While doing the Classics essay "How important to the Aeneid are the relationships between parents and children and what was the significance of these relationships to readers in the reign of Augustus?" I started to deviate into all the actually interesting historical links and Augustan messages in it. I've decided that if by the end of the year we haven't done an essay like that, I'll probably just write it for fun anyway, using the excuse that it's a revision aide, but actually because I'd love to write that sort of essay. I hadn't done any really interesting Classics essays in ages, and I was starting to regret applying for Ancient History, especially since I've been doing loads of really interesting Fundamentalism essays in RS, and I was really close to applying to do Theology (or as
Dan would pedantically say, read Theology). Even in the essay I included some completely irrelevant material about Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus Cunctator, The Great Delayer, who arguably saved Rome from destruction by Hannibal Barca's Mercenary army.
Which brings me to another point, the Second Punic War, in my opinion, should be studied much more, as it was one of the greatest wars in history. The death tolls were not matched until over 2000 years later in the First World War, and it established Rome as the power it eventually became, though arguably it was the First Punic War that established Roman ambitions. What is undeniable is that by the Third Punic War, Rome had territorial ambitions outside of Italy, which it had never exhibited before the Punic Wars. In fact, before the Wars Rome was confined purely to the Italian peninsula, and exhibited no ambitions, having 2 previous treaties with Carthage allowing them naval dominance of the Mediterranean, as she was a largely agriculturally based power at the time. Also, no power at the time would have been, frankly, stupid enough to challenge Carthage in the sea, as her naval power was long established, from her sailors expeditions round the Horn of Africa around 500BCE to her more than likely expedition to America, evidenced by Paraiba tablets which had Phoenician inscriptions, on it, now unfortunately lost due to a rebellion in the area after it's 1872 finding. This stone had Phoenician inscriptions on it, though at the time they were believed to be grammatically incorrect, modern research has proved, using photographs of it, that what was originally thought by Ernest Renan to be grammatical errors were grammatical features of the language not yet grasped at his time. Also, on a Phoenician coin found, there was a map of-what is thought to be- their view of the world, including much of Europe, including Britain, Africa and its Horn, and what is almost unmistakably the Americas. Also, many statues in the Americas depict men with flared nostrils and high brows, features common of Negroid men, not the North Americans, whose brows were much lower.
Anyway, I was sidetracked for a bit. The Punic Wars were the largest conflicts in Europe for millenia, and they helped develop Rome from an agricultural and peaceful nation into an expansionist martial power. Carthage's naval defeat by the Romans at the battle of Mylae was unanticipated by anyone in the ancient world, probably even the Roman fleet itself, especially as the Roman force was outnumbered by the Carthaginians. Yet their victory, as almost all victories of this nature are, was due to their innovation of the corvus, a "beaked" platform which could be swivelled from the Roman ships, quinquiremes copied from a beached Carthaginian vessel, and would hook the more nimble and skilled Phoenician sailors to spot, allowing the Roman soldiers, who were more skilled (though at the time they were mustered farmers, not professional soldiers), to cross and capture their opponents. This completely dispelled the idea of Carthaginian supremacy in the Mediterranean, and helped the Romans defeat their opponents, despite Carthage's superiority. It should be noted here, that the corvus was soon abandoned due to it's unwieldy nature, and the fact that ships equipped with it were in severe danger in storms, as the device weighed many tonnes.
The tactics and innovations of the Punic Wars remained in history for millennia, until the change in warfare brought by the railway and to a lesser extent firearms, though Napoleon still used many Hannibal-like tactics in his campaigns. Now, it is often argued that Napoleon was a poor general as he didn't create innovative new tactics himself, but I would disagree, as the mark of a brilliant general is not just innovation. Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus Major is unarguably one of the greatest military leaders of the Roman world. Yet he didn't innovate at all. He simply took copied Hannibal's unorthodox(at the time) tactic, of arranging maniples of infantry between cavalry, and outflanking the opposing infantry using cavalry. In a twist of irony, Hannibal was defeated by his young opponent (or perhaps more accurately protégée) at Zama using exactly the same tactics with which he had achieved his greatest victory at Cannae in 216 BCE, a battle so bloody that the death toll of that battle was again remained unmatched until the World Wars. The infantry in the centre engaged each other, while the cavalry of either side met. Prior to this battle, the Romans had stolen Carthage's previous secret weapon, the Numidian cavalry along with their prince Massinissa(who lived to be 90, and was renowned for fighting and still being virile at that age), by aiding him in a civil war. Numidian cavalry were the elite cavalry of the Ancient World, and were practically unbeatable.
Therefore, as the cavalry fought on the flanks, the Carthaginian cavalry, made up of lesser riders, were defeated, and the Numidians chased them behind Carthaginian lines. They left the battlefield while chasing their fleeing opponents, and as they did, the Carthaginian infantry, which included powerful Gaulish and Iberian footsoldiers, pressed their advantage, and came close to breaking the Roman line. Yet at this crucial time, the Numidians turned back, striking at the unprotected Carthaginian back and flanks, eventually decimating the army. Hannibal lost, though arguably, and in my opinion, the better general, as his weak troops let him down. At this point I will note that at Zama Hannibal did have elephants, but they were useless, as by now it was common knowledge how to deal with them, and the Romans easily turned them away beforehand. This is why I hate that Hannibal is often associated with elephants, as he barely used them, most of them having died during his crossing of the Alps, and those that remained were hardly used, or effective. He should be associated with cavalry, as he, like Alexander before him, used them to great effect in an innovative new way, which his opponents didn't expect.
The Punic wars allowed Rome to become the military power that it became, which in turn led to the spread of Christianity. So to trace it all back, you can claim, as I do, that the Mamertines, who in 288 BCE captured Messana(modern Messina) and asked both the Carthaginians and the Romans for aid, are the reason that right now, Christianity in all its forms is the largest religion in the world, and has such wide reaching effects.
So, I've basically already decided what I'm going to write about in my dissertation for my third year at Uni, and to be honest, I already had by last year. I'll probably write another mini essay like this about the Aeneid and it's historical links, as is said, one about Napoleon, his classical inspirations and aspects of his generalship, and possibly one about the Sengoku period, which despite what
Matty's shit book says, exists, though I'll admit that I've forgotten a surprising amount about that period, and most of the little that I can remember involves the fact that at the Battle of Nagashino the Tokugawa army used the line formation, for the first time ever in history, against the Takeda cavalry, completely decimating them and establishing the previously untrusted flint-lock rifle as the next innovative weapon.
Anyway, I'm actually going to sum up in this paragraph, as opposed to the last one in which I clearly failed despite my best attempts. So, I'm going to write my dissertation, in all likelihood, about the impact of the Punic Wars on History up till now. And I can't wait. If not that, it's going to be on the Classical links of something. Unfortunately, the only professor whose expert field was Carthage works at Cambridge, which I didn't even apply to, so I'll be at a disadvantage to people who want to write on more popular subjects, such as Greece or Rome. I guess it's the nature of a History and Ancient History course that I want to involve the two, and I might actually do it on the influence of the ancient cultures on modern, such as the various figures, such as the German Kaisers, Napoleon and even the Founding Fathers of America, who have tried to emulate the Roman government. There's another dissertation in the making, America as the Modern Rome, another thing which I noticed, and after finding in Jared Diamond's book Collapse that it was not just my theory, I became even more interested in. So yeah, this is a MASSIVE essay, especially for just a blog, but it's still fun.
