Punic wars impact
Over and over again, man has engaged in war with his neighbors, friends, and his enemies. In a good deal of these wars, it was caused by self-important nations that were in the action of making their empire larger and ended up aggravating another superpower or an ally of one. For some of fifteen years regarding the defeat of Rome the tides went back and forth between the two but ended up leading to the victory of the Romans. When the war was over with, Rome made some very unpleasant request and Carthage filled those requests even though some of them were very drastic.
The first Punic War started with an offer by the locals in Messana for the Romans to benefit them in defeating the Carthaginians. Rome saw this as a good fighting chance to let off of the stretch of the Carthaginian Empire and to stop the possible attack on Italy. The Carthaginians were told that they must break off their invasion or war would be fulfilled. Carthage didn't listen so they left no choice but for Rome to declared war.
Out of the multiple wars, the first battle was fought completely in Sicily in 263 BCE. Since the Romans were the higher in rank fighters they took the ground battle and carried on to prevail until 256 BCE. After the success over Carthage, the Romans started to surround Greek cities that were working with the Carthaginians. The Romans terminated these cities, which caused them to harden their resistance. Rome became fully aware that in order to beat Carthaginians they would need to build an armada and so in 261 BCE they began building. To counter the Romans inexperience at sea they used a corvus. With the gadget the Romans could attach their ships to the enemies ships and come abroad. This made the battle at sea also ...
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...the stubbornness, means, and extra men for options throughout any long war. Rome fitted to their enemies by building their army and trained them correctly. Without any doubt in mind, Rome had one of the best military states that there ever was. The totally rude requirements they enforced upon their enemy united with the massive amount of lost fighters in this war seem far larger an effort than was crucial to put an end to the war. My opinion of this is that this war ended up being an essential milestone in our records and at the same time, it was essentially utterly needless.
Works Cited http://www.history.com/topics/ancient-history/punic-wars http://www.dl.ket.org/latin2/historia/republic/punic1.htm http://www.forumromanum.org/history/morey14.html http://www.forumromanum.org/history/morey15.html
http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Punic_Wars.html
The Second Punic war, beginning in 218 BC, was the second major war between the Roman Empire and the Carthage. Around the same time, the Roman Empire deployed troops to the Northeastern peninsula of Spain to keep reinforcements, from the Carthaginian South, from getting to Hannibal’s armies in Italy to assist them. In A Histor...
Soon the second Punic War began because Carthage was infuriated with their treatment and torments from the Empire of Rome. This war was even worse than the first, and it shook Rome to its core. The first World War began with an accumulation of many causes, but one of the more influential problems was land hunger or imperialism. When Germany lost, it had the same treatment from the world that Carthage got from Rome. In the same case, the Second World War began because of the humiliation given to Germany with the peace treaty.
The war started because of conflicting interests between the two, especially the expanding Roman Republic. At the end of the war, thousands of lives were lost, Rome ascended into power, conquering Carthage and becoming the most powerful state in the Mediterranean. During one point of the Second War, or the Hannibalic War, Carthage nearly brought Rome to her knees. With reinforcement from their Gallic allies, Carthage defeated the Roman army in the Battles of Trebia, Trasimene, and Cannae. Had Rome not defeated Carthage, the history Western civilization would be drastically altered, shaping a very different world than the one we live in today. It is said “All roads lead to Rome”. There is a lot of truth to this quote because Rome, with all its power and glory, paved the road for our modern society; it allowed Christianity to spread and flourish, the basis for democracy, and served as melting pot of cultures and customs.Rome can be considered one of the greatest influences on Western civilization, leaving us with priceless gifts that we will always
A good example of this is Italy. They wanted to become an empire so they attacked a country which they thought was weaker than them (Abyssinia). This caused a war which in the end was won by Abyssinia. Another cause was the idea of social Darwinism. This meant the survival of the fittest.
The first Punic War started with a request by the locals in Messana for the Romans to aid them in defeating the Carthaginians. Messana was at the southern tip of Italy and would be a great asset to the already superior naval fleet of Carthage. Rome saw this to be a good opportunity to halt the expansion of the Carthaginian Empire and to stop the possible attack on Italy (which was controlled by Rome). Despite this fact the Roman council debated on whether to attack on these premises or not, but eventually it was decided that they would wage war on the Carthaginians. The Carthaginians were then told that they must halt their invasion or war would be waged. They did not stop and Rome declared war.
The roots of the Peloponnesian war can be traced long before 431 BCE, when it officially started. It can be traced back to as early as the Persian Wars, where the Athenians had found their home burned by the hands of the Persians. That disaster left the Athenians with no home and no sanctuary. Even though that was a defeated battle amidst a victorious war, they still had reason to believe that the Persians will come back for more. Apprehensive at the thought of having their city burned yet another time, the Athenians knew they had to do something. Naturally, they chose to get help. Gathering up the neighboring city-states around them, the Athenians formed the Delian League; an alliance working directly to defend the whole of Greece from Persian attacks (Kagan 8). In the beginning, this worked out well; everybody got their say on what went on in the league, and everybody was satisfied. However, the Athenians saw that if they were to take more power, the members of the league would not be strong enough to resist. Therefore, that was exactly what they did; they took more and more power until what was the Delian League became the Athenian Empire (Kagan 8). As they grew even more powerful and wealthy, their neighbors of Sparta and the Peloponnesian League, Sparta's alliance, could not help but notice (Kagan 13). In 431 BCE, lighted b...
So, in 264 B.C. the assembly voted to send a force to expel the Carthage (or Punic)
The next few years saw minor conflicts between the two bodies, during which both commanders built their navies. Octavian sent his admiral, Marcus Agrippa, to summon Roman fleets across the Mediterranean. These fleets were mostly composed of Triremes, the standard naval vessel of the time, and were equipped ...
The legend about Rome’s origins puts the founding of the city at around 735 B.C. It is said that a Vestal Virgin gave birth to twin boys, Romulus and Remus, and claimed that they were the sons of the god Mars. The Vestal Virgin was the sister of a king. The king believed that she was lying and imprisoned her. He put her two boys in a basket and threw it into the Tiber River. A she-wolf found the twins and raised them. The twins, Romulus and Remus, came back and killed the king and founded the city of Rome. Afterwards Romulus and Remus fought and Remus was killed. Romulus was Rome’s first king and after he died, he became a god and vanished.
The military might of Rome was second to none in its prime. Victorious battle after battle did nothing but increase Rome’s population of young men suited for combat, increase Rome’s borders, and increase Rome’s influence over its people and the surrounding people. With such great generals as Alexander the Great, Pompey the Great, and Julius Caesar Rome won many decisive battles. At its largest times, Rome controlled most of the Middle East, Asia Minor, present day Europe, and Egypt. It’s is hard to state that conquering and controlling all of the surrounding territory didn’t help aid in Rome’s great success. But would they have been so successful militarily if they didn’t have the trade routes or the technology?
Even before the war started, Hannibal knew what he was going to do. Since Carthage had no navy, there was no hope of going directly from Carthage to Italy over the Mediterranean Sea. Hannibal thought up a dangerous but ingenious plan. In order to get to Italy over land, Hannibal and his army would have to travel from Carthage-controlled Spain across the Alps and into the heart of the enemy. Hannibal left in the cold winter of 218 B.C. with 50,000 infantry, 9,000 cavalry, and 37 war elephants. While crossing the Alps, “Hannibal’s force suffered greatly from the elements and the hostility of the local tribesmen” (Beshara, 3). By the time they reached Italy, after only fourteen days, over 9,000 men had perished along with most of the elephants, but this number was soon replenished after 14,000 northern Gaul rebels joined Hannibal’s army. This group of 60,000 men proved superior to the Roman forces, and after at least three recorded major victories, the Roman senate was exasperated. An army of 80,000 Roman soldiers was sent to stop Hannibal’s army of now 50,000 once and for all. In July of 216 B.C., the Romans engaged the Carthaginians in “the neighborhood of Cannae on the Italian east coast” (Lendering, 2). Greatly outnumbered, Hannibal realized that he would have to win by strategy, and that is exactly what he did. As the two lines met, Hannibal’s cavalry gained the flanks and, moving up the sides, attacked the rear of the Roman line.
Throughout history, no other era was more significant than that of the Roman Empire. The power and influence of the Roman government and it=s rule over the world was accomplished by the Roman Army. The Roman army was the ultimate weapon of war because of the well trained men, their effective weapons and their brilliant battle tactics.
The Carthaginians and Romans fought in three different wars over the course of 118 years. Romans fought the Carthaginians to ruin their hold on a chain of islands that would let them control the Western Mediterranean. The Romans wanted to have control. They then fought over land in Italy, particularly Sicily. In the third conflict, Carthaginians tried to save their city and land from being taken over completely by Romans. In these wars, they mainly fought over trade routes in the Mediterranean. Each wanted power and more territorial possession.
Ultimately, the Roman Republic’s downfall lay in its lack of major wars or other crises, which led to a void of honor and leadership. War united all of Rome’s people, and provided the challenge to its leaders to develop honor and leadership by their causes and actions. The lack of war allowed the Roman Republic to stagnate and become self-indulgent. By the end of the Punic Wars, which combined these elements, Rome was sure to fail. Without a common thread uniting its society, the Roman Republic unraveled because it had nothing left holding it together.
In early centuries, Romans claimed their warfare was mostly defensive and they were protecting themselves against their enemies. Through their wars, Romans gained new territories, yet Romans claimed territorial expansion was not their main goal. Rome has been accused for using defensive aggression. Romans, out of fear of an attack from rivals at their borders, would preemptively attack enemies. After their enemies were defeated, Romans would seize the enemy territory (Parker 2014). Eventually, after centuries of battles and expansions Romans conquered Greece. During 246 BC Romans began to take over Greece. Initially, Romans in Italy were conquering parts of the Mediterranean. Romans began with Sicily, an island near Italy. By 275 BC, Romans were fighting Carthaginians in alliance with Greeks. Greeks allied Carthaginians out of fear of Roman power expansion. Romans were angry at Greece for such an alliance and after winning against Carthaginians, began to take over Greece as well (Carr 2012).