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Carthaginian warfare has been overshadowed by defeat to Rome in the Punic Wars, but for six centuries before that Carthage was remarkably successful in conquering lucrative territories in North Africa, the Iberian Peninsula, and Sicily. By...

The Carthaginians were famed in antiquity for their seafaring skills and innovation in ship design. The empire their navy protected stretched from Sicily to the Atlantic coast of Africa. Able to match the tyrants of Sicily and the Hellenistic...

Military supremacy of the seas could be a crucial factor in the success of any land campaign, and the Romans well knew that a powerful naval fleet could supply troops and equipment to where they were most needed in as short a time as possible...

Hasdrubal Barca (c. 244-207 BCE) was the younger brother of the Carthaginian general Hannibal (247-183 BCE) and commanded the forces of Carthage against Rome in Spain during the Second Punic War (218-202 BCE). They were both, along with another...

The First Punic War was fought between Carthage and Rome between 264 and 241 BCE, largely over control of Sicily. The longest continuous war in history up to that time was fought on the island, at sea, and in north Africa with both sides...

The armies of Carthage permitted the city to forge the most powerful empire in the western Mediterranean from the 6th to 3rd centuries BCE. Although by tradition a seafaring nation with a powerful navy, Carthage, by necessity, had to employ...

Hamilcar Barca (c. 285 – c. 228 BCE) was a Carthaginian general active in the First Punic War (264-241 BCE). He then quashed a rebellion closer to home between 241 and 237 BCE before returning abroad, where he successfully expanded...

The Second Punic War (aka The Hannibalic War) was fought between Carthage and Rome between 218 and 201 BCE. While the First Punic War had been fought largely over control of Sicily, the Second Punic War involved confrontations in Spain, Italy...

The Battle of Cannae (2 August 216 BCE) was the decisive victory of the Carthaginian army over Roman forces at Cannae, southeast Italy, during the Second Punic War (218-202 BCE). The Carthaginian general Hannibal Barca (l. 247-183 BCE), who...

In the search for ever more impressive and lethal weapons to shock the enemy and bring total victory the armies of ancient Greece, Carthage, and even sometimes Rome turned to the elephant. Huge, exotic, and frightening the life out of an...