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With
the Hannonian dynasty gone and the Carthaginian monarchy effectively at
an end, the Council of Elders now set about reforming the army. Three
commanders were appointed; Hanno, Himilco and Hasdrubal.
Agathocles
meanwhile had conquered several important cities around Carthage, had
left his army under command of his sons and had returned to Sicily to
conduct campaigns against Carthaginian territory on that island. The
troops remaining in Africa however were met by the three commanders,
each at the head of a separate army, and were heavily defeated. The
port of Syracuse was blockaded by the Carthaginian fleet and Agathocles
only managed to hang on due to help from his Etruscan allies who sent
their fleet to relieve the harbour in 307 BC. Meanwhile, with this
alliance of the Etruscans and the Syracusans, it was only natural for
Carthage to seek an alliance of its own. It found its ally in Rome in
306 BC. One source points out that Rome and Carthage might indeed have
agreed to divide their enemies' territory between them. Rome would keep
any gains made in Italy, whereas Carthage would keep what was won on
Sicily.
This
treaty clearly established the two powers as eventual master of the
Greek colonies in the south of Italy and Sicily. One last desperate
attempt in 281 BC by the Greeks , who called in king Pyrrhus of Epirus
almost managed to swing the balance the other way again; Rome was
driven back and Carthage lost almost all its Sicilian territory, but
for the city of Lilybaeum, when Pyrrhus set over to Sicily. But as king
Pyrrhus withdrew, the result was pretty much what had been agreed
between Carthage and Rome. Sicily fell almost entirely to the
Carthaginians whilst the Romans gained the overlordship of Italy. With
the increased Greek influence through its Sicilian colonies, the import
of ever more eastern luxuries and the fostering of especially good
political and trade relationship with Egypt which was dominated by
Ptolemaic Greeks, Carthage's cultural sophistication continued to grow.
So, too, were ever more Greek gods adopted into the Carthaginian
pantheon, or at least they were assimilated with appropriate African
ones, just as the Romans merged Greek and Latin deities.
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