Origins
Carthage (Phoenician: Qart-ḥadašt, “New City”) was founded traditionally in 814 BCE by colonists from the Phoenician city of Tyre, led according to legend by the princess Elissa (Dido in Roman tradition). Archaeological evidence confirms a late 9th century BCE founding, making it one of the earliest Phoenician colonies in the western Mediterranean. The site on the Gulf of Tunis offered excellent harbors, fertile hinterland, and strategic position controlling maritime routes between the eastern and western Mediterranean. From these advantages, Carthage grew from trading post to commercial empire over the following centuries.
The colony’s institutional development reflected its Phoenician heritage while adapting to western Mediterranean conditions. Like Tyre and other Phoenician cities, Carthage initially had kings, but royal power gradually gave way to oligarchic institutions dominated by wealthy merchant families. By the 5th century BCE, Carthage had developed a republican constitution that impressed Greek observers. Aristotle, in his Politics, praised the Carthaginian system as a well-balanced mixture of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy—a stable government that had avoided both tyranny and civil war.
Carthage’s rise to dominance followed the decline of Phoenician power in the east. When Tyre fell to Nebuchadnezzar II in 573 BCE and later to Alexander the Great in 332 BCE, Carthage became the leading Phoenician city. It consolidated control over other Phoenician colonies in the western Mediterranean—in Sicily, Sardinia, Spain, and along the North African coast—creating a commercial empire stretching from the Atlantic to Libya. This transformation from trading colony to imperial power reshaped the political, economic, and military institutions of the republic.
Structure & Function
The Carthaginian constitution combined elected magistrates, a council of elders, and a citizen assembly. Two annually elected sufetes (judges) served as chief executives, comparable to Roman consuls but with primarily civil rather than military authority. Military command was separate, held by generals (rab mahanet) elected for specific campaigns and subject to recall and punishment for failure—a check on military power that distinguished Carthage from Rome. The council of elders and the Tribunal of One Hundred and Four provided aristocratic oversight, while the citizen assembly decided matters on which the magistrates and council disagreed.
Commerce lay at the heart of Carthaginian power. The city’s famous harbors—a rectangular commercial port connected to a circular military harbor capable of housing 220 warships—exemplified its maritime orientation. Carthaginian merchants traded throughout the Mediterranean and beyond, reaching Britain for tin, the Atlantic coast of Africa for gold, and establishing trade routes across the Sahara. The state maintained commercial treaties and protected trade monopolies through naval power, most notably through treaties with Rome that defined spheres of influence.
Unlike Rome, Carthage relied heavily on mercenary armies rather than citizen soldiers. This system allowed Carthage to field large forces without depleting its commercial population, drawing on Libyans, Numidians, Iberians, Gauls, and Greeks. The navy, however, remained primarily Carthaginian, crewed by citizens and slaves trained in maritime warfare. This military structure—professional mercenaries led by Carthaginian commanders, supported by a citizen navy—created a formidable military machine but also vulnerabilities exploited by Rome during the Punic Wars.
Historical Significance
Carthage represented an alternative path of Mediterranean development to Rome: a commercial republic where wealth derived from trade rather than conquest, where mercantile values shaped political institutions, and where naval rather than land power projected influence. Had Carthage prevailed in the Punic Wars, the Mediterranean world might have developed along different lines—perhaps more commercially oriented and less militarily expansionist than under Roman rule.
The Punic Wars (264-146 BCE) determined Mediterranean hegemony. In three devastating conflicts, Rome and Carthage struggled for supremacy. The First Punic War (264-241 BCE) cost Carthage Sicily and naval dominance. Hannibal’s invasion of Italy during the Second Punic War (218-201 BCE)—including his famous crossing of the Alps with war elephants—brought Rome to the brink of defeat before his eventual withdrawal. The Third Punic War (149-146 BCE) ended with Carthage’s complete destruction, its population enslaved, and its site symbolically cursed. Roman senator Cato’s repeated insistence that “Carthage must be destroyed” (Carthago delenda est) expressed Rome’s determination to eliminate its rival.
Carthage’s legacy persisted despite its destruction. Roman colonists rebuilt the site, and Carthage became a major city of Roman Africa. Punic language and culture continued for centuries in North Africa, influencing later Berber and eventually Islamic civilization. The Carthaginian model of a commercial republic—government by merchant oligarchs, economy based on trade rather than conquest—anticipated later Mediterranean trading states from Venice to the Dutch Republic. Archaeological excavation since the 19th century, particularly the discovery of the tophet (sacrificial precinct) and harbor installations, has revealed the sophistication of Carthaginian civilization beyond the hostile portraits in Greek and Roman sources.
Key Developments
- 814 BCE: Traditional founding date; Tyrian colonists under Elissa establish Carthage
- c. 650-580 BCE: Carthage establishes dominance over Phoenician colonies in western Mediterranean
- c. 550 BCE: Carthage and Etruscan allies defeat Greek colonists at Battle of Alalia; Carthaginian control of western sea lanes secured
- 509 BCE: First treaty between Carthage and Rome defines spheres of influence
- 480 BCE: Battle of Himera; Carthaginian invasion of Sicily defeated by Syracuse; simultaneous with Salamis
- 410-405 BCE: Carthage renews Sicilian wars; major territorial gains
- 348 BCE: Second Romano-Carthaginian treaty; commercial relations formalized
- 311-306 BCE: Wars with Syracuse; Carthage controls western Sicily
- 264 BCE: First Punic War begins; Rome challenges Carthaginian control of Sicily
- 241 BCE: First Punic War ends; Carthage loses Sicily and pays heavy indemnity
- 237-219 BCE: Carthaginian expansion in Spain under Hamilcar and Hasdrubal; founding of Cartagena
- 218-201 BCE: Second Punic War; Hannibal’s invasion of Italy ends in Carthaginian defeat
- 149-146 BCE: Third Punic War; Rome besieges and destroys Carthage; site cursed and population enslaved
- 122 BCE: Roman colony established at Carthage site
- c. 44 BCE: Julius Caesar refounds Carthage as Roman colony; becomes major African city