Dark Side History: Carthage’s Child Sacrificing Empire

Carthage is known as the arch enemy of Rome during its brutal ascendance to power, but what is less known is the fact that Carthage had its own side of brutality and a society and Phoenician culture just a complex as that of the Romans. In this episode we will dig into the darker side of Carthage both in its own expansive politics and in its religion that underpinned most of its society and we will go into the rather dark subject of human sacrifice..
This video is part of the dark side history series • Dark Side History ,
And can also be seen in the all history playlist: • All history
Please don't forget to comment, ask questions, like and subscribe as those actions helps this channel grow!
Sources and further reading:
Barceló, Pedro, THE PERCEPTION OF CARTHAGE IN CLASSICAL GREEK HISTORIOGRAPHY, Acta Classica, Vol. 37 (1994), pp. 1-14, Classical Association of South Africa, www.jstor.org/stable/24594338,
Kennedy, Maev (21 January 2014). "Carthaginians sacrificed own children, archaeologists say". The Guardian.
Miles, Richard (2011), Carthage Must Be Destroyed: The Rise and Fall of an Ancient Civilization, Viking.
Moscati, Sabatino (1972). I fenici e Cartagine. Torino
Polybius, Polybii Historiae, editionem a Ludovico Dindorfi curatam, retractavit Theodorus Büttner-Wobst, Lipsiae in aedibus B. G. Teubneri, vol.1-5 excluding vol.2
Quinn, Josephine Crawley(2018), In Search of the Phoenicians, Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey
Siculus, Diodorus (1935). Library of History: Loeb Classical Library. Translated by Oldfather, C. H. Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press.
Siculus, Diodorus; H. Valesius; I. Rhodomannus; F. Ursinus (1814). The Historical Library of Diodorus the Sicilian in Fifteen Books to which are added the Fragments of Diodorus. Translated by G. Booth. London: J. Davis
Soren, David; et al. (1990), Carthage: Uncovering the Mysteries and Splendors of Ancient Tunisia, New York: Simon & Schuster.
#History #Carthage #Punic

[@theculturedjinni]

Please do enjoy this video about Carthage’s empire and its culture, if you have any questions or other comments please do state them, a thought unsaid is a missed opportunity to learn more, push the like button if you found it good, also don't forget to subscribe if you have not done so before!

[@outoftheblu__]

Great topic, Carthage is one of the most interesting ancient empires. It was cool seeing a video talk about the lesser known aspects of their society. Nice work 👍

[@theculturedjinni]

Thanks for the comment I truly appreciate it. I actually think that Carthage is extremely interesting, especially its religion as it seems from the tentative evidence we have that they had some sort of theocratic structures, their elected leaders were called safits, which is derived from a semitic root meaning clean or pure, the same root actually exists in Arabic (this I can confirm) which like hebrew and aramic is related to Pheonician. It was thus likely that they had some sort of religious function or were chosen from the priests. We also know that a lot of other cultures that were similar to the Carthagininas had theocratic structures. I could have gone into more depths of it but then the video would have become too long I felt, better to spare it for some time in the future. Maybe a video about ancient Semitic paganism. I am currently working upon the editing in the video about foundational empires that I hinted to you about earlier. Anyway, I hope that this and future videos will be to your liking. I aim to please.

[@NightshineThieves]

This is a really interesting video! I haven't heard much about this era so it's always interesting to learn more!

[@theculturedjinni]

I am glad that you found interesting, I try to find interesting things related to history all over the place. 👍

[@SomasAcademy]

Interesting video full of good information, but if I might give some constructive criticism, I found the visuals a bit distracting; the transparent overlay of moving video over the still map, along with the label up at the top and the flashes of text, and the smaller images that are overlaid on top of it all for certain parts of the video (like the mask icon at certain parts, and the coins around 7:30 that also have text on top of them)... it all felt a bit cluttered to me, especially in a few parts where text overlaps with other text. I would recommend focusing on maybe two elements that best illustrate your point in any given scene (like an image and some text). Also, smaller point, at ~19:40-45 you have some kind of iffy captions. The Canaanites were not all descended from Phoenicians, Phoenicians were a smaller group within the larger category of Canaanites (with Canaan being a region encompassing most of modern Israel-Palestine and Lebanon). This category also included the ancestors of the Israelites, though they would later distance themselves from Canaanite identity and cast the Canaanites as a rival population which they conquered and wiped out, instead of their own ancestors and cousins. That's an aside, my point is just that the Canaanites the Hebrews spoke of were not specifically the descendants of Phoenicians, but were largely their southern relatives. Just after that, you have a caption about how "The Demon Baal Sebub (lord of flies) was the Hebrews naming Baal a demon," but the image you use is of Baphomet, a demon actually derived from the Prophet Muhammad (Muhammad > Mahomet > Baphomet) - basically, the early Crusaders thought that Muhammad was the name of the Muslim God, and since he wasn't the same as their God, they assumed he was a demon as they often did with Pagan gods. Also, it's worth noting that the first record of the name Ba'al Zebub is not referring to a god worshipped by the Canaanites, but rather the Philistines - while they worshipped the same gods as the Canaanites (a category which included Hebrews at the time), the Philistines were not Canaanites themselves, let alone descendants of the Phoenicians. It is unlikely that Ba'al Zebub was a reference to Ba'al Hammon, as the title of "Ba'al" was applied to many gods, and Ba'al Hammon was associated with Tyre, while Ba'al Zebub was labelled "the god of Ekron." Apologies for nitpicking, it's just what I do.

[@theculturedjinni]

Thanks for the constructive criticism. I am all welcome to it and I really appreciate that you took your time to view and comment upon this video. Regarding the picture of Baphomet that was more of generic choice of picture for a demon/devil with regard to demonification of deities, but yes it is not ba'l precisely. I never said that the Phoenicians, were the group that Cannanites descended from, just that Phoenicians were refererad to as Canaanites ( though this is kind of debated as to what groups made up the Canaanites which was a group consisting of many different peoples). And it is true that we should be aware the that there did exist a lot of diversity in the Levant but there probably also existed a lot of overlap due to shared heritage and due to intercultural borrowing. Regarding the title Ba'l it just means lord so it is as you say possible that it is an entirely different god, however there is actually some theoretical speculations about the name lord of flies being a reference to the human sacrifice (as death attracts flies) and it would be vary similar type of worship. in regards to ba'l Sebub there is another possible connection with the name Malqart, from 'abd malqart= servant of malqart in inscriptions found all around old Canaan. Malqart was actually a pretty popular deity so it is not entirely unreasonable to assume that he might be the same ba'l or lord. Of course there could also just exist overlap in similar types of worship. It also does not help that certain gods like Tanit are sometimes refereed to as aspects of Ba'l Hammon/Malqart so overlap and fusions between various gods was not uncommon thus separating them and say this is that god or that is sometimes hard to do as well. I am actually planing in the future (maybe a couple of months into the future) to make video about ancient Semitic Paganism so I will take this into consideration then. I made some oversimplifications here that might have deserved a bit more depth. But once again I actually appreciate these sorts of notifications and comments! It forces me to clarify things that I might not have been clear enough in.

[@aster3907]

very interesting

[@theculturedjinni]

I am glad you found it interesting!👍

[@chiupuh]

Nice video. For the amount of information you present, text is very important. In my opinion you should avoid 3D text- like you have in the begining- it is often unclear. I would suggest avoid gradient text also, unless it's on a plain background.- the next title after the 3D text was gradient I believe. Otherwise great vid! Keep it up!

[@theculturedjinni]

Thanks for the advice. I will keep it in mind for the future. After all making videos is a learning process! I am extremely thankful that you take the time to view and comment upon my videos.

[@chiupuh]

@@theculturedjinni my pleasure. Your content is really informative 👏 👍

[@StoicHistorian]

Had no idea about this, great video

[@theculturedjinni]

Yeah the Carthaginians were a lot more complex than only "the enemies/victims of Rome", it is actually pretty interesting to look into the research of this as some of those that do ancient Semitic studies involving Carthage actually have a background in Arabic or Hebrew studies, and I can't but actually also kind of follow a similar type of thinking. However, again as I state in the video we actually don't have much information about Carthage so some things have to be guessed by likelihood from "close cultures".

[@namerelevant2499]

Just discovered your channel. Keep it up! Good work on interesting subjects.

[@theculturedjinni]

I will continue, as I plan to at the very least release a video every Sunday at around 15.00 New York time.

[@afrodobooks]

This is why I'm glad I live in the modern world too. I agree. But hey, another great informative video!

[@theculturedjinni]

Yeah, people are sometimes not aware of how much different the past was. And thanks for the comment, I am glad you liked it.

[@DanMcLeodNeptuneUK]

Next time I'm around Tunisia I just HAVE TO visit the Carthaginian ruins! And once again, I feel the need to start an anti-Roman Carthage campaign in Rome Total War ...

[@theculturedjinni]

In the famous words of Cato "Cartago delenda est". Though to be honest Cartago is a really fun faction to play in both Rome I and Rome II due to the size of the unit roster and the various possible play-styles with them.

[@omran1305]

I'm happy on KZbin

[@theculturedjinni]

And I am too, thanks for checking out my channel!

[@jesusnavarrete6317]

Correct me if I'm wrong but even Rome didn't like this ??!

[@theculturedjinni]

Yes, they might have been fine with killing infants themselves (as they practiced it regularly themsevles), but due to their ideals about religion and ritual purity, "castus" in latin, they actually saw human sacrifice and especially child sacrifice as being ritually impure and hence barbaric in their eyes. It was fine killing infants outside of religion, but it was not fine to involve the gods in it. The world of the antiquity was truly a very different place than today and people thought about things very differently from how we think about things today.

[@DigisonixTheGod]

Hi

[@venum7603]

They Never did that they just p.ut the sick kids with each others when they die they never sacrificed them

[@theculturedjinni]

Good that you comment! I appreciate comments and questions regarding my videos! Never be afraid to question things here on my channel! But regarding the fact that the phoenicians killed babies or just burned already dead ones. Actually, new evidence such as knife wounds (why stick a knife in an already dead baby?) upon the skeletons found in neighboring phoenician settlements together with the older evidence from several cultures (Romans, Greeks, Egyptians and the Jews ( these are more than just a few individual cases), several of which(Romans and Greeks) had no problem with infanticide (killing children) themselves but would have issues with sacrifice of Humans to deities, paint a picture of a culture that in all likelihood did practice human sacrifice according to Josephine Crawley. And also other Pagan Semitic cultures (that are different degrees of related to the Carthaginians did practice human sacrifice, so it would not be a stretch to imagine the Phoenicians doing it too!) I hope you can see why I reasoned to adopt this interpretation of the Carthaginians actually doing child sacrifice! Again I am thankful that you took the time to comment upon my video! If you have any question regarding this or any of my other videos then don't be afraid to voice them!

[@buculahau]

I have heard that a ritual practice by "jws" called blood libel has been practice up to modern times!

[@jamessheehy2752]

Unfortunately recent discoveries have shown that they systemically held sacrifices of children on mass in times of need mass graves of urns were found. These urns were analysed and the children ranged from a few months to early teens and were healthy. They think that possibly the origin of Carthage may have been Baal Zealots leaving in mass or being evicted over these beliefs from caanan.

[@venum7603]

@@jamessheehy2752 bud m from Carthage we doing study about this . Not true

[@dony7476]

Abortion

[@dony7476]

Back then they killed so thier God give them a better life. Now they abort so the mother / father have a better life.

[@theculturedjinni]

Post-birth abortion in this case. 😒

[@dony7476]

@The Cultured Jinni (A History & Culture Channel) same. Just relabeled due to thier location. Both have beating hearts, blood, brains eyes working organs and respond to pain or stimuli. Both human

[@theculturedjinni]

@@dony7476 I understand the sentiment and what you mean, though just to raise one point in the opposite direction, not all abortions are made at that stage, as some abortions happen before those things have developed. And, even with that I don't think it is that close of a comparison as the Carthaginians did this out of piety in a religion now long gone and abortion in modern day is done due to other reasons, which can be considered illegitimate or legitimate depending upon reason and philosophical outlook.

[@dony7476]

@The Cultured Jinni (A History & Culture Channel) The reasons for abortions are 98% because the parents want a better life. Seldom for other reasons. Prob 99% of the time They can't control thier lust and pursuit of pleasure. Put it this way If a scientist finds a single cell amoeba on Mars, they announce they found life on mars and get excited. Bur if a baby that is a multi celled organism, with working circulation and neurological systems and multiple cells working in unison. (Even at the early stages) they say it's not life. They kill it. Humanity is so dark and selfish sometimes.