The importance of Carthage in antiquity was due to its strategic location close to Sicily and Italy and near the mouth of Medjerda River (then the Bagradas) -- often depicted on Roman coins.

The river runs through an incredibly fertile valley -- the nourishing spine of Tunisia. This is the heart of the wheat-and-olive-growing areas, and it was subsequently a source of food supplies for Rome. Starting near what was the Roman military camp of Timgad in eastern Algeria, the river continues through the ancient Libyan/Berber city of Dougga (Thugga) and NE to Carthage and Utica, both of which were bursting ports, Punic and (later) Roman cities, strongholds and commercial centres.

North-eastern Tunisia is a mountainous promontory culminating in the great sandstone quarries at Cape Bon. The Phoenician settlers used massive ashlar blocks from these quarries to link up curtains of rubble walls in a technique known as opus Africanum. The NW has more mountains and with a rainier and windier climate.

The quarries first exploited by the Libyans, include those at Chemtou near the Algerian border. These yielded a beautiful yellow and sometimes even pinkish marble (giallo antico) much prized by the Romans. The eastern coast area (Sahel) between Sousse (ancient Hadrumetum) and the fishing ports of Mahdia to the south has a pleasant climate. Mahdia was the site of a shipwreck in the early first century BC; bronze sculptures by major Hellenistic Greek artists (such as Boethos of Chalcedon) poured into the sea just off the coast. Mahdia was also a pottery-making region where an elegant African Red Slip Ware was produced.

Berbers (the term is a misnomer, since it is derived from the Greek ba/rbaros and the Latin barbarus and means a group that is foreign, strange and savage). They were semi- nomads who lived off the land, tended flocks and carried their wealth with them as they migrated seasonally to warmth, shelter and food. They inhabited central Tunisia in the Capsian period- the 9th or the 8th millennium BC (Capsa was the ancient name of Gafsa). The Capsians, sometimes referred to as the Proto-Mediterraneans, began to spread across the Mahreb (Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia) in the 8th millennium. Rock engravings and sculptures like those found at El Mekta (near Gafsa) seem to date from the 7th millennium BC. The animals depicted on them stress the importance of hunting. Many Tunisian Berbers speak their own dialects. They have no written literature, although numerous ancient Libyan inscriptions have been found.

The Carthaginians began by paying a quit-rent or custom to the natives, but that did not last very long; they made war, and exacted tribute from the original possessors of the soil.

When Carthage suffered from over-population colonies were dispatched out west along the coast, and down south into the interior. These colonies were more on the Roman than the Greek pattern; the emigrants built cities and intermarried freely with the Berbers, for there was no difference of colour between them, and little difference of race. In course of time the whole of the habitable region was subdued; the Tyrian factory became a mighty empire. Many of the roving tribes were broken in; the others were driven into the desert or into wild Morocco. A line of fortified posts and block-houses protected the cultivated land.

The desire to obtain red cloth and amber and blue beads secured the allegiance of many unconquerable desert tribes, and by their means, although the camel had not yet been introduced, a trade was opened up between Carthage and Timbuktu. Negro slaves, bearing tusks of ivory on their shoulders and tied to one another so as to form a chain of flesh and blood, were driven across the terrible desert�a caravan of death, the route of which was marked by bones bleaching in the sun. Gold dust also was brought over from those regions of the Niger, and the Carthaginian traders reached the same land by sea. For they were not content, like the Tyrians, to trade only on the Morocco coast as far as Mogador. By good fortune there has been preserved the log-book of an expedition which sailed to the wood-covered shores of Guinea; saw the hills covered with fire, as they always are in the dry season when the grass is being burnt; heard the music of the natives in the night; and brought home the skins of three chimpanzees which they probably killed near Sierra Leone.

In the sixth century, the Phoenicians were conquered by the Assyrians, and later by the Persians, making Phoenicia virtually disappear. Carthage, however, remained not as a colony, but as an independent state. The city was known to its Punic or Phoenician inhabitants as the "new city," probably to distinguish it from Utica, the "old city."

Carthage expanded in the 8th and 7th c BC to nearby Sicily and Sardinia and more distant ports of Spain (Gades, now modern Cadiz), Morocco (Lixus) and the Balearic Islands (Ibiza). Expansion eastward was followed by settlements in Libya (Lpqy, or Leptis Magna and Ui, now Tripoli). In the 6th c Carthage was the largest and richest city in the western Mediterranean, but its ruling class was preoccupied: Greek colonies had sprouted all over southern Italy and Sicily.

Every year the Carthaginians sent to the national temple a tenth part of their revenues as a free-will offering. During the great Persian wars, when on all sides empires and kingdoms were falling to the ground, the Phoenicians refused to lend their fleet to the Great King to make war upon Carthage. When Tyre was besieged by Alexander the nobles sent their wives and children to Carthage, where they were tenderly received.

By the 5th century BC, active military participation by Tyre in the west had doubtlessly ceased; from the latter half of the 6th century Tyre was under Persian rule. Carthage thus became the leader of the western Phoenicians and in the 5th century formed an empire of its own, centred on North Africa, which included existing Phoenician settlements, new ones founded by Carthage itself, and a large part of modern Tunisia. Nothing is known of resistance from the indigenous North African population, but it was probably limited owing to the scattered nature of local societies and the lack of state formation.

When Phoenicia died, Carthage inherited its settlements on the coasts of Sicily and Spain and on the adjoining isles. Not only were these islands valuable possessions in themselves�Malta as a cotton plantation, Elba as an iron mine, Majorca and Minorca as a recruiting ground for slingers; they wee also useful as naval stations to preserve the monopoly of the Western waters.

The actual stages of the growth of Carthaginian power are not known, but the process was largely completed by the beginning of the 4th century. The whole of the Cap Bon (Jazirat Sharik) peninsula was occupied early, ensuring Carthage a fertile and secure hinterland. Subsequently, its control extended southwestward as far as a line running roughly from al-Kaf to the coast at Thaenae (now the ruins of Thinah, or Tina). Penetration occurred south of this line later, Theveste (Tbessa, T�bessa) being occupied in the 3rd century BC. In the Cap Bon peninsula, where the Carthaginians developed a prosperous agriculture, the native population may have been enslaved, while elsewhere they were obliged to pay tribute and furnish troops.

Carthage maintained an iron grip on the entire coast, from the Gulf of Sidra to the Atlantic coast of Morocco, establishing many new settlements to protect its monopoly of trade. These were mostly small places, probably of only a few hundred inhabitants. The Greeks called them emporia, markets where native tribes brought articles to trade, which could also serve as anchorages and watering places. Permanent settlements in modern Libya were few and dated after the attempt of Dorieus to plant a Greek colony there. Though in time fishing and agriculture played a part in their wealth, Leptis Magna with its neighbours Sabratha and Oea (Tripoli) became rich through trans-Saharan trade; Leptis Magna was the terminus of the shortest route across the Sahara linking the Mediterranean with the Niger. A Carthaginian named Mago is said to have crossed the desert several times, but doubtless much of the trade (in precious stones and other exotics) came through intermediate tribes. Other stations on the Gulf of Gabes included Zouchis, known for its salted fish and purple dye, Gigthis (Bu Ghirarah), and Tacape (Qabis, Gab�s). North of Thaenae was Acholla, traditionally an offshoot of the Phoenician settlement on Malta, Thapsus (Rass Dimas), Leptis Minor, and Hadrumetum, the largest city on the east coast of Tunisia. From Neapolis (Nabul, Nabeul), a road ran direct to Carthage across the base of the Cap Bon peninsula.

West of Carthage there have been changes in the course of the Majardah (Bagradas) River; as a result, Utica, a port in Carthaginian and Roman times, is now some seven miles from the sea. Utica was second only to Carthage in importance among the Phoenician settlements and always maintained at least a nominal independence. Beyond Cape Farina (Ra's Sidi 'Ali al-Makki) as far as the Strait of Gibraltar, the coast offered a number of anchorages, but few of the stations reached anything like the prosperity of those on the Gulf of Gabes and the east coast of Tunisia. One of the more important was Hippo Diarrhytus (Bizerte, Banzart), whose natural advantages as a port were utilized at an early date; another Hippo, later called Hippo Regius (B�ne, modern Annaba), was also probably of Carthaginian origin. Along the same stretch of coast were Rusicade (Philippeville, Skikda) and Collo (Chullu). Still farther west, a number of place-names known from the Roman period betray an earlier Phoenician interest through the incorporation of a Phoenician element, rus, meaning "cape"; e.g., Rusuccuru (Dellys) and Rusguniae (Matifou). Tingis (Tingi, Tangier) was already settled in the 5th century BC.

The foreign policy of Carthage was very different from that of the motherland. The Phoenicians had maintained an army of mercenaries, but had used them only to protect their country from the robber kings of Damascus and Jerusalem. They had many ships of war, but had used them only to convoy their round-bellied ships of trade and to keep off the attacks of the Greek and Etruscan pirates. Their settlements were merely fortified factories; they made no attempt to reduce the natives of the land. If their settlements grew into colonies they let them go. But Carthage founded many colonies and never lost a single one. Situated among them, and possessing a large fleet, she was able both to punish and protect. She defended them in time of war; she controlled them in time of peace.

A policy of concession had not saved the Phoenicians from the Greeks, and now these same Greeks were settling in the West and displaying immense activity. The Carthaginians saw that they must resist or be ruined, and they went to war as a matter of business. They first put down the Etruscan rovers, in which undertaking they were assisted by the events which occurred on the Italian main. They next put a stop to the spread of the Greek power in Africa itself.

To her subject people Carthage acted as a tyrant. She had even deprived the old Phoenician cities of their liberty of trade. She would not allow them to build walls for fear they should rebel, loaded them with heavy burdens grievous to be borne, treated the colonial provinces as conquered lands, and sent decayed nobles as governors to wring out of the people all they could. If the enemies of Carthage invaded Africa they would meet with no resistance except from Carthage herself, and they would be joined by thousands of Berbers who longed to be revenged on their oppressors.

Recent discoveries in Chemtou (Simitthus) have provided valuable information through the necropolis dated between the 4th c BC and the Roman conquest. A colossal altar, visible from a great distance, capped the hill. The altar combines Greco-Roman, Punic and Egyptian motifs, and it was the first monument that used the famous Chemtou marble known as marmor numidicum.

Carthage was accused by its enemies in antiquity of oppressing and exacting excessive tribute from its subjects.

There were, however, different categories of subject community, the most favoured being the original Phoenician settlements and the colonies of Carthage itself. There is little evidence of opposition among them to Carthaginian control.

Similar institutions and laws may be attributed to a common cultural background rather than to an attempt to impose uniformity. Carthage exacted dues on imports and exports and levied troops and probably sailors. Carthaginian subjects of various nationalities in Sicily also received favourable treatment, at least in economic matters. Relatively free trade was allowed until the end of the 5th century, and a number of cities had their own coinage. In the 4th century, some Sicilian Greek states became subject to Carthage, paying a tribute amounting apparently to one-tenth of their produce.

It was the Libyans of the interior who suffered most, though few were reduced to slavery. During the First Punic War, Libyans are said to have had to pay one-half of their crops as tribute, and it is supposed that the normal exaction was a quarter, a burdensome imposition. They also were required to provide troops, and from the early 4th century they formed the largest single element in the Carthaginian army; it is unlikely that they received pay except in booty before the Punic Wars. The Carthaginians are said to have "admired not those governors who treated their subjects with moderation but those who exacted the greatest amount of supplies and treated the inhabitants most ruthlessly." This hostile judgment (by the Greek historian Polybius) was made in connection with the Libyans and a destructive revolt--one of a number known--that followed the first Punic War. In this revolt (241-237 BC), mercenaries, unpaid after the Carthaginian defeat in the First Punic War, revolted and for a while controlled much of Carthage's North African territory. It was fought with great atrocities on both sides, and the Libyans were among the most fervent of the rebels. They even issued coins on which the name Libyan appears (in Greek), which probably indicates a growing ethnic consciousness. Notwithstanding this relationship, Carthaginian civilization had profound effects on the material culture of the Libyans.