Eshmun
Punic · deity · primordial · Recorded classification
The healer-god, equated with Asklepios/Aesculapius; at Carthage his temple on the Byrsa was the principal sanctuary and the last redoubt in 146 BCE. Shares theonym and origin with the eastern Phoenician Eshmun (corpus id phoenician_eshmun); authored here in his Punic/Carthaginian role. SOLITARY in this batch: at Sidon he is paired in cult with Astarte, but no Punic kinship is attested, so no kin edge is asserted (the Astarte pairing and the late youth-revival myth of Damascius via Photius cod. 242 are noted, not wired). The Asklepios interpretatio and the etymology are flagged as interpretive/unresolved.
Domains
- healing
- civic tutelage
Powers
- Cures disease and restores bodily health
Epithets
- Asklēpios / Aesculapius (interpretatio)The Greek and Roman sources name the Byrsa temple as that of Asklepios — the standard interpretatio of Eshmun. Recorded as an interpretatio note, not a relation (counterpart not in this batch).Strabo 17.3.14 and Appian, Punica (the Byrsa 'temple of Asklepios' = Eshmun) (primary)
Sources
- existence: Eshmunazar II sarcophagus, KAI 14 = CIS I 3 (Sidon); Appian, Roman History 8 (Punica) and Strabo 17.3.14 (the Byrsa temple, Carthage) (primary); E. Lipiński, Dieux et déesses de l'univers phénicien et punique (Studia Phoenicia XIV, 1995); Serge Lancel, Carthage: A History (1995) (secondary)