Punic Wars

by

Dexter Hoyos

• LAST MODIFIED: 17 April 2025
• DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199791279-0269

Introduction

Between 264 and 146 BCE the Roman and Carthaginian republics fought three wars which defined the future of the Mediterranean world. The First and Second wars’ military and naval history has always been a scholarly, and the Second even a popular, fascination. The Third has been viewed, as early as Polybius’s time, as a gross example of amoral Roman ruthlessness. In warfare Hannibal’s encirclement tactics at Cannae still intrigue—and at times have inspired—military strategists. The naval strategies of the two sides in the First war raise questions, for instance of manpower and materials. In one or more of the wars the antagonists’ military resources, strategic aims, diplomacy, and mistakes undergo regular discussion. Further, why each war was launched, where the ultimate responsibility lay for each outbreak, and whether miscalculations by one state or both contributed to the outbreaks (especially of the First and Second), are extensively treated in scholarly literature.

General Overviews

The available ancient evidence is unequal. Carthaginian and pro-Carthaginian writings on the wars, such as those by Philinus of Agrigentum on the First war and by the Greek friends of Hannibal, Silenus and Sosylus, on his career, were accessible to the Greek and Roman authors whose works survive, but can now only be glimpsed in comments (usually criticisms) by Polybius and a few others (for instance Polybius, Histories 1.14–15, 3.20). Pro-Roman accounts contemporary with the wars have been lost too. Polybius writing in the middle and later second century, Livy in the Augustan age a hundred years after him, and more succinct narratives still later in date, like Appian’s war narratives and a Byzantine epitome of Cassius Dio’s history of Rome, supply the evidence we now have. Archaeological and other physical materials are still limited, though discoveries occur (see Hurst 1992 under Third Punic War; Telmini, et al. 2014). Because written sources are Greek and Roman and focus on Rome, modern studies largely do the same: Roman military methods and constraints, and the wars’ impact on society, demography, and economy (De Sanctis 1967/1968, Brunt 1971, Erdkamp 1998, De Ligt 2012, Hin 2013). The more limited materials for 3rd- and 2nd-century Carthage have expanded largely thanks to archaeological research, and studies continue to integrate Carthage more fully into the history of the Mediterranean world (Huss 1985, Ameling 1993, Miles 2013, Telmini, et al. 2014). By 264 and still more by 218 Carthage was strongly open to Greek influences, perhaps more so than Rome at that time. The Punic Wars launched the Roman empire. Sicily including its old Greek cities became dependent on Rome through the First (Vacanti 2012, under First Punic War: course); the Second brought conflict and alliance with states in Greece: enmity with Macedon, alliance with the Aetolian League, friendship with Athens and Pergamum. Victory over Carthage then led to fresh involvement in the Greek world and by 188 Roman predominance there. At the same time the Romans mastered southern and eastern Spain (Vervaet and Ñaco del Hoyo 2007, under Second Punic War: Course). The Third war ended with the sack of Carthage and annexation of much of its North African territory, making Roman dominance even if not yet Roman rule effectively extend across the entire Mediterranean world.

• Ameling, Walter. Karthago. Studien zu Militär, Staat und Gesellschaft. Vestigia 45. Munich: C. H. Beck, 1993.

  Largely dealing with the sixth to third centuries, this volume studies Carthage’s political institutions, military and naval resources, and methods of warfare, emphasizing that the ruling aristocracy was essentially not mercantile but land-based.

• Brunt, P. A. Italian Manpower 225 BC–AD 14. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971.

  A monumental study of the population of Rome and Italy, Rome’s military needs and demands, the size of armies and fleets, the resources for these, and the results for Italy of almost continuous warfare, recruitment, disease, and migration (including colonization in the Roman sense). The evidence in ancient sources for census statistics, army and fleet strengths, and natural resources is thoroughly if often skeptically analyzed.

• Burton, Paul J. Friendship and Empire. Roman Diplomacy and Imperialism in the Middle Republic (353–146 BC). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2011.

  DOI: 10.1017/CBO9781139035590

  A major study of the way Rome developed, and very often exploited, the usages of friendly relations and alliances to impose its hegemony first over peninsular Italy and then beyond, during the fourth to second centuries BCE.

• De Ligt, Luuk. Peasants, Citizens and Soldiers: Studies in the Demographic History of Roman Italy 225 BC–AD 100. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2012.

  DOI: 10.1017/CBO9781139003834

  Wide-ranging social and population study of Rome’s demography up to the reign of Trajan, including the impact of the Punic Wars.

• Erdkamp, Paul. Hunger and the Sword: Warfare and Food Supply in Roman Republican Wars. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1998.

  DOI: 10.1163/9789004525818

  Offers a detailed study of military logistics and the strategic implications of military food supply for Roman republican wars, with a special focus (chapters 7 and 11) on the Second Punic War.

• Harris, William V. War and Imperialism in Republican Rome 327–70 B.C. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979.

  An influential study that stresses the constant drive, both in the Roman elite and in wider Roman society, to fight wars in order to acquire plundered wealth and military eminence. Argues against views that defensive bellicosity, or fear of attack by powerful enemies, or miscalculations were the main factors in Roman wars. Trenchant analysis of Polybius’s pro-Roman attitudes and of the always growing importance of wealth and status in Rome.

• Hin, Sara. The Demography of Roman Italy: Population Dynamics in an Ancient Conquest Society (201 BCE – 14 CE). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2013.

  DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511782305

  Wide-ranging analysis of the evidence and implications for the changing demographics of Italy in the middle and late Republic and the Augustan Age.

• Huss, W. Geschichte der Karthager. Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft, Abteilung 3, Teil 8. Munich: C. H. Beck, 1985.

  The most thorough one-volume history of Punic Carthage, giving substantial treatment (241 pages) to the Punic Wars. Separate chapters deal with the political system, political history, and economy, religion, and social lives of the Carthaginians. Extensive footnotes cite ancient evidence (even obscure items) and a very thorough range of modern scholarship. Written in clear, plain German. There are, though, very few maps and no illustrations.

• Miles, Richard. “Punic Carthage.” In Oxford Bibliographies in Classics. Edited by R. Scodel. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013.

  Extensive and up-to-date account of Carthaginian history, society, and archaeology by a leading specialist.

• Telmini, Boutheina Maraoui, Roald Docter, and Babette Bechtold. “Defining Punic Carthage.” In The Punic Mediterranean: Identities and Identification from Phoenician Settlement to Roman Rule. British School at Rome Studies. Edited by Josephine C. Quinn and Nicholas Vella, 113–147. Cambridge, UK, and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014.

  Survey of the current state of archaeological investigation on the site of Carthage, by three distinguished archaeologists.