Albright, W. F. “The Phoenician Inscriptions of the Tenth Century B. C. from Byblus.” Journal of the American Oriental Society 67, no. 3 (1947): 153–60. https://doi.org/10.2307/596081.
KAI 005
Gibson 3:07; Lidzbarski, EsE II, 167–9.
Metadata
- Collection
- Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung, Berlin, Germany | ÄMP (Public)
- Keywords
-
- Inscription | Royal
- Inscription | Votive
- Language
- Phoenician / Punic
- Script
- Phoenician
- Find Type
- Excavation
- Material
- Stone
- Updated by
- James D. Moore, 2026-06-28
- Date (Paleographic)
- Gregorian -940 to -930
General Notes
The ˀAbibaˁal inscription survives on the base of a statue which held the Egyptian ruler Sheshonq of the Twenty-Second Dynasty. It requires a fair bit of textual restoration. It was first published by Clermont-Ganneau in 1903, but not deciphered correctly until a later date because this inscription, like others from Byblos in this period, features an archaic כ which was mistaken for a ש. The Phoenician is split around two cartouches on the statue’s base. With the base of the throne upright, it begins in the upper left corner and goes down toward the ground. The second line must be reconstructed, though to turn to the corner and continue along the bottom edge, and curl back upward around in the right margin around the other cartouche. This is one of five royal inscriptions from an old period at Byblos, around the tenth century B.C.E. See the notes to 11441 for further information. The notes to 11441 present the general suggestion that ˀAbibaˁal is the older brother of ˀElibaˁal and the son of Yeḥimilk. Albright also proposes the possibility that ˀAbibaˁal is Yeḥimilk’s younger brother. He notes that the script is quite close to what one finds on the ˀAḥiram sarcophagus inscription. However, as the inscriptions of ˀAbibaˁal and ˀElibaˁal are set into Egyptian artifacts of successive pharaohs, the reigns of these kings in Byblos must be chronologically proximate and possibly adjacent. ˀAbibaˁal must precede ˀElibaˁal since Sheshonq preceded Osorkon, but the manner of ˀAbibaˁal’s relationship to ˀElibaˁal and chronology with the other Byblian kings is not clear. The choice of setting such an inscription into the statue of a foreign leader presents another curiosity. Gibson (1982, 20) notes that if Byblos were a vassal to Egypt at this time, one would expect recognition of such a relationship in the text. He considers it likeliest that ˀAbibaˁal received the statue as a gift upon a visit to Egypt and used it for a votive offering to demonstrate his power. The statue now rests in the Vorderasiatisches Museum in Berlin.
Bange, Ludger A. A Study of the Use of Vowel-Letters in Alphabetic Consonantal Writing. München: Verl. UNI-Druck, 1971.
Clermont-Ganneau, Charles. Recueil d’archéologie orientale. Vol. 6. E. Leroux, 1905.
Clermont-Ganneau, Charles Simon. “Fragment de stèle découvert à Djebaïl (Byblos), avec les cartouches du pharaon Chechonk Ier.” Comptes rendus des séances de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres 47, no. 1 (1903): 91. https://doi.org/10.3406/crai.1903.19290.
Clermont-Ganneau, Charles Simon. “Inscription égypto-phénicienne de Byblos.” Comptes rendus des séances de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, 1903, 378–85. https://doi.org/10.3406/crai.1903.19466.
Cross, F. M., and D. N. Freedman. Early Hebrew Orthography: A Study of the Epigraphic Evidence. American Oriental Series 36. New Haven, CT: American Oriental Society, 1952.
Donner, Herbert, and Wolfgang Röllig, eds. Kanaanäische und aramäische Inschriften. 5., erw. Und überarbeitete Aufl. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1971.
Dussaud, René. “Les inscriptions phéniciennes du tombeau d’Ah́iram, roi de Byblos.” Syria 5, no. 2 (1924): 135–57. https://www.jstor.org/stable/4236810.
Février, James Germain. “Inscriptions puniques et néopuniques.” In Inscriptions Antiques du Maroc, 81–132. Éditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1966. https://www.persee.fr/doc/etaf_0768-2352_1966_mon_1_1_881.
Herrmann, W. “Der historische Ertrag der altbyblischen Inschriften.” Mitteilungen des Instituts für Orientforschung 6 (1958): 14–32.
Lemaire, André. “La datation des rois de Byblos Abibaal et Élibaal et les relations entre l’Égypte et le Levant au Xe siècle av. notre ère.” Comptes rendus des séances de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres 150, no. 4 (2006): 1697–1716. https://doi.org/10.3406/crai.2006.88119.
Lidzbarski, Mark. Ephemeris für semitische Epigraphik. Vol. Zweiter Band 1903–1907. II vols. Giessen : J. Ricker, 1908. http://archive.org/details/ephemerisfrsem02lidzuoft.
Magnanini, Pietro. Le iscrizioni fenicie dell’Oriente: Testi, traduzioni, glossari. Rome: Centro di Studi Semitici, Istituto di Studi del Vicino Oriente, 1973.
Montet, Pierre. “Comment rétablir l’inscription d’abibaal, roi de Byblos?” Revue Biblique (1892-1940) 35, no. 3 (1926): 321–27. https://www.jstor.org/stable/44103161.
Yeivin, S. “Did the Kingdoms of Israel Have a Maritime Policy?” The Jewish Quarterly Review 50, no. 3 (1960): 193–228. https://doi.org/10.2307/1452922.
Images
Textual Notes
1 - זי]⸢ב⸣א𐤟 : Z- is a proclitic relative pronoun found only in archaic Byblian royal inscriptions (Krahmalkov 2000, 166). 2 - במצרמ𐤟 : The preposition B- can mean ‘from,’ as it does in this case (Krahmalkov 2000, 92-93). MṢRM as Egypt appears to be a sensible reading, as this is inscribed upon an Egyptian artifact, though Gibson notes that, as Février has suggested, it could relate to “distress” as Hebrew MṢRYM in Lam. 1:3 (Gibson 1982, 21). 2 : The large reconstruction takes up Montet’s suggestion that the text of the second line continued, winding below the cartouches, and began back upward to the right of them, where the final two words again become visible (1926, 322-323). Thus, a significant portion of text was lost. The reconstruction comes on the basis of ˀElibaˁal’s quite similar inscription (Lemaire 2006, 1700).
Text and Translation
Choose alternative texts and translations from the filter. Click individual words in a text for more details.
John C.L. Gibson Last updated 26 April, 2026 by James D. Moore
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John C.L. Gibson Last updated 26 April, 2026 by James D. Moore
[Statue which] Abibaal king of [Byblos son of …......]
[king of] Byblos brought from Egypt for the Mistress [of Byblos, his lady. May the mistress of Byblos prolong the days and years of Abibaal] over Byblos!
Moore, James D., Cody Beasley. 'KAI 005.' DEAPS. 24 Apr, 2026. https://deaps.osu.edu/text_objects/11445. Accessed: 01 Jul, 2026.