An interesting historical story.
In 249, Rome lost another entire fleet to a storm. Carthage returned to mastery of the sea. Were there any trees left in Italy to build another fleet and enough plebeians to man it? You would think the Romans had had enough of naval warfare and its meteorological capriciousness. Read more…
Xanthippus was a Spartan who fortunately arrived in Carthage at just the right time to buck them up. He proceeded to make no secret of his disdain for Punic generalship. Put up or shut up, he was told. He was given command of the army. He trained it and Read more…
The First Punic War began in 264 B.C. and early on it became apparent it would be a war fought for control of Sicily. Since Sicily is an island, Carthage was confident it would win because of its powerful navy. The fact that Rome did not even have a navy Read more…
The quinquereme was the dominant oared galley in the Punic Wars. Dionysius of Syracuse is credited with inventing it. Five referred to the five oarsmen that rowed a bank of oars. It is believed that this meant two oars (the top and middle) had two men apiece and one oar Read more…
The return of Pyrrhus from his Sicilian adventure found Rome in bad straits. It was war-weary (constant warfare can do that to you) and suffering from a plague. In spite of that, Rome was still Rome. In 275 B.C., it sent two consular armies southward. Pyrrhus marched to meet them. Read more…
The first battle in the Pyrrhic War was fought near Heraclea in 280. Heraclea was located southwest of Tarentum on the sole of Italian boot. The Romans camped on the other side of a river. When a scout was captured, the Romans knew Pyrrhus was nearby. Pyrrhus’ army consisted Read more…
In 282 B.C., the city of Thurii asked Tarentum to help it against the Lucanians. When the Tarentines turned them down, Thurii asked Rome. As you can imagine, the Romans were only too happy to rescue the damsel in distress. A Roman army defeated a Lucanian Read more…
294 B.C. was marked by raiding by both sides and several battles. One of the battles saw the Samnites taking advantage of a thick fog to assault a Roman camp. They captured the tent of the quaestor (the lowest elected official who supervised the treasury; they were sometimes assigned Read more…
In 295 B.C., Rome was faced with the chilling prospect of four peoples combining against it. The situation was so dire that Rome had five men who were given imperium. (Imperium was the power to command an army.). In other words, the Romans had five armies deployed, led by five Read more…
Rome then went further into Samnium in 321 BC during the Second Samnite War. The Samnite general Gaius Pontius (Caius Ponius) was a “consummate warrior and commander.” High praise from Livy. He disguised some of his men as shepherds and had them tell the Romans that its ally Apulia Read more…