Re: evidence for early Phoenician presence in Britain?

<As far as I know, there is zero archeological or linguistic
evidence for Phoenician presence in England.>

... and as long as you are willing to discard what you don't know :-)

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Daniel J. Milton" <dmilt1896@...>
wrote:

>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Michael Smith"
> <mytoyneighborhood@...> wrote:
> >
> > Hi, I found this in my Grandma's 1933 elementary school
> > textbook "Foreign Lands and Peoples" (California State Series).
> > page 50 reads:
> >
> > "A block of tin tells a tale. A few years ago some men were
> > digging a foundation for a building in a city on the south coast

of

> > England. The earth was very soft, so they dug down and down to
> find
> > a firm foundation. After going down for many feet, they came to
> > something that seemed like a floor of strong oak planks. It was
> the
> > deck of an old ship. The place where the city stood had once been
> a
> > harbor. The ship had sunk in the harbor, and the harbor had been
> > filled by mud brought by streams. The men cut through the deck

of

> > the sunken ship and found that the ship was still loaded with
> blocks
> > of tin.
> > The writing on the blocks of tin in the old ship buried

beneath

> > the English city showed that it was a Phoenician ship."
> >
> > Does anyone know any further information about this find? Is

there

> > any linguistic evidence for possible Phoenician loanwords in
> > Brittonic to add support to this?
> >
> > -Michael
> **********
> The mysterious Tin Isles - Casiterides could have been England

or

> nearby, but also, and much more probably, could have been farther
> south. As far as I know, there is zero archeological or linguistic
> evidence for Phoenician presence in England. It was generally
> accepted in the 19th century, and appears to be a thriving belief in
> the nuttier fringes of the Web (Atlantis, did Jesus visit England?,
> etc.). An interesting statement is:
> http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/bpl/nana/200
> 1/00000007/00000004/art00027
> The appropriation of the Phoenicians in British imperial ideology
>
> The Phoenicians played ambivalent roles in Western historical
> imagination. One such role was as a valued predecessor and prototype
> for the industrial and maritime enterprise of nineteenth-century
> imperial Britain. Explicit parallels were drawn in historical
> representations and more popular culture. It was widely believed

that

> the Phoenicians had been present in Britain, especially in Cornwall,
> despite a lack of convincing historical evidence, and much

importance

> was placed on supposed archaeological evidence. Ideological tensions
> arose from the need to reconcile ancient and modern Britain, and

from

> the Semitic origin of the Phoenicians. This example shows the power

of

> archaeological objects to provide material support for national and
> imperial constructions of the past.
>
> I would say your Grandmother's schoolbook shows what wishful
> thinking can lead to.
> Dan Milton