Tophet of Salammbo: Ancient Carthaginian Burial Chamber

 36°50'28.42"N 10°19'22.25"E

(from Wikimedia Commons)

   Who doesn't know Carthage? The ancient civilization that wrote history by becoming Rome's big rival and by dominating the Mediterranean's trade routes! Located in the present-day city of Tunis, it is renowned for its great sophistication at the time, having excellent military officers, numerous trade partners and a fine political structure (Learn more). But what you might not know, is that, despite all this, Carthage had some quite primitive rituals. Therefore, today we're going to learn about the Tophet of Salammbo, which opened a new way of how we viewed this advanced civilization. Now, let us start.

   In 1921, two French archaeologists were exploring the remains of the old port of Carthage, when suddenly they bumped into a big precinct filled with stone markers. This, they found out, was a tophet. Previously, people had already found some of these, but the one at Salammbo is the most  important as it is almost intact and helped the most in recreating the old traditions. So, a tophet was basically a site designed to host sacrifices to Carthaginian gods. Once it is done, the victims' ash urns are buried beneath the earth and marked by Stelae stones. However, the bloodiest part is that it's very likely they burnt the victims alive... and that they were mostly innocent children and lambs.

   This sounds very gruesome, I know. So, to understand this, first we must check ancient history. Greeks and Romans already mentioned it in old scripts, but to be honest, we didn't really listen to them. This is so because these guys also knew the concept of war propaganda and said the most ruthless and barbaric made-up stories about their enemies. Then, the Bible (which Catholics did listen to, evidently) mentioned such a ritual that was offered to a deity called Moloch, nevertheless, it was said to exist in Canaan rather than Carthage (although, historians believe there existed ties between these cultures). Still, another possible explanation  why we didn't believe it, could be that we didn't want to imagine such an event. Anyway, I don't want to overthink it like archaeologists do, so I'll let the matter flow and will explain the sanctuary's history.

A 19th-century drawing of the ritual (from Wikimedia Commons)

   The Tophet of Salammbo was built during the reign of Queen Alyssa in the 9th century BC, coinciding with the city construction. For it they needed stone, bronze and imported pots from Egypt and Corynth they would later transform to urns (the origins of recycling). If you wonder why they needed bronze, it was for a statue of Baal, worshiping god of fertility and thunderstorms; while the goddess Tanit (moon, sexuality and war) was represented by a special sign in the Stelae stones. The tophet would exist for many centuries, until Romans conquered Carthage and built over it.

Left; a bronze statue of Baal, right; a Stelae stone with the sign of Tanit (both files from Wikimedia Commons [1] and [2])

   Today, the Tophet is one of the main attractions in Tunisia's capital, forming part of an UNESCO World Heritage Site together with the old Punic port and other buildings from the era. It is actually barely recognizable as it is located under the shade of palm trees on a little plot of land. Hard to believe that dead bodies lay underneath.

Sources and Picture Credits:

Sources: History Hit, Atlas Obscura, World History Enciclopedia, Obsidian Publish

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Picture 1: Patrick Giraud