The Carthage tophet, is an ancient sacred area dedicated to the Phoenician deities Tanit and Baal, located in the Carthaginian district of Salammbô, Tunisia, near the Punic ports. This tophet, a "hybrid of sanctuary and necropolis", contains a large number of children's tombs which, according to some interpretations, were sacrificed or buried here after their untimely death. The area is part of the Carthage archaeological site, a UNESCO World Heritage site.
The question of the fate of these children is closely linked to Phoenician and Punic religion, but above all to the way in which religious rites - and beyond that, Phoenician and Punic civilization - were perceived by the Jews in the case of the Phoenicians, or by the Romans during the conflicts that pitted them against the Punics. Indeed, the term "tophet" was originally used to designate a place near Jerusalem, synonymous with hell: this name, taken from biblical sources, leads to a macabre interpretation of the rites supposed to take place there, and corroborates an assumption shared by those who provided sources on the Phoenicians in general and the Punics in particular: religion in Carthage was "infernal". More recently, the collective imagination has been fed by Gustave Flaubert's novel Salammbô (1862), which gave its name to the district where the sanctuary was discovered. The comic strip Le Spectre de Carthage, part of the adventures of Alix written by Jacques Martin, takes up this interpretation.
The major difficulty in determining the cause of the burials lies in the fact that the only written sources reporting the rite of child sacrifice are all foreign to the city of Carthage. As for the archaeological sources - stelae and cippes - they are open to multiple interpretations. As a result, the debate between the various historians who have studied the subject has been lively for a long time, and has yet to be completely settled. The utmost caution is therefore called for, as the ancient historian is faced with written and archaeological sources that are, if not divergent, at least open to interpretation.
Discovery and excavation history
Early stages
The existence of stelae on the site has been known for a considerable period, with the earliest documented references dating back to 1817.These stelae were scattered throughout the Carthage archaeological site due to the dispersal that occurred following its destruction in 146 BC and the subsequent urban development activities that disturbed the soil during the construction of the Roman city. Over time, the Carthage site became a target for significant exploitation, including the quarrying of building materials, including marble. This contributed to the gradual deterioration of the main monuments. Between 1825 and 1827, Jean-Émile Humbert a Dutch soldier and archaeologist, sent cippi and votive bases to the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden. The Archaeological Museum of Kraków also has some very fine Punic stelae from the site. A special place in Carthage's history must also be given to the cargo of the Louvre and the sinking of the Magenta, flagship of the Mediterranean fleet, which sank at Toulon on October 31, 1875, following a fire followed by an explosion. On board were over 2,000 Punic stelae and other artefacts, including the statue of Empress Sabina, wife of the Roman Emperor Hadrian (117-138). The archaeological finds had been loaded at La Goulette, and came from the excavations (authorized by Sadok Bey) of Pricot de Sainte-Marie, an interpreter for the French General Consulate. Following the shipwreck, the divers recovered some of the steles and the statue, while the archaeological pieces were dispersed among various collections, including the Bibliothèque nationale de France. As for the wreck, it was dynamited so as not to impede access to the port. At a depth of twelve meters, what remained of the wreck gradually silted up. Three archaeological campaigns were carried out in 1995-1998 by Max Guérout and the Groupe de recherche en archéologie navale to recover steles and the head of the statue. In April-May 1995, the head of the statue of Sabine was found, followed in April-May 1997 by some 60 fragments of stelae and fragments of the statue. Finally, in 1998, 77 fragments or steles were brought back to the surface.