The Phoenicians take the Mediterranean
Traders from a few Levantine cities plant colonies from Cyprus to Spain.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 500 years
- Known to
- ± 50 years
- Era
- Iron Age, Holocene
Freed from imperial control after the Bronze Age collapse, Tyre, Sidon and Byblos build a commercial network spanning the Mediterranean, founding trading posts and colonies in Cyprus, Sicily, Sardinia, North Africa and southern Spain, reaching the Atlantic for tin and silver. They spread the alphabet, glassmaking and purple dye. Because they wrote on papyrus rather than clay, almost none of their own literature survives — they are known largely through their enemies.