Tyre the homeland: Carthage and Cadiz under the god's eyes

Abstract : According to some classical literary sources, Phoenician westward expansion and particularly the foundation of certain settlements were governed in myth by speci!c deities, !rst of all Heracles/Hercules (Melqart) and Kronos/Saturn (Baal Hammon). In trying to reread the passages devoted to the mythological foundation of Carthage and Cadiz, this paper aims to discuss the features of the two gods and their possible functional relation at the beginning of the colonial phenomenon, in order to outline some ideological aspects, from a religious perspective, of the construction and selfdetermination of the western "new world(s)".