Editing Tophet (section)

===Extrabiblical attestations===
There is no archaeological evidence for the Tophet at Jerusalem, so that we are reliant on the biblical descriptions to understand it.{{sfn|Stavrakopoulou|2013|p=139}} Archaeology has not yet securely identified any Tophets in the [[Levant]], but there is other evidence for child sacrifice there.{{sfn|Quinn|2011|p=390}} Ancient Egyptian inscriptions from the second millennium BCE attest the practice in the Levant.{{sfn|Bauks|2006|p=58}} A late 8th-century BCE Phoenician inscription from [[İncirli, Pazarcık|İncirli]] in Turkey may indicate that first born sons were sacrificed there along with sheep and horses.{{sfn|Holm|2005|p=7134}} The sacrifice of first-born sons in times of crisis appears to be dealt with at length in the inscription, although the precise context is unclear.{{sfn|Kaufman|2007|pp=9-10}}

Greco-Roman sources also reference child sacrifice, such as an attempt at [[Tyre, Lebanon|Tyre]] to revive a custom of sacrificing a boy during [[Alexander the Great]]'s [[Siege of Tyre (332 BC)|Siege of Tyre]] in 332 BCE, recorded by first century CE Roman historian [[Quintus Curtius Rufus]].{{sfn|Quinn|2011|p=390}} The church historian [[Eusebius]] (3rd century CE) quotes from [[Philo of Byblos]]'s Phoenician history that:{{sfn|Bauks|2006|p=71}}
{{blockquote|It was a custom of the ancients in great crises of danger for the rulers of a city or nation, in order to avert the common ruin, to give up the most beloved of their children for sacrifice as a ransom to the avenging daemons; and those who were thus given up were sacrificed with mystic rites. Kronos then, whom the Phoenicians call Elus, who was king of the country and subsequently, after his decease, was deified as the star Saturn, had by a nymph of the country named Anobret an only begotten son, whom they on this account called ledud, the only begotten being still so called among the Phoenicians; and when very great dangers from war had beset the country, he arrayed his son in royal apparel, and prepared an altar, and sacrificed him.
:(Euseubius of Caesarea, ''Praeparatio Evangelica'' 1.10.44 <nowiki>=</nowiki> 4.16.11){{sfn|Eusebius|1903}}}}