Ship Sarcophagus Explained

The Ship Sarcophagus, also known as the Sarcophagus au Navire, is a Roman era sarcophagus found by Georges Contenau in 1913 in Magharet Abloun, a necropolis containing the remains of Phoenician kings and notables in the south of Sidon in modern-day Lebanon. The sarcophagus has been dated to the 2nd century CE.^{[1] [2]}

It is considered the most important of all the sarcophagi discovered by Contenau in Sidon.^[3]

The relief at the head of the sarcophagus represents an ancient ship.^[3]

Bibliography

• Editio princeps: Georges Contenau. “Mission archéologique à Sidon (1914). In: Syria. Volume 1, 1920. pp. 16–55. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3406/syria.1920.2837

Notes and References

1. Book: Stillwell . Richard . The Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites . 1976 . Princeton University Press . SIDON (Saida) Lebanon entry .
2. Book: Herm, Gerhard. The Phoenicians: The Purple Empire of the Ancient World. 1975. Morrow. 978-0-688-02908-1. 127. en.
3. "Sidon." In The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East. Ed. Eric M. Meyers, Issam Ali Khalifeh. Oxford Biblical Studies Online: "In 1913 Georges Contenau, director of the Department of Oriental Antiquities of the Louvre Museum, uncovered a series of Roman sarcophagi at Magharat Ablun, of which the Sarcophage au Navire is the most important. On it a sculptured relief of a Roman ship is depicted."