What if Carthage won the Punic Wars?

[Northwest Slobovia]

The carthaginians were most certainly not conquerors.

The reason the roman empire conquered most of europe is that they were a heavily agrarian economy.

I'd say all ancient economies were "heavily agrarian": without mechanization, most people have to farm to feed the cities.

This random web site -- which I'm taking a lot of salt -- says:

Carthage was fairly advanced in agriculture and was a net exporter of grains, and famous for her horses, which strongly resemble the Arabian horses of today. Mago wrote a 28 volume treatise on agriculture and soil conservation, which was so highly valued by the Romans that they ordered it translated into Latin for their own use after the fall of Carthage in 146 B.C. They practiced irrigation and crop rotation, possibly learned from their contacts with Egypt and other near eastern countries. After the disastrous loss of the Second Punic war with Rome (202 B.C.), Hannibal was elected Shophet (or Suffete, a post very similar to the Judge-Kings of Israel), and pushed through a number of government reforms, and placed renewed emphasis on agriculture which was highly successful, allowing Carthage to pay her heavy war indemnity to Rome and recover her wealth, in spite of the loss of her empire.

(all the way at the bottom)

None of the claims are sourced, so I don't take them as necessarily factual, but they sound reasonable to me: trade made them rich, but they needed grain and land to grow it just as much as the next civilization.

[Terrible Rage Over Lost Luggage]

If Carthage won the Punic Wars, you'd ask, "What if Rome won the Punic Wars?"

Also, they'd be called the Pubic Wars, and guys would be complaining about how women don't want to shave their punic hair for them.

Not the sort of world I'd want to live in.

[Zephie]

Carthage is irrelevant in history

[The Archregimancy]

The carthaginians were most certainly not conquerors.

Hamilcar Barca's conquest of a large portion of Spain - a major overseas Carthaginian territorial conquest that predates any non-insular Roman expansion outside of Italy rather suggests otherwise.

That rather bizarre statement is alone enough for most people to wholly ignore the feasibility of the admittedly entertaining flights of fantasy in the rest of your post.

[Samuraikoku]

I certainly wonder if that would have had an effect on Roman Law. But I cannot say for certain.

[Krownsinburg]

Carthage is irrelevant in history

The only nation that ever stood a chance against Rome before the Goths, Franks, Vandals & Huns began their conquest is irrelevant in history?

I think not, sir.

That's like saying North Korea is irrelevant in history.

[The Republic of Lanos]

Carthage is irrelevant in history

The only nation that ever stood a chance against Rome before the Goths, Franks, Vandals & Huns began their conquest is irrelevant in history?

I think not, sir.

That's like saying North Korea is irrelevant in history.

Carthage didn't have any Chinese People's Volunteers barge in right before the Romans were about to finish overrunning the country.

[Czechanada]

We'd be playing Carthage: Total War instead of Rome: Total War.

[Ostroeuropa]

The carthaginians were most certainly not conquerors.

Hamilcar Barca's conquest of a large portion of Spain - a major overseas Carthaginian territorial conquest that predates any non-insular Roman expansion outside of Italy rather suggests otherwise.

That rather bizarre statement is alone enough for most people to wholly ignore the feasibility of the admittedly entertaining flights of fantasy in the rest of your post.

One man does not a conquerors culture make.
http://www.angelfire.com/empire2/unkemp ... RTHEMP.GIF
You can see that they are heavily based around coastal conquests. (Also, the baleares should be coloured there).
The difference is, a carthaginian would be regarded as respectable from wealth, and a carthaginian leader as prestigious because he helped trade and curbed piracy.
Compare that to the romans, where such things are simply adequate, and to be prestigious military service and conquest is required.
Their treatment of the moors (Numidians/Mauri) is a symptom of this.
"Should be conquer them?"
"Why? They are trading with us."
VS the roman
"HOLY SHIT MORE LAND! *stab*"

The conquest of spain was in response to the loss of corsica, sardinia, and sicily in the first punic war. If anything it greatly sped up their collapse. Suddenly shifting from a trading power to a quasi-militaristic one isn't going to help you stop a genuinely militaristic society.
It would be like france suddenly deciding to invade belgium in 1938 and wasting masses of resources to scare the germans away.
You are also forgetting that Rome had been regularly beating up the spanish and making vassals out of the local tribes.
The carthaginian action in spain directly caused the second punic war (The siege of a spanish city Sagunto under roman protection.)

Carthaginian "Conquest" of spain barely lasted two decades if you ignore the rock of gibraltar and a few trade ports.
Deciding to up and and attack the Iberians wasted money, troops, and lost them a potentially valuable ally against the romans. (Rome had very few voluntary friends in Iberia) as well as gave the romans an excuse to attack.
After the 2nd punic war, Carthage's power was essentially destroyed.
If you're best example for why they are conquerors is a complete clusterfuck that ends up destroying their nation, nets them exactly 0 spains, lasts only two decades, bankrupts the nation, and doesn't even manage to maintain control over the areas they claim DURING that decade, then i'd say it's fairly supportive of my claim that they are not conquerors.



237 BCE Carthage invades spain
228-227 BCE The invasion of the south-east of spain is complete. And the war against the various tribes there ends.
219 BCE They attack a roman vassal
218 BCE They lose all of spain

"Hurrr. 10 years later we has south east spai-"
"Hai we're rome, we'll defeat you and occupy ALL spain in 1 year." (Except the cantabrians and vascones but screw them they pay us money and we'll get around to it eventually i guess)

[Nazis in Space]

There'd be a shitton of Barcelonas throughout the mediterranean, and mediterranean countries would consequently dominate european football.

Needless to say, the changes are minute at best.

[Krownsinburg]

You people underestimate Carthage.

Persia underestimated Greece, they lost, then got taken over.

[New England and The Maritimes]

Latins would probably just rise again.

[Napkiraly]

Furthermore, I consider that Rome must be destroyed.

[The Archregimancy]

Hamilcar Barca's conquest of a large portion of Spain - a major overseas Carthaginian territorial conquest that predates any non-insular Roman expansion outside of Italy rather suggests otherwise.

That rather bizarre statement is alone enough for most people to wholly ignore the feasibility of the admittedly entertaining flights of fantasy in the rest of your post.

One man does not a conquerors culture make.
http://www.angelfire.com/empire2/unkemp ... RTHEMP.GIF
You can see that they are heavily based around coastal conquests. (Also, the baleares should be coloured there).
The difference is, a carthaginian would be regarded as respectable from wealth, and a carthaginian leader as prestigious because he helped trade and curbed piracy.
Compare that to the romans, where such things are simply adequate, and to be prestigious military service and conquest is required.
Their treatment of the moors (Numidians/Mauri) is a symptom of this.
"Should be conquer them?"
"Why? They are trading with us."
VS the roman
"HOLY SHIT MORE LAND! *stab*"

The conquest of spain was in response to the loss of corsica, sardinia, and sicily in the first punic war. If anything it greatly sped up their collapse. Suddenly shifting from a trading power to a quasi-militaristic one isn't going to help you stop a genuinely militaristic society.
It would be like france suddenly deciding to invade belgium in 1938 and wasting masses of resources to scare the germans away.
You are also forgetting that Rome had been regularly beating up the spanish and making vassals out of the local tribes.
The carthaginian action in spain directly caused the second punic war (The siege of a spanish city Sagunto under roman protection.)

Carthaginian "Conquest" of spain barely lasted two decades if you ignore the rock of gibraltar and a few trade ports.
Deciding to up and and attack the Iberians wasted money, troops, and lost them a potentially valuable ally against the romans. (Rome had very few voluntary friends in Iberia) as well as gave the romans an excuse to attack.
After the 2nd punic war, Carthage's power was essentially destroyed.
If you're best example for why they are conquerors is a complete clusterfuck that ends up destroying their nation, nets them exactly 0 spains, lasts only two decades, bankrupts the nation, and doesn't even manage to maintain control over the areas they claim DURING that decade, then i'd say it's fairly supportive of my claim that they are not conquerors.



237 BCE Carthage invades spain
228-227 BCE The invasion of the south-east of spain is complete. And the war against the various tribes there ends.
219 BCE They attack a roman vassal
218 BCE They lose all of spain

"Hurrr. 10 years later we has south east spai-"
"Hai we're rome, we'll defeat you and occupy ALL spain in 1 year." (Except the cantabrians and vascones but screw them they pay us money and we'll get around to it eventually i guess)

The problem with all of the above is that you're making a retrospective judgement on the basis of what happened after the Second Punic War, and backprojecting those outcomes as indicative of what would have happened in a Carthaginian Mediterranean.

If you compare the maps of Roman and Carthaginian territory prior to the first two Punic Wars, it's Carthage that starts with all of the external territory, not Rome. Rome controlled no territory outside the Italian Peninsula (in which I'm including Cisalpine Gaul) prior to the First Punic War. Rome controlled no territory outside of Italy, Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica. You're also ignoring the point that the reason that Carthage only seems to control coastal territory is that much of the inland territory in North Africa was uneconomic desert that wasn't worth controlling; even the Romans only marginally expanded inland in North Africa.

Hamilcar Barca's conquest of Spain was entirely comparable to Roman conquests of specific territories by individuals - notably the conquests of Spain and Gaul; your evidence for considering it temporary and atypical is that Rome conquered Carthaginian Spain after 10 years. But that's to take an established historical event and assume that it demonstrates that Carthaginian control of Spain was doomed to be transient. It doesn't. Rome only began to control overseas territories as a result of its victories in the first two Punic Wars. Given Barcid activity in Spain, it seems wholly likely that Carthage would have engaged in a similar period of territorial expansion had they won since they had already set the precedent that the Romans themselves would subsequently follow.

You are also forgetting that Rome had been regularly beating up the spanish and making vassals out of the local tribes.

Let's assume, please, that when it comes to Classical history threads, I'm not 'forgetting' anything; I more likely don't consider it directly germane to the core point.

[Gauthier]

Elephants would replace horses. Races would require larger tracks. There'd be a lot more poop.

Engines would be measured in elephantpower.

[Genivaria]

Well I think Carthage would capitalize on its victory by annexing part of or all of Italy.
One more peninsula with trade ports one both sides.

[The Elven Imperium]

Greek. Not Latin be the language of scholars today?

[Priory Academy USSR]

Potentially, it would still be around today. I doubt it would have spread all the way up into Germania; more likely, it would control Belgium as a trading base with the local tribes, and the same with Britannia and Gaul. Of course, at some point they'll probably think, 'hey, why don't we cut out the middle man?' and take direct control of those that they traded with, sometime circa 1000 AD if things are going well in the Mediterrean. There, I'd say the Carthaginians would conquer Italy up to where the Romans ruled, or divided it back up into it's consituent states, ie the Etruscans, with Carthage friendly rulers. Eventually, they'd take direct control of Italy, and maybe even Greece too.

Well, that's my uneducated guess.

[Yewhohohopia]

Greek. Not Latin be the language of scholars today?

You're thinking of English.

[Forsher]

We would have used the Phoenician alphabet instead of the Latin one.
Romance languages would be based off of Punic, and the influence would not have reached as far North.
I think Carthage would have fell sooner as they were already relying on mercenaries to heavily fill their ranks by the time of their wars with Rome. Which Rome did just before its fall by relying on German mercenaries.

As far as I can tell, the Phonecian Alphabet is the Grandfather of the Latin One through Greek. Also, we may not use an alphabet at all... it entirely depends on exactly what this new Carthage did.

[The Nuclear Fist]

If Carthage had won the Punic Wars and brought Rome to heel, how would Europe have looked during the Hunnic invasion?

[New England and The Maritimes]

If Carthage had won the Punic Wars and brought Rome to heel, how would Europe have looked during the Hunnic invasion?

Probably the same. Mass devastation in certain countrysides, but no direct, decisive impacts on its own.

[The Nuclear Fist]

If Carthage had won the Punic Wars and brought Rome to heel, how would Europe have looked during the Hunnic invasion?

Probably the same. Mass devastation in certain countrysides, but no direct, decisive impacts on its own.

So no longer lasting Hunnic kingdom or even a permanent Hunnic minority?

You make me sad.

But seriously, if the Carthaginians wouldn't have expanded all that far into Central Europe, which is where the Huns swarmed in from if I remember correctly, wouldn't said Huns be seeing much less stiff resistance?

[New England and The Maritimes]

Probably the same. Mass devastation in certain countrysides, but no direct, decisive impacts on its own.

So no longer lasting Hunnic kingdom or even a permanent Hunnic minority?

You make me sad.

But seriously, if the Carthaginians wouldn't have expanded all that far into Central Europe, which is where the Huns swarmed in from if I remember correctly, wouldn't said Huns be seeing much less stiff resistance?

The Huns came out of the area around Kazakhstan, then went around the black sea and started attacking the Eastern Roman Empire.

[Vetalia]

I'd say all ancient economies were "heavily agrarian": without mechanization, most people have to farm to feed the cities.

I would think a big component of Rome's strength was that it wasn't heavily agrarian, at least not in comparison to its neighbors...the latifundia of Italy and other provinces were easily comparable to modern agribusiness in a lot of ways, not the least sheer productivity, and their displacement of subsistence farmers in favor of their economies of scale and ability to produce commodity agriculture for trade generated a large, landless population for recruitment into the military.