There is a massive problem with artefacts being stolen or copies of artefacts being sold to tourists and collectors. Recently a stone stele/a appeared on ebay.usa that was described as a native North American image of a girl carved on a stone. The stone to anyone who has visited Carthage is very similar to the stelae there in depicting the image of Tanit with a Lotus flower above her (at the triangular point of the stone) and four letters below the image of Tanit in Phoenician?
I wondered whether there is anyone out there who could decipher the meaning of the script.
[ibb.co]
The American ebay seller described a box full of bits and pieces of unknown origin from somebody who had recently died. The stone is very carefully pecked on its front face. It is only approx. one foot tall but the quality of the carved images is quite crude and shallow so its provenance as an ancient object is uncertain and may have possibly been made as a copy for the vibrant tourist market of the 1950s. However the Phoenician letters carved beneath the image of Tanit are intriguing and I wondered whether they have any significant meaning or if they are random letters. I have so far failed to find a similar stela that it may have been copied from but maybe an expert recognises the pattern on this stone as a copy of another stone.
I wondered whether there is anyone out there who could decipher the meaning of the script.
[ibb.co]
The American ebay seller described a box full of bits and pieces of unknown origin from somebody who had recently died. The stone is very carefully pecked on its front face. It is only approx. one foot tall but the quality of the carved images is quite crude and shallow so its provenance as an ancient object is uncertain and may have possibly been made as a copy for the vibrant tourist market of the 1950s. However the Phoenician letters carved beneath the image of Tanit are intriguing and I wondered whether they have any significant meaning or if they are random letters. I have so far failed to find a similar stela that it may have been copied from but maybe an expert recognises the pattern on this stone as a copy of another stone.