DiaryEntriesOfIntrest

Ref: PaxRomana

Diary Entries Of Intrest

Greek and Latin sources speaking of the offering of children by fire as sacrifices in the Punic city of Carthage, which was a Phoenician colony. Cleitarchus, Diodorus Siculus and Plutarch all mention burning of children as an offering to Cronus, that is to Baal Hammon, the chief god of Carthage. (Ba‘al Hammon, better known to the Romans as Melkarth)

A translation of Cleitarchus' paraphrase of a scholia to Plato's Republic as:

"There stands in their midst a bronze statue of Kronos, its hands extended over a bronze brazier, the flames of which engulf the child. When the flames fall upon the body, the limbs contract and the open mouth seems almost to be laughing until the contracted body slips quietly into the brazier. Thus it is that the 'grin' is known as 'sardonic laughter,' since they die laughing."

Diodorus Siculus (20.14) wrote:

"There was in their city a bronze image of Cronus extending its hands, palms up and sloping toward the ground, so that each of the children when placed thereon rolled down and fell into a sort of gaping pit filled with fire."