By Sasha Alex Lessin, Ph.D. (Anthropology, UCLA)
CARTHAGE, A CITY THAT REFUSED TO BE “JUST A COLONY”
Phoenician sailors from Tyre (in what is now Lebanon) founded Carthage on the Gulf of Tunis, traditionally dated to around 814 BCE. Carthage began as a trading outpost, but its merchants, shipwrights, farmers, and priesthood turned it into a western Mediterranean powerhouse. This urban engine linked Iberian metals, African grain, island harbors, and Levantine skills into one living network.
I picture a dockworker watching the first deep-hulled ships nose into the sheltered water and thinking, This place wants to become a city; it already knows how.
PHOENICIAN ROOTS: TRADE AS A SURVIVAL TECHNOLOGY
Phoenician city-states—Tyre, Sidon, and others—depended on sea trade. Their mariners built a chain of coastal stations and colonies across the Mediterranean, seeking safe harbors, resupply points, and access to resources. Carthage sat near the Strait of Sicily, a maritime choke point that controlled east–west movement. Geography handed the settlers a strategic advantage; the Carthaginian organization turned it into leverage.
“The gods” did not float above this story like poetry; they entered it as names and masks—Melqart (Phoenician city-god of Tyre) whom Greeks equated with Heracles and Romans with Hercules. The equivalence mattered because it let later empires translate Carthage’s sacred order into their own political language.
I imagine a Tyrian navigator staring at the stars and murmuring, Melqart, steer our hull—because if you do not, tribute collectors onshore will.
DIDO/ELISSA: FOUNDING AS COURT ESCAPE, SACRED DRAMA, AND POLITICAL MYTHMAKING
Ancient traditions placed Queen Elissa (Dido) at the origin of Carthage: a Tyrian royal who fled court violence and sailed west with allies, wealth, and ritual authority. Later Roman literature retold her story for Roman purposes, most famously by making Aeneas abandon her under divine command—Rome’s narrative of destiny built itself on Carthage’s heartbreak.
Here, the “gods” acted like a steering committee. In the Roman retelling, Jupiter (Marduk or Marduk posing as Yahweh/Enlil or Zeus) whom you map to an Enlil-like dominator current) enforced a future empire’s timetable. In the Punic devotional world, Tanit and Baal Hammon anchored Carthage’s civic-religious identity (with Tanit often associated with protective sovereignty and fertility in Punic contexts). The names shifted; the power claims stayed stable.
I hear Dido on the deck, wind snapping her cloak, thinking, I do not flee to survive—I flee to found.
BUILDING A THALASSOCRACY: SHIPS, SILVER, AND THE DISCIPLINE OF SECRECY
Carthage grew into a maritime empire (a thalassocracy). It expanded influence through treaties, protected trade routes, and—when needed—force. Carthaginian networks reached Iberia for metals, the western islands for ports, and North Africa for agriculture and manpower. Rome and Carthage collided most fiercely where their systems overlapped: Sicily and the sea-lanes around it.
Carthage did not rely solely on citizen levies; it recruited heavily from subject peoples and mercenaries, a choice that shaped both its reach and its vulnerabilities. A Carthaginian quartermaster could “buy” an army—yet he also had to keep it paid, fed, and loyal.
I imagine a Carthaginian woman managing a courtyard ledger—grain in, dye out, sailors’ wages counted—thinking, Men boast about battles; I keep the city alive.
THE GREEK CONTEST: SICILY AS A CHESSBOARD
Greek colonization in Sicily and southern Italy created constant friction with Punic interests. Carthage and Syracuse repeatedly fought over western and central Sicily across multiple wars and shifting alliances. Carthage survived setbacks and plagues, rebuilt fleets, and returned—because Sicily sat too close, and because the sea-lanes mattered too much.
Carthage’s spiritual world competed with Hellenic divine branding. Greeks spoke of Heracles; Carthaginians spoke of Melqart. Greeks swore by Zeus; Carthaginians invoked Baal Hammon and Tanit. When armies marched, “the gods” marched as cultural operating systems: they legitimized sacrifice, law, and conquest.
I imagine a Syracusan soldier hearing Punic drums and thinking, Their gods sound different—but their ships block the same water.
ROME ENTERED: THREE PUNIC WARS AND ONE DECISION TO ERASE
Rome and Carthage signed early treaties defining spheres of trade and influence, but Sicily lit the fuse.
THE FIRST PUNIC WAR (264–241 BCE): ROME LEARNED THE SEA
A dispute around Messana escalated into a full-scale struggle. Rome built fleets, fought a massive naval war, and forced Carthage to cede Sicily and pay a heavy indemnity.
I imagine a Carthaginian shipwright staring at Roman copies of Punic hull designs and thinking, They learned our craft fast—too fast.
THE SECOND PUNIC WAR (218–201 BCE): HANNIBAL NEARLY BROKE ROME
Hannibal Barca marched from Iberia, crossed the Alps, and won shattering victories in Italy. Rome survived through endurance, alliances, and counter-strategy—then carried the war to Africa. Scipio Africanus, aided by the Numidian king Masinissa, defeated Hannibal at Zama (202 BCE), ending Carthage’s bid for parity.
I imagine a mother in Carthage listening to rumors from Italy and whispering, Let our sons come home; let this empire choose trade over blood.
THE THIRD PUNIC WAR (149–146 BCE): THE WAR FACTION CHOSE ANNIHILATION
Rome exploited Carthage’s constrained position and moved from containment to destruction. Roman forces besieged the city and—after brutal fighting—destroyed it in 146 BCE. Rome enslaved survivors and broke Carthage’s state power.
This looked like a theological verdict written as policy: a dominator current (Rome’s imperial ideology, crowned with its gods and later its “civilizing” rhetoric) chose to erase a rival system rather than coexist.
I hear an elder in the burning streets thinking, They do not want victory; they want silence.
ROMAN CARTHAGE: REBUILT, CHRISTIANIZED, CONTESTED
Rome later rebuilt Carthage; under the Empire, it became a significant city and a key hub in North Africa. Christian thinkers and church councils in Roman Africa made Carthage a central stage for early Western Christianity, including figures such as Tertullian and Augustine in their North African context.
Older divine names did not simply vanish. People re-labeled power. Temples became churches; sacred authority shifted garments; the deeper social function—sanctioning order—remained.
I picture a bishop walking past old Punic stones and thinking, These blocks remember other prayers, but the human hunger behind worship has not changed.
VANDALS, BYZANTINES, AND ARAB CONQUEST: THE CITY LOST ITS INFRASTRUCTURE
After Roman power fractured, the Vandals took North Africa in the 5th century CE; Byzantium later reconquered Carthage under Belisarius and organized it as an exarchate. In the late 7th century CE, Arab forces conquered the region; they shifted population and materials toward Tunis, and Carthage’s harbors and strategic function collapsed.
I imagine a mason prying stones from an old wall and thinking, Empires do not only defeat cities—they recycle them.
MODERN CARTHAGE: A SUBURB SITTING ON A LAYER CAKE OF EMPIRES
Today, Carthage exists as an upscale suburb of Tunis and an archaeological landscape visited by tourists and scholars. Modern Carthage’s political symbolism persists—an “emblematic” place near the capital—while the ancient city’s footprint remains visible in ruins, foundations, and the peninsula’s stubborn shape.
I picture a child standing on Byrsa hill, looking down at the sea and the city, thinking, How many worlds have stood here within this one place?
CARTHAGE AS A TEST OF TWO CURRENTS
Carthage built a cooperative machine of trade—ports, treaties, shipyards, farms, households, and (often overlooked) women’s work that stabilized wealth, food, and continuity. Rome answered with a dominator solution: it removed the rival by force and then rebranded the site as its own.
Anunnaki “gods” operated as masks worn by enduring power-currents:
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Melqart ⇄ Heracles/Hercules (hero-god branding for sovereignty and strength)
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Jupiter/Zeus (imperial destiny logic)
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Later Christian and Muslim sacred authority (new names, similar function: legitimizing rule)
Carthage’s more profound lesson survived its destruction: a society can win the sea through cooperation—and still lose the century to domination.
REFERENCES
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Wikipedia: Ancient Carthage Wikipedia
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Wikipedia: History of Carthage Wikipedia
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Wikipedia: First Punic War (dates and summary) Wikipedia
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Wikipedia: Second Punic War (dates and summary) Wikipedia
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Wikipedia: Third Punic War (dates and outcome) Wikipedia
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Encyclopaedia Britannica: Carthage Encyclopedia Britannica
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Encyclopaedia Britannica: First Punic War Encyclopedia Britannica
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Encyclopaedia Britannica: Second Punic War Encyclopedia Britannica
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Encyclopaedia Britannica: Third Punic War Encyclopedia Britannica
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ANUNNAKI & ANCIENT ANTHROPOLOGY EVIDENCE, REFERENCES, TIMELINE & WHO’S WHO
Evidence https://wp.me/p1TVCy-1zg
References http://wp.me/p1TVCy-2cq
Timeline http://wp.me/p1TVCy-1Km
Who’s Who http://wp.me/p1TVCy-1PE
.NEW STUFF www.enkispeaks.com
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