In 264 BC, 11 years after the victory over Pyrrhus, Rome engaged with Carthage in a struggle for the control of the Mediterranean Sea. Carthage at this time was the foremost maritime power in the world, ruling as absolutely in the central and western Mediterranean as did Rome on the Italian Peninsula.
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Hannibal's March into Italy
Carthage and Rome were rivals for control of Sicily in the 3rd century BC. The rivalry led
to the Punic Wars. Hannibal, commander of the Carthaginian army, transported a large army
on the backs of elephants across the Alps to attack the Romans in Italy.
The First Punic War was waged mainly for the possession of Sicily and was marked by the emergence of Rome as a great naval power. Having gained the support of Hiero II, king of Syracuse, the Romans took Agrigentum (now Agrigento), and at Mylae in 260 BC, with their first naval armament under the consul Gaius Duilius, they defeated a great Carthaginian fleet. The transfer of the war to Africa resulted in the defeat and capture of the Roman general Marcus Atilius Regulus. After several naval disasters, the Romans won a great naval victory in 242 BC off the Aegates Islands, west of Sicily. The war ended in the following year with the cession to the Romans of the Carthaginian part of Sicily, which was made into a Roman province; this was Rome's first foreign possession. Sardinia and Corsica were taken from Carthage and annexed as provinces soon after.
Finding Rome an equal match at sea, Carthage prepared for a resumption of hostilities by acquiring a foothold in Spain. Under the leadership of the great general Hamilcar, who conceived the project of making Spain a military base, Carthage occupied the peninsula as far as the Tagus River; Hamilcar's son-in-law Hasdrubal continued the work of subjugation until his death in 221 BC; and finally Hamilcar's son Hannibal extended the conquests of Carthage up to the Iberus (now Ebro) River. The Second Punic War began in 218 BC. Hannibal crossed the Alps with an enormous force, descending on Italy from the north, and defeated the Romans in a series of battles; he then continued to ravage most of southern Italy for years. He was recalled to Africa to face Scipio Africanus, who had invaded Carthage. Scipio decisively defeated Hannibal at Zama in 202 BC, and Carthage was compelled to give up its navy, cede Spain and its Mediterranean islands, and pay a huge indemnity. Rome was thus left in complete control of the western Mediterranean.
The Romans now became more harsh in their treatment of the Italian communities under their domination, and the Greek cities of southern Italy, which had sided with Hannibal, were made colonies. Meanwhile Rome was extending its power northward. During 201-196 BC the Celts of the Po Valley were subjugated, and their territory was Latinized, but they themselves were declared incapable of acquiring Roman citizenship. The interior of Corsica and Sardinia was subdued, and Spain, where the wars were troublesome, was held by military occupation, a practice that gave rise to the first Roman standing armies.
Roman Empire, AD 117
In terms of the vastness of territory, Rome reached its zenith under the rule of Trajan.
Trajan, an Antonine ruler, conquered Dacia (part of modern-day Romania and Hungary) and
Arabia, and won several important victories in Parthia (Iran).
Fifty years after becoming the foremost power of the west by defeating the Carthaginians at Zama, Rome had also become the mightiest state in the east, first by conquering Hannibal's ally Philip V, king of Macedonia; Philip's ambition to dominate the Aegean Sea drew Rome into the Second Macedonian War (200-197 BC), which ended with his defeat. Next came the liberation of Greece, which, with the alliance that followed, enabled Rome to proceed against Antiochus III, king of Syria, who was defeated by the Romans at Magnesia in 190 BC and obliged to surrender his possessions in Europe and Asia Minor. Western Greece, however, continued to give trouble, and Philip's son and successor, Perseus (212?-166? BC), fought the Romans in the Third (and final) Macedonian War, which terminated in the utter rout of his armies and his capture at Pydna in 168 BC by the general Lucius Aemilius Paullus (229?-160? BC). Macedonia was made a Roman province in 146 BC, and in that year a revolt of the Achaean League in Greece resulted in the capture and destruction of Corinth.
Also in 146 BC came the end of the Third Punic War, which had begun three years earlier. Publius Cornelius Scipio Aemilianus Africanus Minor captured and destroyed Carthage, thus bringing to an end the Carthaginian empire, whose territory became the Roman province of Africa. A series of Spanish campaigns ended with the capture of Numantia in 133 BC. In the same year Attalus III of Pergamum died and bequeathed his client kingdom to its protector, Rome; shortly after, this territory was formed into the province of Asia.
Thus in 131 years Rome had developed from a land power controlling only the Italian peninsula to a world empire. From Syria to Spain the Mediterranean was now dominated by Rome, but Roman authority was better established in the west than in the east. During this period the Romans made great cultural advances. Brought into contact with the Greeks, first in southern Italy and Sicily, and later through Roman expansion to the east, they adopted much from the older civilization in art, literature, philosophy, and religion. Roman literature began in 240 BC with the translation and adaptation of Greek epic and dramatic poetry, and the various Greek schools of philosophy were formally introduced into Rome in 155 BC.
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