The Phœnicians, as already observed, were among the first who, attracted by the never-failing instinct of gain, directed their course to a country which promised the highest advantages to their commerce. The precise period of their entering into relations with the inhabitants is unknown. For some time their settlements, of which Gades, now Cadiz, was the first and most powerful, were confined to the coasts of Bætica, whence they supplied the natives with the traffic of Asia Minor and the shores of the Mediterranean, in exchange for the more valuable productions of the peninsula, such as gold, silver, and iron.[1] Previously to their arrival, the use of these metals was, it is said, unknown to the Celts and Iberians. At first, for the convenience of their trade and their worship the Phœnicians obtained permission to build magazines and temples: these soon expanded into villages, and the villages into fortified towns. Besides Cadiz, Malaga, Cordova, and other places of minor note were monuments of their successful enterprise, and proofs of their intention to fix their permanent abode in a country on which nature had lavished her choicest gifts. In time they penetrated into the interior, and arrived in the heart of the mountainous districts of the north, probably to superintend the operations of the mines which they had prevailed on the natives to open. Coins, medals, and ruins, attesting their continued location, have been found in most provinces of Spain, and even at Pamplona in Navarre. Almost everywhere have they left traces of their existence, not only in medallic and lapidary inscriptions, but in the religion, language, and manners of the people. It is possible, however, that the residence of this people in Spain may have been confounded with that of the Carthaginians. The similarity in language, manners, and superstitions might naturally have diminished the distinction between the two nations, and in time destroyed it. The uncertainty which hangs over this period, and the apparent incongruity of the few dates handed down to us, with the transactions which accompany them, confirm the suspicion. The whole period, indeed, from the first settlement of the Tyrians to the wars between the rival republics of Rome and Carthage, is too conjectural to deserve the name of historical, though some few facts are seen to glimmer through the profound darkness which surrounds them. THE GREEK COLONIES; THE CARTHAGINIAN CONQUEST [Sidenote: [_ca._ 600-227 B.C.]]