Pygmalion of Tyre Pygmalion of Tyre Pygmalion (also known as Pu'mayyaton) was king of Tyre from 831 to 785 BC and a son of King Mattan I (840-832 BC). During Pygmalion's reign, Tyre seems to have shifted the heart of its trading empire from the Middle East to the Mediterranean, as can be judged from the building of new colonies including Kition on Cyprus, Sardinia (see Nora Stone discussion below), and, according to tradition, Carthage. For the story surrounding the founding of Carthage, see Dido. A possible reference to Pygmalion is an interpretation of the Nora Stone, found on Sardinia in 1773 and,
Pygmalion of Tyre of kings given in Menander/Josephus. It was argued, based on philological considerations, that the name as given in the Assyrian text could be matched to a Phoenician "Ba‘al-‘azor" and the Greek "Baal-Eser/Balazeros", a name corresponding to two kings in Menander’s list. The first "Balazeros" was a son of Hiram I, contemporary of David and Solomon, so this was too early, but the second name referred to the grandfather of Pygmalion and was therefore in the right date range. Pygmalion’s dates are derived from Josephus’s "Against Apion" i.18, where Josephus quotes the Phoenician historian Menander as follows: Pygmalion . . .