On Tue, 4 Nov 2003, Andre Engels wrote:
Is there someone here with good and current knowledge
about ancient history
in general and/or Phoenicia in particular? If so, please take a look at the
recent edits to [[Phoenicia]]. I get the impression that someone is trying
to pass off the opinion of a respected but by no means general accepted
theory/professor as being 'the' truth about Phoenicia. I do know something
about this subject, but not enough to either go into an edit war or resolve
it.
I am not an expert about Phoenicia, but I think I know a thing or two
about ancient history -- at least enough to know when something doesn't
"feel" right.
This article starts off oddly, assuming that the reader knows the definitions
for "Phoenicians" & ''Canaanites". And it doesn't help that
this article
lacks a link to [[Canaan]]. (An article in desperate need of work, but
one task at a time.) I'm also not sure why Phoenician is said to be an
"Afroasiatic" language when many informed people would classify it as a
Semitic language, just like Arabic, Babylonian, Hebrew & Egyptian. It also
doesn't help that the link to [[Afroasiatic]] doesn't lead anywhere.
(And yes, I know "Afroasiatic" & "Semitic" are synonymous; but
would the
average reader who is consulting this article for the first time?)
I'm puzzled at the section "Mysterious origins"; I've refreshed my
knowledge
of the Ancient Near East from time to time, & I've never encountered any
theory that the Phoenicians are anything but the descendants of the native
peoples of either that region, or perhaps immigrants from an adjacent
region.
And I recognize the names of two names in the history of this article:
one is sincere, but advocates "alternative" interpretations of history;
the other has contributed at least one article that is, to be polite,
highly fanciful.
Like you, Andre, I'm highly suspicious about the content of this article,
but I don't have the research or time to fight to clean it up. At least
right now.
Geoff