Tunisia. Carthage must be destroyed. Who destroyed Carthage What is the reason for the complete destruction of Carthage by the Romans

Rome's subjugation of Greece and the Third Punic War (149–146 BC) Having dealt with Macedonia, Rome adjusted its foreign policy course in the East. From now on, the Romans were interested in weakening their recent allies - Pergamum and Rhodes. Supporting

Destruction of Carthage 146 BC. e. As a result of the Third Punic War (from the word Poeni or Puni - in Latin "Phoenicians"), Carthage, a colony of the Phoenician city of Tyre, which created a maritime empire in the Western Mediterranean, was taken and destroyed by the Roman army in 146 BC.

Morning rushed through the open window with a hasty bird noise. It drowned out the ringing cries of bread and fruit peddlers, street vendors, car horns, even the endless roar of the sea, invisible behind the walls of the snow-white houses of Tunisia. The clean and cool hotel room was furnished according to the faceless “global” hotel standard, only on the wall hung a large photograph of an ancient clay mask - a mysterious half-smile, strands of thick hair falling onto the shoulders, a clearly defined spread of eyebrows over wide-open huge eyes - a photograph that could hang only here, twelve kilometers from Carthage.

And although this mask is clearly and academically identified in all scientific publications and prospectuses: a mask of the 5th century BC, found in a Phoenician burial during the excavations of Carthage, I believed the inscription made under this photograph: “Beautiful Dido.”

Carthage arose several centuries earlier than the small Gallic village of Lutetia, which later became Paris. He was already there when the Etruscans appeared in the north of the Apennine Peninsula - teachers of the Romans in the arts, navigation, and crafts. Carthage was big city already when a furrow was drawn around the Palatine Hill with a bronze plow, thereby performing the ritual of founding “Square Rome”.

And like the beginning of any city, whose history goes into the half-forgotten distance of centuries, the founding of Carthage was also consecrated by legend.

The daughter of the ruler of the main Phoenician city of Tyre, Dido, was supposed to inherit the royal throne together with her husband. But Dido’s brother killed the future heir, and the princess, fearing that the same fate awaited her, fled with her entourage to Africa. Her ship landed near the city of Utica. The exile turned to the Numidian king Giarbus with a request to allocate her some land to build a house for herself and her retinue. Giarb allowed Dido to build a house, but it should occupy no more space than the oxhide would limit... And then Dido, in front of Giarb’s amazed advisers, cut the ox hide into thin strips and fenced off with them such an area on which an entire city could be built. This is how the Birsa fortress arose on the northern coast of Africa, which means “skin.” And soon the city of Carthage spread out near the walls of the fortress.

Like most ancient legends, the myth of Dido apparently reflects some real events Phoenician history. But still, the place chosen for the construction of Carthage turned out to be too successful to attribute the honor of its founding to just one mind and chance - the city for many centuries kept under its control the main trade routes between the east and west of the Mediterranean. Ships from Etruria and Spain passed through the harbor of Carthage, with British Isles(even there, many researchers believe, Phoenician sailors went there for tin) and from Sicily. And when the city of Tire fell under the onslaught of the Persians, Carthage became the capital of Phenicia.

Twelve kilometers to Carthage. Behind the car windows you can see the houses of coastal towns merged into one settlement - Punik, Kram, Salambo. Once an integral part of Carthage, they are now quiet resorts. It's winter in North Africa now, and the towns seem deserted. A small, incredibly blue saucer of the trading harbor of Carthage flashed ahead.

But Carthage itself is not there...

By the 5th century BC, all the Phoenician colonies in Africa, many lands of Spain, the Balearic Islands, and Sardinia were already subordinated to the new capital. Carthage by this time had become one of the richest cities in the Mediterranean.

Carthaginian merchants equipped expeditions to unknown lands in order to find, in modern terms, new markets for their goods. Little evidence from ancient authors about the Carthaginian expeditions has reached us, but even the little that we know is striking in its scope and power.

“The Carthaginians decided that Hanno would go to sea beyond the Pillars of Hercules and found the Carthaginian cities. He sailed with sixty ships, on which were thirty thousand men and women, supplied with supplies and everything necessary,” says the so-called “Periplus of Hanno,” the story that has come down to us about one of the most famous odysseys of the Carthaginians.

The Carthaginian fleet had no equal at that time in the entire Mediterranean Sea. The Carthaginian war galleys “were built in such a way,” writes Polybius, “that they could move in any direction with the greatest ease... If the enemy, fiercely attacking, pressed such ships, they retreated without exposing themselves to risk: after all, light ships are not afraid of the open sea. If the enemy persisted in pursuit, the galleys turned around and, maneuvering in front of the formation of enemy ships or enveloping it from the flanks, again and again went for the ram.” Under the protection of such galleys, heavily laden Carthaginian sailing ships could sail in “their” sea without fear.

The rulers of Carthage supported their power by an alliance with the Etruscans, and this alliance was like a shield that blocked the movement of the ancient Greeks to the trading oases of the Mediterranean. But under the blows of the Roman legions, the military power of the Etruscans began to decline, and Carthage began to seek an alliance with Rome. Your future killer.

Apart from the lines of the guidebook, little reminds us that here was one of the largest ports of antiquity - in the trading harbor of Carthage, as ancient sources say, 220 heavily laden sailing ships could anchor simultaneously. It seems that you are standing on a completely deserted shore. Desolation. Bitter wormwood smell of dry grass. Heaps of garbage. Marble debris: fragments of columns, pieces of capitals, blocks, details of stone carvings - broken, shattered architecture. In the green shade, under palm trees and bushes, lie sarcophagi - small stone boxes slightly larger than a birdhouse. This and the ruins of the temple of Aesculapius are all that remains here from the Phoenician Carthage...

The Carthaginians first concluded an agreement on an alliance with Rome at the end of the 6th century BC. At this time, Carthage waged a fierce struggle with Greece for dominion in Sicily. This struggle lasted for more than three centuries - until the 4th century BC. Owning the largest island of the Mediterranean Sea and establishing itself in Spain, Carthage was at the end of the 6th century BC the most powerful maritime power of the ancient world.

But in 480 BC, at the Battle of Himera in Sicily, the united Greek army crushed the hitherto invincible Carthaginians. The autocracy of Carthage on the trade routes of the Mediterranean ended. True, he still fought, he fought for more than one century, and certain stages of this struggle were successful for him. Carthage managed to almost completely regain Sicily, he expanded his possessions in Africa itself - and the current territory of Tunisia was almost entirely part of the Carthaginian power. The Carthaginian army, replenished with African warriors, regained Sicily at the beginning of the 3rd century BC. But already in the middle of this century he stood up against Carthage

Rome, which did not want to share the Mediterranean Sea with anyone.

For 118 years, the struggle between Carthage and Rome continued intermittently, a struggle that went down in history under the name “Punic Wars.”

After the First Punic War, which lasted twenty-three years - from 264 to 241 BC - Carthage lost Sicily and paid 1,200 talents of indemnity. Carthage decided to take revenge. The Second War lasted seventeen years, from 218 to 201. The famous Carthaginian commander Hannibal made an unprecedented transition with his army from Spain to Italy, approached Rome, crushing selected Roman legions. But this war also ended in defeat. Carthage lost Spain and paid 10 thousand talents of indemnity.

In 149 BC, the third Punic War began. It lasted only three years. It's hard to even call it a war. As F. Engels wrote, “this was simple oppression of the weakest enemy by a ten times stronger enemy.”

And all these three years, the Roman senator Marcus Porcius Cato, with fanatical obstinacy, ended his speech, no matter what it was about, with the words: “Besides, I believe that Carthage must be destroyed.”

And Carthage was destroyed. The agony of the doomed city lasted six days. The legionnaires of Scipio Aemilianus captured the military port and gradually occupied the entire lower city. Fires began in Carthage, perishing from hunger and thirst. On the seventh day, 55 thousand townspeople surrendered to the mercy of the victors.

... "Carthage must be destroyed." Scipio Aemilian carried out the order of the Senate. Heavy plows plowed what was left of its streets, and salt was sown into the land on which only yesterday there were vineyards, grain growing and trees standing, in order to forever sterilize it.

Legend has it that Scipio himself wept as he watched the great city disappear into oblivion, and his retinue heard that the commander whispered the words of Homer: “One day the sacred Troy will perish, and with it Priam and the people of the spearman Priam will perish.”

Underfoot are huge stone slabs, corroded by time. Now this is a road to nowhere - the ancient Carthaginian road from North Africa to Libya and further to Egypt. The gilded chariots of triumphants rushed along it and the Roman legionaries passed; the blood of the Carthaginian mercenaries who rebelled against their masters at the end of the second Punic War, the blood of the Ligurians, Lusitanians, Balearians, Lydians, Greeks, and Egyptians flowed here. And further away, right by the sea, the light trunks of Roman columns gleam white...

Twenty-four years after the destruction of Carthage, on the spot where Roman plows passed on the last day of the last Punic War, the Romans rebuilt new town. Everything that remained from Phoenician Carthage was used as building material for the buildings and temples of Roman Carthage. Carthage very quickly became the administrative, economic and cultural center of the entire African Roman province. In 29 AD, Emperor Augustus granted Carthage the rights it had before the Punic Wars. The city in northern Africa became rich and powerful again. The hills running down to the sea were again built up with white stone houses, temples, and palaces, and the slave market was again noisy in many languages.

Carthage was Roman for six centuries. In the 5th century it was conquered by the Vandals, and it became the capital of their kingdom. In the 6th century, Carthage came under Byzantine rule. In VII it was captured and again destroyed by the Arabs. In the 9th century, on the site of Carthage there was only a small village with only about a thousand inhabitants. And in the 16th century, Carthage - Phoenician, Roman, Byzantine - was finally destroyed by the Spaniards.

And today, over Carthage, over what remains of Carthage, the threat of a third destruction hangs.

The significance that Carthage played - its architects, artists, jewelers, sculptors, artisans - for the whole of North Africa, especially for Tunisia, is enormous. Being at a crossroads international routes, Carthage, like a sponge, absorbed the cultures of all peoples and tribes. The oldest decoration found by archaeologists in Carthage has Syrian features, some figurines of the Phoenician mother goddess are clearly made in the Greek style, and figurines are found in the Carthaginian settlements of Tunisia, the whole appearance of which is strikingly similar to the ancient Egyptian sphinxes. And all this wealth has been closely intertwined over thousands of years with local, African traditions in art and culture. One of the largest Tunisian researchers, Jelal El-Kafi, writes that “in the history of Tunisia - an area where civilizations from the entire Mediterranean world have long met and interbred - Carthage appears as one of the peaks in the majestic panorama of a cultural tradition dating back more than one millennium.” Carthage was killed twice, but it was too great to disappear without a trace.

A large bush of pale lilac flowers, and in it, as if fused with it, stands a snow-white Corinthian capital. It was not destroyed or broken by man, but time, wind, sand and water removed from it that sharpness that is inevitable in any product that has just come out of the hand of a master - it stands as a light sketch in stone, light and beautiful. And nearby, right on the ground, framed by the lacy greenery of climbing plants, a piece of a fresco flashes on a fragment of an ancient wall. Carthage is reminiscent not only of the products of its craftsmen, discovered by archaeologists, exhibited in numerous museums around the world. In many cities and towns of the Maghreb, mosques, khan's palaces, and residential buildings were built from its ruins: you often see either a stone with a half-erased inscription from Carthage inserted into the wall of an ordinary house, or a cabinet made from a block of an antique column.

But the main thing that has preserved Carthage over the centuries is the land. The land of Carthage became a protected field for archaeologists. Who can take upon himself the courage to say what masterpieces of world art the explorer's spade will stumble upon tomorrow in this land?

And this protected field is under threat of destruction.

This time it's final. The city of Tunisia is growing, it is already cramped within the old walls, within the old borders, and it launched an attack on Carthage.

Roads, parking lots, campsites, villas, hotels, motels - ordinary development, without a plan, chaotic, begins to cover this land. El-Kafi writes that “if things continue as they are now, the brick and concrete of modern residential areas will inevitably bury the soil of Carthage.”

Now the Tunisian government, together with UNESCO, is looking for ways to save Carthage. The Carthage-Tunisia project is being created. Optimal options for the urban development of Tunisia are being sought in order to allocate significant areas of the future city to archaeological zones.

“Carthage should not be destroyed” - such an epigraph can be prefaced by the project “Carthage - Tunisia”. And I want to believe that above the ground ancient city The steel, glass and concrete of the 20th century AD will not rise as the last tombstone.

Tunisia, 22.09 - 29.09.2013
Carthage, 09/25/2013

Legend of Carthage begins with the Phoenician city of Tyre, the beautiful princess Dido, betrayal, greed, lust for power that destroyed the royal family.
Saving her life, Dido fled to an unknown country in northern Africa and there she persuaded local residents sell her a piece of land that can be covered with bull skin. Clever and cunning Dido cut the bull's skin into the thinnest strips, tied them and laid them out, separating a whole mountain. On the mountain, under the leadership of Dido, the Birsa fortress was built, which means skin, and around the fortress the city of Kart Hadasht - the New City - Carthage grew.
The founding date of Carthage is considered to be 814. BC e.

Over the next centuries Carthage strengthened his position by establishing colonies in Corsica, Ibiza and northern Africa and re-subordinating the former Phoenician colonies.
Thanks to numerous trade routes, Carthage by the 1st century. BC e. became one of the largest cities in the world and the capital of the largest state.

The Carthaginians surrounded their city with impregnable walls. The length of the massive city walls was 37 kilometers and the height was 12 meters. The city had temples, markets, administrative buildings, towers, a cemetery and a theater. There was a fortress in the center of the city, and a port on the coast.
Ancient builders built residential buildings from limestone that reached 6 floors in height. These houses had bathtubs, sinks and even showers. By 600 BC. e. In ancient Carthage, a unified water supply system appeared, consisting of cisterns, canals, pipes and a 132-meter aqueduct. Putting a bathtub and running water to it is half the battle. It was necessary to remove the used water and the ancient builders created a unified sewage system in Carthage.

Reconstruction of ancient Punic Carthage from the National Museum of Carthage.

My main pride Carthage was its harbor, built in the 2nd century. BC e. It had no analogue in the ancient world. The harbor contained two separate ports. The first is for merchant ships; merchant ships from all over the world came here. The second is a circular port with numerous docks in the center and hundreds of warships. Carthaginian warship - quinquereme. These are powerful and fast warships with five rows of oars. Quinquereme could high speed penetrate through an enemy ship. The Carthaginians put production of such ships on stream.

Excavations on Birsa Hill, remains of Phoenician buildings of the 2nd century BC. e.

The main opponent Carthage was Ancient Rome. The size of Carthage's army was smaller, but Carthage had the most powerful fleet of antiquity; for several centuries Carthage dominated the Mediterranean Sea.

History brings to us the names of the great commanders of Carthage: Hamilcar, Hasdrubal, Hannibal.

The wars between Carthage and Rome went down in history as the Punic. The Romans considered Carthage a constant threat to their empire. Only one winner could emerge from this mortal battle; the vanquished must be wiped off the face of the earth.

Remains of a Phoenician city on the hill of Byrsa.

The battles went on with varying degrees of success, but Carthage lost both the first and second Punic Wars.

In 202 BC. e. Roman senator Marcus Cato saw the wealth of Carthage, which had recovered from its defeats in the Punic Wars, and again felt threatened by it. Since then, the famous phrase “Carthage must be destroyed” became the leitmotif of all his speeches in the Senate.

In 149 BC. e. Rome began the third Punic War. Carthage held off the siege of Rome for 3 years, but in the spring of 146 BC. e. Carthage was destroyed to the ground and burned. Its area was forever cursed, the ground was sprinkled with salt as a sign that no one should ever settle here.

However, 100 years later Julius Caesar decided to establish a colony here. Roman engineers removed about 100,000 cubic meters. meters of land, destroying the top of Birsa Hill to level the surface and destroy traces of the past.

Over time Carthage became the second largest city in the West after Rome. Temples, a circus, an amphitheater, a theater, baths, and an aqueduct were built here.

At the top of the hill is the Cathedral of St. Louis (1897). Currently there is a concert hall here.

But the Roman Empire fell into decline and Carthage was captured by the Vandals, then by the Byzantines, and in 698 AD. e. Arabs. Its stones served to build the city of Tunis. In the following centuries, the marble and granite that once adorned the Roman city were plundered and taken out of the country.

Today it's a suburb Tunisia.
Present-day Carthage shows tourists three cultural layers - the very modest remains of a Phoenician city on the hill of Byrsa, numerous ancient Roman ruins and a modern suburb Tunisia with the presidential palace.

The Roman era is represented by numerous mosaics, sculptures and bas-reliefs.

Next to the cathedral is the entrance to National Museum Carthage, located in the building of a former monastery, whose monks laid the foundation for the collection.

On the outer walls there are paintings with Roman mosaics.

On the ground floor of the museum there is a huge panel of Roman mosaics.

Roman statues and bas-reliefs dedicated mainly to the god of wine, Bacchus.

Marble sarcophagi of the Punic era (15th century BC) Priest...

...and the priestess.

Copy of the giant head of Princess Antonina found in Carthage (original in the Louvre).

Punic masks.

Punic pottery.

Phoenician glass.

Entrance to the Archaeological Park of the Baths of Antonia Pius.

This is the most picturesque of all the surviving sites of Carthage. The park area is more than 4 hectares, it is lined with rectangular alleys. During excavations, remains of various eras were also discovered here - Punic burials, Roman buildings, Byzantine churches.

On the sides of the entrance alley there are small sarcophagi for the burial of children sacrificed to the god Baal.
This is an infamous fact from history Carthage. Archaeologists have discovered a site where urns containing the charred remains of animals and small children were found. 20,000 children were sacrificed over 200 years. Although, perhaps, it was a children's cemetery, and the terrible rumors were black PR for the ancient Romans.

The entrance alley divides the park into two parts. On the left side are ancient underground cisterns, which now contain fragments of statues, mosaics, and ruins of houses with swimming pools. On the right are the ruins of the thermal baths.

Byzantine church with interesting mosaics.

An ancient dwelling where a collection of statues was found.

Mosaic floors in Roman houses.

Near the sea - the baths of Anthony Pius.

The baths were built in 147-162. n. e. under the Roman Emperor Antoninus.

Visiting baths in the Roman Empire was a way of life. Here they communicated, conducted business negotiations, made deals, relaxed, had fun, and made important decisions. “The patrician went to the bathhouse and washed himself at the same time” - an ancient Roman proverb.

What we see now is only the first floor of the baths. There were three in total.
On an area of ​​approximately 2 hectares there were gardens surrounded by a colonnade, huge halls with hot baths, steam rooms, halls for gymnastic exercises, for relaxation and conversation, and public toilets. The baths had open pools by the sea and terraces - solariums, a marble staircase led to the seashore.

The floors of all rooms were covered with mosaics, the walls were lined with marble, and the halls were decorated with marble statues.

The baths were destroyed by vandals in 439. All that remained of the huge complex was the lower utility floor, where the water was heated and from where hot air was supplied to the steam rooms.

Archaeologists installed individual surviving 20-meter columns to show the height of the structure.

Behind the white fence is the presidential palace.

To be continued...

Carthage- an ancient city-state in the North. Africa (in the area of ​​modern Tunisia). Founded in 825 BC e. Phoenicians. To the beginning 3rd century, having conquered the North. Africa, Sicily (except Syracuse), Sardinia and South. Spain emerged as a powerful Mediterranean power, which led to a clash between it and Rome. After the defeat in the Punic Wars (264-146 BC), Carthage was destroyed by the Romans (146), the main Carthaginian territory became part of the Roman province of Africa, the rest was transferred to Numidia.

Carthage (Phoenician Kartadasht, lit. - new city), a slave-owning city-state in the North. Africa (territory of modern Tunisia), subjugated in the 7th-4th centuries. BC e. a significant part of the Northern coast. Africa, southern Spain and a number of islands of the Mediterranean. K. was founded in 825 BC. e. Phoenician colonists from the city of Tire. It was located on a peninsula, which created favorable conditions for the defense of the city from land and the development of trade. From the 7th century BC e. was one of the largest trading city-states of the ancient world, had the best in the West. parts of the Mediterranean port. During its heyday, according to some sources, there were up to 700 thousand people in Kazakhstan. Power in K. belonged to the slave owners. oligarchies. This means the role in politics. life was played by commanders elected from the ranks of the same slave owners. oligarchies. The state was headed by 2 elected rulers. State aristocratic the council, representing the highest authority, consisted of 30 people. Large slaveholding was widely developed in Kazakhstan. With. agriculture and handicraft production, in which, along with slaves, semi-free dependent producers - bodas - were exploited. In addition to private workshops in Kazakhstan, there were also state ones, where state labor was exploited. slaves An important part of the Kazakh economy was the intermediary sea. trade and slave trade. K. led numerous war, for which he maintained a large landmass. army and strong navy. The core of the army was a squad of slave owners. nobility Another part of the army were detachments fielded by dependent Africans. tribes and allies. His ch. and the most combat-ready part were mercenaries. Representatives of the Carthaginian Senate recruited mercenaries among the unconquered tribes of Africa, on the Iberian Peninsula, in Gaul, Italy, Greece and on the islands of the Mediterranean. The Carthaginian army consisted of infantry, cavalry, war chariots and war elephants. The Carthaginians themselves served in the cavalry and in the selected honorary foot squad (“sacred detachment”). The army had a strong force of warriors who fought on 300 war elephants. The Carthaginian army was strong in its technology. equipment (various siege and throwing machines). The battle formation of the Carthaginians usually consisted of three parts: the right and left wings (cavalry) and the main. forces (the rest of the army). The Balearic slingers scattered ahead, covering the battle formation. Usually the army was located in a carefully guarded camp. It lived predominantly. at the expense of local funds, ruining the country where the war was going on. The fleet played an active role in the war. actions. In the history of K. Ch. wars with Rome take place. Both Roman and Carthaginian slave owners carried out captured policies and fought for dominance in Sicily, and then throughout the West. Mediterranean. For military history. art of the greatest interest are the wars between Canada and Rome (see Punic Wars), during which it received its greatest development. These wars revealed the talent of such outstanding commanders as Hannibal Barca and Hasdrubal.

In 146 BC e. after a three-year siege, which ended with a six-day (but another data, seven-day) assault, K. was captured by the Romans and completely destroyed. Later, due to the favorable geogr. the situation was restored several times. In the beginning. n. e. was one of the largest cities in the Mediterranean. After its destruction during the Arab conquests, it was rebuilt in 698, but later lost its significance. The ruins of K., located near the city of Tunisia, are one of the most visited places by tourists.

Materials from the Soviet Military Encyclopedia in 8 volumes, volume 4 were used.

Literature:

Shifman I. Sh. The emergence of the Carthaginian state. M.-L., 1963;

S t p o k o v A. A. History of military art. T. 1. M., 1955. See Decree, geogr. names;

Mashkin N.A. Carthaginian power before the Punic Wars. - “News, ancient history", 1948, No. 4.

Read further:

Bickerman E. Chronology of the ancient world. Middle East and antiquity. Publishing house "Science", Main editorial office of oriental literature, Moscow, 1975.