Two Punic Stelae Rediscovered in Philadelphia

Two Punic stone stelae and a glass head-bead (of the “demonicmask” type) acquired in North Africa over a century ago have been rediscovered in the Penn Museum. Though present in some European collections, Punic stelae are relatively scarce in US museums. The stelae illustrate the funerary art of late Punic Carthage and votive practices in its so-called tophet, with one of the stelae containing the dedication of an offering by a man counting a rab (“chief ”) and a suffete (“judge”) in his ancestry, indicating that he held a degree of state authority in Carthage. The stelae are representative of the time around the Hannibalic era at Carthage, and are fine illustrations of the historic and sociological conditions in the Punic world

Ancient history · Archaeology · Art · Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History · Archaeology and Historical Studies · Classical Antiquity Studies · History

• Cemetery or sacrifice? Infant burials at the Carthage Tophet

  Open Access•Paolo Xella, Josephine Quinn et al.•Antiquity•2013

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