A Newly Discovered Tanit Pendant from Maresha

Abstract

Recent excavations of Subterranean Complex 89 at Maresha yielded, among other items, a bronze pendant in the shape of the Phoenician-Punic goddess Tanit. The pendant was discovered in a room with ships graffiti and nearby a loculi tomb that was later dismantled. Exact parallels to this pendant are known from Tel Ashkelon and Tel Michal in Israel and Tall Sukas in Syria, while similar examples were identified at Sidon, Tel Ashkelon, Megiddo and Motya (Sicily). With the exception of the anomalous example from Megiddo, which dates to the eleventh century BCE, all of these pendants date to the Persian and/or Hellenistic period. Phoenician (especially Sidonian) influences on the Idu-maean town of Maresha are reviewed, perhaps testifying to a Sidonian presence at the town, as is also attested by the Apollophanes inscription from the so-called Sidonian tomb.