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The Most Significant Outcome Of The Second Punic War

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Introduction
The Punic Wars were a defining moment in the expansion of the Roman Republic, with the Second Punic War (218 – 201 BC (Grant, 1960)) playing the part of a corner stone in the bridge to create the powerful Roman Empire. Moreover, this was the first time that Rome had expanded into territories outside of Italy which was pivotal in the development of the Roman Republic, and furthermore the Rome Empire, as it marks the beginning of an imperial Roman power (Rickard, 2001). Accordingly, this war has captured great interest as it triggered a number of significant modifications to the Roman Republic.
This war between the Romans and their most powerful enemies, the Carthaginians, incurred devastating losses on both sides, with the Romans eventually rising to victory. Following their victory, the Roman Republic was almost geographically unrecognisable and had been moulded by the Second Punic War into the “super-powered Empire of the Mediterranean” (UNRV History, Results of the Second Punic War, 2015).
This investigation aims to explore to what extent the most significant outcome of the Second Punic War was the changes in social hierarchy within the Roman army. In order to examine whether the impact on the Roman army following the Second Punic War was the most significant outcome, other key outcomes must also be assessed, such as peace treaties, territorial gains and the destruction of Rome’s greatest enemy: Carthage.
At the onset of the war, however, a Carthaginian

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