Customer Reviews

Punic Wars

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"DELENDA EST CARTHAGO"

"Carthage Must be Destroyed" those most famous words were spoken by Marcus Porcius Cato in the 2nd Century BC. In this new book on the Punic Wars by Adrian Goldsworthy we are taken back into this most fascinating period of history. We follow in the steps of Hannibal, Hasdrubal, Hamilcar, Scipio Africanus and many more famous and infamous commanders and leaders as the Roman Legions and the soldiers and sailors of Carthage clash in this gigantic struggle of the Ancient World.

Each of the three wars are described in as much detail as possible bearing in mind the lack of primary sources for some periods. We follow the stalemate in Sicily during the First Punic War (264-241 BC). Then the more famous struggle in Spain and Italy during the Second Punic War (218-202 BC), followed by the final Roman victory in the Third Punic War (149-146 BC).

The author provides details of all the famous battles, Trebia, Lake Trasimene, Cannae and of course Zama. He also follows the lesser-known campaigns in Spain, Macedonia and Sicily. I found the author to be very fair in his assessment of the commanders and their decisions and offers comments on the sources used in his book and others.

I would compare this book favourably with Nigel Bagnall's `Punic Wars' and both books sit proudly in my library. The author took the time to explain the military traditions, training and tactics of the two opponents, which assisted greatly when it came to follow the battles. 16 maps are provided to assist in the narrative and all where of a decent standard however, no illustrations were to be found in the book.

The book was easy to read and the narrative flowed along faultlessly. Overall this is a very decent one-volume account of the Punic Wars and I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys decent history or who has a love for this period.

One of the most confusing dramas throughout human history is the Second Punic War; the nature of the First and Third, although more easily understood, simply add to this confusion. Adrian Goldsworthy has put together a narrative history that easily solves this problem. The story he presents is clear, concise, and devoid of an overemphasis on unfamiliar names.

This single-volume history of all three conflicts is clearly the best out there. Goldsworthy does an excellent job of neutrally explaining the cuases of all three (difficult to do, as all the sources are Roman). The conflict is expertly explained without getting bogged down in the details of too many individual battles. Strategy and tactics are explained as resulting from the technology and culture of the time in a way that is both informative and interesting.

One of the best aspects of this book is that it is filled with maps, and that they are placed in the book at the precise moment when you need to consult one. This is so rare in contemporary writing that praise for this should be counted doubly.

The one detractor of the book is that it is lacking in illustrations. Naval and siege technologies are described in some detail, yet very few complimentary illustrations or diagrams are offered. However, I'll (and I assume you will too) take the maps over the illustrations any day.

Essentially, this is the finest book on the subject, and is highly recommended for readers of all historical interests...

Mr. Goldsworthy presents a clean and concise analysis of the three Punic Wars which beset Rome and Carthage in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC. There is not much to quibble about with this book, presenting as it does one of the best studies of all there conflicts out there. The author discusses the primary works of Polybius, Appian, Livy and others and lists their strong and weak points in describing the Punic conflict.

What the book lacks if anything is a few illustrations showing the reader what some of the naval vessels of the period looked like. The detailed descriptions provided of their construction and use is not supported by any pictures. Otherwise, the narrative flows smoothly, with the author commenting on the validity of the principal primary works and attempting to fill in the gaps with his own astute ideas. Obviously the information on the 2nd Punic War with Hannibal's epic invasion of Rome is the most completely covered. The author provides a great blow by blow description of the early campaigns in Italy from Hannibal's first success at the Trebbia River to Cannae itself. Our information on the 1st and 3rd Punic Wars is much less complete and therefor receives correspondlingly less attention.

The author is careful not to compare the military genius of Hannibal and Scipio Africanus, believing that such comparisons are poinless, even if fun for the military historian. Goldsworthy tries to fill in the numerous gaps left by the primary sources with his own hypothesis which allows the reader to make his own conclusions.

This book provides fresh analysis of an age-old conflcit often seen to this day with many myths. The author provides comparisons with the past to the present with the military situation which might be annoying to the pure student of antiquity, but which is useful to the military historian. The main strength of this work is that it provides a comprehensive and comparative account of the all three of the Punic conflicts. The author carefully traces the strategies both combatants took, and notes their differences in each conflict. A most excellent read and a must for military historians and those fascinated with antiquity and early Rome.

Toward the end of his fascinating history of the Punic Wars, author Adrian Goldsworthy speculates that one of the reasons for Carthage's fall is that the African empire was too exclusively mercantile in its mindset. Somehow, the notion that they could grow their empire through a consistent plan of conquest never quite took root in their minds. Carthage could boast one of the greatest generals in all of history in Hannibal Barca; yet they let his campaign in Italy fizzle from lack of follow-through.

If Carthage represented a failure of the imagination, Rome always seemed to have their eyes on the prize. Even after Trebia, Lake Trasimene, and the slaughter at Cannae, Rome simply refused to treat with Hannibal. Moreover, they did not make the mistake of limiting their focus to Italy alone: They continued to fight in Spain, Cisalpine Gaul, and even Illyria and Greece. Once they had developed a powerful general in Scipio Africanus, they successfully invaded the Carthaginian mainland while Hannibal was bottled up in the toe of Italy.

Hannibal could destroy Rome's armies in the fields, but he was never strong enough to take Rome itself. Under the intelligent, if at times arthritic, generalship of Fabius Cunctator, Rome managed to avoid fighting pitched battles with Hannibal's army for over 12 years while at the same time keeping him bottled up away from the vicinity of Rome. More seriously, Hannibal failed to persuade any major Italian cities -- with the sole exception of Capua -- to throw in their lot with Carthage. From the outset, his battle plan was to live off the land; but to defeat Rome, he also had to woo the land to his side.

It is a great pity that there exist no histories of the wars from the Carthaginian side. Polybius and Livy produced very readable pro-Roman histories. It is somewhat ironic that the Phoenicians invented our alphabet, but their great colony at Carthage seemed to be averse to using it.

Goldsworthy did a good job of marshalling his sources in the endnotes, yet keeping scholarly "intrusions" into the text at a minimum. My only complaint is that the maps in my Cassell hardbound edition are poorly drawn, riddled with errors, and insufficient. It would have been useful, for instance, to have maps of the territories that Hannibal controlled at different times. Many cities mentioned in the text appear on none of the maps. Also, it would have been useful to do a better job of distinguishing all the Hamilcars, Hannibals, Gisgos, Hannos, Magos, and Hasdrubals from one another. Look at the index, and see what I mean.

If you like this book, I recommend that you read the two great historical novels written about the period: Gustave Flaubert's Salammbo and Winifred Bryher's The Coin of Carthage.

The Punic Wars by Adrian Goldsworthy is a wonderful trip back into time. It is difficult to translate wars and battles that took place over 2000 years ago and make them relevant to modern times. Goldsworthy does a fine job but fails in the latter.

His strength is in describing what happened in the three Punic Wars. The book is not just a military history of the era, but also a political one as well. He spends considerable time analyzing the political climate that led to almost 50 years of war between Carthage and Rome. The strength is in the First Punic War that led the groundwork for the other two. After reading the book one does understand why the wars were fought.

As a military history, the book is limited by a absence of primary sources describing the battles. The one exception are the battles fought by and against Hannibal. His description of the battle of Caenne, with a marvelous narrative of how Hannibal was able to destroy a numerically superior Roman force. He describes the battle in sufficient detail so as to allow the reader to understand the basics of Hannibal's successful tactics.

Where Goldsworthy does not excel is in his attempt to make the Wars relevant to the present. While there are parallels between the Wars and the First and Second World Wars they are unlimited and overplayed. In addition, while he is correct that Carthage did not understand the Roman for pension for "playing for keeps" rather than to obtain a favorable negotiated treaty, that lesson also had limited applicability.

The Punic Wars is interesting reading because of the effect that the Wars had on our history. That is reason enough to read the book. The fact that it is so well written just adds to the allure.

Adrian Goldsworthy is a highly-regarded young British historian and, on the basis of his immensely readable Punic Wars, it's easy to see why. The book more than lives up to its glowing cover blurb from the great military historian John Keegan and, in fact, reminds one of his own work as Mr. Goldsworthy renders what might be confusing battle scenes with admirable clarity. Equally impressive is the way he sifts the ancient sources, highlighting long-running controversies, and explains why he makes choices among them. The focus is heavily on the actual fighting, so you'll have to look elsewhere for a thorough treatment of the politics behind it all, but he succeeds brilliantly at depicting the warfare between Rome and Carthage.

Also useful are the Preface and conclusion in which Mr. Goldsworthy explains why we should still be interested in this history. He begins by noting that when he would mention the topic on which he was writing to people they'd murmur something about the Alps but that would about exhaust their knowledge. This is undoubtedly true for almost all of us, but astonishing given how central Greek and Roman language, history, and culture were to the educations of our forebears. To have forgotten these things as a society is to have weakened one of the pillars on which they built our civilization. And if it seems unimportant to some, Mr. Goldsworthy ends by suggesting just one of the ways in which the Roman victory in the Punic Wars matters utterly to us today. it made possible the Roman Empire and within that Empire the eventual penetration of Christianity to the ends of Europe. We still live in the world these wars made possible. It's not asking much that we recall them and when a historian as deft as this comes along, it's even pleasurable to do so.

After the era of the great Classical Age of the Greeks the slow motion shift of the geopolitical center of gravity westward in the Mediterranean world is reflected in the inexorable conflict of the Carthaginians and the Romans for dominance. This first-rate no-bones account describes this ominous collision of world history that lies at the threshold of the world of the Roman era to come. It also shows the strains on the cultural politics of the Roman Republic as this will disintegrate to produce the world of the Caesars and the Empire. The book comprehensively covers all three Punic Wars and clearly lays out the tale in a manner that still, for being told a myriad times, evokes dramatic suspense.

Punic Wars by Adrian Goldsworthy proves to be a well written and well researched book on the series of wars fought between the North African city of Carthage and the Roman Republic. This series of conflicts won by Rome, opened the way for decline of their Republican system and rise of Pax Romana of the Imperial period. While the author and some of the previous reviewers gaves hints that this wasn't a good thing, I thought as Cato did, that as long as Carthage exist as an economic and possible military rival, Rome can never gained total mastery of the region. Seeds of imperial Rome was planted during these wars although it took a while to bloom.

I was impressed by the author's analyical accessments of who,why and how certain events turned out the way they did. He made it very clear why Rome won and why Carthage lost and it just wasn't about numbers and resources. Rome thought in the concept of total war, Carthage thought in terms of limited war. This difference determined the outcome of the First and Second Punic Wars and deciding factor behind Carthage's destruction in the Third War. Unfinished business was probably in Cato's mind when he called for "Delenda est Carthago".

The author's book on the Punic Wars proves to be written with clarity and well grasp of the knowledge at hand. This make this book very ideal to read and understand, a hallmark of a very good military history book. Despite of the limited primary sources to these wars, the author does an excllent job in bringing out the conflicts while analysizing the source material itself.

I would say that the only real weakness of this book lies in the fact that there weren't enough maps for novice readers to followed the wars, campaigns and battles as described in the book. Maybe diagrams of different military systems used by the Romans and their enemies would be nice as well.

But overall, this book turned out to be one of the best books I ever read on the subject and come well recommended to anyone who have an interest in this period.

I took several Roman history classes in college but came out of those with an incomplete and hazy understanding of the three Punic Wars. Hannibal and Scipio Africanus remained in my memory over these long years but little else. In an effort to clear the haze, I picked up Goldsworthy's book and revived much of what I had forgotten. Goldsworthy details the cause, events and results of the three wars and provided a level of information beyond popular histories but scholarly nonetheless. I did find myself having to list the names of the various Roman consuls and Carthaginian commanders to keep them all in proper order, and the chronology in the back helped. I also had to use a map from a different book to follow the movements and locations of the armies. A better map in the book would be helpful. With a limited number of primary sources available, any history of this period will not have the same level of detail and information as accounts of other, more recent conflicts. Despite the paucity of sources, Goldsworthy does a fine job of providing possible reasons and outcomes without being overly speculative and dogmatic. All in all this is a good book, slow at times and a little dry, but a good account of an interesting period.

Over two thousand years ago, the Ancient World was thrust into three major conflicts that not only changed the course of antiquity, but the course of the world as we know it today. The three wars fought between Rome and Carthage between 264 and 146 BC gave rise to the Roman Empire, and Rome's subsequent influence on World History. Despite its importance, however, the Punic Wars are not well-known to those outside the insular world of the Classics. Adrian Goldsworthy has provided a great service by making these world wars of antiquity accesible to the modern reader and the general public. Doing so is no easy task, considering the incomplete record that one has to cope with whenever writing about the ancient world. Goldsworthy manages to put together his history based partially on the primary works of the ancient writers Polybius, Livy, and Appian (while noting each one's shortcomings) and partially on the more recent excavations of the battle sites. The result is a fluid narrative, albeit one that a reader used to accounts of more recent history might find frustrating, since a good deal of information is still uncertain.

Of the three Punic Wars, the Second (Hannibalic) is covered in the greatest detail. While nearly everyone knows that Hannibal crossed the Alps with his elephants, few know how he managed to do so. And the losses that his armies suffered en route are even less well-known. Once it Italy, Hannibal won victory after victory, culminating in the massacre at Cannae in 216, still regarded as the most one-sided battle ever. Despite this, the Romans fought on, with a stubborness and determinedness that eventually won them all three wars. How they did so remains one of the most fascinating and instructive historical tales of all time. The implications of the wars of antiquity are many. For a historian, the importance of these wars in shaping the ancient and modern worlds should be examined. For the military strategist, it is worth comparing the strategies of ancient generals to glean information of the conduct and theory of war. And the political scientist, forever complaining about the lack of "qualitative" data (eg, historical examples), should began incorporating the wars of the ancient world, as well as those of the modern, into their theories of state behavior.