the Phoenician dialect of ancient Carthage

of or relating to or characteristic of ancient Carthage or its people or their language; "the Punic Wars"; "Carthaginian peace"

tending to betray; especially having a treacherous character as attributed to the Carthaginians by the Romans; "Punic faith"; "the perfidious Judas"; "the fiercest and most treacherous of foes"; "treacherous intrigues"

Carthaginian. The word derives from the Greek for Phoenician. Carthage was originally a Phoenician colony.

The Punics, (from Latin pūnicus meaning Phoenician) were a group of Western Semitic speaking peoples originating from Carthage in North Africa who traced their origins to a group of Phoenician and Cypriot settlers. Contrary to other Phoenicians they had a landowning aristocracy who established a rule of the hinterland in Northern Africa and trans-Sahara traderoutes. In later times one of these clans conquered a Hellenistic inspired empire in Iberia, possibly having a foothold in Western Gaul.