Tanit

The great goddess of Carthage, 'Tanit Face of Baal' (Tinnit Pene Baal), consort of Baal Hammon and named before him on the tophet stelae; her emblem is the 'sign of Tanit'. Romanized as Dea/Iuno Caelestis. Shares theonym and origin with the eastern Phoenician Tanit (corpus id phoenician_tanit); her ultimate origin (a Punic form of Astarte vs. an autochthonous Libyan goddess later assimilated to Astarte) is contested. The etymology of 'Tinnit' and the attribution of the 'sign of Tanit' are flagged as unresolved/reconstructed. The Caelestis/Artemis interpretatio is recorded here, not wired as a relation (counterparts not in this batch).

Domains

• great goddess
• fertility and motherhood
• heaven and moon

Powers

• Mediates as the manifest Face of Baal
• Shields Carthage as its civic patroness
• Grants offspring, fertility and abundant increase

Epithets

• Pene Baal (Pene Baʿal / Tinnit Pene Baal, 'Face of Baal')Her defining epithet; she is the 'face/presence' of Baal Hammon.Carthaginian tophet stelae (tnt pn bʿl) (primary)
• Rabat (rbt, 'Lady')Her title in the dedicatory formula, paralleling Baal Hammon's ʾdn ('Lord').Carthaginian tophet stelae (l-rbt l-tnt) (primary)

Relations

• spouse: Baal HammonConsort pair of Carthage; the bond is cultic/epigraphic (joint invocation; 'Face of Baal'), not a narrative marriage. No parentage or offspring attested.Carthaginian tophet stelae — joint invocation l-rbt l-tnt pn bʿl w-l-ʾdn l-bʿl ḥmn (CIS I) (primary); Serge Lancel, Carthage: A History (1995) (secondary)

Sources

• existence: Carthaginian tophet votive stelae, CIS I (the l-rbt l-tnt pn bʿl formula, Tanit named first from the 5th c. BCE) (primary); F. O. Hvidberg-Hansen, La déesse TNT: Une étude sur la religion canaanéo-punique (Copenhagen, 1979) (secondary); Serge Lancel, Carthage: A History (Blackwell, 1995) (secondary)