KNMY inscription

The KNMY inscription (KAI 79 or CIS I 3785) is an inscription in the Punic language from Carthage that is believed to record a so-called "molk" child sacrifice. The text is inscribed on a 55 cm high stela that was discovered in 1922.

In this inscription KNMY, a Carthaginian slave (or "servant"), says that he "vowed" (nador) "his flesh" (BŠRY, cf. Hebrew beśarō) to the two major gods of Carthage, Tinnīt-Phanebal and Ba‘al-Ḥammon, which is understood to mean that he sacrificed a child of his (Krahmalkov translates BŠRY as "<this child> of his own flesh").

The name rendered in Punic as KNMY is not otherwise known. It is not Semitic, but probably Libyan or Berber. The inscription ends with a curse for those who might remove or damage the stela.

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.