Events

The five-year conflict between Carthage and Agathocles of Syracuse, fought across Sicily and (uniquely) into Carthaginian Africa itself. Carthage opened the war strongly: Hamilcar son of Gisco defeate...

The first foreign army ever to operate on Carthage's home territory. In August 310 BCE, besieged in Syracuse, defeated in the field, his treasury empty, Agathocles of Syracuse took the audacious step ...

The political crisis of 265–264 BCE that produced Rome's first overseas war and the first of the three Punic Wars. The trigger was the Mamertines, a band of Campanian mercenaries who had seized the Gr...

The most studied battle of antiquity and Hannibal's tactical masterpiece. Drawn south into Apulia by Hannibal's seizure of the Roman supply depot at Cannae, the Roman consuls Aemilius Paullus and Tere...

The decisive engagement of the Second Punic War. After Scipio's invasion of Africa forced Hannibal's recall from Italy, the two commanders met in open battle in Numidia in autumn 202 BCE. Scipio's ref...

The peace treaty that ended the Second Punic War. Negotiated in the months after Zama, the terms were dictated by Rome and ratified, by Polybius's account, through Hannibal's intervention against the ...