# Taanach — Salammbô character guide

> Taanach in Salammbô by Gustave Flaubert.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** old Taanach

**First appearance:** 0000-i-the-feast

## Snapshot

Salammbô's aged nurse, she moves through the silent halls of Megara tending her mistress's body while powerless to touch the fever consuming her mind.

## Who they are

Old Taanach keeps the rhythms of Salammbô's chamber — drawing back the felt lozenges at sunset, releasing the musk-scented doves, watching her charge waste into trance and refusal. She is the household's memory and its hands, closer to Salammbô than any priest yet shut out from the visions that hollow her. Her helpless tenderness measures the distance between Carthage's glittering surface and the private ruin growing inside it.

## Relationships

### [Salammbô](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/salammb_se/characters/salammbo)

_professional_

Taanach is Salammbô's devoted servant and confidante, attending to her personal needs.

### [Salammbô](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/salammb_se/characters/salammbo)

_professional_

Taanach is Salammbô's devoted servant and confidante, attending to her personal needs.

## In the story

### [III: Salammbô](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/salammb_se/chapters/iii-salammb)

Salammbô's nurse and slave; she assists in the ritual and is dismissed by Schahabarim before the theological discussion.

### [X: The Serpent](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/salammb_se/chapters/x-the-serpent)

Salammbô's old slave who assists in the ritual preparations and applies cosmetics.

### [XIII: Moloch](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/salammb_se/chapters/xiii-moloch)

Provides food from Hamilcar's kitchens to a starving slave.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/salammb_se/characters/taanach
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/salammb_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/salammb_se/characters