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Notes: Prelude

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Notes for Prelude, Casus Belli, Carthage, 255 B.C.

1. Baal Hammon and Tanit were the principal gods of Carthage. There was no god called Moloch, contrary to some of the literature on the period. Serge Lancel (1992, p. 251) says the “famous god Moloch,” mentioned in the more romantic sources, especially Flaubert and Jeremiah and Isaiah in the Bible, is a misunderstanding of the Punic term molk, which refers to the ritual of sacrifice, not to the god to whom the sacrifice was directed. On page 255, Lancel constructs a more plausible, less romantic version of the molk, the sacrifice of children to Baal and sometimes Tanit. See further discussion in Note 3 below.
2. Did Hamilcar Barca have a son named Hanno? Some modern writers mention a son by this name, supposedly the man Hannibal left in charge of northern Spain when he crossed the Pyrenees on his way to Italy. But most sources list Hamilcar with only three sons, Hannibal, Hasdrubal, and Mago. I’ve followed the majority except in the prelude, in which I’ve invented the story of Hamilcar allowing his young (and eldest) son to be sacrificed to Baal in the Moloch. It serves as part of Hamilcar’s motivation for hating Rome, which he passed on to his sons. (I’ve chosen to omit the probably legendary story in which Hamilcar forces his young son Hannibal to swear eternal hatred for Rome.)
3. I’ve taken the description of the Moloch sacrifice from Lancel (1992, p. 255), adding some embroidery in the gaps myself. Did the Carthaginians really sacrifice little children to Baal Hammon? They did. See Lancel (1992, p. 251 ff.). The story traces back to Diodorus of Sicily (XX, 14, 4-7), supplemented by Kleitarchos, Plutarch (De Superstitione, 13), and Isaiah (30:31-3). The whole matter has been highly romanticized, especially by Flaubert (Salammbo), so I’ve mostly followed the more reasoned descriptions by Lancel, based on archaeology more than ancient sources. See also Note 1 above.