The Punic Wars Essay

Some classes are the Eques began their matches on horseback, but ended in hand-to-hand combat. They wore tunics, bronze helmets, round shields and a long sword. Another class was the Hoplomachus who fought with a long spear as well as a short sword or dagger; he wore a visored helmet with crest and long greaves over both legs to protect them since he carried only a small shield, usually round. The attacking class was the Provocator was the most heavily armed and the only one who wore a pectoral covering; the extent of the armour hindered the gladiator’s ability to dodge making it slower and agile. However, he was pair with another gladiator to assist him.

Used mainly to counter missile troops, the shields took great strength to hold up for sustained periods of time. An example of the enemy that it was used to counter is British slingers. These men used strips of leather and ovoid lead shots to great effect, as each bullet could shatter a legionary's bone, finishing his career in the legions, even if he survived the trauma, and generally forcing him to beg for the remainder of his life. The small size of these missiles allowed some to fit through small gaps between the shields, but the majority were stopped whilst the legion marched on. This picture shows an example of a sling bullet: This bullet is probably Seleucid in origin, as seen from the anchor, and was used between 220 and 130 BC, in the siege of Dor.

The U.S. military uniforms are completely different from the Roman Republic; nothing is the same except for the use of a helmet. Warfare has changed since the ancient times and with that change, what soldiers wear for protection had to change as well.

There were three Punic or Carthaginian Wars is Roman history. These were between 264 and 146 BC. These wars were the first great wars of Roman expansion outside Italy. The enemy of Rome had a large empire that stretched along the coast of North America and southern Spain and some parts of Sicily. This empire was known as Carthage. The purpose of these wars was to decide which power would become the dominant force around the Mediterranean Sea.

In 264 B.C. the Romans became committed to their first over-seas conflict, when “Carthage attempted to gain control of the island of Sicily. The prospect of such a powerful neighbor only a few miles offshore from Italy worried the Romans. When Sicilian Greeks asked for Roman

Carthaginians were forced to withdraw. In 256 BC Rome established a base in North Africa under the power of the Roman general, Marcus Atilius. For thirteen years the wars were fought in Sicily. In 255 Carthage rebuilt its Army with cavalry and war elephants and went on to attack Rome. they also used a gladius, pilum and plumbata to fight. A gladius is a sword. a pilum is a javelin. It was 6 foot 7 inches and it had an iron shank about 0.28 inches in diameter and 24 inches long with pyramidal head. The plumbata were mainly throwing weapons. There were also naval battles and the ships of rome were damaged in a storm. The war resumed in 254 to 241 when the Romans had 200 warships and gave them undisputed control of the sea. A year later Carthage surrendered.

After these events the Carthaginian Empire decided to use their Navy as one of the strategies to win the war. What they didn’t know is that the Romans had built many ships and armed them with a

Romans fought in a manner very similar to the Greeks. In early times they utilized the phalanx and a cavalry back-up, but around the 1st century BCE they began to form a “checkered board” pattern. This allowed them to cover more ground and allow men room to fight. In the first century they also retired using a cavalry (Cartwright). The form of foot soldiers only with no horseback cavalry was uncommon. In

The axes were made from ground igneous, which are rocks crystallized by molten magma. Most arrowheads and knives were made of flaked flint. Medicine shields were sacred because it reflected the power of the warrior and was meant to give him spiritual protection. The war shield was made out of hide from the neck of a buffalo, which was smoked with glue made from bison hoofs. The war clubs were wooden and had knife blades protruding out of them.

An important contributing factor to an army's success is armor for defense. An army can have skilled soldiers, but cannot be successful without the right armor. Roman and Greek armies wore similar types of armor. The Roman and Greek foot soldiers wore a square breastplate on their torso. While the Romans only wore one greave on their left leg, Greeks wore greaves on both legs. A greave was a sheet of metal worn to protect the legs (Horsepower: Harnessed…). Soldiers wear greaves even in current day. Recently, the greaves have been upgraded to protect the legs from ‘Improvised explosive devices,’ such as those in Iraq (Frost, Quad Guard). Roman soldiers wore a helmet that protected the neck, and came around to protect their face. The Greek’s helmets were more full and protective than the Roman helmets. Greek helmets covered their entire head and only left small

Over the course of one-hundred years the Mediterranean antiquity was rocked by an ancient cold war between the North African seafaring state of Carthage, and the newly rising city of Rome located on the Italian Peninsula. In the course of two major wars and one extended three year long siege of Carthage itself Rome would conquer its last major foe and turn the Mediterranean into a Roman lake.

With the introduction of the hoplite phalanx to the Roman army, came a multitude of wars and long drawn out campaigns that the Romans were involved in throughout the republic period. One such campaign or campaigns that set the Roman republic as the uncontested superpower in the Mediterranean was the Punic Wars. Rome fought three wars against Carthage between 264 and 146 BCE. These wars constituted major events in the history of Rome and the Mediterranean basin (Marcel Le Glay 2009) p. 73. Though these wars were fought for reasons such as competing economics, revenge (most notably the Carthaginian general Hannibal), and a fear that could be related in today’s terms of opposing forces such as (the United States and Soviet Union feared each other during the Cold War) the fact is in the end Rome defeated the Carthaginians, not only were the Carthaginians defeated, but the city of Carthage was demolished and the people massacred or sold into slavery so as not to threaten the Romans ever again. In the fall of the city, in obedience to the Senate’s orders the inhabitants were reduced to slavery or forced to emigrate, the town was burnt and soil was

They used everything that they had available to them in all the ways that they could. An example of this would be their saddlebags, which were composed of animal stomachs. These bags were used to carry tools, millet, dried meat, and milk. These bags were waterproof and highly effective. They overall were innovative people who worked with everything that they had to make efficient tools and weapons to aid them in battle.

Carthaginians were wealthy and from the North Africans city that was founded by Phoenician’s they had more power, military, and naval experience than the Romans (Backman, Cultures of the West, p.184). Because Carthaginians were trying to expand into Sicily which held just one of Rome’s greatest grain producing cities this unsettled the Romans, who feared being cut off from a great food source (Backman, Cultures of the West, p.184). Though they tried a workable solution of sharing control of the Mediterranean this was not to be. This inability to work together was one of the reasons for the start of the Punic wars, a series of three different wars (Jones, Rome, Podcast 1). In the bloody 3rd war of the Punic wars Rome defeated the Carthaginians (Jones, Rome, Podcast 1). After the Punic wars the Romans had found they had accumulated vast amounts of wealth and land. This put them in an awkward position, because they had no plan in place for this and did not know what to do with it (Backman, Cultures of the West, p.187). This huge wealth also created a problem for Rome, one of greed and corruption which began to take control over Rome (Backman, Cultures of the West, p.187). Senators who amassed wealth begun to become lazy and accustomed to a life of leisure, also the more wealth they got the more they wanted (Jones, Rome, Podcast 1). The next problem for Rome was these greedy senators not only wanted the wealth they wanted power too

Having an armor is a must for every soldiers in the battlefield. The soldiers will never know what will happen to them. That is why an armor is critical for them because it serves as their first layer of protection during their time the battlefield. In general, an ideal armor must be solid, strong, and comfortable to wear. On the other hand, an armor must be lightweight too because the soldiers will not wear an armor that drain their energy. Also, if possible, a flexible or bendable material can be one of the main composition for the armor. It will increase the comfortability of the armor for the soldiers. So that, they can perform better because they have a better equipment on them.