It would be beside my subject to enter into an investigation, on this occasion, of all the places mentioned in this portion of Scripture. I will therefore confine myself to the meaning of Tarshish, which bears close connexion with the object I have in view. After a rigorous and critical examination of different works written on it, I am led to adopt the view of the profoundly learned Bochart—viz., that the Tarshish of the Scriptures was the Tartessus of Spain, with a district around including Cadiz.[1] Let us view for a moment the state of Spain in ancient times. Its treasures of gold and silver were immensely vast. We read in Strabo a description of the natives by Posidonius, who, he says, used mangers and barrels of gold and silver. Such a country could not fail being very attractive to the Phœnicians. Indeed, it is a well authenticated fact that the Phœnicians did trade to Carthage and Spain.
[1] – See [Appendix B].
But we also read of Israel’s monarch (1 Kings, x. 21, 22)—“And all King Solomon’s drinking vessels were of gold, and all the vessels of the house of the forest of Lebanon were of pure gold; none were of silver; it was nothing accounted of in the days of Solomon.
“For the king had at sea a navy of Tharshish with the navy of Hiram: once in three years came the navy of Tharshish, bringing gold, and silver, &c.” Now if Tharshish be Spain, the conclusion is inevitable, the Israelites must have visited the western countries in the days of Solomon.
The conclusion resulting from the examination of the meaning of Tarshish, is confirmed by two very ancient sepulchral monuments found in Spain. As these monuments attracted the attention of the learned Christian antiquarians about two hundred years ago, it may not be uninteresting to give a short sketch of their history, and especially since they form an important link in the chain of evidence of the very early wanderings of the Jews.
The Duke of Savoy, formerly viceroy of Valencia, presented Francis Gozanga, Bishop of Mantua and General of the Franciscans, with a manuscript which was originally dedicated to Alfonso Duke of Segorbe and Count of Ampurias, written in an antique Spanish dialect, in which the ruins of Saguntum are noticed. After many Roman monuments being described, a sepulchral monument, bearing a Hebrew epitaph, is mentioned as being of far greater antiquity than the Roman monuments; for the characters were more ancient than the square alphabet now in use, which must have been the Samaritan, as those characters were used by the Hebrews prior to their Babylonish captivity. In consequence of the stone being much fractured and defaced, the following could only be decyphered, but which gives us still a somewhat correct idea of its date. It runs thus:
זהוא קבר אדונירם עבד המלך שלמה
שבא לגבת את־המס ונפטר יום . .[1]
of which the following is the Spanish manuscript version:—“De Adoniram la fossa es esta, que vigne Salomo del Re servent dia, y mori tribut lo pera rebre....” The following is a literal English translation:—“This is the grave of Adoniram, the servant of King Solomon, who came to collect the tribute, and died on the day....”
[1] – See [Appendix C].
The Bishop of Mantua published a history of the Franciscan order, in which he mentioned, on the authority of the manuscript alluded to, the existence of the above-menioned monument. Villalpando, a learned Jesuit and a shrewd critic, read the book, but not being willing to put implicit confidence in the bishop’s startling assertion, desired his brethren, the Jesuits, who lived in Murviedro, a beautiful little place built from the ruins of Saguntum, to make great search for that particular stone on the site described; his request was complied with; an investigation was instituted. The Murviedro natives immediately pointed out a large stone near the gate of the citadel, which was commonly called by the natives, “The Stone of Solomon’s Collector.” There was an almost obliterated Hebrew inscription on the self-same stone, but not corresponding to the one looked for: which we shall presently notice. There was, however, a manuscript chronicle preserved in the town, in which they found the following entry: “At Saguntum, in the citadel, in the year of our Lord 1480, a little more or less, was discovered a sepulchre of surprising antiquity. It contained an embalmed corpse, not of the usual stature, but taller than is common. It had, and still retains on the front, two lines in the Hebrew language and characters, the sense of which is—‘The sepulchre of Adoniram, the servant of King Solomon, who came hither to collect tribute.’ Of this Adoniram, the servant of Solomon, mention is made in the 5th chapter [14th verse] of the first book of Kings, and more expressly in the 4th chapter [6th verse] of that book. The Hebrew letters rendered into Roman are these: ‘Ze hu keber Adoniram ebed ha Melec Selomo, seba ligbot et hammas, voniptar yom.’”