Carthage

Carthage and the Gulf of Tunis

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Carthage was an ancient Mediterranean city and commercial/military empire located on a small peninsula in North Africa overlooking the Gulf of Tunis. Carthage existed on a site near the location of the modern city of Tunis, Tunisia.

According to Roman and Greek sources, Carthage was founded in 813 BC, at roughly the same time as Rome. Carthage was Rome’s strongest competitor for Mediterranean dominance. The two cities' histories are intertwined beginning in 264 BC, when the first Punic War began. In 146 BC, Carthage was sacked and destroyed by Rome.

Founding of Carthage

Carthage was founded by Phoenicians, an ancient people calling themselves Canaans (from Canaanites, in the Old Testament). The Phoenician civilization included the great ancient cities of Tyre and Sidon on the coastal Levant (now modern Lebanon, Syria and Northern Israel).  The Phoenicians were renowned in the ancient world for their seafaring skills. This made them a great trading culture, and very wealthy and influential. Their settlements and trade routes stretched across the Mediterranean north to Greece, south to North Africa, and west all the way to Spain and Portugal. The most important of these Phoenician outposts was Carthage.

The founding myth of Carthage is unique. According to legend, Elissa, later Dido, flees her home city of Tyre to settle with her followers in Carthage. She is chased from Tyre by her brother Pygmalian, the king. Pygmalian is said to have cheated Elissa of her inheritance, the right to rule and co-equals, and then to have killed her husband and her uncle. Afterward, Elissa goes into exile with her supporters.

There is historical evidence supporting the existence of Pygmalian and Dido. While there were no historic ruling queens in Phoenician history, the uniqueness of a female-centric myth gives credence to the story. There is archeological evidence supporting an eighth- or ninth-century BC founding, though recent work suggests the founding date was a few hundred years later.

          Carthaginian Ship

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Rise of Carthage

Geography and technology can largely explain Carthage’s rise in the sixth and seventh centuries, which were a time of Phoenician expansion. Carthage can be seen as a gateway city, since maritime traders had to pass through, or by, Carthage on their way westward. Ships of this era stayed close to shore as they hopped from port to port. In the case of the Phoenicians, trade routes expanded westward from Cypus, down the coast of the Levant and over to North Africa where they stayed close to the coast all the way to the Iberian peninsula. Carthage also was a jumping off spot for destinations north, including Sardonia, Syracuse and eventually Rome. Carthage also benefited from land trade routes that brought the goods of the African Continent north to be traded around the Mediterranean.

Over the first three or four hundred years, Carthage grew from a city to an Empire whose reach stretched along the same westward trade routes that Phoenicia enjoyed, as well as inland to include large land holding in North Africa. In the fifth century, Hano the Navigator is reported to have expanded the Carthaginian Empire’s trade routes down the Atlantic coast of Africa, out to the Canary Islands, into Somolia, and from India through the Red Sea.

Carthaginians traded in all manner of goods. They produced the famously valuable dyed cloth of their home city, Tyre purple. Carthaginians traded and imported large quantities of iron, tin, and silver, and were great producers and exporters of bronze. Agriculturally, they produced fish, wine, fruit, nuts, grain, and wool. They manufactured agricultural implements, and every type of product; these include dyes, furniture, perfumes, jewelry, mirrors, jars, lamps, musical instruments. Beyond this, they had a knowledge economy in terms of expertise in animal husbandry (they raised horses), ships and sailing, and agriculture    

Governmental Structure

Carthage was organized as a Republic during recorded history. This form of government was not transported from Phoenicia, but rather developed as Carthage developed. It was a simple republican arrangement where persons were elected to rule, and and be accountable to, other citizens. The role of representative was a coveted position, based more on the wealth and power of an ever-changing, upwardly, and downwardly, mobile group of elite citizens. The term plutocracy has been used to describe Carthage, as opposed to the patriarchy of Rome, where power was invested in long running family lines.

The government itself had at least four different branches, or functionaries. At the top were two magistrates that were annually elected. They were an executive branch who ran the government in consultation with the Carthaginian Senate. The Adirim was the senate of Carthage. They were elected by the population of citizens, though it is not known how they were chosen for candidacy. They represented citizen issues with the government and consulted with the magistrates. A third arm of Carthaginian government, known as "pentarchies,” is alluded to by Aristotle. This was a council made of five powerful commissioners, whose powers proceeded them in office and existed after they left. Apparently, their duties include judicial issues and taxation and treasury. Finally, there were the military leaders, Generals and Admirals. These men served for the duration of a war/conflict. History's most famous Carthaginian, Hannibal, was of this office. Generals were held accountable by a mysterious group that only Aristotle referred to as the "One Hundred and Four." He felt they had the most power in Carthage. They would supervise and punish Generals. Military leaders who failed in war could expect severe punishment up to and including death by means as cruel as crucifixion.

          Carthaginian Gold Coin

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Culture

Carthaginian culture was syncretic, owing to the vastness of its trading empire and its Phoenician heritage. Religiously, they were like most other ancient cultures, worshipping a variety of deities. Many of these, like Baal, Kusor and Hawot, came from Phoenicia. Other god’s were of Greek, Roman and Egyptian origins. A cultic practice of particular interest to scholars is that of tophet, the burial in urns of ashes. Archeological evidence of the bones of small children and fetus’s has fueled speculation about child or human sacrifice in Carthage.

When Rome destroyed Carthage, they burned everything to the ground, and erased Carthage’s libraries. Therefore poetic, dramatic, and other literary activities must be assembled from second-hand sources. There are documents concerned with maritime, military, linguistic and agricultural activities, but present little evidence of the poetic history of Carthage.

A much larger remnant of Carthaginian visual arts remains. These reflect a diverse and technically sophisticated culture. Advanced decoration is evident not only on tombs and objects of worship, but also on commonplace items like pottery, coinage, and household items, such as a mirror handle.

The Punic Wars

The Carthaginian Empire grew concurrently with the Roman Empire. Eventually, the two Empires clashed in a series of three Punic wars spanning some 120 years. Punic is the word for Phoenician/Carthaginian. The first war was fought over interests on the island of Sicily, which is located between the Italian peninsula and northern Africa. The second Punic war brought the historic figure of the Carthaginian general Hannibal, riding elephants and defeating Roman land forces for nearly sixteen years before returning, undefeated, to Carthage. The third Punic war was decisive. In the spring of 146 BC, Roman General Scipio Aemilianus captured and burned Carthage to the ground, thus ending a great city and empire.

Sources

Hoyos, Dexter. The Carhaginians. New York: Routledge, 2010. Print.

Lancel, Serge. Carthage: A History. Trans. Antonia Nevill. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1995. Print

Picard, Gilbert Charles and Colette Picard. The Life and Death of Carthage: A survey of Punic history and culture from its birth to the final tragedy. Trans. Dominique Collon. New York: Taplinger Publishishing Co. 1969. Print.

Image Sources

1.      http://pages.uoregon.edu/klio/rr/06-pyrrhus.htm

2.     http://library.thinkquest.org/05aug/00156/cultureofcarthage.html

3.     http://pages.uoregon.edu/klio/rr/07-FirstPunicWar.htm