\f1 \fs22 Carthage, whose name means <<new city,>> was founded by colonists from \b \cf4 \ATXht1146 Tyre\b0 \cf0 \ATXht0
at the end of the ninth or, at the latest, during the first few decades of the eighth century BC. Over the course of two centuries favorable political and economic conditions led to the North African city becoming the main Phoenician colony in the West.
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A policy of expansion into the Mediterranean inevitably brought Carthage into conflict with all the great powers of the time. From the middle of the sixth century BC onward they clashed with the Greeks in northwest Sicily, where the Phoenician colon
ies of \b \cf4 \ATXht1144 Moyta\b0 \cf0 \ATXht0 , Panormus, and Solus were located.\par
In the central and northern Tyrrhenian Sea they fought with the Phocians, who operated as pirates from their base at Alalia in Corsica. They were defeated in 535 BC
by the Carthaginians in alliance with the \b \cf4 \ATXht55 Etruscans\b0 \cf0 \ATXht0 .\par
In the third century BC Carthage encountered the emerging power of \b \cf4 \ATXht88 Rome\b0 \cf0 \ATXht0 : the conflict assumed dramatic proportions for it was no
t just control of the Mediterranean that was at stake but the very survival of the two powerful cities and their civilizations. This marked the beginning of the so-called <<Punic Wars,>> which were brought to an end in 146 BC with the definitive destruct
ion of Carthage by the armies of Scipio Aemilianus.\par
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RELATIONS WITH ROME \par
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The Roman name of <<Punic>> for the Phoenicians was a Latin adaptation of the word Phoenikes, used by the Greeks to describe the coastal populations of Phoenic
ia, Syria, and Anatolia. For this reason the wars between Rome and Carthage were referred to as <<Punic>> by Latin historians. Before they came into direct conflict, however, the Romans and Carthaginians established sound political and commercial relatio
ns, sanctioned by four successive treaties. \par
But the expansionist aims of Rome led to a deterioration of relations in the third century BC. In 264 the First Punic War (264-241 BC) broke out, and the Carthaginians were repeatedly defeated by the Roma
ns in the waters off Sicily. In the Second Punic War (219-202 BC), the Carthaginians succeeded in taking the war to Italy, under the leadership of \b \cf2 \ATXht8 Hannibal\b0 \cf0 \ATXht0 . After a series of brilliant victories, the Carthaginian general
tried to get the Italic peoples to rise against Rome, but had little success and from this point on his enterprise began to fail. Its energies revived, Rome decided to attack Carthage in Africa, where \b \cf2 \ATXht16 Scipio\b0 \cf0 \ATXht0 landed in 20
4 BC, earning himself the name of Africanus, or the African. Recalled home hastily, Hannibal fought and lost the last and decisive battle at Zama.\par
The Third Punic War (149-146 BC) concluded with the destruction of Carthage, burned to the ground by t
