Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/558

 

This Second Treaty between Rome and Carthage belongs chronologically to the second period of Carthaginian history; but the natural connection of the events demands the notice at one view of the relations between the states, from the beginning, to their quarrel about Sicilian affairs. Livy, with his usual partiality, represents the Carthaginians as sending ambassadors to Rome, to sue for this alliance. But we know that Carthage was mistress of the Tyrrhenian seas, along the coasts of Italy (Diod. xvi. 66); and that the coasts of Latium were insulted and plundered by a Greek fleet. Against such invaders, Niebuhr supposes, the Romans sought protection from the great maritime power of Carthage (Niebuhr, vol. iii. pp. 85 — 87); and they would readily consent to renounce a commerce, which they had already lost, with Sardinia and Africa, for the sake of safety on their own coasts.

The amicable relations between the two republics, and the concord of their views respecting Italy, are further attested by the congratulations which the Carthaginians sent to Rome, on the conclusion of the first Samnite War (B.C. 342), with the present of a gold crown of 25 pounds' weight for the shrine of Jupiter in the Capitol. (Liv. vii. 38.) And again, in B.C. 306, the ancient treaty between Rome and Carthage was renewed for the third time, with a fresh offering of rich presents. (Liv. ix. 43.)

But such friendships between ambitious republics necessarily involve jealousies, the sure presage of alienation, quarrel, and internecine war; and both the friendship and the jealousy are further shown in the history of the more intimate alliance which was formed by Rome and Carthage in view of a common danger. Each state had evidently come to regard Grecian Italy as its future prize, when the aid brought by Pyrrhus to the Tarentines raised an obstacle to their designs, which they at once united to remove, with a cordiality precisely measured and limited by the interests of each. Carthage had doubtless viewed the progress of the Roman arms in S. Italy with feelings which her own position in Sicily compelled her to dissemble; and Rome, on her part, showed no disposition to seek aid from Carthage, till the war with Pyrrhus became very critical. In the third year of the war, B.C. 279, Rome and Carthage concluded a close defensive alliance, which Livy (Epit. xiii.) expressly calls the fourth, and Polybius (iii. 25) the last, treaty between the two republics. The provisions of the former treaties were renewed, with additional articles, which, with the events that ensued, we give in Niebuhr's words (vol. iii. p. 506): — "It was provided, that neither should make a treaty of friendship with Pyrrhus without the accession of the other, in order that if he attacked the latter, the former might still have the right of sending succours. The auxiliaries were to be paid by the state, which should send them; the ships to convey them to and fro were to be given by Carthage. The latter was also to afford assistance with ships of war, in case of need; but the marines were not to be compelled to land against their will. This clause in 'case of need' Carthage, with the wish of compelling Pyrrhus to return to Epirus, may probably have interpreted in such a way that, without waiting for a summons from Rome, a fleet of one hundred and thirty galleys under Mago cast anchor near Ostia, at the disposal of the senate. It was dismissed with thanks without being used, probably because Rome did not wish the Poenians tocarry off the population and wealth of Italian towns, or because it feared lest they should establish themselves in Italy. There was no need of their assistance. The Punic admiral now went to Pyrrhus as a neutral and unsuccessful mediator of peace, as the latter was already known to hare directed his thoughts to Sicily. (Justin, xviii. 2.) "The events which followed the transference of the war to that country belong to the history of the Carthaginian affairs in Sicily; but they may be dismissed here, partly because they led to no permanent result, and partly because their progress furnishes another proof of the deeply rooted jealousy which now existed between Rome and Carthage. Pyrrhus spent three years in Sicily, B.C. 278 — 276, attempting to do his part to fulfil the bright prospects held out by the Greeks who had called him thither, of a Greek kingdom over which he was to rule after the expulsion of the Carthaginians. The faithlessness of the Greeks to their promises and their interests alone spoiled the scheme; and, after wasting his efforts on the impregnable fortress of Lilybaeum, he abandoned the enterprize in disgust. During these three years Rome was steadily pursuing her own interests in Italy, by subduing the states which had aided Pyrrhus, and Carthage was left to fight her own battle in Sicily. "That there prevailed a deeply founded mistrust between the two republics," says Niebuhr (vol. iii. p. 511), "is clear even from the fact, that Roman auxiliaries were either not demanded, or else were not given for the defence of the Punic province: though Carthage, it Is true, raised soldiers in Italy." (Zonaras, viii. 5.)

From this view of the relations of the two republics, during their state of amity, it is impossible not to be struck with the fact, remarked by Niebuhr elsewhere, how the order in which Rome was called to deal with her successive enemies contributed to fulfil the designs of providence for her advancement to universal empire, and how different would have been her fate, and that of Carthage, and of the world, had Carthage deserted her during her struggles with the Etruscans and other peoples of Italy, with the Gauls, and with Pyrrhus.

(7.) Athens. — There was another foreign power, with whom Carthage never came actually in contact, but whom nevertheless she watched with deep interest and anxiety (Thucyd. vi. 34), and whose fortunes had no small influence on her own. Had the Athenian expedition to Sicily been successful, a conflict must have ensued with Carthage; but she was relieved from this danger, and left the more free to pursue her own designs in Sicily by the destruction of that ill-fitted armament, B.C. 411.

10. Summary. — Such was the growth of the Carthaginian empire, and such her relations to foreign, states, during a time partly extending into the second period of her history, though belonging chiefly to the first. To sum up, in a few words, her position at the great historical epoch marked by the renewal of her wars with the Greeks of Sicily: — In Africa she had subdued the Libyans immediately round the city; formed relations with the Nomads, which enabled her to purchase their services as mercenaries in her wars, and carriers for her inland commerce; planted agricultural colonies in the fertile districts about the city, and others, both commercial and agricultural, along the coasts of Byzacium and the Lesser Syrtis, and even to the Great Syrtis, so far as the physical character of the district permitted; as well as on the W. portion of the N. coast, to the Pillars of Her- 