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Phoenician
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Byblos: Phoenician and Roman ruins Phoenician necklace Phoenician writing
The rise and fall of the Phoenician civilization
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Byblos: Phoenician and Roman ruins
Byblos: Phoenician and Roman ruins Phoenician and Roman ruins at Byblos, Lebanon.

Phoenician

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Phoenician alphabet
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Phoenician necklace
1 of 2
Phoenician necklacePhoenician necklace made from glass beads, 3rd–1st century bce.
Phoenician writing
2 of 2
Phoenician writingA basalt relief stela of King Kilamuwa from the 9th century bce showing Phoenician writing. The stela was found at an archeological site in Turkey.

Phoenician, person who inhabited one of the city-states of ancient Phoenicia, such as Byblos, Sidon, Tyre, or Beirut, or one of their colonies. Located along eastern Mediterranean trade routes, the Phoenician city-states produced notable merchants, traders, and colonizers. By the 2nd millennium bce they had settled in the Levant, North Africa, Anatolia, and Cyprus. They traded wood, cloth, dyes, embroideries, wine, and decorative objects; ivory and wood carving became their specialties, and the work of Phoenician goldsmiths and metalsmiths was well known. Their alphabet became the basis of the Greek alphabet.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaThis article was most recently revised and updated by Adam Zeidan.