Roman attitudes towards the Carthaginians.

[WotWotius]

How are they depicted in literature?

 

I have recently been allocated a presentation on Rome's attitudes towards Carthage, and I was wondering what sources (other than Livy and Polybius) I should read, and how certain writers depict the Carthaginians, and why.

 

Below are my findings on Livy's work:

 

Unlike the

[Pantagathus]

WotWotius,

 

Sorry I/m just now seeing this...

 

For a bit more 'non-biased' portrait (Which doesn't in reality truly exist) Diodorus Siculus contains a lot of information regarding the Carthaginians.

 

Herodotus has some tidbits as does Justinus (a good bit), Appian (based mostly on the Polybius, + Livy and his sources), and Pausanias. For an Antiquarian viewpoint versus a 'historical' both Strabo and Pliny have many anecdotes that prove somewhat valuable. Just always keep in mind the chronology of the accounts we are left with to gain insight into the Carthaginain mind and motives. Herodotus and Polybius were the only two writers to be contemporary with them. Many of the other accounts are centuries beyond even the fall of Carthage much less their heyday in the mid-1st Millennium BC.

 

I have studied them a great deal and am of the opinion that they were probably not the abominable and esurient autocrats that they are painted as being in Livy. They were just shrewd and calculating mercantilists who would go to great lengths to protect their commercial interests.