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Carthage, Saturn with the attributes of Baal-Hammon Date 323 CE
Ivory sphinx from Carthage, made in Phoenicia ca. 850 BCE–ca. 700 BCE
Carthage was founded in the 9th century BC in what is now Tunisia.In the course of the long Punic wars, Carthage occupied territories belonging to Rome, which finally destroyed its rival in 146 B.C.
Carthage controlled the coasts of Sardinia and Corsica, and in the west, the ports of the Maghreb and Andalusia. It also controlled the gold trade from Senegal. Hispania did not leave many written accounts. Nor did the Carthaginians.
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Diodorus Greek historian, author of the Library of World History. His activities can be dated between 60 and 30 BCE.
In Sicily39 the Syracusans, sending ambassadors to Carthage, not only censured them for the war but required that for the future they cease from hostilities. To them the Carthaginians gave ambiguous answers and set about assembling great armaments in Libya, since their desire was fixed on enslaving all the cities of the island; but before sending their forces across to Sicily they picked out volunteers from their citizens and the other inhabitants of Libya and founded in Sicily right at the warm (therma) springs a city which they named Therma.40
p34780 1 When the events of this year came to an end, in Athens Callias succeeded to the office of archon and in Rome the consuls elected were Lucius Furius and Gnaeus Pompeius.41 At this time the Carthaginians, being elated over their successes in Sicily and eager to become lords of the whole island, voted to prepare great armaments; and electing as general Hannibal, who had razed to the ground both the city of the Selinuntians and that of the Himeraeans, they committed to him full authority over the conduct of the war. When he begged to be excused because of his age, they appointed besides him another general, Himilcon, the son of Hanno and of the same family.42 2 These two, after full consultation, dispatched certain citizens who were held in high esteem among the Carthaginians with large sums of money, some to Iberia and others to the Baliarides Islands, with orders to recruit as many mercenaries as possible. 3 And they themselves canvassed Libya, enrolling as soldiers Libyans and Phoenicians and the stoutest from among their own citizens. Moreover they summoned soldiers also from the nations and kings who were their allies, Maurusians and Nomads and certain peoples who dwell in the regions toward Cyrenę. 4 Also from Italy they hired Campanians and brought them over to Libya; for they knew that their aid would be of great assistance to them and that the Campanians who had p349been left behind in Sicily, because they had fallen out with the Carthaginians,43 would fight on the side of the Sicilian Greeks. 5 And when the armaments were finally assembled at Carthage, the sum total of the troops collected together with the cavalry was a little over one hundred and twenty thousand, according to Timaeus, but three hundred thousand, according to Ephorus.
The Carthaginians, in preparation for their crossing over to Sicily, made ready and equipped all their triremes and also assembled more than a thousand cargo ships, 6 and when they dispatched in advance forty triremes to Sicily, the Syracusans speedily appeared with about the same time number of warships in the region of Eryx. In the long sea-battle which ensued fifteen of the Phoenician ships were destroyed and the rest, when night fell, fled for safety to the open sea. 7 And when word of the defeat was brought to the Carthaginians, Hannibal the general set out to sea with fifty ships, since he was eager both to prevent the Syracusans from exploiting their advantage and to make the landing safe for his own armaments.
81 1 When news of the reinforcements which Hannibal was bringing was noised throughout Sicily, everyone expected that his armaments would also be brought over at once. And the city, as they heard of the great scale of the preparations and came to the conclusion that the struggle was to be for their very existence, were distressed without measure. 2 Accordingly the Syracusans set about negotiating alliances both with the Greeks of Italy and with the Lacedaemonians; p351and they also continued to dispatch emissaries to the cities of Sicily to arouse the masses to fight for the common freedom. 3 The Acragantini, because they were the nearest to the empire of the Carthaginians, assumed what indeed took place, that the weight of the war would fall on them first. They decided, therefore, to gather not only their grain and other crops but also all their possessions from the countryside within their walls. 4 At this time, it so happened, both the city and the territory of the Acragantini enjoyed great prosperity, which I think it would not be out of place for me to describe. Their vineyards excelled in their great extent and beauty and the greater part of their territory was planted in olive-trees from which they gathered an abundant harvest and sold to Carthage; 5 for since Libya at that time was not yet planted in fruit-trees,44 the inhabitants of the territory belonging to Acragas took in exchange for their products the wealth of Acragas and accused fortunes of unbelievable size. Of this wealth there remain among them many evidences, which it will not foreign to our purpose to discuss briefly.
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Fighting with them was also Dexippus the Lacedaemonian, who had lately arrived there from Gela with fifteen hundred mercenaries; for at that time, at Timaeus says, Dexippus was tarrying in Gela, enjoying high regard by reason of the city of his birth. 4 Consequently the Acragantini invited him to recruit as many mercenaries as he could and come to Acragas; and together with them the Campanians who had formerly fought with Hannibal,53 some eight hundred, were also hired.
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