Here is the long-awaited corpus on Tyrian coinage in the Persian period (4th-5th cent. BCE), containing a chronological catalogue of 1,814 silver and bronze coins. Besides the usual numismatic analysis (monetary production, volume of emissions, manufacturing techniques and processes...), the authors have also studied the monetary inscriptions and iconography. They focused on using their own statistical data, reaching many interesting metrological conclusions. The Tyrian workshop was innovative, in that around 388 BCE it inaugurated a yearly dating system. This book is also an important historical volume on Tyre and on the Persians' western policy, based on the results of a numismatic analysis, combined with all the other sources: in particular, the city's significant difficulties in the first part of the 4th cent. and its prosperity during the reign of King Ozmilk (347-333/2), in stark contrast to the decay of Sidon at that time.

The Phoenicians present a tantalizing face to the ancient historian. Latin sources suggest they once had an extensive literature of history, law, philosophy and religion; but all now is lost. Offering new insights based on recent archaeological discoveries in their heartland of modern-day Lebanon, Mark Woolmer presents a fresh appraisal of this fascinating, yet elusive, Semitic people. Discussing material culture, language and alphabet, religion (including sacred prostitution of women and boys to the goddess Astarte), funerary custom and trade and expansion into the Punic west, he explores Phoenicia in all its paradoxical complexity. Viewed in antiquity as sage scribes and intrepid mariners who pushed back the boundaries of the known world, and as skilled engineers who built monumental harbour cities like Tyre and Sidon, the Phoenicians were also considered (especially by their rivals, the Romans) to be profiteers cruelly trading in human lives. The author shows them above all to have been masters of the sea: this was a civilization that circumnavigated Africa two thousand years before Vasco da Gama did it in 1498.

Arwad (now in Syria), Byblos (now Jbeil in Lebanon), Sidon (Saida in Lebanon), and Tyre (Sour in Lebanon)—the four major cites of Persian-period Phoenicia—all minted their own coins. Archaeologists and historians have found these coins to be a major resource for the reconstruction of Phoenician history. They have increasingly been able to use them to discern important details of Phoenicia’s political history that were previously unknown or were presented only from the perspective provided by the reports of the Greek historians or were based on knowledge of the Greek language, rather than being based on knowledge of Semitic languages and the iconography and inscriptions of the Phoenicians themselves. For more than two decades, Alain and Josette Elayi have researched the history of the Phoenician cities in the Persian period before Alexander’s conquest. In the first stage of their research, the authors provided an overview of the Phoenician economy under Persian rule. The second stage provided an analysis of all hoards, which included Phoenician coins dating to the Persian period. The third stage was an investigation of Phoenician weights, in which the Elayis used an original method that is also suited to numismatic studies. The fourth stage covered the monetary and political histories of the four Phoenician cities. In A Monetary and Political History of the Phoenician City of Byblos, the Elayis’ tour de force is the coin catalog, which introduces 1,662 silver Byblian coins, also published in 25 plates. In addition to the usual numismatic analysis (monetary production, number of issues, manufacturing techniques, and processes), this impressive volume provides information on monetary inscriptions and iconography and on the history of Byblos. The book is an indispensable reference for understanding coin circulation, trading exchanges, and even the wars involving the Greeks, Cypriots, and Egyptians in the Phoenician eastern Mediterranean.

Large-scale economic change such as the rise of coinage occurred during the Persian-dominated centuries (6th-4th centuries BCE) in the Eastern Mediterranean and ancient Near East. How do the biblical texts of the time respond to such developments? In this study, Peter Altmann lays out foundational economic conceptions from the ancient Near East and earlier biblical traditions in order to show how Persian-period biblical texts build on these traditions to address the challenges of their day. Economic issues are central for how Ezra and Nehemiah approach the topics of temple building and of Judean self-understanding, and economics are also important for other Persian-period texts. Following significant interaction with the material culture and extra-biblical texts, the author devotes special attention to the ascendancy of economics and its theological and identity implications as structuring metaphors for divine action and human community in the Persian period.

Demetrius the Besieger offers the first historical and historiographical biography of Demetrius Poliorcetes (336-282 BC) to be published in English. Also known as 'The Besieger of Cities', Demetrius is the most fascinating and high profile of the Successors to Alexander the Great, an outstanding, yet enigmatic figure famous for his siege warfare and his legendary womanising: this volume charts the many triumphs and disasters during his career and hispivotal role in the formation of the so-called 'Hellenistic' age.

The Phoenicians created the Mediterranean world as we know it--yet they remain a poorly understood group. In this Handbook, the first of its kind in English, readers will find expert essays covering the history, culture, and areas of settlement throughout the Phoenician and Punic world.

This Handbook aims to serve as a research guide to the archaeology of the Levant, an area situated at the crossroads of the ancient world that linked the eastern Mediterranean, Anatolia, Mesopotamia, and Egypt. The Levant as used here is a historical geographical term referring to a large area which today comprises the modern states of Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, western Syria, and Cyprus, as well as the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and the Sinai Peninsula. Unique in its treatment of the entire region, it offers a comprehensive overview and analysis of the current state of the archaeology of the Levant within its larger cultural, historical, and socio-economic contexts. The Handbook also attempts to bridge the modern scholarly and political divide between archaeologists working in this highly contested region. Written by leading international scholars in the field, it focuses chronologically on the Neolithic through Persian periods - a time span during which the Levant was often in close contact with the imperial powers of Egypt, Anatolia, Assyria, Babylon, and Persia. This volume will serve as an invaluable reference work for those interested in a contextualised archaeological account of this region, beginning with the 'agricultural revolution' until the conquest of Alexander the Great that marked the end of the Persian period.