Talk:Phoenician language

Israel vs. Palestine
Phoenician was spoken in modern day... coastal northern Palestine?

Modern-day Palestine is the preferred way the Palestinian Arabs call the Palestinian Authority, which is in the area of the Biblical kingdoms of Israel and of Judea, but which does not have a northern coast. So Phoenician was NOT spoken there.

Therefore the correct text about included areas where the language was spoken should read: ...coastal northern Israel...

There is no reason to exclude the mentioning of Israel, in particular since any Israeli reading Phoenician inscriptions can usually understand the language off-hand, being closer to Hebrew (especially Biblical Hebrew) and Aramaic than to Arabic. Israelis are familiar with those letters which are similar to the Hebrew "handwriting script", and have the same letter-set with the same usage (although some changes have occurred in the way they are articulated in most communities). These letters are written on Israeli currency, preserving the writing of ancient Jewish coins which survived on holy scriptures till the end of the 2nd and third temples under the Roman empire (circa 150 with the Bar Kusiba revolt). These ancient coins themselves preserved the ancient Phonecian alphabet used in the Kingdom of Israel, at least 400 years earlier.

. The Samaritans preserve this alphabet, but live in 2 locations where Phoenician was not spoken (Tel Aviv and Nablus). This alphabet was used in the kingdoms of Israel and Judea, during the period of the first temple and until circa 359 bc.

Palestine is also referred to as the area of the biblical place of the Israelites, as accepted by all, so perhaps this could be acceptable to all political parties: ...coastal northern Israel, in ancient Palestine פשוט pashute ♫ (talk) 04:30, 16 March 2018 (UTC)


 * "Modern-day" is attached to "Lebanon", not Palestine. The link is to Palestine (region), a page which clearly describes a coastal area: "the region comprises the State of Israel and the Palestinian territories in which the State of Palestine was declared". I don't see there's any problem here. Pinkbeast (talk) 11:32, 5 April 2018 (UTC)

It originally said Israel and in November 2017 someone changed it to Palestine. Someone then undid the edit, then Pinkbeast undid that edit, and has been on here since reverting several edits (including my edit). Also no reason was given for changing it to Palestine. Pinkbeast eventually changed it Palestine (region). If it had been about a piece of land in the modern-day West Bank or Gaza strip, then it saying Palestine would have been better, but this is about an area of land which is in modern-day Israel, and so should not have been changed. 14:10, 20 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:C7D:8AA3:C300:E856:EF6F:9704:1A06 (talk)
 * However we got here, it seems to make more sense to me to link to a page for a geographical area than one for a political entity. Pinkbeast (talk) 01:43, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * It makes more sense to use the country here, because the State of Palestine has the same name as the region. With it saying Israel, there can be no confusion. There's also one country mentioned preceding it and two following it, which keeps it in line with naming countries there. When people look at a map they see Israel and Palestine, so the country makes it clear for all readers, rather than unnecessarily and confusingly using a historical region, when it is a lot more straight-forward otherwise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:C7D:8AA3:C300:F802:4425:21D2:9582 (talk) 03:17, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Israel is also the name of a region so by your line of argument it would be just as confusing.
 * By the way, ...
 * Is that a phenny, err sorry, a penny in the image or what's the denomination? Rhyminreason (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 17:19, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

How about, neither "Israel", nor "Palestine"? The Phoenicial language was spoken in Phoenicia. It's customary to use the term Phoenician for the language only after 1050 BCE. This is around the time of the Kingdom of Israel which occupies some of the area where it was spoken, but a considerable area to the south of it as well (map left). Philistia of the time seems rather too far south to be a good designation for where Phoenician was spoken (map right). As the Phoenicia article states:"Scholars generally agree that it included the coastal areas of today's Lebanon, northern Israel and southern Syria reaching as far north as Arwad." and there's no reason this article can't say something similar. Other descriptions of the area include "the western Levant", "western part of the Fertile Crescent". Mathglot (talk) 04:34, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Not a bad idea - go ahead, if you ask me. Pinkbeast (talk) 06:11, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Since edits have since been removed. I have added "Western Galilee" as a non-politically connotated term to include the areas to the south of Lebanon. It's important that this area is mentioned, since the description is otherwise incomplete. I hope we can all agree on this! Western.galilee (talk) 14:22, 8 March 2023 (UTC)