CMS 206 - Background material on Carthage

Carthage: ["Kart-Hadasht" or "new city"] Originally a colony in North Africa (modern day Tunisia) settled by Phoenicians from Tyre in the eight century, B.C.E. The Phoenicians were sea-faring, trading people whose empire was located in the area that is today Syria (they are mentioned in Herodotus and Homer and the Hebrew Bible) and who traded extensively throughout the Mediterranean. Their chief cities were Tyre and Sidon. They invented the alphabet that the Greeks adopted. Carthage was unusual in that it was meant from the beginning to be a consideral settlement. Most Phoenician settlements were small trading posts for which the Phoenicians usually paid rent to the native population of the area. And, in fact, the Phoenicians paid rent for Carthage until the middle of the sixth century, B.C.E. Phoenician cities in the Middle East suffered severe reversals during the 7th century, B.C.E. and submitted to Persian domination during the 6th (they supplied the navy that Xerxes used against the Greeks). During these centuries Carthage grew to be an extremely important city-state in its own right, and by the 5th century, B.C.E., was independent of any control by Tyre.

The settlers of Carthage and their descendents freely intermarried with prominent members of the native population of their locale (and of colonies Carthage itself established along the southern Mediterranean coast in N. Africa). The people and their culture came to be called "Punic." The Roman word "poenicus," a transliteration of the Greek word "phoinikos" means "red," and may refer to the skin color of the Phoenicians of the middle east. Thus, in Polybius and many Roman authors, you will see these people referred to as "Punic," "Carthaginian" or "Phoenician."

Punic policy towards the poorer nomadic tribes of the region (called Libyans, or Numidians (nomads), by the Greeks, they were the ancestors of the modern Berber people) was considerably harsher, however, and they routinely faced the risk of rebellion. During the fourth and third centuries, Carthage enthusiastically adopted and adapted artistic and architectural motifs of Egyptian and Hellenic culture, but never abandoned their own religious, artistic and social customs. The cultural life of the cities of this empire, accordingly, was a fascinating mix of native, immigrant and imported influences. Virtually no literary works survive from Carthage, although we know of at least one important agricultural treatise by a Carthaginian named Mago that profoundly influenced Roman thinking about agricultural science. It is not perhaps coincidental that this is the only work that survives at least by reputation, for the Carthaginians performed agricultural marvels in North Africa, expanding the region's cultivated land to far greater inland areas than has ever been achieved since their sway.<p>

Carthage dominated the western Mediterranean by establishing colonies in Sicily, Sardinia, and Spain (or by coming to dominate other settlements that had been established in the western Mediterranean by Phoenician cities in the 7th and 6th centuries B.C.E.), and forbidding traders from any other city-state to travel or trade in the region. This gave them unchallenged access to the metal, agricultural and personel resources of the entire region and contributed (as did their agricultural success in North Africa) to their extraordinary growth and wealth. At the time of the First Punic War, Carthage controled an area of about 28, 000 square miles (in N. Africa) and a population of 3 to 4 million people.

Aristotle greatly admired the Carthaginian political system. Every year two "Suffetes" [literarly, 'judges'] were elected who were the state's chief administrative officers. They executed policy decisions made by a council of about thirty which itself was a standing subcommittee of a senate of 300. Additionally, citizens met in popular assembly. Leaders called upon each of the increasingly larger political bodies if they could not reach a concensus within the smaller group. Thus, if the the council reached consensus on a matter of policy, it simply instructed the suffetes to carry out its decision. If council members could not reach consensus, they referred the matter to the senate for debate and decision. If they senate reached consensus, it directed the suffetes to implement its decisions. If they senate could not reach consensus, it referred the matter to the popular assembly. Although the assembly would only be called upon in truly important and controversial matters, citizens enjoyed a great deal of freedom of speech in assembly. Suffetes and members of the council and senate, as well as generals, were elected by the citizenry as a whole.

The Carthaginians rested judicial authority in a council of 104 judges chosen from the senate of 300 by a board of five elected magistrates. The judges were charged with supervising magistrates and preventing the suffetes from acting on tyrannical temptations.

Although Carthaginian citizens originally served in its army, by the 3rd century B.C.E., citizens were exempt from military service (to manage Punic trading interests and industries). The Carthaginian army and navy were composed of mercenaries and subject peoples, but led by an officer corp comprised of members of the Carthaginian elite. Carthage was served quite well by its officer corp despite very exacting Punic standards. They usually crucified generals who lost and were reluctant reinforce winning generals, lest too many troops feed tyrannical ambitions.

Until the last generation, much western scholarship about Carthage has been infected by three insidious prejudices. First, Rome never had much good to say about the Punic people, and it was Roman literary works that survived to influence western thinking, not Punic. Second and third, because the Phoenicians were a Semitic people and because North Africa fell under Moslem influence in the Middle Ages, western anti-semitic and anti-islamic prejudices strongly influenced the view European and American scholars have had of Carthage and its culture. It is not uncommon to read handbook accounts that speak of the "shallow, mercantile, religiously fanatical" culture of Carthage. We should, like Cicero, remember, however, that Carthage was an empire that successfully dominated the western Mediterranean for more than half a millenium, and it is unlikely, given its continuity and material resources, that its cultural life was was not as compelling and successful as that of its neighbors.