited on the island, the houses were built in stories. The majority of the population was on the mainland. Hiram by substructures enlarged the eastern and southern sides, so as to afford room for a public place, Eurychorus.
The northern or Sidonian harbour was 900 ft. long, 700 wide, protected by walls. The southern or Egyptian was formed by a great breakwater; the barbours could be closed by a boom; a canal through the city joined the harbours. "Tyre did build herself a strong hold" (Zec_9:3); so Diodorus Siculus (xvii. 40), "Tyre had the greatest confidence, owing to her insular position, fortifications and abundant stores." A double wall, 150 ft. high, besides the sea, secured island Tyre. "Her merchants were princes, and her traffickers the honourable of the earth" (Isa_23:7-8). Hiram, as friend and ally, supplied David with timber and workmen for his palace (2Sa_5:11), and Solomon with cedars of Lebaron conveyed by floats to Joppa, 74 geographical miles, after having been hewn by Hiram's Sidonian hewers unrivaled in skill (1Ki_5:6). (See HIRAM; SOLOMON.) The Tyrian skill in copper work appears in the lilies, palms, oxen, lions, and cherubim which they executed for Solomon.
Tyrian colonists founded Carthage 143 years and eight months after the founding of Solomon's temple. (Josephus, contra Apion 1:18). Asher never possessed Tyre; though commanded to exterminate the Sidonians along with the other Canaanites, Israel never had war with them (Jdg_1:31-32). The census takers in going to Tyre under David seem merely to have counted the Israelites resident in Tyre (2Sa_24:7). Joshua (Jos_11:8; Jos_19:28) designates Sidon "great." In David's time Tyre assumes the greatness above Sidon. So secular history represents Sidon as mother city of Phoenicia, which see (Justin, Hist. xviii. 3; Strabo Geegr. 1:2, section 33). (See PHOENICIA.) Old Egyptian inscriptions give Sidon the first place. Homer often mentions Sidon, never Tyre. The reason for his and the Pentateuch's silence as to Tyre is, Tyre, though existing, was as yet subordinate. Secular history accords with the Bible in dating the accession of Tyre to greatness just before David's reign.
Unlike other independent commercial cities Tyre was a monarchy, not a republic (Jer_25:22; Jer_27:3). The friendly relations between Tyre and Israel (Solomon supplying grain and oil in return for Hiram's timber, metals, and workmen) were again renewed when Ahab married the Sidonian king Ethbaal's (or Ithobal king of Tyre, according to Menander, in Josephus Ant. 8:13, section 2) daughter. Joel (Joe_3:4-8) denounces Tyre for selling children of Judah and Jerusalem as slaves to the Greeks, Amos threatens Tyre with devouring fire for "delivering the whole captivity (captive Israelites) to Edom, and remembering not the brotherly covenant" (Amo_1:9-10), between David and Hiram which guaranteed safety, religious privileges, and the undisturbed exercise of their faith to the Jews sojourning in Tyre.
Hiram's successors were Baleazar, Abdrastatus (assassinated by his nurse's four sons, the elder of whom usurped the throne; then Hiram's line after a servile revolt was restored in), Adrastus, Aserymus, Phales (who slew his brother Aserymus and was slain by), Ithobaal, priest of Astarte and father of Jezebel, Ahab's unscrupulous, cruel, and idolatrous queen. Tyre's annals record the three years' drought of 1 Kings 17-18. Then Badezor, Matgen, Pygmalion; he slew Acerbas, Hercules' high priest, and the husband of Elissa or Dido. She fled with many of the aristocracy and founded Carthage. Her self immolation on a funeral pyre is essentially oriental. The next certain event after some interval is Elulaeus' reign and Shalmaneser's invasion. Shalmaneser, after taking Samaria, turned his arms against Tyre, then mistress of Sidon, and Cyprus with its copper mines ("copper" derives its name from Cyprus), 721 B.C. Menander, the translator of the Tyrian archives into Greek (Josephus Ant. 9:14, section 2), says Elulseus king of Tyre subdued a revolt in Cyprus.
The Assyrian king then, assailed Pnoenicia; Sidon, Akko (Acre), and Palaeo-Tyrus submitted, and helped him with 60 ships and 800 rowers against 12 ships of Tyre. The Tyrians dispersed their opponent's fleet, but he besieged them for five years, apparently without success. Isaiah (Isaiah 23) refers to this siege; Sargon probably finished the siege. The reference to "the Chaldaeans" (Isa_23:13) implies an ulterior prophetic reference also to its siege under Nebuchadnezzar which lasted 13 years. "Behold," says the prophet, calling Tyre's attention to the humiliating fact that upstart Chaldees, subordinate then to Assyria and only in later times about to become supreme, should first as mercenaries under the Assyrian Shalmaneser, then as Nebuchadnezzar's army, besiege the ancient city Tyre. (See CHALDEES.)
Alexander the Great destroyed new Tyre after a seven months' siege. Nebuchadnezzar, having no vessels to attack the island city, besieged the mainland city, but the heart of the city was on the island. To this latter God's threat applies, "I will scrape her dust from her and make her like the top of a rock" (Eze_26:2; Eze_26:4, etc.); instead of her realizing her exulting expectation on Jerusalem's downfall, "I shall be replenished now she is laid waste," the very soil which Tyre brought together on the rock on which she built I will scrape so clean away as to leave no dust, but only the bore rock as it was; "it (island Tyre) shall be a place for spreading of nets in the midst of the sea." Ezekiel (Eze_27:10-11) informs us that, like her daughter Carthage, Tyre employed mercenaries, "of Persia (the first mention of Persia in ancient literature), Lud, Phut, and Arvad"; a frequent occurrence and weakness in commercial cities, where artisans' wages exceed a soldier's pay.
Merchants of Sheba and Raamah, i.e. Arabia. and the Persian gulf, brought Tyre gold (Ezekiel 27). (See SHEBA; RAAMAH.) Tarshish supplied Tyre with silver, iron, tin (from Cornwall), and lead; Palestine supplied Tyre with wheat, oil, and balm (1Ki_5:9; Act_12:20); whence the two nations were always at peace. Tyre got the wine of Helbon (Aleppo), not Judah's wines though excellent (Gen_49:11). (See TARSHISH.) The nomadic Bedouin Kedar supplied lambs, rams, and goats; Egypt, linen; the isles of Elishah (Greece, the Peloponnese, and Elis especially), blue and purple dyes; (latterly Tyre extracted her famous purple from her own shell fish the Murex trunculus (See SCARLET); Pliny ix. 60-61, Pausanias iii. 21, section 6; the shell fish were crushed in round holes found still by travelers in the solid sandstone there: Wilde, Voyage along Mediterr.); and Dedan on the Persian gulf, ivory and ebony.
The exultation of Tyre at Jerusalem's overthrow by Nebuchadnezzar might seem strange; but Josiah's overthrow of Solomon's altars to Ashtoreth or Astarte, the Tyrian queen of heaven, which for 350 years had been a pledge of the goodwill between Jerusalem and Tyre (2Ki_23:13), had alienated the Tyrians; the selfishness of commercial rivalry further made them regard Jerusalem's fall as an opening for Tyre to turn to herself the inland traffic of which Jerusalem had hereto been the "gate"; Tyre said against Jerusalem, "Aha, she is broken that was the gates (the commercial mart) of the people, she is turned unto me" (Eze_26:2); the caravans from Petra, Palmyra and the East instead of passing through Jerusalem, will be transferred to me. Tyre is thus the world's representative in its phase of intense self seeking, which not so much opposes directly God's people as exults in their calamity when this subserves her schemes of gain, pride, and ambition, however ostensibly heretofore on friendly terms with them.
But Tyre experienced the truth "he that is glad at calamities shall not be unpunished" (Pro_17:5). Nebuchadnezzar's siege of 13 years followed; "every head was made bald, and every shoulder peeled, yet had he no wages nor his army, for Tyre, for the service that he had served against it" (Eze_29:18-19). Jerome states that Nebuchadnezzar took Tyre, but had no wages for his pains since the Tyrians had removed in ships from Tyre everything precious. So God gave him Egypt in compensation; his success is implied in Tyre receiving a king from Babylon, probably one of the Tyrian hostages detained there, Merbal (Josephus, Apion 1:21, on the authority of Phoenician annals). Tyre probably submitted on mild terms, for no other authors mention its capture. Josephus quotes Phoenician records as stating that "Nebuchadnezzar besieged Tyre 13 years under their king Ithobal." Its capture accords with Pharaoh Hophra's expedition against Tyre not long after, probably in self defense, to prevent Tyre's navy becoming Babylon's weapon against Egypt.
Under Persia Tyre supplied cedar wood to the Jews for building the second temple (Ezr_3:7). Alexander the Great, in order not to have his communications with Greece cut off, wished to have the Phoenician fleet at command; the other Phoenician cities submitted. Tyre stood a "seven months'" siege, the Cyprians blockading the northern harbour, and the Phoenicians the southern harbour, so that Alexander was enabled to join the island to the mainland by a vast artificial mole constructed of the ruins of mainland Tyre remaining after Nebuchadnezzar's siege; while Carthage, through internal commotions, was unable to help the mother city. The conqueror slew 8,000 of the brave defenders, crucified 2,000 in revenge for the murder of some Macedonians, and sold into slavery 30,000 of the inhabitants. Ezekiel (Eze_26:11-12) says: "Nebuchadnezzar shall slay, ... They shall break down thy walls, and shall lay thy stones and timber and dust in the midst of the water." The overthrow of Tyre by Nebuchadnezzar was the first link in the long chain of evil, and the earnest of its final doom.
The change from "he" to "they" marks that what he did was not the whole, but paved the way for other's completing what he began. It was to be a progressive work until Tyre was utterly destroyed. Alexander did exactly as Eze_26:12 foretells; with the "stones, timber," and rubbish of mainland Tyre he made the causeway to island Tyre (Q. Curtius iv. 2), 322 B.C. "Thou shalt be built (re-established as a commercial queen and fortress of the seas) no more." Nebuchadnezzar, Alexander, Antigonus, the crusaders in A.D. 1124, and the Saracens in the 13th century, A.D. 1291 (before whom the Tyrians vacated their city, fulfilling Isa_23:7), all contributed to make Tyro what she is, her harbours choked up, her palaces and fortresses in ruins and "built no more," only a few fishermen's humble abodes, Tyre only "a place to spread nets upon." In Hasselquist's day (Voyages in Levant, A.D. 1751) there were "about ten inhabitants, Turks and Christians, living by fishing." Its present population is 3,000 or 4,000.
It was for long a Christian bishopric. Ithobaal was king at the beginning of Nebuchadnezzar's siege, and Baal his son at its close. Then the form of government changed to that of judges (Suffetes, Hebrew shophetim). Tyre is a vivid illustration of vicissitudes of fortune, so that Lucan calls her "unstable Tyre." During Tyre's existence Thebes, Nineveh, Babylon, and Jerusalem have fallen, and Carthage and Rome have risen and fallen; she "whose antiquity is, of ancient days" (Isa_23:7), who heaped up silver as dust and fine gold as the mire of the streets" (Zec_9:2), is now bore and poverty stricken. Greed of gain was her snare, to which she sacrificed every other consideration; this led her to join the wicked confederacy of seven nations constituting the main body, with three accessories, which sought to oust Jehoshaphat and God's people out of their inheritance (Psa_83:7).
Psa_87:4 foretells that Tyre personified as an ideal man shall be in Messianic days spiritually born in Jerusalem. Her help to Solomon's temple foretypified this, and the Syrophoenician woman's faith (Mar_7:26) is the firstfruit and earnest. Isaiah's (Isa_23:18) prophecy that "her merchandise shall be holiness to the Lord ... it shall be for them that dwell before the Lord to eat sufficiently and for durable clothing," was fulfilled in the consecration by the church at Tyre of much of its wealth to God and the support of Christ's ministry (Eusebius Hist. 10:4). Paul found disciples there (Act_21:3-6), a lively instance of the immediate and instinctive communion of saints, though previously strangers to one another. What an affecting picture of brotherly love, all bringing Paul's company on their way "with wives and children until they were out of the city, then kneeling down on the shore" under the canopy of heaven and praying!
Psa_45:12, "the daughter of Tyre shall entreat thy favor (so supply the omission) with a gift, even the rich (which Tyre was preeminently) among the people shall entreat thy favor," begging admission into the kingdom of God from Israel (Isa_44:5; Isa_60:6-14; Psa_72:10). When Israel "hearkens" to Messiah and "forgets her own people (Jewish ritualism) and her father's house (her boast of Abrahamic descent), the King shall greatly desire her beauty," and Messiah shall become "the desire of all nations," e.g. Tyre (Hag_2:7). On the other hand Tyre is type of (See ANTICHRIST) (Ezekiel 28) in her self deifying pride. "I am a God, I sit in the seat of God, in the midst of the seas ... yet thou art a man and not God. Though thou set thine heart as the heart of God, behold thou art wiser than Daniel ... no secret, can they hide from thee; with thy wisdom thou hast gotten riches" (compare Dan_7:1-25; Dan_11:36-37; 2Th_2:4; Rev_13:1; Rev_13:6; 2Ti_3:1-9).
The "seas" answer to the political disturbed sea of nations out of which antichrist emerges. Tyre's "holy island," sacred to Melkart (Sanchoniathon) answers to antichrist's mimicry of God's throne in the temple of God. Her self-vaunted wisdom (Zec_9:2) answers to the "eyes of a man" in the little horn (Dan_7:8; 1Co_1:19-31) and the second beast's "great wonders." Man in our days by discoveries in science hopes to be so completely lord of the elements as to be independent of God, so that "no secret can be hidden from him" in the natural world, which is the only world that self-willed fools recognize. When just at the summit of blasphemous self glorification, God shall bring these self deceivers with their masters, antichrist, the false prophet, and Satan, "down to the pit," as. Tyre (Eze_28:8; Revelation 16; 17; Rev_19:20; Rev_20:10).
In Tyre's king another example was given of man being put on his trial under most favorable circumstances, with all that beauty, sagacity, and wealth could do for man, like Adam and Eve in Eden (Eze_28:13-14). No "precious stone" was withheld from Tyre; like the overshadowing cherubim, its king overshadowed Tyre; as the beau ideal of humanity he walked up and down "in the midst of the stones of fire" like "the paved work of sapphire" (Exo_24:10; Exo_24:17) under the feet of the God of Israel. But, whereas Hiram feared the God of Israel and helped forward His temple, "iniquity" even pride was found in Tyre. Therefore, God "cast her to the ground" (Eze_28:17; Isa_23:9), "sacred and inviolate" (hiera kai asulos) though she calls herself on coins. The Lord Jesus entered the coasts of Tyre, but it is uncertain whether He entered Tyre itself (Mat_15:21; Mar_7:24; Mar_7:26).
Fausset's Bible Dictionary
By Andrew Robert Fausset, co-Author of Jamieson, Fausset and Brown's 1888.

Tyre. (a rock). A celebrated commercial city of Phoenicia, on the coast of the Mediterranean. Its Hebrew name, Tzor, signifies a rock; which well agrees with the site of Sur, the modern town, on a rocky peninsula, formerly an island. There is no doubt that, previous to the siege of the city by Alexander the Great, Tyre was situated on an island; but, according to the tradition of the inhabitants, there was a city on the mainland, before there was a city on the island; and the tradition receives some color from the name of Palaetyrus, or Old Tyre, which was borne in Greek times, by a city on the continent, thirty stadia to the south.
Notices in the Bible. ? In the Bible, Tyre is named for the first time, in the Book of Joshua, Jos_19:29, where it is adverted to as a fortified city, (in the Authorized Version, "the strong city"), in reference to the boundaries of the tribe of Asher. But the first passages in the Hebrew historical writings, or in ancient history generally, which actual glimpses of the actual condition of Tyre, are in the book of Samuel, 2Sa_6:11, in connection with Hiram, king of Tyre, sending cedar wood and workmen to David, for building him a palace; and subsequently, in the book of Kings, in connection with the building of Solomon's Temple.
It is evident that, under Solomon, there was a close alliance between the Hebrews and the Tyrians. Hiram supplied Solomon with cedar wood, precious metals and workmen, and gave him sailors for the voyage to Ophir and India, while, on the other hand , Solomon gave Hiram supplies of corn and oil, ceded to him some cities, and permitted him to make use of some havens on the Red Sea. 1Ki_9:11-14; 1Ki 26-28; 1Ki_10:22.
These friendly relations survived for a time, the disastrous secession of the ten tribes, and a century later, Ahab married a daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Sidonians, 1Ki_16:31, who, according to Menander, was daughter of Ithobal, king of Tyre. When mercantile cupidity induced the Tyrians, and the neighboring Phoenicians, to buy Hebrew captives from their enemies, and to sell them as slaves, to the Greeks and Edomites, there commenced denunciations, and at first threats of retaliation. Joe_3:4-8; Amo_1:9-10.
When Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, had taken the city of Samaria, had conquered the kingdom of Israel, and carried its inhabitants into captivity, he laid siege to Tyre, which, however, successfully resisted his arms. It is in reference to this siege, that the prophecy against Tyre in Isaiah, Isa_23:1, was uttered. After the siege of Tyre, by Shalmaneser, (which must have taken place, not long after 721 B.C.), Tyre remained a powerful state, with its own kings, Jer_25:22; Jer_27:3; Eze_28:2-12, remarkable for its wealth, with territory on the mainland, and protected by strong fortifications. Eze_26:4; Eze_26:6; Eze_26:8; Eze_26:10; Eze_26:12; Eze_27:11; Eze_28:5; Zec_9:3.
Our knowledge of its condition, thenceforward, until the siege by Nebuchadnezzar, depends entirely on various notices of it, by the Hebrew prophets; but some of these notices are singularly full, and especially the twenty-seventh chapter of Ezekiel furnishes us, on some points, with details such as have scarcely come down to us, respecting any one city of antiquity, excepting Rome and Athens.
Siege by Nebuchadnezzar. ? In the midst of great prosperity and wealth, which was the natural result of extensive trade, Eze_28:4, Nebuchadnezzar, at the head of an army of the Chaldees, invaded Judea, and captured Jerusalem. As Tyre was so near to Jerusalem, and as the conquerors were a fierce and formidable race, Hab_1:6, it would naturally be supposed that this event would have excited alarm, and terror, amongst the Tyrians.
Instead of this, we may infer from Ezekiel's statement, Eze_26:2, that their predominant feeling was one of exultation. At first sight, this appears strange, and almost inconceivable; but it is rendered intelligible, by some previous events in Jewish history. Only 34 years before the destruction of Jerusalem, commenced the celebrated reformation of Josiah, B.C. 622.
This momentous religious revolution, 2Ki_22:1; 2Ki_23:1, fully explains the exultation and malevolence of the Tyrians. In that reformation, Josiah had heaped insults on the gods, who were the objects of Tyrian veneration, and love. Indeed, he seemed to have endeavored, to exterminate their religion. 2Ki_23:20.
These acts must have been regarded, by the Tyrians, as a series of sacrilegious, and abominable, outrages; and we can scarcely doubt that the death in battle of Josiah at Megiddo, and the subsequent destruction of the city, and Temple of Jerusalem, were hailed by them with triumph, and retribution, in human affairs. This joy, as instances of divine retribution in human affairs.
This joy, however, must soon have given way to other feelings, when Nebuchadnezzar invaded Phoenicia, and laid siege to Tyre. That siege lasted thirteen years, and it is still a disputed point whether Tyre was actually taken by Nebuchadnezzar on this occasion. However this may be, it is probable that, on some terms or other, Tyre submitted to the Chaldees. The rule of Nebuchadnezzar over Tyre, though real, may have been light, and in the nature of an alliance.
Attack by the Persians; Capture by Alexander. ? During the Persian domination, the Tyrians were subject in name to the Persian king, and may have given him tribute. With the rest of Phoenicia, they had submitted to the Persians, without striking a blow. Toward the close of the following century, B.C. 332, Tyre was assailed, for the third time, by a great conqueror.
At that time, Tyre was situated on an island nearly half a mile from the mainland; it was completely surrounded by prodigious walls, the loftiest portion of which on the side fronting the mainland, reached a height of not less than 150 feet; and, notwithstanding the persevering efforts of Alexander, he could not have succeeded in his attempt, if the harbor of Tyre to the north had not been blockaded by the Cyprians, and that to the south by the Phoenicians, thus affording an opportunity to Alexander, for uniting the island to the mainland by an enormous artificial mote. (The materials for this, he obtained from the remains of old Tyre, scraping the very dust from her rocks into the sea, as prophesied by Ezekiel, Eze_26:3-4; Eze 12; Eze 21, more than 250 years before).
The immediate results of the capture by Alexander, were most disastrous to Tyre, as its brave defenders were put to death; and in accordance with the barbarous policy of ancient times, 30,000 of its inhabitants, including slaves, free females and free children, were sold as slaves. It gradually, however, recovered its prosperity through the immigration of fresh settlers, though its trade is said to have suffered by the vicinity, and rivalry, of Alexandria. Under the Macedonian successors of Alexander, it shared the fortunes of the Seleucidae.
Under the Romans, at first, it enjoyed a kind of freedom. Subsequently, however, on the arrival of Augustus in the East, he is said to have deprived, both Tyre and Sidon, of their liberties for seditious conduct. Still, the prosperity of Tyre, in the time of Augustus, was undeniably great. Strabo gives an account of it at that period, speaks of the great wealth, which it derived from the dyes of the celebrated Tyrian purple which, as is well known, were extracted from shell-fish found on the coast, belonging to a species of the genus Murex.
Tyre in the time of Christ and since. ? When visited by Christ, Mat_15:21; Mar_7:24, Tyre was, perhaps, more populous than Jerusalem, and if so, it was, undoubtedly, the largest city which the saviour is known to have visited.
At the time of the crusades, it was still a flourishing city, when if surrendered to the Christians, on the 27th of June 1144. It continued more than a century and a half in the hands of Christians, but was deserted by its inhabitants, in A.D. 1291, upon the conquest of Acre, (Ptolemais), by the sultan of Egypt and Damascus. This was the turning-point in the history of Tyre, which has never recovered from the blow. Its present condition is a fulfillment of Ezekiel's prophecy, Eze_28:5. It contains, according to Volney, 50 or 60 poor families, who live in part by fishing; and is, as Bruce describes it, "rock whereon fishers dry their nets."
Smith's Bible Dictionary
By Dr. William Smith.Published in 1863

or TYRUS, was a famous city of Phenicia. Its Hebrew name is ציר or צר , which signifies a rock. The city of Tyre was allotted to the tribe of Asher, Jos_19:29, with the other maritime cities of the same coast; but it does not appear that the Asherites ever drove out the Canaanites. Isa_23:12, calls Tyre the daughter of Sidon, that is, a colony from it. Homer never speaks of Tyre, but only of Sidon. Josephus says, that Tyre was built not above two hundred and forty years before the temple of Solomon; which would be in A.M. 2760, two hundred years after Joshua. Tyre was twofold, insular and continental. Insular Tyre was certainly the most ancient; for this it was which was noticed by Joshua: the continental city, however, as being more commodiously situated, first grew into consideration, and assumed the name of Palaetyrus, or Old Tyre. Want of sufficient attention to this distinction, has embarrassed both the Tyrian chronology and geography. Insular Tyre was confined to a small rocky island, eight hundred paces long, and four hundred broad, and could never exceed two miles in circumference. But Tyre, on the opposite coast, about half a mile from the sea, was a city of vast extent, since many centuries after its demolition by Nebuchadnezzar, the scattered ruins measured nineteen miles round, as we learn from Pliny and Strabo. Of these, the most curious and surprising are, the cisterns of Roselayne, designed to supply the city with water; of which there are three still entire; about one or two furlongs from the sea, so well described by Maundrell, for their curios construction and solid masonry. Old Tyre withstood the mighty Assyrian power, having been besieged in vain, by Shalmaneser, for five years; although he cut off their supplies of water from the cisterns; which they remedied by digging wells within the city. it afterward held out thirteen years against Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and was at length taken; but not until the Tyrians had removed their effects to the insular town, and left nothing but the bare walls to the victor, which he demolished. What completed the destruction of the city was, that Alexander afterward made use of these materials to build a prodigious causeway, or isthmus, above half a mile long, to the insular city, which revived, as the phoenix, from the ashes of the old, and grew to great power and opulence, as a maritime state; and which he stormed after a most obstinate siege of five months. Pococke observes, that “there are no signs of the ancient city; and as it is a sandy shore, the face of every thing is altered, and the great aqueduct is in many parts almost buried in the sand.” Thus has been fulfilled the prophecy of Ezekiel: “Thou shalt be built no more: though thou be sought for, yet shalt thou never be found again,” Eze_26:21. The fate of insular Tyre has been no less remarkable. When Alexander stormed the city, he set fire to it. This circumstance was foretold. “Tyre did build herself a strong hold, and heaped up silver as the dust, and fine gold as the mire of the streets. Behold, the Lord will cast her out, and he will smite her power in the sea, and she shall be devoured with fire,” Zec_9:3-4. After this terrible calamity, Tyre again retrieved her losses. Only eighteen years after, she had recovered such a share of her ancient commerce and opulence, as enabled her to stand a siege of fourteen months against Antigonus, before he could reduce the city; but after this, Tyre fell alternately under the dominion of the kings of Syria and Egypt, and then of the Romans, until it was taken by the Saracens, about A.D. 639, retaken by the Crusaders. A.D. 1124; and at length sacked and razed by the Mamelukes of Egypt, with Sidon, and other strong towns, that they might no longer harbour the Christians, A.D. 1289.
The final desolation of Tyre was thus foretold: “I will scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock: it shall be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord God.” “I will make thee like the top of a rock: thou shalt be a place to spread nets upon: thou shalt be built no more; for I the Lord have spoken it, saith the Lord God.” Nothing can be more literally and astonishingly executed than this sentence. Huetius relates of one Hadrianus Parvillerius, that “when he approached the ruins of Tyre, and beheld the rocks stretched forth to the sea, and the great stones scattered up and down on the shore, made clean and smooth by the sun and waves and wind, and useful only for the drying of fishermen's nets, many of which happened at the time to be spread thereon, it brought to his memory the prophecy of Ezekiel concerning Tyre, that such should be its fate.” Maundrell, who visited the Holy Land, A.D. 1697, describes it thus: “This city, standing in the sea upon a peninsula, promises at a distance, something very magnificent; but when your come to it, you find no similitude of that glory for which it was so renowned in ancient times, and which the prophet Ezekiel describes, 26, ZEC 27:28. On the north side it has an old Turkish ungarrisoned castle; beside which, you see nothing here but a mere Babel of broken walls, pillars, vaults, &c; there being not so much as one entire house left! Its present inhabitants are only a few poor wretches harbouring themselves in the vaults, and subsisting chiefly by fishing: who seem to be preserved in this place by Divine Providence, as a visible argument how God has fulfilled his word concerning Tyre, namely, that it should be as the top of a rock; a place for fishers to dry their nets upon, Eze_26:14.” Hasselquist, who saw it since, in A.D. 1751, observes as follows: “None of those cities which were formerly famous are so totally ruined as Tyre, now called Zur, except Troy. Zur now scarcely can be called a miserable village, though it was formerly Tyre, the queen of the sea. Here are about ten inhabitants, Turks and Christians, who live by fishing.” Bruce, who visited this country about eighty years after Maundrell, says, that “passing by Tyre from curiosity, I came to be a mournful witness of the truth of that prophecy, that Tyre, the queen of nations, should be a rock for fishers to dry their nets on.” Mr. Buckingham, who visited it in 1816, represents it as containing about eight hundred substantial stone-built houses, and from five to eight thousand inhabitants. But Mr. Jowett, on the authority of the Greek archbishop, reduces this number to less than four thousand; namely, one thousand two hundred Greek Catholics, one hundred Maronites, one hundred Greeks, one thousand Montonalis, and one hundred Turks. Mr. Jowett observed numerous and beautiful columns stretched along the beach, or standing in fragments half buried in the sand, that has been accumulating for ages: “the broken aqueduct, and the ruins which appear in its neighbourhood, exist as an affecting monument of the fragile and transitory nature of earthly grandeur.” Mr. Joliffe states, that there now exist scarcely any traces of this once powerful city. “Some miserable cabins, ranged in irregular lines, dignified with the name of streets, and a few buildings of a rather better description, occupied by the officers of government, compose nearly the whole of the town. It still makes, indeed, some languishing efforts at commerce, and contrives to export annually to Alexandria cargoes of silk and tobacco; but the amount merits no consideration. The noble dust of Alexander, traced by the imagination till found stopping a beer barrel, would scarcely afford a stronger contrast of grandeur and debasement, than Tyre, at the period of being besieged by that conqueror, and the modern town of Tsour erected on its ashes.”
As commercial cities, says Mansford, ancient Alexandria and London may be considered as approaching, the nearest to Tyre. But Alexandria, during the whole of her prosperous days, was subject to foreign rule; and London, great as are her commerce and her wealth, and possessing as she does almost a monopoly of what has in all ages been the most enviable, and most lucrative branch of trade, that with the east, does not centre in herself, as Tyre did, without a rival and without competition, the trade of all nations, and hold an absolute monopoly, not of one, but of every branch of commerce. For the long period of a thousand years, not a single production of the east passed to the west, or of the west to the east, but by the merchants of Tyre. Nor for many ages were any ships found but those of Tyre daring enough to pass the straits of the Red Sea on one side, or of the Mediterranean on the other. While the vessels of other countries were groping along their coasts, clinging to their landmarks, and frightened at a breeze, the ships of Tyre were found from Spain, if not from Britain, on the west, to the coast of Malabar and Sofala on the east and south. No wonder that her merchants were princes, and that they lived in a style of magnificence unknown in any other country in the same age; or that she should be considered a desirable prey by the conquerors of the times. But enterprise and wealth did not alone complete the character of the Tyrians; they had an undoubted claim to valour of no common order. Their city, which possessed scarcely any territory beyond their own walls, maintained a siege of thirteen years (the longest in history except that of Ashdod) against the whole power of Babylon; and another of seven months against Alexander, whose successes had afforded no instance of similar delay. And in neither case had the captors much to boast of, as the Tyrians had shipped off their most valuable property to Carthage; and in the former particularly, as has been already related, they so effectually secured or sacrificed the whole, that the soldiers of Nebuchadnezzar found nothing to reward them for their length of labour, during which, by excessive toil and heat, “their heads were made bald, and their very shoulders peeled,” but vacant streets, and houses already sacked. Carthage, Utica, and Cadiz, are celebrated monuments of the power of Tyre on the Mediterranean, and in the west. She extended her navigation even into the ocean, and carried her commerce beyond England to the north, and the Canaries to the south. Her connections with the east, though less known, were not less considerable; the islands of Tyrus and Aradus, (the modern Bahrain,) in the Persian Gulf. The cities of Faran and Phoenicum Oppidum, on the Red Sea, in ruins even in the time of the Greeks, prove that the Tyrians had long frequented the coast of Arabia and the Indian Sea. But, through the vicissitudes of time, Tyre, reduced to a miserable village, has no other trade than the exportation of a few sacks of corn and raw cotton, nor any merchant, says Volney, but a single Greek factor in the service of the French Saide, (Sidon,) who scarcely takes sufficient profit to maintain his family. In allusion to Tyre in her better days, Forbes observes, when speaking of Surat, “The bazars, filled with costly merchandise; picturesque and interesting groups of natives on elephants, camels, horses, and mules; strangers from all parts of the globe, in their respective costume; vessels braiding on the stocks, others navigating the river; together with Turks, Persians, and Armenians, on Arabian chargers; European ladies in splendid carriages, the Asiatic females in hackeries drawn by oxen; and the motley appearance of the English and nabob's troops on the fortifications, remind us of the following description of Tyre, ‘O thou that art situate at the entry of the sea, which art a merchant of the people for many isles,' &c, Eze_27:3. This in a true picture of oriental commerce in ancient times; and a very exact description of the port and the bazars of Surat, at the present day.”
Dr. Vincent has given the following able illustration of the trade of Tyre as described in Ezekiel 27, which must be considered as one of the most ample and early accounts extant. The learned author has rendered the Hebrew names into others better known in the geography of more recent times;—Tyre produced from Hermon, and the mountains near it, fir for planking; and from Libanus, cedars for masts. From Bashan, east of the sea of Galilee, oaks for oars. From Greece, or the Grecian isles, ivory to adorn the benches or the waists of the galleys. From Egypt, linen, ornamented with different colours for sails, or flags, or ensigns. From Peloponnesus, blue and purple cloths for awnings. From Sidon and Aradus, mariners; but Tyre itself furnished pilots and commanders. From Gebal, or Biblos, on the coast between Tripolis and Berytus, caulkers. From Persia and Africa, mercenary troops. From Aradus, the troops that garrisoned Tyre with the Gamadim. From Tarshish, or by distant voyages toward the west, and toward the east, great wealth, iron, tin, lead, and silver. Tin implies Britain or Spain, or at least a voyage beyond the Straits of Hercules. From Greece, and the countries bordering on Pontus, slaves, and brass ware. From Armenia, horses, horsemen, and mules. From the Gulf of Persia, and the isles within that gulf, horns, (tusks) of ivory, and ebony. The export to these isles was the manufacture of Tyre. From Syria, emeralds, purple, broidered work, fine linen, coral, and agate. The exports to Syria were the manufactures of Tyre in great quantities. From Judah and Israel, the finest wheat, honey, oil, and balsam. From Damascus, wine of Chalybon, (the country bordering on the modern Aleppo,) and wool in the fleece. The exports to Damascus were costly and various manufactures. From the tribe of Dan, situated nearest to the Philistines, the produce of Arabia, bright or wrought iron, cassia or cinnamon, and the calamus aramaticus. In conducting the transport of these articles, Dan went to and fro, that is, formed or conducted the caravans. By one interpretation, they are said to come from Uzal; and Uzal is said to be Sana, the capital of Yemen, or Arabia Felix. From the Gulf of Persia, rich cloth for the decoration of chariots or horsemen. From Arabia Petraea and Hedjaz, lambs, and rams, and goats. From Sabea and Oman, the best of spices. From India, gold, and precious stones. From Mesopotamia, from Carrhae and Babylonia, the Assyrians brought all sorts of exquisite things; that is, fine manufacture, blue cloth, and broidered work, or fabric of various colours, in chests of cedar bound with cords, containing rich apparel. If these articles were obtained farther from the east, may they not be the fabrics of India, first brought to Assyria by the Gulf of Persia, or by caravans from Karmania, and the Indus, and then conveyed by the Assyrians, in other caravans, to Tyre and Syria? In this view, the care of package, the chests of cedar, and the cording of the chests, are all correspondent to the nature of such a transport. From Tarshish the ships came that rejoiced in the markets of Tyre: they replenished the city, and made it glorious in the midst of the sea, Eze_27:5-25. Dr. Vincent observes, that from the Tarshish last mentioned the ships returned to the ports in the Red Sea; as from the nineteenth to the twenty-fourth verse every particular relates to the east, while that referred to in the twelfth implies the west—Spain, or beyond. We have here some light thrown on the obscurity which surrounds the situation of this distant and unknown place. There is, indeed, a clear reference to two distinct places, or parts of the world, denominated Tarshish; perhaps from those very circumstances, their distance, and the little that was known respecting them. That one was situated westward, and reached by a passage across the Mediterranean, is certain from other parts of Scripture; that the other was eastward, or southward, on the coast of Arabia, India, or Africa, is equally certain. See TARSHISH, and See OPHIR.
Biblical and Theological Dictionary by Richard Watson
PRINTER 1849.

Along the Mediterranean coast north of Palestine lay the ancient land of Phoenicia, whose chief cities were the ports of Tyre and Sidon. The Bible rarely uses the name Phoenicia, preferring to refer to the country by the names of its chief cities, either separately or together (1Ki_5:1; Ezr_3:7; Jer_47:4; Eze_28:2; Eze_28:21; Zec_9:2; Mar_7:24; Luk_6:17; Act_12:20). Other Phoenician towns along the Mediterranean coast were Zarephath and Byblos (1Ki_17:9).
The Phoenicians were among the great sailors of the ancient world and had large shipping fleets working the trade routes of the Mediterranean Sea (Isa_23:5; Isa_23:7). This brought much wealth to Phoenicia, particularly to Tyre, since it was the chief port (Eze_27:3; Eze_27:25). But with wealth came arrogance, and this brought judgment from God (Eze_28:5; Eze_28:9; Eze_28:16). The judgment on Phoenicia was usually pictured in the overthrow of Tyre or the downfall of its king (Eze_27:2; Eze_28:2; Eze_28:12). (For map and other details of Tyre, including its important rulers, commercial power and colourful history, see PHOENICIA.)
Bridgeway Bible Dictionary by Don Fleming
PRINTER 1990.

tı̄r (צר, cowr. חר, cōr, ?rock?' Τύρος, túros, ?Tyrus?; modern Sur):

1. Physical Features:
The most noted of the Phoenician cities situated on the coast, lat. 33? 17 minutes, about 20 miles South of Sidon and about 35 North of Carmel. The date of its foundation is uncertain, but it was later than that of Sidon. It is mentioned in the travels of the Egyptian Mohar, dating probably from the 14th century BC, and in the Tell el-Amarna Letters of about the same period. Herodotus describes the temple of Hercules at Tyre and says it was built 2,300 years before his time, which would carry back the beginning of the city to more than 2700 BC. It was a double city, one part on an island, a short distance from the shore, and the other on the mainland opposite. The island city had two harbors, connected by a canal, one looking North and the other South. The island was rocky and the city was fortitled on the land side by a wall 150 ft. high, the wall being of less elevation on the other sides. It was an exceedingly strong position, and is referred to in the Bible as the ?strong? or ?fortitled? city (Jos_19:29). The space within the walls was crowded with buildings, and is said to have contained 40,000 inhabitants. The town on the mainland was situated in a plain extending from the Ras el-‛Abyaḍ, on the South to Sarepta on the North, a distance of about 20 miles. It was fertile and well watered, the river Leontes (Litany) passing through it to the sea, about 5 miles N. of Tyre, and the copious fountain of Ras el-‛Ain, 3 miles to the South, furnishing an abundant supply both for the city and the gardens.

2. History:
(1) Tyre was for centuries subordinate to Sidon, but when the Philistines subdued the latter city, probably in the 12th century. (see SIDON), Tyre received an accession of inhabitants from the fugitives which gave it the pre-eminence. From this time dates its great commercial and colonial activity. Its mariners pushed boldly out to the West and founded colonies in Spain and North Africa, some of which, like Gades, Abdera and Carthage, became famous. They extended their commerce more widely than Sidon had ever done and ventured into the Atlantic and reached the coasts of Britain and West Africa. They reached out to the East also, and had their ships in the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, and their land routes threaded all Western Asia (see PHOENICIA). Tyre, like all the Phoenician cities, became subject to Egypt under Thothmes III in the first half of the 15th century BC, and remained so for some 300 years, but it enjoyed practical autonomy under native kings, being only subject to tribute and to furnishing contingents of ships when the Egyptian kings made their expeditions to the North. In the Tell el-Amarna Letters, dating from the first half of the 14th century, we find a certain Abi-melek (or Abi-milki) writing from Tyre to the king of Egypt asking for aid against the Amorite leader, Aziru, and the king of Sidon, who had joined the rebels. The name is Phoenician, and we know that it was the policy of the Egyptian kings to leave the native dynasts on the throne.
(2) After the decline of Egypt, Tyre regained her independence and exercised the hegemony over most of the Phoenician towns, at least as far North as Gebal (Byblus), as appears in the control that Hiram had over the Lebanon forests in the time of David and Solomon. Hiram was evidently desirous of an alliance with Israel, since he sent messengers to David and furnished cedar and workmen to build him a house, apparently without solicitation. The friendly connection between the two kingdoms was advantageous to both, since David and Solomon needed the timber and the skilled artisans that Hiram could furnish, and Hiram needed the food products of the land of Israel (1 Ki 5). Tyre was at this time noted for the skill of its artificers, and its manufactured products were famous throughout the world (see PHOENICIA, 4.). The purple dye and works in bronze were especially famous, and Hiram, the Tyrian artisan, was engaged by Solomon to cast the bronzes required for the temple (1Ki_7:13 ff). Hiram, the king, enlarged and beautified his capital. He united the two small islands on which the city was built by filling up the space between, where he made an open square and built a splendid temple to Melkarth and Astarte. He engaged in commercial enterprises with Solomon (1Ki_9:26-28; 1Ki_10:22), both in pursuance of the friendly alliance and also for the advantage of having the use of the port of Ezion-geber on the Red Sea. His brilliant reign lasted 43 years.
(3) The list of kings who succeeded him contains the names of Baal-azar, Abd-ashtoreth, murdered by his brothers, the eldest of whom succeeded him, followed by Astartus and Aserymus murdered by his brother, Pheles, who was overthrown by the high priest Eth-baal, showing how disturbed the period was. Eth-baal, or Ithobal, was the king who made an alliance with Ahab and gave him Jezebel, his daughter, in marriage, which proved most disastrous both to her and the country because of the introduction of the Baal-worship into Israel. Eth-baal was an energetic monarch, and is said to have rounded Botrys (Batrun). He reigned 32 years, and was followed by Badezor and Mattan, who gave his daughter, Elissa (Dido), in marriage to her uncle Sicharbas and transferred the throne to them; but they were set aside by an uprising of the people, and Pygmalion, son of Mattan, was placed on the throne, and Sicharbas put to death. Elissa fled with a party of nobles, by sea, to Africa and founded the city of Carthage. This happened about the middle of the 9th century BC, Josephus putting it at 860 BC.
(4) In the first half of this century Tyre became subject to Assyria, and her hegemony in Phoenicia came to an end, but her prosperity was not seriously checked as we may infer from Isa_23:8, which was written a century or so later. Assyria was satisfied with the payment of tribute until the time of Tiglath-pileser III (745-727), who laid a heavier hand upon her, and this led Elulaeus, king of Tyre, to form a confederacy of the Phoenician cities against Assyria. Shalmaneser IV subdued all except Tyre, which he distressed by cutting off her water-supply. But the people dug wells and obtained enough to subsist upon for five years, when Shalmaneser was killed and Elulaeus recovered control of his territory. He was not molested by Sargon, but Sennacherib advanced against him with 200,000 men, and Elulaeus fled to Cyprus. The citizens made a successful resistance and Sennacherib did not take Tyre, but it submitted to Esar-haddon, and its king, Baal, obtained the special favor of the Assyrian king, who made him ruler of all the coast cities from Dor to Gebal, and the Lebanon was placed under his control (680-673 BC). It is rather surprising that Baal refused to assist him in his attack upon Egypt and that Esar-haddon did not punish him, probably because he was too much occupied with Egypt. Ashur-banipal, however, did compel him to submit and to give him his daughter, and those of his brothers, as secondary wives, but left him as king of Tyre.
(5) On the decline of Assyria, Tyre regained its independence, and its greatness is indicated by the fact that it resisted Nebuchadnezzar 13 years (598-585); it is uncertain whether the island city was taken, but it evidently came to terms with the king of Babylon (compare Eze_27:26; Josephus, Ant., X, xi, 1 and see The Expository Times, 1899, pp. 378, 430, 475, 520). After this siege Sidon took the lead and Tyre was in a disturbed state: the monarchy was overthrown and suffetes, or judges, took its place for six years, when the old order was restored. The decline of Babylon enabled Tyre to regain her independence for a short period until its submission to the Persians about 525 BC, and thenceforth it was a vassal state during the continuance of the Persian empire.
(6) It was by no means hindered in its commercial prosperity, and its great strength is seen in the brave and energetic resistance it made to Alexander the Great. All Phoenicia submitted to him without resistance, and Tyre was willing to admit his suzerainty, but declined to receive him into the city. This so angered Alexander that he at once commenced a siege that proved the most difficult undertaking in all his wars. He had no fleet and was obliged to build a mole (causeway) from the mainland to the island, but before he could finish it the Tyrians destroyed it and beat back their assailants handily. Alexander had to do the work all over again, and since he was convinced that without a fleet he would not be able to take the city, he procured ships from the Phoenician towns that had submitted, and with the aid of these was able to blockade the port and prevent the besieged from issuing forth to destroy the new causeway. This was at length pushed up to the very wall of the city, which was finally breached, and the troops of Alexander forced their way in. But even then the defenders would not yield, and the king himself had to lead the assault upon them with his bodyguard and put them all to the sword. Those who died with arms in their hands were 8,000, and the survivors, women, children and slaves, to the number of 30,000, were sold in the open market. He placed over the ruined city, into which he introduced some colonists, a certain Abd-elonim, and left it after having spent about seven months in subduing it.
(7) After the death of Alexander, Tyre passed into the hands of Ptolemy Lagi, and when Antigonus, in 314 BC, took Phoenicia from him, Tyre resisted, and he had to blockade it 15 months before it would yield, showing how quickly it had recovered from its previous disaster. It became a part of the Seleucid kingdom when Antiochus III drove the Ptolemies from Syria (198 BC), and the Seleucid kings regarded it of importance and gave it the right of asylum, and it was allowed the status of a free city by the Romans, Antony recognizing the magistrates and council of Tyre as allies. When the Parthians attacked and took Syria, in 40 BC, Tyre would not submit and was left untouched, being too strong for them. Augustus deprived it of its freedom, but it was given the status of a ?metropolis? by Hadrian, and this title appears on its coins.
(8) Tyre is mentioned in the New Testament several times: Christ visited its territory (Mat_15:21; Mar_7:24), and people from there came to hear Him (Luk_6:17). Herod Agrippa I had trouble with Tyre, and a deputation came to visit him at Caesarea (Act_12:20). Paul visited Tyre on his journey from Asia to Jerusalem (Act_21:6-7).
Christianity was accepted by the people of Tyre, so that the 2nd century AD saw a bishopric established there, and in the 4th a council was held there to consider charges against Athanasius, by the party of Arius; he was condemned, a decision which brought the Tyrian church into disrepute. Tyre was already obnoxious to Christians because the anti-Christian philosopher Porphyry was from there. Tyre continued a commercial center, and Jerome says that it was the noblest and most beautiful of the Phoenician cities and an emporium of commerce for almost the whole world (Commentary on Ezekiel). It was of considerable importance in the Crusades and continued so until toward the end of the 13th century, when its trade declined, and it has now dwindled to a town of some 5,000 inhabitants. For ?literature? see PHOENICIA.

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
PRINTER 1915.

The original position of this famous city was on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean, about midway between Egypt and Asia Minor, near the north-western frontier of Palestine. It was a colony of Zidon, and was founded before the records of history.
As early as the eleventh century before the advent of Christ, the Tyrians had become famous for skill in the arts. About 1142 B.C. (2Sa_5:11), their King Hiram sent cedar-trees to Jerusalem, and workmen who built David a house. A generation later, when Solomon, preparing to build the temple, sent to the same monarch for similar assistance, he said to him (1Ki_5:6), 'Thou knowest that there is not among us any that can skill to hew timber like unto the Sidonians.' He also (1Ki_7:13) sent and fetched Hiram out of Tyre, a widow's son, filled with cunning to work all works in brass. In subsequent ages, every king coveted a robe of Tyrian purple, and Ezekiel (Eze_27:16) speaks of 'the multitude of wares of its making,'?emeralds, purple, and broidered work, and fine linen, and coral, and agate.
The commerce of Tyre was commensurate with its manufactures. Situate at the entry of the sea, it became a merchant of the people for many isles. It was inhabited by seafaring men, and was styled by way of eminence 'the merchant-city,' whose merchants were princes, whose traffickers were the honorable of the earth' (Isa_23:8). Among their other colonies, whither 'their own feet carried them afar off to sojourn,' were Cyprus, Utica, and Carthage. In Ezekiel 27, Syria, Persia, and Egypt, Spain, Greece, and every quarter of the ancient world, are portrayed hastening to lay their most precious things at the feet of Tyre, who sat enthroned on ivory, covered with blue and purple from the isles of Elishah; while the Gammadims were in her towers, hanged their shields upon her walls round about, and made her beauty perfect.
Near the close of the eighth century before the Christian era, Shalmaneser, the king of Assyria who captured Samaria, was led by cupidity to lay siege to Tyre. He cut off its supplies of water which aqueducts had furnished, but wells within the walls supplied their place; and at the end of five years he gave up his blockade as hopeless.
It was against a city such as this, so confident, and to all appearance so justifiably confident, of sitting a queen forever, that several prophets, particularly Isaiah and Ezekiel, fulminated the denunciations which Jehovah dictated. They prophesied that it should be overthrown by Nebuchadnezzar, that it should revive, but at length be destroyed and never rebuilt.
Before a generation had passed away, according to Josephus, Philostratus, and the Seder Olam, Nebuchadnezzar came up, as had been predicted (Eze_26:7-13), making a fort, casting a mount, and lifting up the buckler. At the end of thirteen years (about A.M. 3422) he took the city, and Tyre was forgotten seventy years, as had been foretold by Isaiah (Isa_23:15). In the year B.C. 332 Tyre, which had been rebuilt on an island half a mile from the shore, and had again become a flourishing emporium for all the kingdoms of the world upon the face of the earth, 'and heaped up silver as the dust, and fine gold as the mire of the streets,' was assailed by Alexander the Great in the midst of his Oriental career of conquest. It sustained a siege of seven months, and was at length taken only by means of a mole, by which the island was turned into a peninsula, and rendered accessible by land forces. In constructing this mole Alexander made use of the ruins of the old city, and thereby fulfilled two prophecies (Eze_26:12; Eze_26:21). So utterly were the ruins of old Tyre thrown into the sea, that its exact site is confessedly undeterminable.
The mole of Alexander has prevented Tyre from becoming insulated again. The revival of the city was long retarded by the rivalship of the newly-founded Alexandria, and by other causes, but it was at length partially restored, and was often the subject of contest during the crusades. It was in the hands of the Europeans till 1291, when it was finally yielded to the Muslims. Its fortifications, which were almost impregnable, were demolished, and it has never since been a place of consequence. Travelers of every succeeding century describe it as a heap of ruins, broken arches and vaults, tottering walls and towers, with a few starveling wretches housing amid the rubbish. It was half ruined by an earthquake in 1837. One of the best accounts of its present appearance is given by Dr. Robinson, who spent a sabbath there in 1838 (Biblical Researches, iii. 395): 'I continued my walk,' says he, 'along the shore of the peninsula, part of which is now unoccupied, except as ?a place to spread nets upon,? musing upon the pride and fall of ancient Tyre. Here was the little isle, once covered by her palaces and surrounded by her fleets: but alas! thy riches and thy fame, thy merchandise, thy mariners and thy pilots, thy caulkers, and the occupiers of thy merchandise that were in thee?where are they? Tyre has indeed become like the ?the top of a rock.? The sole tokens of her more ancient splendor?columns of red and gray granite, sometimes forty or fifty heaped together, or marble pillars?lie broken and strewed beneath the waves in the midst of the sea; and the hovels that now nestle upon a portion of her site present no contradiction of the dread decree, ?Thou shalt be built no more.?'




The Popular Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature
by John Kitto.


(Heb. Ts6r, צוֹר[r צֹר, 1Ki_5:1; Psa_83:7; Psa_87:4; Eze_26:15; Eze_27:3; Eze_27:8; Eze_27:32; Eze_28:12; Hos_9:13; Zec_9:3; the form likewise found in inscriptions, Gesenius, Monum. Phrien. p. 261]; Sept., New Test., Josephus, and other writers, Topot; A.V. “yrus” [q.v.] in Jeremiah, Ezekiel [usually], and the minor prophets [except Joel]; SEE TYIAN ), a celebrated commercial city of antiquity (Jos_19:29; 2Sa_24:7; Isa_23:1; Eze_26:15; Eze_27:2, etc.), situated in Phoenicia, on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea, in latitude 330 17' N. (Smythe, Mediterranean, p. 469). Although not the oldest, it was the greatest of the Punic cities, both in size and power. SEE PHOENICIA.
I. The Name. — Its Hebrew name, Tsôr, signifies a rock, which well agrees with the site of Sur. the moderin town on a rocky-peninsula, formerly.an island. From the word “Tsôr” were derived two names of tle city, in which the first letters differed from each other, though both had a feature of their common parent 1st, the Aramaic word Tura (טֻרָא) whence the Greek word Turos, probably pronounced Tyros, which finally prevailed in Latin, and, with slight changes, in the modern languages of the West; and, 2nd, Saca, or Sarra, which occiirs. in Plautus (Truc. 2, 6, 58, “purpuram ex Sara tibi attuli”), and which is familiar to scholars through the well-known line of Virgil, “Ut gemma bibat, et Sarrano dormiat ostro” (Georg. 2, 506; comp. Aul. Gell. 14:6; Silius Italicus, 15:203; Juvenal, 10:30). Accordingi to a passage of Probus (ad Virg. Georg. 2, 115), as quoted by Grote (Hist. of Greece, 3, 353), the form “Sara” would seem to have occurred in one of the Greek epics now lost, which passed under the name of Homer. Certainly this form accords best with the modern Arabic name of Sur.
II. Ancient Relations. —
1. Old Tyre. — There is no doubt that, previous to the siege of the city by Alexander the Great, Tyreu was situated on an island; but, according to the tradition of the inhabitants, if we may believe. Justin (11, 10), there was a city on the mainland before there was a city on the island; and the tradition receives some color from the name of Palsetyrus, or Old Tyre, which was borne in Greek times by a city on the continent, thirty stadia to the south (Strabo 12, 11, 24). But a difficulty arises in, supposing that Paletyrus was built before Tyre, as the word Tyre evidently means “a rock,” and few persons who have visited the site of Palaetyrus can seriously suppose that any rock on the surface there can have given rise to the name. To escape this difficulty, Hengstenberg makes the suggestion that Palaetyrus meant Tyre that formerly existed, “quae q uo udam fuit;” and that the name was introduced after the destruction of the greater part of it by Nebuchadnezzar, to distinguish it from that part of Tyre which continued to be in existence (De Rebus Tyiriorum, p. 26). Movers, justly deeming this explanation unlikely, suggests that the original inhabitants of the city on the mainland possessed the island as part of their territory, and named their city from the characteristic features of the island, though the island itself was not then inhabited (Das phoniische Alterthum, II, 1, 173).
This explanation is possible; but other explanations are equally possible. For example, the Phoenician name of it may have been the Old City' and this may have been translated “Palaetyrus” in Greek. Or, if the inhabitants of the mainland migrated to the island, they may afterwards, at some time or other, have given to the city which they left the name of Old Tyre, without its being necessarily implied that the city had ever borne simply the name of Tyre. Or some accidental circumstance, now beyond the reach of conjecture, may have led to the name. This again would tally with the remark of Grote, who observes (loc. cit.) that perhaps the Phoenician name which the city on the mainland bore may have been something resembling Palaetyrus in sound, but not coincident in meaning. It is important, however, to bear in mind that this question regarding Palaetyrus is merely archaeological, and that nothing in Biblical history is affected by it. Nebuchadnezzar necessarily besieged the portion of the city on the mainland, as he had no vessels with which to attack the island; but it is reasonably certain that, in the time of Isaiah and Ezekiel the heart or core of the city was on the island. The city of Tyre was consecrated to Hercules (Melkarth), who was the principal object of worship to the inhabitants (Quintus Curtius, 4:2; Strabo, 16:757); and Arrian, in his History, says that the temple on the island was the most ancient of all temples within the memory of mankind (2, 16). It cannot be doubted, therefore, that the island had long been inhabited. With this agree the expressions as to Tyre being “in the midst of the seas” (Eze_27:25-26); and even the threat against it that it should be made like the top of a rock to spread nets upon (see Des Vignoles, Chronologie de L'histoire Sainte [Berlin. 1738], 2, 25). As, however, the space on the island was limited, it is very possible that the population on the mainland may have exceeded the population on the island (see Movers, loc. cit. p. 81).
2. Connection with Sidon. — Whether built before or later than Palaetyrus, the renowned city of Tyre, though it laid claims to a very high antiquity (Isa_23:7; Herod. 2, 14; Quintus Curtius, 4:4), is not mentioned either in the Iliad or in the Odyssey; ‘but no inference can be legitimately drawn from this fact as to the existence or non-existence of the city at the time. when those poems were composed. The tribe of Canaanites that inhabited the small tract of country which. may be called Phoenicia proper was known, by the generic name of Sidonians (Jdg_18:7; Isa_23:2; Isa_23:4; Isa_23:12; Jos_13:6; Eze_32:30); and this name undoubtedly included Tyrians, the inhabitants being of the same race, and the two cities being less than twenty English miles distant from each other. Hence when Solomon sent to Hiram king of Tyre for cedar-trees out of Lebanon, to be hewn by Hiram's subjects, he reminds Hiram that “there is not among us any that can skill to hew timber like the Sidonians” (1Ki_5:6). Hence Virgil, who, in his very first mention of Carthage, expressly states that it was founded by colonists from Tyre (En. 1, 12 ), afterwards, with perfect propriety and consistency, calls it the Sidonian city (ibid. 1. 677, 678; 4:545; see Des Vignoles, loc. cit. p. 25). In like manner, when Sidohians are spoken of in the Homeric poems (I7. 6:290; 23:743; Od. 4:84; 17:424), this might comprehend Tyrians; and the mention of the city Sidon, while there is no similar mention of Tyre, would be fully accounted for if it were necessary to account for such a circumstance at all in a poem by Sidon's having been in early times more flourishing than Tyre. It is worthy, likewise, of being noted that Tyre is not mentioned in the Pentateuch; but: here, again, though an inference may be drawn against the importance, no inference can be legitimately drawn against the existence, of Tyre in the times to which the Pentateuch refers. SEE SIDON.
3. General Characteristics. — As already intimated, Tyre was composed of two distinct parts or towns in historical times; the one situated on the mainland, or continental Tyre, and one on the island opposite, from four to thirty stadia (Pliny, Strabo) distant from each other. According to Pliny, the circumference of both was reckoned at about nineteen Roman miles, the island town comprising about twenty-two stadia. The town on the shore was called Palaetyrus, not from its having been founded before Island Tyrus for this, indeed, we may assume to have been the first of the two (Reland, Vitringa, Hengstenberg, etc.) — but from the circumstance of its having achieved a high renown long before its much less favorably situated island-sister. Constantly exposed to earthquakes and deluges-occupying a space naturally circumscribed, and rendered still more so by the erections necessary for the purple-fisheries and manufactories-and cut off from the easy means of export and import by caravans that belonged to the opposite city, Island-Tyrus was by far inferior in importance. In fact, only one (the western) part of the island had been built over up to the time of Hiram, the contemporary of Solomon —viz. the “Old Town” (τὸ ἄστυ), which probably served as harbor, a place for arsenals and magazines, to Palsetyrus, that by this time had sent out colonies already to Tartessus and the northern coast of Libya. The other part of the island, or rather a small island by itself, which has now ceased to be such, and which was first joined to the city as the “New Town” by Hiram, had till then probably been inhabited only by the priests attached to the sanctuary of Melkart. Besides these two there was a third town or suburb, the Eurychoros (esplanade), formed by means of substructions on the eastern side of the rock. Palaetyrus, extending from the river Leontes on the north to the Ras el-Ain on the south, covered with all its outlying parts the whole available maritime strip of land, and lay in one of the most fertile and blooming plains of Phoenicia (comp. Hos_9:13, שטולה בנוה, “planted in a pleasant place;” or William of Tyre, Fertilitate prsecipua et amcenitate quasi singularis, habet planitiem sibi continuam divitis glebse et opimi soli,” Hos_13:3). It was watered by several aqueducts, which carried the stream from the fountain-group situated in ‘the plain itself (head of the well, Ras al- Ayin), not only through the whole territory of the continental city, but, probably by means of subterranean pipes, also into the island-city. Without this supposition it would hardly be credible how the latter, which, up to the siege by Shalmaneser (before the 8th century), had subsisted on rain-water only collected in cisterns and open canals (ὑδραγωγοί) from the Ras, could have stood the long sieges by Nebuchadnezzar (thirteen years) and of Alexander, who naturally stopped the over ground supplies, without apparently once suffering from want of water.
Possibly we may, in a certain annual rite called the “Wedding of the land-water to the sea-water,” still kept up by the inhabitants, see a faint reminiscence of this ancient juncture. Here also stood the ancient royal palace and the first sanctuary of Hercules, though the most celebrated one lay on the island opposite. The happy mixture of land and sea scenery thus exhibited by the two cities in the time of their prosperity is graphically described by Nonnus, a learned Egyptian antideologist of the end of the 4th Christian century: “The sailor furrows the sea with his oar, as the ploughman the soil; the lowing of oxen and the song of birds answer the deep roar of the main; the hamadryad among the tall trees hears the voice of the Nereid calling to her from the waves; the breeze from Lebanon, while it cools the rustic at his midday labor, speeds the sailor seaward.” “O Tyrus,” exclaims the prophet (Eze_27:3, etc.), “thou hast said, I am of perfect beauty; thy borders are in the midst of the sea, thy builders have perfected thy beauty.” The poets call her “a virgin bathing in the sea, a Tartessus-ship swimming upon the ocean, an island on shore, and a city in the sea withal,” etc. Above all, however, Nonnus makes his Indian hero get into ecstasies at the primeval fountains, especially those where the water ‘gushing out of the depths of the earth, returns every hour;” and he mentions three distinct sources or water-nymphs “Abarberea, the fertile; Kallirrhoe, the sweet; and Drosera, the rich and bridal one.”
The description of Tyre in the prophecy of Ezekiel (Ezekiel 27; Ezekiel 10) receives striking illustration from what we believe to be its earliest coins. These coins were held to be most probably of Tyre or some other Phoenician city, or possibly of Babylon, on numismatic evidence alone, by Mr. Burgon, of the British Museum. They probably date during the 5th century B.C. — they may possibly be a little older-but it is most reasonable to consider them as of the time of, and issued by, Darius Hystaspis; The chief coins are octodrachms of the earlier Phoenician weight, bearing, on the obverse, a war-galley beneath the towered walls of a city, and, on the reverse, a king in a chariot, with an incuse goat beneath. This combination of galley and city is exactly what we find in the description of Tyre in Ezekiel, which mainly portrays a state-galley, but also refers to a port, and speaks of towers and walls. SEE NAVIGATION.
III. History. —
1. The early history of Tyre is so completely shrouded in mythical mystery that a rational reconstruction of it is next to impossible. We hear of kings of Phoenicia whose very names mostly prove them to be mere types of deities, or special tribes, such as Agenor, Phoenix, Phalis, Sidon, Tetramnestus, Tennes, Strato, Abdalominus (a word spelled in many different ways, the only reasonable orthography of which, however, must be Abd-Alonim [Heb. Elyonim], עבד עליוני, “servant of the highest ones, or gods”). Abibal, however, is called the first king of Tyre, and the predecessor of Hiram (Hierom, Suram, etc..), the Biblical Chiram, with whom, indeed, begins what to us is approximately the historical period of Phoenicia. We have already mentioned the calamity in consequence of which the Sidonians, hitherto the mightiest power of Phoenicia, were obliged to leave their capital and seek refuge in neighboring Tyre. This took place about B.C. 1200, and very soon after that period Tyre assumed the hegemony. Before the time of Samuel we already hear of the princes (Suffetes) of Tyre oppressing the Israelites (Jdg_10:12).
In the Bible, Tyre is named for the first time in the book of Joshua (Jos_19:29), where it is adverted to as a fortified city (in the A. V. “the strong city”), in reference to the boundaries of the tribe of Asher. Nothing historical, however, turns upon this mention of Tyre; for it is indisputable that the tribe of Asher never possessed the Tyrian territory. According to the injunctions of the Pentateuch, indeed, all the Canaanitish nations ought to have been exterminated; but, instead of this, the Israelites dwelt among the Sidonians or Phoenicians, who were inhabitants of the land (Jdg_1:31), and never seem to have had any war with that intelligent race. Subsequently, in a passage of Samuel (2Sa_24:7), it is stated that the enumerators of the census in the reign of David went in pursuance of their mission to Tyre, among other cities, which must be understood as implying, not that Tyre was subject to David's authority, but merely that a census was thus taken of the Jews resident there.
2. But the first passages in the Hebrew historical writings, or in ancient history generally, which afford glimpses of the actual condition of Tyre are in the book of Samuel (2Sa_5:11), in connection with Hiram king of Tyre (B.C. 980-947) sending cedar-wood and workmen to David, for building him a palace; and subsequently in the book of Kings, in connection with the building of Solomon's temple. One point at this period is particularly worthy of attention. In contradistinction from all the other most celebrated independent commercial cities out of Phoenicia in the ancient and modern world, Tyre was a monarchy, and not a republic; and, notwithstanding its merchant princes, who might have been deemed likely to favor the establishment of an aristocratical commonwealth, it continued to preserve the monarchical form of government until its final loss of independence. Another point is the skill in the mechanical arts which seems to-have already been attained by the Tyrians. Under this head, allusion is not specially made to the excellence of the Tyrians in felling trees; for, through vicinity to the forests of Lebanon, they would as naturally have become skilled in that art as the backwoodsmen of America. But what is peculiarly noteworthy is that Tyrians had become workers in brass or copper to ant extent which implies considerable advancement in art. In the enumeration of the various works in brass executed by the Tyrian artists whom Solomon sent for, there are lilies, palm-trees, oxen, lions, and cherubim (1Ki_7:13-45). The manner in which the cedar-wood and fir-wood were conveyed to Jerusalem is likewise interesting, partly from the similarity of the sea voyage to what may commonly be seen on the Rhine at the present day, and partly as giving a vivid idea of the really short distance between Tyre and Jerusalem.
The wood was taken in floats to Joppa (2Ch_2:16; 1Ki_5:9), a distance of less than seventy- four geographical miles. In the Mediterranean, during summer, there are times when this-voyage along the coast would have been perfectly safe, and when the Tyrians might have reckoned confidently, especially at night, on light winds to fill the sails which were probably used on such occasions. From Joppa to Jerusalem the distance was about thirty-two miles, and it is certain that by this route the whole distance between the two celebrated cities of Jerusalem and Tyre was not more than 106 geographical, or about 122 English, miles, Within such a comparatively short distance (which by land, in a straight line, was about twenty miles shorter). It would be easy for two sovereigns to establish personal relations with each other, more especially as the northern boundary of Solomon's kingdom, in one direction, was the-southern boundary of Phoenicia. Solomon and Hiram may frequently have met, and thus laid the foundations of a political alliance in personal friendship. If by messengers they sent riddles and problems for each other to solve (Josephus, Ant. 8, 5, 3; Cont. — Apion. 1, 17.), they may previously have had, on several occasions, a keen encounter of wits in convivial intercourse. In this way, likewise, Solomon may have become acquainted with the Sidonian women who, with those of other nations, seduced him to polytheism and the worship of Astarte in his- old age. Similar remarks apply to the circumstances which may have previously occasioned the strong affection of Hiram for David (1Ki_5:1).
However this maybe, it is evident that under Solomon there was a close alliance between the Hebrews and the Tyrians. Hiram supplied Solomon with cedar-wood, precious metals, and workmen, and gave him sailors for the voyage to Ophir and India; while, on the other hand, Solomon gave Hiram supplies of corn and oil, ceded to him some cities, and permitted him to make use of some havens on the Red Sea (1Ki_9:11-14; 1Ki_9:26-28; 1Ki_10:22). Under Hiram, Tyre not only attained to its fullest glory and renown among its sister-states, but the capital itself, enlarged by him into three distinct towns, received its fullest share of palaces, temples, and public edifices, and its two roadsteads and two harbors probably date from this period. It is at this period also when the joint trading expeditions to Ophir are recorded to have taken place, in which the Tyrians furnished the: pilots and mariners. Hiram himself seems altogether to have been a very refined, pious, and peaceful monarch. Hardly any wars are recorded during his lifetime, arid his reported interchange of problems with the “wisest of mankind” points to is renown as a bel esprit. These friendly relations survived for a time the disastrous secession of the ten tribes, and a century later Ahab married a daughter, of Ethbaal, king of the Sidonians (1Ki_16:31), who, according to Menander (Josephus, Ant. 8:13, 2), was a daughter of Ithobaal, king of Tyre.
3. Hiram was followed, according to Menander (in Josephus) and Theophilus, by Baleastartus, whose four sons reigned after him for short periods. First came, Abdastartus (939-931), who, in consequence of a palace revolution, was followed on the throne for twelve years by a soil of his nurse-a period of internal sedition and general lawlessness having intervened, during which (so Justin tells us) all the free citizens of Tyre were murdered by the slaves. Astartus, the eldest son of Baleastartus, succeeded to the government, and ruled from 918 to 907, when a third brother, Astarymus, was made king. He was murdered nine years later by Phaletus, his youngest brother, who, after a brief reign of nine months, was put to death by Ithobaal, priest of Astarte, in whose family the kingdom henceforth became hereditary.
This Ithobaal, the Ethbaal of Scripture, whose daughter was married to Ahab, is called by Josephus “king of Tyre and Sidon,” a sign of the supremacy which Tyre had acquired in his day. The drought reported to have taken place in Judaea under Ahab seems to have also touched Phoenicia, and such was Ithobaal's piety that at his supplication thunder-claps were heard, followed by copious rains. It was chiefly before his reign (898-866) that Tyre commenced to spread its colonies as far as Africa, Spain, etc. owing, in the first instance, probably to the danger of life and uncertainty of circumstances into which the country had been plunged bb the internal conflicts. But Ithobaal himself seems to have, encouraged colonization, and, in order to prevent the overcrowding of the old cities, to have built a number of new cities. Balezor, his son, succeeded in 865, and was followed by his son Mutton, the office of high-priest devolving on his second son, Sicharbaal. Mutton died in 833, and left two children, Elissa (Dido) and Pygmalion, who were to share the kingdom between them, while Elissa by her marriage with Sicharbaal, was to unite the high-priesthood with the crown. To this arrangement, however, the people, averse to the supreme priestly power, demurred, and Pygmalion was declared sole king. Elissa's husband having been killed, for the sake of his treasures, by the new king, and herself being-deprived of her dominion, she is said to have entered into a conspiracy with the aristocratic party, and, in the ninth year of Pygmalion's reign, assisted and followed by her brother Barca and the principal families of the land, to have reached Carthage (New Town, קרת חדשא), a colony founded some time, before by the Sidotians (about B.C. 813), and to have completely rebuilt it and laid the foundation for a power which contended with mighty Rome for the empire of the worlds.
4. The political existence of Palestine, Syria, and Phoenicia, which instead of making a joint desperate stand, kept on intriguing and plotting against each other Phoenicia, moreover, being hated and despised by her allies for her iniquitous trade in slaves kidnapped among her neighbors, chiefly in Judaea-was henceforth doomed. From this time commenced denunciations, and, at first, threats of retaliation (Joe_3:4-8; Amo_1:9-10); and, indeed, though there might be peace, there could not be sincere friendship between the two nations. But the likelihood of the denunciations being fulfilled first arose from the progressive conquests of the Assyrian monarchs. It was not probable that a powerful, victorious, and ambitious neighbor could resist the temptation of endeavoring to subjugate the small strip of land between the, Lebanon and the sea so insignificant in extent, but overflowing with so much wealth, which by the Greeks was called Phoenicia. Accordingly, when the king of Assyria had taken the city of Samaria, had conquered the kingdom of Israel and carried its inhabitants into captivity, he turned his arms against the Phoenician cities.
At this time Tyre had reached a high point of prosperity. It possessed the island of Cyprus, with the valuable mines of the metal “copper” (so named from the island), and apparently the city of Sidon was subject to its sway. But the Assyrian king seems to have taken advantage of a revolt of the Cyprians; and what ensued is thus related by Menander, who translated the archives of Tyre into the Greek language (see Josephus, Ant. 9:14, 2):” Elulaeus reigned thirty-six years (over Tyre). This king, upon the revolt of the Kittaeans (Cyprians), sailed with a fleet against them, and reduced them to submission. On the other hand, the king of the Assyrians attacked in war the whole of Phoenicia, but soon made peace with all, and turned back. On this, Sidon and Ace (i.e. Akko or Acre) and Palsetyrus revolted from the Tyrians, with many other cities, which delivered themselves up to the king of Assyria. Accordingly, when the Tyrians would not submit to him, the king returned and fell upon them again, the Phoenicians having furnished him with sixty ships and eight hundred rowers. Against these the Tyrians sailed with twelve ships, and, dispersing the fleet opposed to them, they took five hundred men prisoners. The reputation of all the citizens in Tyre was hence increased. Upon this the king of the Assyrians, moving off his army, placed guards at their river and aqueducts to prevent the Tyrians- from drawing water. This continued for five years, and still the Tyrians held out, supplying themselves with water from wells.” But there can hardly be a doubt that Tyre, as well as the whole of Phoenicia, very soon was made tributary to Assyria, like all the neighboring countries, and the calamities brought upon them all alike by the uninterrupted war expeditions of the Assyrian monarchs could not but be felt also by the dependencies and colonies. These fell more or less about this time into the hands of new settlers, from whom again Carthage, somewhat later, wrested a part for herself.
5. After the siege of Tyre by the Assyrians (which must have taken place not long after B.C. 721), Tyre remained a powerful state with its own kings (Jer_25:22; Jer_27:3; Eze_28:2-12), remarkable for its wealth, with territory on the mainland, and protected by strong fortifications (Eze_28:5; Eze_26:4; Eze_26:6; Eze_26:8; Eze_26:10; Eze_26:12; Eze_27:11; Zec_9:3). Our knowledge of its condition thenceforward until the siege by Nebuchadnezzar depends entirely on various notices of it by the Hebrew prophets; but some of these notices are singularly full, and especially the twenty-seventh chapter of Ezekiel furnishes us, on some points, with details such as have scarcely come down to us respecting any one city of antiquity, excepting Rome and Athens. One point especially arrests the attention, that Tyre, like its splendid daughter, Carthage, employed mercenary soldiers (Eze_27:10-11). This has been the general tendency in commercial cities on account of the high wages which may be obtained by artisans in a thriving community, compared with the ordinary pay of a soldier, and Tyre had been unable to resist the demoralizing temptation. In its service there were Phoenicians from Arvad, Ethiopians obtained through the commerce of Egypt, and hardy mountaineers from Persia. This is the first time that the name of Persia occurs in the remains of ancient literature, before its sons founded a great monarchy on the ruins of the Chaldean empire. Independently, however, of this fact respecting Tyrian mercenary soldiers, Ezekiel gives interesting details respecting the trade of Tyre. On this head, without attempting to exhaust the subject, a few leading points may be noticed. The first question is as to the countries from which Tyre obtained the precious metals, and it appears that its gold came from Arabia by the Persian Gulf (5, 22) just as in the time of Solomon it came from Arabia by the Red Sea. SEE OPHIR.
Whether the Arabian merchants, whose wealth was proverbial in Roman classical times (Horace, Od. 1, 29, 1), obtained their gold by traffic with Africa or, India, or whether it was the product of their own country, is uncertain; but so far as the latter alternative is concerned, the point will probably be cleared up in the progress of geological knowledge. On the other hand, the silver, iron, lead, and tin of Tyre came from a very different quarter of the world, viz. from the south of Spain, where the Phoenicians had established their settlement of Tarshish, or Tartessus. As to copper, we should have presumed that it was obtained from the valuable mines in Cyprus; but it is mentioned here in conjunction with Javan, Tubal, and Meshech, which points to the districts on the south of the Black Sea, in the neighborhood of Armenia, in the southern line of the Caucasus, between the Black Sea and the Caspian. The country whence Tyre was supplied with wheat, was Palestine. It may be added that the value of Palestine as a wheat country to Tyre was greatly enhanced by its proximity, as there was scarcely a part of the kingdom of Israel on the west of the river Jordan which was distant more than a hundred miles from that great commercial city. The extreme points in the kingdom of Judah would be somewhat more distant, but the wheat probably came from the northern part of Palestine. Tyre likewise obtained from Palestine oil, honey, and balm, but not wine apparently, notwithstanding the abundance of grapes and wine in Judah (Gen_49:11). The wine was imported from Damascus, arid was called wine of Hebron, which was probably not the product of the country adjoining the celebrated city of that name, but came from the neighborhood of Damascus itself (see Porter, Handbook for Syria, 2, 495; comp. Athenaeus, 1, 51). The Bedawin Arabs supplied Tyre with lambs and rams and goats, for the rearing of which their mode of life was so well adapted. Egypt furnished linen for sails, and doubtless for other purposes, and the dyes from shellfish, which afterwards became such a source of profit to the Tyrians were imported from the Peloponnesus (comp. the Laconicas purpuras of Horace, Od. 2, 18, 7, and Pliny, 9:40). Lastly, from Dedan, in the Persians Gulf, an island occupied possibly by a Phoenician colony, horns of ivory and ebony were imported, which must originally have been obtained from India (Ezekiel 27). SEE COMMERCE.
6. When the iron grasp of Assyria began to relax, the Chaldaeo-Egyptian contest brought still greater miseries upon that unfortunate Syro- Phoenician coast, and Phoenicia, still nominally ruled by Tyre. The Phoenicians, it would appear, had allied themselves to the Egyptians, who under Psammetichus had seized upon Philistia, and were about to assist Pharaoh-Necho in his further conquest of the Tyro-Palestinian states. When, therefore, at Carchemish, the Egyptians had been defeated by the Chaldaeans, the latter instantly followed up their victory by occupying Syria, Palestine, and Phoenicia, and selling a great number of the inhabitants of the latter, about B.C. 605. A league having been formed between these states to throw off the foreign yoke, gave rise to a new Chaldean expedition against them under Nebuchadnezzar (Jer_25:22; Jer_27:3; Jer_47:4), which ended with the destruction of Jerusalem (B.C. 588) and the reduction of the sea-coast except Tyre. For thirteen years Nebuchadnezzar besieged it by water and by land, but with what degree of success is still a matter of debate. Hitzig, Gesenius, Heeren, Winer. Kenrick and others hold that the siege was a failure. It is certain that the fall of Tyre is mentioned in no ancient history-neither by Josephus, nor by the Tyrian historian Menander, nor by Philostratus. Berosus, indeed, affirmed that Nebuchadnezzar “subdued all Syria and Phoenicia,” but Tyre is not expressly mentioned. Nay, Jerome says persons who had examined Greek and Phoenician histories, especially the writings of Nicolaus Damascenus, find no mention of the siege at all, but the reply of the father is only a retort upon the peifidia et mendacia of profane writers. Jerome's own assertion is, “Deus praedixerat, hoc sufficit.” The question then comes to be, whether the oracle of Ezekiel implies the capture of Tyre. The most graphic descriptions of this siege are found in Eze_26:7-12; Eze_26:17; Eze_28:2; Eze_29:18, etc. The prophet's language, “Son of man, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, caused his army to serve a great service against Tyrus every head was made bald, and every shoulder was peeled; yet he had no wages, nor his army, for Tyrus, for the service that he had served against it.
Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, “Behold I will give the land of Egypt unto Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and he shall take her multitude, and take her spoil, and take her prey and it shall be the wages for his army. I have given him the land of Egypt for his labor wherewith he served against it, because they, wrought for me, saith the Lord God” (Eze_29:18-20), would seem to imply that Nebuchadnezzar had failed; that his army had put forth all its energies, till “every head was bald” by the constant pressure of the helmet, and “every shoulder peeled” by the hard labor of the trenches and siege work, but that he had been disappointed, that he got no wages that the rich booty of the city did not fall into his possession, and that therefore Egypt was to afford him compensation “as a spoil,” “a prey,” “and wages for his army.” But surely the author or the collector of these. oracles could not so contradict himself and his own utterances as to affirm, as in 26:7-21, and then deny, the capture of Tyre by Nebuchadnezzar. The narrative of Berosus and Jerome is accepted by Movers, and Ewald, the latter of whom says that Jerome's statement “quite agrees with the brief words of Ezekiel.” It may also be replied, with Havernick, Hengstenberg, Fairbairn, and others, that the meaning is that Nebuchadnezzar, though he took the city, yet found no fitting recompense, as, according to Jerome, the inhabitants had removed all their valuable property to the island. That he took Palaetyrus seems certain, though there is no proof of Jerome's assertion that, in his assault upon the island, he had nearly completed a dam, and had erected warlike engines on it.
It is plain, too, that Tyre made submission to the Chaldaean king. Many of the Tyrian royal family resided afterwards at Babylon, perhaps as hostages, and several of them were asked by the Tyrians at different times and crises to come and reign over them. These facts are proofs of the Chaldaean conquest, and that it was more than such' a capitulation as is admitted by Niebuhr, Dunker, Kenrick. and others (Niebuhr, Gesch. Assur's, p. 216; Dunker, Gesch. des Alterthums, 1, 172; Kenrick, Phoenicia, p. 390; see Pusey, On Daniel, p. 288). Moreover, Isaiah, in his oracle against Tyre, specifically declared that it should be destroyed, not by the power which then threatened, but by the Chaldaeans, a people “formerly of no account” (23:13). The more detailed predictions of the prophet Ezekiel were delivered a hundred and twenty years later, B.C. 588. Tyre was not taken till the fifteenth year after the captivity, B.C. 573, more than seventeen hundred years, according to Josephus, after its foundation. Its destruction then must have been entire; all the inhabitants were put to the sword or led into captivity, the walls were razed to the ground, and it was made a “terror” and a desolation. It is remarkable that .one reason assigned by Ezekiel for the destruction of this proud city is its exultation at the destruction of Jerusalem. “I shall be replenished now she is laid waste” (Eze_16:2). This clearly indicates that its overthrow was posterior to that event and, if we take the seventy years during which it was; predicted by Isaiah (Isa_23:15) that Tyre should be forgotten to denote a definite term (which seems the most natural sense), we may conclude that it was not rebuilt till the same number of years after the return of the Jews from Babylon. That it was continental Tyre, and not insular Tyre, which Nebuchadnezzar besieged appears from the description of the siege which we have given us by Ezekiel; for we find that the king: cast up a mound against it, and erected engines to batter down the walls (Eze_28:8-10).
But that the city on, the island then, escaped this fate is manifest; from the Phoenician histories. But as to the latter also, at least; a show of submission, if not a subjection — leaving the native sovereigns on the throne, and their wealth and naval power untouched — was what Nebuchadnezzar gained when he ended the “wageless” siege (comp. Eze_29:17). Once more Nebuchadnezzar armed, at the end, of this war, against Egypt, but Pharaoh. Apries, swiftly marching upon Phoenicia, subduing it, and destroying its fleet, prevented this expedition. In this expedition; Apries besieged Sidon, fought a naval battle with Tyre, and reduced the whole of the coast of Phoenicia, though this could not have had lasting effects (Herod. 2, 161; Diod. 1, 68, Movers, as phonische Alterthum, 2, 451). The rule of Nebuchadnezzar over Tyre, though real, may have been light and in the nature of an; alliance; and it may have been in. this sense that Merbal, a subsequent Tyrian king, was sent for to Babylon (Josephus, Cont. Apion. 1, 21). At this time the ancient constitution of Tyre was changed. Ithobaal had been followed by Baal, but after Baal two judges (suffetes) took for a certain period the place of the monarch. We hear of, internal commotions-natural enough in a country: and city upon which calamity after calamity had fallen in, so short a time 1 and the existence of two parties in the, commonwealth that looked respectively to Chaldoea and to Egypt could not but foster those internal dissensions., In 538, while Eiromus stood at the head of the Tyrian or Phoenician affairs, Cyrus captured Babylon, and thus, became master also of Phoenicia, which had reverted to; this power. At that time Sidon, being made the royal; residence, again resumed the hegemony.
7. During the Persian domination the Tyrians were subject in, name to the Persian king and may have given him tribute. With the rest of Phoenicia, they had submitted to the Persians without striking a blow; perhaps through hatred of the Chaldees, perhaps solely from prudential motives. But their connection with the Persian king was not slavish. Thus, when Cambyses ordered them to join in an expedition against Carthage, they refused compliance, on account of their solemn engagements and parental relation to that colony; and Cambyses did not deem it right to use force towards them (Herod. 3, 19). Afterwards they fought with Persia against Greece, and furnished vessels of war in the expedition of Xerxes against Greece (ibid. 12, 98); and Mapên, the son of Sirom the Tyrian, is mentioned among those who, next to the commanders, were the most renowned in the fleet. It is worthy of notice that at this time Tyre seems to have been, inferior in power to Sidon. These two cities were less than twenty English miles distant from each other; and it is easy to conceive that in the course of centuries their relative importance might fluctuate, as would be very possible in modern times with two neighboring cities, such, for example, as Liverpool and Manchester. It is possible, also, that Tyre may have been seriously weakened by its long struggle against Nebuchadnezzar. Under the Persian dominion, Tyre and Sidon supplied cedarwood again to the Jews for the building of the second Temple and this wood was sent by sea to Joppa, and thence to Jerusalem, as had been the case with the materials for the first Temple in the time of Solomon (Ezr_3:7).
Under the Persians, likewise, Tyre was visited by a historian, from whom we might have derived valuable information respecting its condition (Herod. 2, 44). But the information actually supplied by him is scanty as the motive of his voyage seems to have been solely to visit the celebrated Temple of Melkarth (the Phoenician. Hercules), which was situated in the island, and' was highly venerated. He gives no details as to the city, and merely specifies two columns which he observed in the temple, one of gold and the other of emerald; or, rather, as is reasonably conjectured by Sir Gardiner Wilkinson, of green glass (Rawlinson, Herodotus, 2, 81,82). Under the successive Persian rulers Phoenicia was allowed to0 retain many of its national institutions, and even a certain amount of independence, in return for which it paid a comparatively small tax and placed its again powerful fleet at the disposal of the conquerors, who entirely lacked that most vital element of naval power. Together, with Philistia and Cyprus, it was incorporated under Darius Hystaspis in the fifth nomos, or circle, of the empire; and up to the time of Xerxes the relations between the conquerors and the conquered were of a perfectly friendly nature. But when this king, during his Greek invasion, had managed to destroy the highly prized Phoenician fleet almost completely, and to this calamity added galling measures and humiliations without end, the people became so exasperated that they took part, under Sidon's leadership, in the revolt of Egypt against Artaxerxes Mnemon and Ochus, about the middle of the 4th century, which ended most disastrously for the whole country, and particularly for Sidon, which, wealth and all, was fired by its own inhabitants. Tyre afterwards (350) again resumed the sway, until, after the battle on the Issus, all the Phoenician cities except herself paid their allegiance to the Macedonian warrior.
8. It was in consequence of this contumacy that Tyre was assailed for the third time by a great conqueror; and if some uncertainty hangs over the siege by Nebuchadnezzar, the results of the siege by Alexander were clear and undeniable. It was essential to the success of his military plans that the Phoenician fleet should be at his command, and that he should not be liable through their hostility to have his communications by sea with Greece and Macedonia suddenly cut off; and he accordingly summoned all the Phoenician cities to submit to his rule. All the rest of them, including Aradus, Byblus, and Sidon, complied with his demands, and the seamen of those cities in the Persian fleet brought away their ships to join him. Tyre alone, calculating probably at first on the support of those seamen, refused to admit him within its walls; and then ensued a memorable siege which lasted seven months, and the success of which was the greatest of all the achievements which Alexander up to that time had attempted. At that time Tyre was situated on an island nearly half a mile from the mainland; it was completely surrounded by prodigious walls, the loftiest portion of which on the side fronting the mainland reached a height not less than one hundred and fifty feet;” and, notwithstanding his persevering efforts, he could not have succeeded in his attempt, if the harbor of Tyre to the north had not been blockaded by the Cyprians, and that to the south by the Phoenicians. Moreover, owing to internal disturbances, Carthage was unable to afford any assistance to its parent state. For seven months Tyre sustained one of the most remarkable sieges ever recorded (B.C. 332). Palbetyrus having been razed to the ground, the island-city was connected by the conqueror with the mainland by means of a mole, which, once destroyed, had to be reconstructed entirely anew. An immense fleet was collected, the ablest engineers of Phoenicia and Cyprus exercised all their skill on the construction of new battering and other machines; while the means of defense on the part of the Tyrians were as cunning as they were successful, and fearfully galling to the besiegers. At last Tyre fell under a furious double attack, and, provoked by their desperate resistance even after the town was already taken, the soldiery fired it and massacred an immense number of the inhabitants. In accordance with the barbarous policy of ancient times, 30,000 of its inhabitants; including slaves, free females, and free children, were sold as slaves (Arrian, 4:24, 9; Diodorus, 17:46). Alexander replaced the population by new colonists, chiefly Carians, and soon again the exceptionally favorable position of the place regained for it part of its ancient prosperity, though its trade is said to have suffered by the vicinity and rivalry of Alexandria.
9. Ptolemy had, after Alexander's death, annexed Phoenicia to his kingdom; but when, in B.C. 315, Antigonus returned from Babylonia, he easily expelled his garrisons from all the Phoenician cities save Tyre, which only surrendered after an eighteen months siege. The boundaries of its territory at that period were: Sarepta to the north, the “Tyrian Ladder” to the south, and Kedes and Baka in Galilee to the east. Under the Macedonian successors of Alexander, it shared the fortunes of the Seleucide, who bestowed on it many privileges; and there are still in existence coins of that epoch with a Phoenician and Greek inscription (Eckhel, Doctr. Nusmmorum Vet. 3, 379, etc.; Gesenius, Mionum. Phoen. p. 262-264, and Tab. 34).
10. Beyond this nothing particular is known of Tyre from this time forth to the time of the civil wars of Rome-with which empire Phoenicia had been incorporated together with Syria by Pompey-when Cassius divided Syria into small provinces and sold them separately. Tyre for a short period thus became a principality again with a king of her own. Under the Romans it thus at first continued to enjoy a kind of freedom; for Josephus mentions that when Cleopatra pressed Antony to include Tyre and Sidon in a gift of Phoenician and Jewish territory which he made to her, he steadily refused, knowing them to have been “free cities from their ancestors” (Ant. 15:4, 1). Subsequently, however, on the arrival of Augustus in the East (A.D. 20), he is said to have deprived the two cities of their liberties for seditious conduct (ἐδουλώσατο, Dion Cassius, 64, 7). Still the prosperity of Tyre in the time of Augustus was undeniably great. Strabo gives an account of it at that period (16, 2, 23), and speaks of the great wealth, which it derived from the dyes of the celebrated Tyrian: purple, which, as is well-known were extracted from shell-fish found on the coast, belonging to a species of the gelius Murex.
In the days of Ezekiel, the Tyrians had imported purple from the Peloponnesus; but they had since learned to extract the dye for themselves; and they had the advantage of having shell-fish on their coast better adapted for this purpose even than those on the Lacedaemonian coast (Pausaniasn 3, 21, 6); Strabo adds that the great number of dyeing- works rendered the city unpleasant as a place of residence. He further speaks of the houses as consisting of many stories even of more than in the houses at Rome-which is precisely what might be expected in a prosperous fortified city of limited area, in which ground-rent would be high. Pliny the Elder gives additional information respecting the city, for in describing it he says that the circumference of the city proper (i.e. the city on the peninsula) was twenty-two stadia, while that of the whole city, including Palaetyrus, was nineteen Roman miles (Fist. Nat. 5, 17). The accounts of Strabo and Pliny have a peculiar interest in this respect, that they tended to convey an idea of what the city must have been when visited' by Christ (Mat_15:21; Mar_7:24). It was perhaps more populous than Jerusalem; and if so, it was undoubtedly the largest city which he is known to have visited. It was not much more than thirty miles distant from Nazareth, where Christ mainly lived as a carpenter's son during the greater part of his life (Mat_2:23; Mat_4:12-13; Mat_4:18; Mar_6:3). We may readily conceive that he may often have gone to Tyre while yet unknown to the world; and whatever uncertainty there may be as to the extent to which the Greek language was likely to be spoken at Nazareth, at Tyre and in its neighborhood there must have been excellent opportunities for conversation in that language, with which he seems to have been acquainted (Mar_7:26). At an early period a Christian community was formed there (Act_21:3; Act_21:7). It was early the seat of a Christian bishopric, and Cassius, bishop of Tyre, is named as having been present at the Council of Caesarea towards the close of the 2nd century (Reland Palestina, p. 1054).
For a long time Tyre retained her manufactures and trade, though a mere shadow of what these once had been. Chiefly with regard to her dyeing produce Hadrian granted Tyre the title of metropolis, and it formed the principal naval station on the Tyrian coast. Once again it was fired in A.D. 193, when it took part with Septimius Severus against Pescennius Niger in their contest for the crown, and Severus gratefully bestowed upon the place, which he peopled with his third legion, the title of colony and the Jus Italicum. Such was its elastic vitality that at the time of Constantine it again equaled all the Eastern cities in wealth and commercial prosperity. Jerome, in the 4th century, calls it the noblest and most beautiful city of Phoenicia, and expresses his astonishment at the apparent nonfulfilment of the prophecy which threatened its eternal desolation (“Nec edificaberis ultra videtur facere qusestionem, quomodo non sit aedificata? quam hodie cernimus Phocenices nobilissimam et pulcherriimam civitatem”).
11. In the 7th century took place the extraordinary Arabian revolution under Mohammed which has given a new religion to so many millions of mankind. In the years A.D. 633-638, all Syria and Palestine, from the Dead Sea to Antioch, were conquered by the caliph Omar. This conquest was so complete that in both those countries the language of Mohammed has almost totally supplanted the language of Christ. In Syria there are only three villages where Syriac (or Aramaic) is the vernacular language. In Palestine it is not the language of a single native; and in Jerusalem, to a stranger who understands what is involved in this momentous revolution, it is one of the most suggestive of all sounds to hear the muezzin daily call Mohammedans to prayers in the Arabic language of Mohammed within the sacred precincts where once stood the Temple in which Christ worshipped in Hebrew or in Aramaic. (As to the Syriac language, see Porter, Handbook for Syria and Palestine, 2, 551.) But even this conquest did not cause the overthrow of Tyre. The most essential conditions on which peace was granted to Tyre, as to other Syrian cities, were the payment of a poll- tax, the obligation to give board and lodging for three days to every Moslem traveler, the wearing a peculiar dress, the admission of Moslems into the churches, the doing away with all crosses and all sounds of bells the avoiding of all insulting expressions towards the Mohammedan religion, and the prohibition to ride on horseback or to build new churches (see Well, Gesch. der Chalifen, 1, 81-82).
Some of these conditions were humiliating and nearly heart-breaking; but if submitted to, the lives and private property of the inhabitants remained untouched.: Notwithstanding the establishment of an imperial dyeing manufactory at Constantinople, Tyre yet retained her ancient celebrity for her purple, which was imported into Lombardy at the time of Charlemagne. Under the caliphs it enjoyed the benefits of a mild and enlightened dominion, and during the crusades was much admired both for its natural beauty and its fine edifices and its generally prosperous aspect. It again had at that time to sustain a long siege, but finally surrendered (1124), and was made an archbishopric, bestowed four years afterwards upon William of Tyre, the chronicler of the crusades. In August, 1192, it was fixed as the northern boundary of the Christian ‘territories in Palestine, and continued to flourish, chiefly through the Venetian trade, as a commercial city until the conquest of Syria by Selim I in 1516, from which time forth its decline, further aided by the discovery of the New World and the route to Asia by the Cape of Good Hope, has been rapid and complete.
IV. Present Condition. — In the first half of the 14th century, Tyre was visited by Sir John Maundeville, who says, speaking of Tyre, which is now called Sûr, here was once a great and goodly city of the Christians; but the Saracens have destroyed it in great part, and they guard that haven carefully “for fear of the Christians” (Wright, Early Travels in Palestine, p. 141). About 1610-11 it was visited by Sandys, who said of it, “But this once famous Tyre is now no other than a heap of ruins; yet have they a reverent aspect, and do instruct the pensive beholder with their exemplary frailty. It hath two harbors, that on the north side the fairest and best throughout all the Levant (which the cursors enter at their pleasure); the other choked with the decays of the city” (Purchas, Pilgrims, 2. 1393). Towards the close of the same century, in 1697, Maundrell says of it, “On the north side it has an old Turkish castle, besides which there is nothing here but a mere Babel of broken walls, pillars, vaults, etc., there being not so much as an entire house left. Its present inhabitants are only a few poor wretches that harbor in vaults and subsist upon fishing” (see Harris, Voyages and Travels, 2, 846). Lastly, without quoting at length Dr. Richard Pococke, who in 1737-40 stated (see vol. 10 of Pinkerton, Voyages and Travels, p. 470) that, except some janissaries, there were few other inhabitants in the city than two or three Christian families, the words of Hasselquist, the Swedish naturalist, may be recorded, as they mark the lowest point of depression which Tyre seems to have reached.
He was there in May, 1751, and he thus speaks of his visit: “We followed the seashore… and came to Tyre, now called Zur, where we lay all night. None of these cities, which formerly were famous, are so totally ruined as this except Troy. Zur now scarcely can be called a miserable village, though it was formerly Tyre, the queen of the sea. Here are about ten inhabitants, Turks and Christians, who live by fishing (Voyages and Travels in the Levant [Lond. 1766]). A slight change for the better began soon after Volney states that in 1766 the Metawileh took possession of the place, and built a wall round it twenty feet high, which existed when he visited Tyre nearly twenty years afterwards. At that time Volney estimated the population at fifty or: sixty poor families. Since the beginning of the present century there has been a partial revival of prosperity. But it has been visited at different times during the last thirty years by Biblical scholars, such as Robinson, Stanley (Sinai and Pal. p. 270), and Renan (Letter in the Moniteur, July 11, 1861), who all concur in the account of its general aspect of desolation. Mr. Porter, who resided several years at Damascus, and had means of obtaining correct information, stated in 1858 that “the modern town, or rather village, contains from 3000 to 4000 inhabitants, about one half being Metawileh; and the other Christians” (Handbook, p. 391). They are living among the broken ruins of its former magnificence, eking out a scanty livelihood upon insignificant exports of tobacco, cotton, wool, and wood. The place as it now stands was founded under the old name Sur in 1766, and suffered very considerably during the earthquake in 1837. The remains of an ancient cathedral church probably enclose the bones of the emperor Frederick Barbarossa and of Origen. About one and a half mile distant from Tyre is the so-called Tomb of Hiram, an immense sarcophagus of limestone, popularly supposed to contain the corpse of that king. SEE HIRAM.
The present city lies only upon the eastern part of the island, on the junction of the island and isthmus. The houses are mostly mere hovels, one story high, with flat roofs; and the streets are narrow, crooked, and filthy. Yet the numerous palm-trees and pride of India trees interspersed among the houses and gardens throw over the plain an Oriental charm. One of the best accounts of its present appearance is given by Dr. Robinson, who spent a Sabbath there in 1838 (Bibl. Res. 3, 395): “I continued my walk,” says he, “along the shore of the peninsula, part of which is now unoccupied except as ‘a place to spread nets upon,' musing upon the pride and fall of ancient Tyre. Here was the little isle, once covered by her palaces and surrounded by her fleets; but, alas! thy riches and thy fame, thy merchandise, thy mariners and thy pilots, thy calkers, and the occupiers of thy merchandise that were in thee-where are they? Tyre has indeed become like ‘the top of a rock.' The sole tokens of her more ancient splendor columns of red and gray granite, sometimes forty or fifty heaped together, or marble pillars-lie broken and strewed beneath the waves in the midst of the sea; and the hovels that now nestle upon a portion of her site present no contradiction of the dread decree, ‘Thou shalt be built no more.'
The downfall and permanent desolation of Tyre is one of the most memorable accomplishments of prophecy which the annals of the world exhibit. The sins which sealed its ruin were, in the words of the sacred writers, these: “Because that Tyrus hath said against Jerusalem, Aha, she is broken that was the gates of the people; she is turned unto me; I shall be replenished, now she is laid waste” (Eze_26:2). “Because thine heart is lifted up, and thou hast said, I am a god, I sit in the seat of God, in the midst of the seas” (Eze_28:2). “The children also of Judah and the children of Jerusalem have ye sold unto the Grecians, that ye might remove them far from their border” (Joe_3:6).
V. Literature. — See, in addition to the works cited above, Cellarii Notit. 2, 381 sq.; Hengstenberg, De Rebus Syriorum (Berol. 1832); Rhyner, De Tyro (Basil. 1715); Camem, De Nave Tyria (Viteb. 1714); Smith, Dict. of Class. Geog. s.v.; Poulan de Bossay, Rechierches sur Tyre (Paris, 1864); Thomson, Land and Book, 1, 260 sq.; Gesenius, Comment. zu Jesa. 1, 707 sq.; Wilson, Lands of the Bible, 2, 229; Badeker, Palestine, p. 426 sq.; Ridgaway, The Lord's Land, p. 604 sq.



CYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLICAL, THEOLOGICAL AND ECCLESIASTICAL
press 1895.

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