Phoenician or Roman ships at The Cape
- Ntandoyenkosi
- 5 days ago
- 17 min read
Happy Sabbath Folks. The Full Moon was observed rising directly in the East on last Monday from the mountainous skies in KwaZulu-Natal, this will place the Sabbath on Monday now for 4 weeks in a row. Every Sabbath we pray, facing East towards our Fathers Heavenly Throne according to Ezekiel 46,1. Anyone who wants to join us in prayer, you are more then welcome to do so. We will be praying at 13:00PM (our time, which is 07:00am New York) behind our curtain in our house(s), just before the midday Sabbath meal. We also pray on the Full Moon days (usually 1 day but can extend 2) as the Gates in the East are said to also be open when the Moon shines at its fullest. Do with this information what you will and make of it what you will. We are simply telling you how we see it and how we practise it.
Now, back to more historical finds of Biblical civilisations in southern Africa. As we already mentioned in our article on the Greek, Roman and Byzantine coins found in the ground in a clay pot in Pondoloand. There are more historical traces left behind by the Phoenicians and quite possibly the Romans. Now the Phoenicians purported travel from the Mediterranean sea, past Gibraltar, and down the long coast of West Africa, all the way down to the Cape of Good Hope. Does not make sense to us. We are not so sure about this route. We think the travel was shorter, and the ancient Phoenician base was in South-East Africa, and later they moved their people and settled elsewhere on the continent and in the world. This Empire is ancient and would not really have died out out but morphed into and assimilated in other cultures as they stayed in the harbours they discovered. What happened is most likely they diffused like this on account of war and survived on their speciality, which was trade, here both Sassanids or Romans come to mind. Now this will be our last article (at least for a while) on the whole Phoenician debacle. We will be moving forward having placed them in the SouthEast African coast. They originated in East-Africa, trading goods from inland Africa to all African Ports, then with International ports sailing directly to ALL of Asia to the east. And then other routes, like the far Americas. Olmec statues must be explained. Think about it makes sense to originally have launched from Tanzanian and or Kenyan ports. And then in the ancient times, they branched out from these homelands. King Hirams headquarters and the Capitol of Tyre. Then later reaching MANY other lands and continents. They traveled the high seas just as we travel the highways today. Accept that, and many other things follow.
So we are then talking something like 3000 years ago (but could be longer) the Phoenicians were busy and doing what they do best. They traded. And while they were trading they explored, and likely not all of them made it back with their precious cargo. Now before the time of the Suez Canal, they (if they had their base in SouthEast Africa) would have to round the Cape, and going up the coast of West Africa, slide through the Gibraltar strait to make it to the Ancient Greeks and Phrygians. However, place an inland lake inside Africa and things change, still it is a long way from the Cape of Good Hope to The Mediterranean sea. Accept the EastAfrican theory as being the home of the Original Phoenicians, and things get more likely. Now there are reports dug up from the South African Archeological Bulletin, in an article Published by H. F. Sampson (author of The Principle of Apartheid in 1966), in 1948 seems to suggest that the idea of a Phoenician influence at the Cape had been around LONG before him. Which is a good suggestion from the man. The cricket field near the Pinelands in Cape Town is the place that may hold several Phoenician ships in its sands.
The Pinelands Cricket Clubs own merchant and traveller George Thompson (1796-1889), that stayed at the Cape for 8 years and in South Africa for over 40 years of his life, in 1820 wrote down some of what he saw in Travels and Adventures in South Africa 1823-24 (Thompson, 1827):
“On the skirts of the Downs, or Flats, which form an isthmus between the Cape peninsula and the rest of the continent, there was discovered a few years ago, at a considerable distance from the sea, what seemed to be the timbers of a vessel deeply imbedded in the sand. This I had myself a cursory view of, but there was too little of the wood visible to enable me to form any clear judgement of its shape, or probable purpose. I found, however, some metallic substance fixed in the wood in a much corroded state. A nautical gentleman who examined it with more care than I had an opportunity of bestowing, thinks that the wood (which has apparently been buried for ages in the sand) greatly resembles cedar, - and conceives it possible that this may be the remains of some ancient Phoenician vessel, wrecked here when our present Cape flats were under water…”.
Interesting remarks from the well traveled Thompson, who wrote some readable books and was well traversed in African customs and culture. We can go deeper than this though, and if we seek out the writings of the Scottish artist Charles Davidson Bell (1813-1882), who was Surveyor General in the Cape at the time.
Bell did report to Lieutenant Governor, Sir Charles Henry Darling (1809-1870), notice all these titles and we could add he was indeed a colonial servant in many different British colonies. Anyways, Bell laid out more details on this particular ancient ship, before Sir Darling. It went something like this, Bell said that he had heard people talk about the wreck of the ancient ship at Tigerberg (Tygerberg, close to Bellville). He had disregarded this at first at first, thinking it could not be so, but then later he went on to examine the site in question. And after he had been there he wrote (Bell, 1852):
“However extraordinary it may seem, I am compelled to believe that this wood is part of a large vessel upward of some seventy feet in length, wrecked when the sea washed up to some of the ancient beaches on the Lion’s Head and now raised some hundreds of feet in height above the present high-water mark and left at a distance of at least 10 miles from the shore”.
Bell reported more, insomuch that the wreck seemed to be exposed by a change in the course of the Hardekraaltje Stream some 30 years earlier (Bell, 1852):
“It is embedded in stiff clay about ten or twelve feet deep (3.6 meters), and when first seen the ribs and knees stood up above the surface to a height of perhaps five feet, partially connected by the planks of one side”.
Now like us, we wanted to go there and see for ourselves, however we found out that much of what was found has long since been dug up and removed. Some of the relics found was sent to England for identification, which according to the experts seemed an impossible task.
Now Bell did request permission to expose the remnants in order to take measurements and make drawings of what was found. permissions were granted and funds allocated, but there are no written (known records) of wether Bell was able to do any research on these. You cannot say the man did not try to figure out more of this. A note here, notice how High these ships had ventured from the Harbour costal lines, makes one wonder, as they say the sea levels used to be lower and waters are rising, could it be the other way around? Beckons many questions, as there may have been more water in the ancient world, both inland Southern Africa and by the coast. More powerful Rivers and more water in General, we think.
The geologist, explorer and road engineer Andrew Geddes Bain (1797-1864) made his way to the site and made comments in an article in Eastern Providence Monthly Magazine in 1857 (Bains, 1857):
“By the mighty ribs of this jolly old Phoenician, plainly traceable as she lies buried in the clay ten feet below the surface of the flats, I found she must have been upwards of a mile in length!” Bain was of the opinion that the ‘wreck’ was “merely a bed of lignite or brown coal, which… is found all over the flats”.
Upwards an English mile in length. Are you people starting to get a feel for how advanced King Hirams people were, how sophisticated their boats were. If this was a Phoenician ship, it proves they were ancient seafaring master. Another chap named Astley John Hilary Goodwin (1901-1959) in the Bulletins editor sent a copy of Sampsons article to Raymond Dart, and here it becomes clear that this is indeed about another site (incredible). This site was not the one mentioned by Bell and Gain (at Tygerberg), and it was 200 good yards on the other side of the railway from the Maitland Cemetery, 3 miles from the sea.
So, in other words, more boats same design. The story goes that this site was found at one of the cemeteries and a mere employee was digging where the ships timbers were found about 6 feet below ground level. The length was said to have been some 50 plus odd meters (180 feet) and the timber itself had a peculiar odour that made it suitable for firewood. All this timber was taken to Cape Town, were it was likely sold as firewood. Yes we can repeat that, Roman or Phoenician ships likely burnt as high end firewood. Now Raymond Dart had collected more information that he published in 1925. Therefore we know that a Mr. Milder in 1880 had seen just under a gravel bed a mast 3 feet in diameter on top of timber 60-70 feet in length. With two iron rings and bolts fastening parts of the mast. And later the same man had seen the ship again and about half of it had been removed. And a lot of the wood had rotted because of exposure to the elements. Another problem in Africa, things do not take long before they decay. Now these ribs of the ship, conclusive with Phoenician and Roman ship building, where something like 30-35 feet in length and 2,5 feet wide. Some serious logs. If we had exact measurements of each ships from Romans and Phoenicians we could decide this on those evidences, but a trusted source needs to be found here.
Now if we read the fairly recent issue of the Saturday Star in an issue from the 13th of March in 1993 (The Saturday Star, 1993):
Shipwreck could rewrite history: A shipwreck buried under a Cape Town cricket pitch could rewrite the history books and prove that ancient civilisations were trading off southern African shores as long as 2000 years ago.
It reads more on the labour of archeologists that began removing the topsoil from a SAPS cricket pitch in Maitland near the Pinelands, Monday 8th of March in 1993. Not long after, on the 16th of March, they began excavating the remains of what could the wreckage of a thousands of years old Phoenician Galley.
The dig was a direct result in investigations made earlier by amateur historian Bernard O`Sullivan backed by Raymond Dart (1893-1988) whom we remember for this coinage research and off course the `discovery` of the Taung skull. A theory we which we do not particularly subscribe to, apes to human and monkey relations and all that jazz. Wonderful theory dont get us wrong, very clever. And there are traces in biological life that it can and does evolve. Such did He create the world. But not like this. So, you may feel the need to be related to monkeys and apes to prove a theory, or in this case a theory of evolution, we do not feel the need. We think humans did not descend from apes, we are not related to them, rather we are related to The Most High. In the image you can see an editorial depiction of Charles Darwin (1809-1882), perhaps a little bit over the line. No offence to Mr. Darwin who apparently was a believer of God. Which is strange, what god is that we ask? His theory though does kinda distance us from ourselves as humans we think. Brings us down, instead of elevating what it means being human. Anyways this drawing it illustrates our point, you are or indeed you will at the very least become what you choose to believe.
Anyways a little tangent there forgive us. Lets get back to Dart, that took upon himself to interview the men working on the excavation in the Cape Flats in 1880, this spurred Dart to write (Dart, 1925):
“At the time, the contact of one end of Africa with the other by navigation was undreamt of, and the significance of finding a boat, 180 feet (54 m) in length, buried six feet (1,8 m) underground at a distance of three miles (6,6 km) from the present coastline, was lost on the workmen, who utilised it for firewood.”
If we could insert a facepalm meme here, we would. For how many discoveries has not meet this fate, be it a valuable gold coin or just a mere piece of old driftwood. Thrown aside to be melted and sold for its value, or just to keep warm. So this Phoenician ship literally went up in flames. No O`Sullivan set out to investigate with approval and backing from Dart, with a grant from Old Mutual, Anglo American and De Beers Chairmans Fund. Furthermore, O`Sullivan said Mick Mountain (a geologist) identified the ancient water courses on the site, probably a link with Salt River. The drilling started in 1986 to locate the ships remains.
Now get this, They found two pieces of wood labelled of Mediterranean origin (which fits more the Roman narrative), and they were radio-carbon dated about 1900 and respectively 500 years ago. All this done by the respectable Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. The oldest 1900 year wood found was then identified as Lebanese Cedar, the wood purported to have been used by the Phoenicians. And we would ad, or the Romans. The true Lebanese cedar we think, was an African original specimen. The ship you see in the image is a modern rendition of the Greek-Roman ships called Bireme, extensively used in Roman conquest, not necessarily trade. We think that a few of these will emerge from the sands and areas in and around the conquered cities as described in great detail by Josephus, now these are buried in sand. That would be anywhere these ships could enter in through Rivers of in Coastal cities, the remains of them are still to be found and they will in time.
Now in 1990, O`Sullivan wrote for South African Journal of Science and called for a major archeological investigation of the site (SAJS, 1990):
“Should Dart’s comments turn out to be inspired as some of his others, although initially discounted, the site may help to rewrite the history of oceanic travel in the southern 3 hemisphere.”
The amateur historian O`Sullivan pointed out the fact that the wreck was not proved to be of Phoenician origin and could rightly so be of another civilisation. This points to only two options in our opinion, Romans or Portuguese.
Bartholomeu Dias (ca. 1450-1500) is historically, which is an outrage, credited widely as Discovering The Cape of Good Hope in 1486. This was was while before The Dutch East India Company sent out a party of small soldiers and officials under Jan van Riebeeck (1619-1677) to establish a base at Table Bay in 1652 and onwards. This is the main settlement claim of the Trekkers. Is this claim valid? How long had the Khoi and San been there before them? Both Kanaanite and Bantus were there before. What do you think. Keeping this in mind, the last dated boat (500 years old) may very well be a Portuguese trading ship, but the older wood found definitely is not from Portugal. Now the discovery of a Phoenician (or Roman) ship on southern African soil would make the Phoenicians the first `True` settlers, if you do not take the Biblical stories into account. So, if the Phoenicians were East-African, then there is another historical claim...
Now then finding sources for The Phoenicians circumnavigating of Africa is not really hard, the problem is they did not call Africa by the name Africa as we do. Herodotus wrote that the Phoenicians sailed around Africa 600 Before Christ, meaning a good 2000 years before the Portuguese. If you look at the work of Abbé Breuill (1877-1961) a renowned researcher on Rock Art, you will find many connections between Phoenician traders and various Bushmen tribes. We will do another big study on this, also just an introduction, but it will cover a lot of these traces of the Kanaanite tribes that have been in Southern Africa for a long time.
If you read Egyptians writings (and we have) you will find the Phoenician Merchant ships had been seen there as far back as 3000 years before Christ. So they have also been around a long time. Now from these comments (and other historical remarks) we have descriptions of what the Phoenician trading ships looked like. The are described as Galleys, with a single pole mast, square sail, with mounted steering oars to port and starboard side. Noe the ancient Phoenicians were a trading conglomeration that went against Egyptian rule and established trade routes we think all over Africa and later in the Mediterranean sea for many years. These men were very characteristic in their purple robes, made from the so-called Tyrian Dye, that consisted of snails (and mollusks) imported from Asia Minor. Which we believe is another clue that their base was on The southeast coast of Africa (Tanzania and Kenya) as they were sea farers, they would be coming by sea. Going to Asia via India. Do you think they would come from their purported Tunisia/Algeria base and then went all they way around West-African and down to Southern Africa (which was not discovered according to mainstream history), and then went to Asia minor and fetched their precious purple dye at Colophon? Guys, lets use some reasoning here. If you read a quote by the ancient Greek historian Theopompus from Aegina, quoted in Deipnosophistae by Athenaeus of Naucratis, said to be in Ancient Egypt:
"...Purple for dyes fetched its weight in silver at Colophon."
Now Colophon was somewhere in Asia Minor, we believe was not were its modern location is given for it (in Greece/Turkey). Asia Minor could even be India or The Horn of Africa in ancient literature. These purple attires became quite famous as the Romans literally just took over the Attire and rebranded it through the Toga Picta and the Roman Magistrates that later wore the Toga Praetexta (a white toga edged in Tyrian Purple). The Toga Picta which we could write its own article about, had a gold thread edging, became a high office attire worn by generals after they had won a battle.
The Romans enjoyed making laws, like civilisations and countries do today also, and it came into law especially about who was permitted to wear these robes. So much so that the mare mention of Purple meant you had pretty much become emperor. So when the Byzantine Empire took off at the turn of the year 1000, which is when the image on left is from and we are likely historically off the continent by now, they restricted the use of the colour for imperial use only. Phrases like born into the purple can then be found in Byzantine writings. More importantly the purple colour can be connected to the Bible, and the more modern word tekelet (תְּכֵלֶת,) or an old Sotho form (of Maoparo/Seaparo) we have the old Hebrew forms of Ubhegede or bhagada (בְּגָדָ֔יו), which appears in describing the garments or Robes and attires worn by the Hebrews Themselves. Although this has now grown into something that started out as Biblical robes or garments, by now it has morphed into something else. This happens when things gets moved off the continent. The historical Priestly Garments, was light blue and often worn by the High Priests but also as a celebratory Tribal and cultural attire. The Tzitzits are more recognisable and used as marking points (4 corner points or 4 layers?) of the attire. We have talked about this before in Clean Garments and Sacred Stones of Southern Africa. And let us not forget then the prayer shawl. We are preparing a larger article about this full attire, likely worn by Immanuel and the difference between His and the High Priest attires. Anyways, this light blue colour that would turn its colour in the sun, came from a creature the Greeks called the HIíllazon (ἑλικών) or Helikon in Roman. This is now something historians say (as an off course) lost knowledge (they actually do say this), and no surprise if you look in the wrong place then off course you are not going to find what you are looking for. So we have a few good candidates for this African Native Mollusk, Ramose Murex (Chicoreus Ramosus) also found in South Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania (Tyrian hub), Madagascar and the Red Sea (modern), then its the Murexsul Nothokieneri found close to East London.
Whatever local or not local Mollusk the dye came from, it must have been available to both the Romans and the Phoenicians (and another mollusk for the Ancient Hebrews). Was it imported from Asia Minor or was it available in some form closer or even on the continent, we do not know for sure. The fact is that Bushmen tribes all over South Africa has depictions, drawings on the wall, of travellers wearing these purple capes and robes. Trading everything from textile, metals, pottery, wine, oil, cedar wood, gold and silver, even a tin operation had been set up in Britain according to some researchers. All early Phoenician colonies. Which is quite the thing to accept. Trade-ports in Britannica, but not in West, South and East Africa.
So while some are entertaining the idea the Phoenicians discovered Britannica and the Americas, others will struggle to place their ships going around the Cape of Good Hope. It is quite senseless to be able to accept this but not entertain the idea that they had circumnavigated Africa long before they ever went a cross the Great Atlantic Ocean and to the Americas. We might be beating a dead horse with this one, as it is very obvious to us having done this research for so long now, but hey, its all about what people chose to believe, no matter the amounts of evidence that you provide.
Still, we can pile it on for you, and if you read John Denison Baldwin (1809-1883) and his Ancient America (1871), you will find compelling arguments that the Phoenicians had indeed NOT navigated to America. Still, if you go deeper, you can see that perhaps Baldwin was comparing very different pieces of culture and writing that indeed were in no way related to the Phoenicians. The stone with Phoenician writing discovered in Paraiba in Brazil, in 1872, tells a different story perhaps unknown to Baldwin and his contemporaries. Claimed to be a forgery by some and genuine by others, it tells the story of a ship that got separated from its fleet that sailed from Egypt, mentioning Pharaoh Necho I or II. The Olmec statues (another long article) does however provide enough evidence for us, as the Phoenicians were indeed black tradesmen that went all over the world and their writing was more then likely different from the Phoenician Hebrew of the modern day writing. There are other more recent findings of Phoenician inscriptions, like those concluded by the likes of Cyrus Herzl Gordon (1998-2001), who even goes further saying Hebrews got to the Americas before Phoenicians. Citing finds like Bat Creek Inscriptions and Los Lunas Decalogue Stone, but these we will not go into. We think the evidence lies in connecting Africans and findings like Olmec in South Americas, back to ancient Southern Africa and the Phoenician bases there, this what is more important than prove that the Phoenicians and or Hebrews went to the Americas. Of course they could have went, but focusing on ancient African history is more important to us. For those that want to dive into this can check Mark McMenamin and his Phoenician theories of the ancient world, sidenote these researchers do not share our Afro-Centric view. Perhaps he thinks the Phoenicians were even Caucasian, so proceed with caution.
Now, In closing of this topic for a while, dont worry we will get back to it but there is a lot of ground to cover. So let us now go out on a tangent here. In saying that all this research may be pointing to another more recent time, keeping , remember the Phoenician strongholds are very old. So we could in fact only be finding remnants of the Romans, who by all accounts controlled most ports in Africa at some point in time. East to West. These younger ships found could be Roman Bireme ships, and stemming from the time of the Romans. Hence the Radio-carbon dating could be right, also there areas which the cedars are stemming from, they are within reason for such a timeline and location. The Romans were certainly present during Christ times at the Cape of Nahum or areas of Cape Town. And certainly in Jerusalem and all major surrounding cities. We just do not know for sure what these ships are, but they present many a problem for historians. What we do know is that this research needs to be take seriously by the people living here. People should be demanding answer for these archeological treasures found beneath the ground (meaning there is lots more to discover), place names still intact after colonial conquests and other tangible treasures left inside clay pots. So these wooden ships could well be Roman remains, what is however a big thunderous for sure, is the fact that they are not British, nor are they Voortrekker ships. And that narrows is down quite a bit historically and we are running low on plausible options.
For what ships are these??
Ungesabi lutho,