What effect did trade have on the Phoenicians?

Phoenician sea trade can, therefore, be divided into that for its colonies and that with fellow trading civilizations. Consequently, the Phoenicians not only imported what they needed and exported what they themselves cultivated and manufactured but they could also act as middlemen traders transporting goods such as papyrus, textiles, metals, and spices between the many civilizations with whom they had contact. They could thus make enormous gains by selling a commodity with a low value such as oil or pottery for another such as tin or silver which was not itself valued by its producers but could fetch enormous prices elsewhere. Trading Phoenicians appear in all manner of ancient sources, from Mesopotamian reliefs to the works of Homer and Herodotus, from Egyptian tomb art to the Book of Ezekiel in the Bible. The Phoenicians were the equivalent of the international haulage trucks of today, and just as ubiquitous.