Ancient Rome's Greatest Rival: The Rise And Fall Of Carthage

This channel is part of the History Hit Network. Over 2,000 years ago, the first great European capital cities rose around the shores of the Mediterranean. More and more people lived in increasingly crowded conditions. The arts, commerce and sciences flourished. Struggling for power and influence, these cities tried to outshine each other by erecting magnificent buildings. People from different cultures and parts of the world were drawn to these cities, seeking prosperity and happiness. On the coast of North Africa, once stood the fabled city of Carthage, a city of merchants and traders and home to one of the greatest seafaring peoples of all time. Beginning in the 12th century BC, the Phoenicians, forefathers of the Carthaginians, came from the east by ship and gradually settled all along the North African coast. Their thirst for adventure and their spirit of exploration are legendary. They sailed around Africa and some say they even reached the Americas. The port of Carthage in 180 BC. This is where the story of Margo begins. He's about to embark on a dangerous voyage that will decide his future. It is also the story of the wealth of Carthage and the merchants who ruled over the Mediterranean. A story of slavery and freedom and the power of love, money and the gods. And the story of a city whose success and good fortune inspired envy and hatred. Where Carthage once stood, there are now fashionable villas. Carthage has become a Nothing testifies to the former might of the city. Tunis is a city of contrasts. Here Africa meets Europe. The present collides with the past. Modern Tunis is the capital of Tunisia, but there is no way it can rival the importance of ancient Carthage. That city was the hub of Mediterranean trade and a meeting place for people from all over the world. Carthage was the New York of the ancient world. In 814 BC, Phoenician seafarers and merchants founded Punic Carthage as a trading outpost. From here they could control all of the western Mediterranean. The port of Carthage attracted shipping from the entire Mediterranean region. Outside the city gates stands a Roman aqueduct. It carried water 130 kilometres from the Atlas Mountains to the new city that the Romans built centuries later on the ruins of Punic Carthage. The settlers then were veterans of the Roman legions, rewarded for their years of service with parcels of land. Visible from afar, the huge aqueduct demonstrated Rome's claim to North Africa. It shows the special significance of this region throughout history. The water also supplied the great Roman baths, one of the city's meeting places. The size of the baths testifies to the city's former greatness and to the luxury its people enjoyed. Roman Carthage was a centre of trade and the main port in North Africa, and it provided Rome with wheat from the hinterlands. From Carthage, the Romans ruled their lands in Africa. But long before the Romans arrived, this was home to the Carthaginians. Few traces of them have survived. Professor Fethi Shelby has been trying for years to uncover the secrets of the Punic Carthaginians. His excavations reveal little of the city's daily life, but they are eloquent about its horrific demise. Among the most important, and most mysterious, remains of culture are the stele. They are stone pillars that were erected on holy sites and burial grounds. They bear puzzling signs and inscriptions. Thousands of stele are kept in the storerooms of the National Museum of Carthage. For Fethi Shelby, they are priceless evidence of a distant past. They are more than 2,000 years old. The unique script is a direct precursor of the Greek and Latin alphabets. Phoenician seafarers brought this alphabet to Carthage from their homeland. Many a sailor about to embark on a long and dangerous journey would pray for help and dedicate a stela to Tarnet, the goddess of Carthage, signs of whose presence were throughout the city. The skeleton of a young Punic man was found in one of the mausoleums of old Carthage. He lived 2,200 years ago. His bones show no sign of the malnutrition that was common among sailors. He was well fed, healthy, and strong. In the laboratory of the National Museum of Carthage, anthropologist Sihem Roudizli attempts to coax his story from these bones. Perhaps this man was one of the city's many merchants. The trading port was the heart of the city and a marketplace for goods from all over the world. People here could buy daily necessities and precious goods from distant lands. Anything was possible in Carthage. You could get rich if you were clever or bold. Margo will navigate a ship sailing into the Atlantic and down the coast of Africa looking for new mineral deposits. With the help of the gods, Margo hopes to add to the city's fame and wealth. If he succeeds, he'll finally be able to marry Biriklit. The sea was full of dangers. Many set sail never to be seen again. Even if he could steer clear of the shallows and weather the storms, they were still pirates and slave traders to contend with. Margo's family could have lived here. These dwellings were built several stories high and were crowded tightly together. If Margo had grown up here, he would have played in these alleys and, like many boys of his age, dreamed of becoming as famous a seafarer as the great Admiral Hanno. In the 6th century BC, Hanno had sailed through the Straits of Gibraltar and steered south along the west coast of Africa in search of new sources of tin and gold. Whether or not he succeeded has not come down to us, but he saw mountains spitting out fire and giant hairy creatures. As proof, he brought back a gorilla skin. The climate requires a particular style of architecture. The old quarter of Tunis today may not look much different from ancient Carthage. Dutch archaeologist Royal Docter is interested in the everyday life of the ancient trading city. How was Punic Carthage organised? First, he must get an idea of the city's layout. He's trying to find the ancient city walls many before him have searched in vain. There should be clues on the plans of previous excavations. Streets which abruptly changed direction for no apparent reason may have done so because they ran into the ancient city walls. This is where he hopes to find them. Here, archaeologists have already dug 10 metres down into the history of Carthage. These steps take Royal Docter past the Byzantine and Roman eras down into the remains of the Punic city. Are these stones from Carthage's old city walls? They were built to protect the inhabitants from raids by North African tribes. At the peak of Carthage's power, over 100,000 people lived here. They all needed food and water. There was no river, nor adequate springs of drinkable water inside the city walls. Carthaginian builders came up with a simple yet ingenious solution. Unlike the Romans, the Carthaginians had no aqueducts. Perhaps they worried that they could easily be destroyed during a war. The Carthaginians used cisterns, giving them a secure water supply even during a siege. The heavy winter rains filled cisterns throughout the city. Carthage of old was home to 100,000 people, a true metropolis for its day, and all those people had to be fed. The marketplace then would have looked much like this one in the old centre of Tunis. Carthaginian fishermen sold their catch here. Animals for slaughter came from the surrounding area. Many city dwellers would have kept poultry to feed their family. The region was fertile. A Punic treatise on agriculture has survived. The Romans found it so important that they even translated it into Latin. The ancient Punic seafarers also knew about agriculture. They waited out the stormy winter months on land, sowing the grain that would become their provisions on board. Grain and bread were their principal foods. A woman bending over an oven, watched by her child as she bakes bread. But above all, Carthaginians were sustained by the sea, by fishing and trade. The sea was their true homeland and the source of their prosperity. Their merchant ships were protected by the Carthaginian navy. Its galleys were famed and feared. If you could have looked down on the ancient city, you'd have seen an unusual circular structure. It was the naval port, Carthage's best-kept secret. All that's left are a few remnants of the walls and the port's Greek and Roman historians wrote awestruck accounts of the naval port. They claimed that it could disgorge entire fleets in an instant. The Romans realised that they would have to discover the port's secret if they wanted to conquer Carthage. The island in the centre of the port was the seat of the admiralty. This was the driving force behind Carthaginian sea power that dominated the Mediterranean. Carthage's warships protected the shipping routes and commercial outposts. The navy was commanded from the city, but the ships acted independently at sea. Carthaginian power came from the experience of the rowing crews and the navigational skills of the captains. They gave it their all, as the punishment for failure could be crucifixion. The captains regularly returned to the home port for repairs to damaged ships. Archaeologists have excavated one of the ramps from which ships could be launched at such frightening speed. But that was only one of the secrets of this ingeniously designed port. Hidden behind the rectangular commercial port was the circular naval port. It was not visible from the sea, and the entrance was also gated. So to anyone watching, the Carthaginian warships seemed to vanish into thin air whenever they entered port. Margo has been at sea for months. Every day Billy Cleat watches anxiously for his ship. He should have returned from his voyage long ago. The town of Calibia. Here too life depends on the sea and the treasures brought home by its seafarers. Calibia was a Punic settlement, and like Carthage, was destroyed by the Romans. The land and sea are unchanged, but today people travel by plane and most goods are transported by large freighters. All the same, Calibia is still an important port, providing many people with their livelihood. Early in the morning fishermen gather in the cafe after selling their catch. Directly next to the fishing harbour is the shipyard. Here they still build ships out of wood. In ancient times they were made from the cedars that grew in Lebanon, home of the Phoenicians. They were the ancestors of the Punic Carthaginians. Over 3,000 years ago they built the first seaworthy vessels and set out to explore the Mediterranean. They were masters of their materials and produced ships that defied wind and waves. The Phoenicians were nomads of the sea. They came from the royal city-state of Tyre, on the coast of present-day Lebanon, and sailed west, establishing trading outposts all along the African coast. Thanks to its strategic position, Carthage grew steadily in importance, eventually overshadowing all other Phoenician settlements, both militarily and commercially. One of the Carthaginians' strong points was their ability to absorb the influence of foreign cultures. The few surviving sculptures show unmistakable Greek and Egyptian traits. The Carthaginians were open to new ideas, a characteristic that explains their enormous success as a trading nation. In a safe, Sihem Rudesli keeps a handful of treasures. They survived both the Roman soldiers and the grave robbers of later centuries. Jewelry is the most intimate evidence of a long vanished past. The gold is evidence of the wealth of Punic settlements and cities. Kerkouane. This Punic city on the sea east of Carthage was also destroyed by the Romans. It is puzzling that unlike other cities, Kerkouane was not built over by the Romans. But for this reason, it provides a unique opportunity to learn more about the structure of a Punic city and the structure of Punic society. Helicopters are not allowed to fly here, so Frenchman Alain Arnoux flew over the site on a motorized paraglider. The pictures he has taken are unique. From above, a remarkably regular layout is revealed. The houses are small. There are no palaces or monumental buildings, no remnants of grand statues, no memorials to kings or generals, no triumphal arches glorifying grand deeds. Who ruled this city? There were no kings in either Kerkouane or Carthage. Government in Carthage lay in the hands of the Safites, two merchants nominated from their own ranks as representatives for a limited period. This system prevented striving for personal power. There were also priests who worshiped all the divinities we have spoken of. These priests are also mentioned on the votive stele of the Tophete, but also on funerary steles. It was a very complex society A kind of democracy seems to have been practiced in Punic society. The form of the Carthaginian state was even admired by the Greeks, the inventors of democracy. We know much about the city's management and the structure of Punic society from the stele. They are an important source of information. The short inscriptions are mostly appeals to the gods. The donors are also identified by name and profession. It was only the wealthy who could afford to commission stealing. They never mentioned the city's poor or its slaves. No city in antiquity could have functioned without slaves. Their muscles were the engines of the ancient world. Anyone could become a slave through poverty, but also by being kidnapped or taken prisoner of war. Margot's ship has been seized by pirates. He has survived the attack, but has been sold to a slave trader. Instead of returning home laden with riches, the once free man has become a slave without any rights, abandoned by the gods. Where will Margot be taken? Cap Bon, French for the good cape. In ancient times this was a fateful place, full of terror and immense suffering. Here slaves and condemned criminals hewed the blocks of stone with which Carthage was built. 15 meters underground there is an extensive network of caves carved out by the slaves. The traces of their chisels can still be seen on the walls. The cave served as both quarry and prison. A man who was a slave in the quarries at Cap Bon had forfeited his life. Margot knows full well that he is at the mercy of the gods, and that he will only leave the caves as a dead man. Yet only a day's journey separates Margot from freedom and his old life, for ships leave here every day with stone for the walls of Carthage. Roald Docter's quest has paid off. He and his assistants have succeeded in uncovering the remains of the Punic city wall. It was a wall of massive proportions. The wall Docter has found served as a line of defense, but in quite a modern way it also divided the city into different spheres, into residential and commercial districts. The dirty smelly industries such as tanneries and metal fabrication were relegated to a position outside the city walls. A whole industrial district developed there. The air was blown through to increase the heat. And it was precisely at these tannery nozzles that some observations were made in the laboratory in Amsterdam. Namely, it was found that there was a very high proportion of lime in the part that was in the oven. And that would mean that lime was added to the iron processing in order to neutralize the pollution. It was only in modern times that calcium was again used to produce high quality steel. Could the Carthaginians have discovered this process 2,000 years ago? Along with other investigative methods, analyses by computer tomography in Amsterdam may provide an answer. CAT scans produce sectional views of the nozzles and reveal the Carthaginians' wide-ranging expertise in metallurgy. The images confirm the bold hypothesis. The Carthaginians actually did develop a multi-phase process for manufacturing high-quality iron. This process was only rediscovered in the 19th century, at the start of the Industrial Revolution. In one of the nozzles, the scientists even discover a valve for directing the flow of air. We know that the Carthaginians had to offer a high-quality product that was manufactured at an industrial level, on a large scale. A lot had to be produced, probably more than the city population itself needed. And we can assume that it was also marketed, that these products were exported. You can think of weapons, but also ship equipment, and so on, and so on. Carthaginian iron was good, but over time, even the best iron crumbles into rust. Not so this well-preserved handle in bronze, an amalgam of copper and tin. There are no tin deposits in all of North Africa, and this was an important raw material. Tin, for example, came from the British Isles. Carthaginians controlled the trade of this and other metals, and kept their sources secret. They even forged their travel logs to mislead rivals. The bronze casters of Carthage were masters of their craft, and created objects of great beauty. The city's artisans produced whatever took the fancy of their customers, including copies of foreign artefacts. In the souks of Tunis, artisans still work as they did some 2,000 years ago, without machines, preserving skills from antiquity. Small workshops like this also existed in Carthage, but even then there must have been big manufacturers producing goods intended for export. Artisans, ship owners, captains, and merchants with their extensive trade connections, all contributed to the general prosperity. There was also the trade in Tyrian purple, a dye made from sea snails, which was held dearer than gold. The purple dye was as famous as the proverbial business acumen of the city's merchants. Carthaginian merchants were respected even in Rome. Later, Pliny the Elder would call their Phoenician ancestors the inventors of trade. Margot knows that his own family is too poor to buy his freedom. Viriclet is Margot's only hope. And Viriclet's last hope is Naba, a rich uncle. He has the power and the money to find Margot and free him for her. The path to Margot leads through the slave market. Who bought him? Where is he now? How much will it cost to free him? Can Naba's gold open the door to Margot's freedom? Four to five days journey inland from Carthage, once to the city of Duga, an important stop on the caravan route into the continent's interior. From the heart of Africa came slaves, ivory, and gold. These ruins are from a later date. As in Carthage, the Romans built a new city on top of the ruins of a Punic settlement. Archaeologists from Freiburg in Germany are searching for traces of Punic Duga beneath the Roman lair. We know very little about this early period in Duga. We have monumental tombs, which bear witness to the high wealth of these powerful local families. We have inscriptions, but we know nothing about the settlement history of this time. And that is the reason why we venture into these early settlement histories down there in a larger area. The archaeologists have found the walls of a district of artisans' workshops from Punic times. Most of the amphora shards found here were produced locally, but from time to time, shards of Roman amphoras are unearthed. Through Carthage, Duga was linked to the Mediterranean trade routes. What lured the Carthaginians into the interior of the continent? What lured the Carthaginians into the interior of the continent was obviously the fertility of this area, in which wine, oil and grain were probably produced in the early period. Duga was easily accessible by means of the valley of the Red Calet, this fertile valley, and it is situated in a strategically favorable position, with steep cliffs on two sides, so it was easy to defend. And the city had building material that could be demolished on the spot. These were good conditions for a city, and so Duga became an important center. The Punic-Numidian ruler Massinissa had a majestic mausoleum constructed here, a sign of the region's wealth. For a time, Massinissa was an ally of Carthage, but in a struggle for power, he switched to the Roman side. A Roman coin. A few years before the destruction of Carthage in 146 BC, more and more such coins appeared in Duga, an indication that the Romans had succeeded in winning over Duga to their side. The Romans fought with weapons and with the power of the word. They spread rumors that the Carthaginians sacrificed their children to the gods here at the sanctuary known as the Tophet. Was the Tophet the site of such bloody rituals? Have archaeologists found evidence of child sacrifice? Or was it merely clever Roman propaganda? Thousands of urns have in fact been found beneath the stele. They contain the ashes and charred bones of sacrificial animals and those of children. For some researchers, this is evidence of bloody human sacrifice, but for Professor Shelby, it is far from being proof. We realized that these ashes belonged to fetuses or to dead children born. Then we remembered that in Carthage, children's graves are rather rare, even though there was a very high mortality rate. So probably here, in the presence of a cemetery of a somewhat special type, we went back to the divinities of Carthage, Balamon and Athanit. And yet, child sacrifice cannot be ruled out entirely. It was known in other ancient cultures. Perhaps Carthage resorted to human as well as to animal sacrifice to appease the gods in hard times. Biriklit's efforts have released Margot from slavery. Now he is being taken back into the company of free men. The priest prays to Thanit, imploring her to support and favor Margot. However pragmatic the Carthaginians may have been in daily life, religion was very important to them. These are burial chambers of rich Carthaginians. Here, various burial objects have been found, small figurines, oil lamps, sacrificial vessels. The Punics believed in a life after death. They also believed in the soul. For them, the soul after death, when it left the body, it had to undertake a long journey. It is often represented leaving the city of the living to the city of the dead. The necropolis at Kerkwan, outside the city proper, the Carthaginians cut their graves out of solid rock. The graves were already robbed in antiquity, but the scattered bones of Carthaginians can still be found here. The walls of the burial chambers are decorated with images reflecting their religious beliefs. A cockerel, drawn in purple, the cockerel is known in Egyptian mythology as the symbol of the soul, the breath of life. It is on its way to the city of souls, which closely resembles a Punic city. Gods and spirits dominated the daily life of Carthaginians. The god Baal-Haman was the patron of Carthage and the guarantor of success and happiness, and signs of his consort, Tanit, goddess of fertility and prosperity. The priest leaves Margo purified and strengthened. Condemned to slavery after a shipwreck, Margo can once again take his place as a free citizen of Carthage. They hope that with Tanit's protection, he will return safely from new voyages to distant lands. Two sarcophagi in the Carthage museum. Perhaps they belong to a rich merchant and his wife, such as Margo and Periclete. In Rome, the die is cast. Carthage must be destroyed. The Roman Empire equips a huge war fleet and sends its legions across the sea to Africa. In the spring of 146 BC, the decisive blow is struck and the city stormed. Dreadful scenes took place in these streets. The Roman soldiers floated from the side of the harbour and climbed the slopes of the hill towards the citadel. On the way, they destroyed all the houses and all the neighbourhoods they had crossed. It was a devastating movement. Houses were dug up, they collapsed. A large part of the population perished under the rubble and flames. The Romans raised Carthage to the ground and cursed the city for all eternity. Never again would people live here. How immense must have been their hate. Or was it fear? And yet, just 100 years after the sack of Carthage, the Romans themselves built a city on these ruins. It was to become the capital of the Roman province of Africa. It was Carthage's extraordinary commercial success that had so enraged the Romans. Only after Rome had annihilated her rival and arch enemy could she rise to greatness. And so, the destruction of Carthage has entered history as one of mankind's greatest tragedies. Carthage became a memorial and a legend. A magical place that has cast its spell on people throughout the ages.