Numidian Nomads and Cato’s Monomania
The interdiction against waging war without Rome’s express permission was established not in the name of universal peace—for the Romans were by no means pacifists. On the contrary, it served as a clever mechanism to systematically undermine Carthage by exposing it to the relentless incursions of its western neighbors, the Numidians, who well warrant a digression of their own.
By Numidia, the Romans designated the northern reaches of modern-day Algeria. And yes, even in those ancient times, the territories that would become Algeria and Tunisia were distinct, frequently hostile polities. The Latin Numidia stems from the ancient Greek nomás, plural nomádes, which in turn yields the English word nomad.
The Numidians were Berbers—the indigenous inhabitants of North Africa—and they indeed led a nomadic existence. By the dawn of the Second Punic War, these disparate tribes had coalesced into two opposing factions: a western faction that allied with Rome, and an eastern one that sided with neighboring Carthage.
Salammbô and Geopolitical Marriages
Have you ever perused Gustave Flaubert’s novel Salammbô, or at least heard whispers of it? The author originally set out to compose it strictly from classical sources, but upon taking a holiday to Tunisia, he promptly burned his drafts and began anew. Set in Carthage in the aftermath of the First Punic War, the narrative follows the title character—a priestess of the goddess Tanit and sister to Hannibal—who is compelled by her warlord father to marry the Numidian chieftain Narr’ Havas (historically known in English as Naravas, rendered in Punic as NRWT) to cement an alliance.
Following the war’s conclusion, the Romans assisted the western Numidians in subduing their eastern rivals and proclaimed the victor’s chieftain as King of all Numidia. This crippling of Carthage allowed the Numidians to annex vast territories eastward into modern-day northwestern Libya, though Carthage itself (the core of contemporary Tunisia) remained stubbornly unconquered for a time.
Ceterum Censeo: Cato’s obsession
To Rome, whose dominion now stretched from the Iberian Peninsula to the Peloponnese, it was profoundly grating to witness Carthage’s economic resilience, which stubbornly refused to wither despite staggering territorial losses. Envy toward a vanquished neighbor that obstinately remained wealthy burned so fiercely in Marcus Porcius Cato—a plebeian tribune who had scaled the highest magistracies of the Roman Republic as consul and censor through populist tirades against aristocratic decay—that a holiday excursion to Carthage left him with a fixed idea that history has never quite forgotten.
Upon his return from that fateful vacation, no matter the topic of his address, he would invariably draw his remarks to a close with the same immutable declaration:
Furthermore, it is my opinion that Carthage must be destroyed.
(Latin: Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam).
Once Carthage was duly obliterated during the Third Punic War (149–146 BC), Cato promptly passed away, having been deprived of his sole conversational preoccupation.
The Finale: Seventeen Days of Fire
The formal pretext for the war arose when Carthage mounted an armed retaliation against yet another Numidian raid. An eighty-thousand-strong Roman force disembarked at Utica (modern Bizerte) to demand that the Carthaginians completely disarm and abandon their city. Furthermore, the Romans stipulated that the displaced populace must not settle within ten miles of the coastline—a stricture amounting to a total ban on the fishing and maritime commerce that formed the lifeblood of Carthage. Ironically, the Numidians, perceiving the Roman landing as an existential threat to their own sovereignty, offered the invaders no support.
For two years the Romans battered the city in vain, until a newly appointed consul instituted a ruthless blockade that starved the vast majority of the inhabitants into submission. The fifty thousand Carthaginians who survived within the crumbling ramparts surrendered only to be sold into slavery. The city, already battered by siege and assault, was put to the torch and burned unceasingly for seventeen days. The territory of Carthage was formally annexed as the Roman province of Africa, with its administrative capital established at Utica.
