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Bible Encyclopedias
Tyre
Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
or (Heb. Ts6r, צוֹר [r צֹר, 1 Kings 5:1; Psalms 83:7; Psalms 87:4; Ezekiel 26:15; Ezekiel 27:3; Ezekiel 27:8; Ezekiel 27:32; Ezekiel 28:12; Hosea 9:13; Zechariah 9:3; the form likewise found in inscriptions, Gesenius, Monum. Phrien. p. 261]; Sept., New Test., Josephus, and other writers, Topot; A.V. "yrus" [q.v.] in Jeremiah, Ezekiel [usually], and the minor prophets [except Joel]; (See TYIAN) ), a celebrated commercial city of antiquity (Joshua 19:29; 2 Samuel 24:7; Isaiah 23:1; Ezekiel 26:15; Ezekiel 27:2, etc.), situated in Phoenicia, on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea, in latitude 330 17' N. (Smythe, Mediterranean, p. 469). Although not the oldest, it was the greatest of the Punic cities, both in size and power. (See PHOENICIA).
I. The Name. — Its Hebrew name, Tsô r, signifies a rock, which well agrees with the site of Sur. the moderin town on a rocky-peninsula, formerly.an island. From the word "Tsô r" were derived two names of tle city, in which the first letters differed from each other, though both had a feature of their common parent 1st, the Aramaic word Tura (טֻרָא ) whence the Greek word Turos, probably pronounced Tyros, which finally prevailed in Latin, and, with slight changes, in the modern languages of the West; and, 2nd, Saca, or Sarra, which occiirs. in Plautus (Truc. 2, 6, 58, "purpuram ex Sara tibi attuli"), and which is familiar to scholars through the well-known line of Virgil, "Ut gemma bibat, et Sarrano dormiat ostro" (Georg. 2, 506; comp. Aul. Gell. 14:6; Silius Italicus, 15:203; Juvenal, 10:30). Accordingi to a passage of Probus (ad Virg. Georg. 2, 115), as quoted by Grote (Hist. of Greece, 3, 353), the form "Sara" would seem to have occurred in one of the Greek epics now lost, which passed under the name of Homer. Certainly this form accords best with the modern Arabic name of Sur.
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