Anyone else see it?

It really is amazing how this Carthaginian, who knew nothing about mountaineering, amassed an army, complete with elephants, and crossed the alps and threatened the Roman Republic.

The only thing that stopped him from overthrowing Rome was the weak will of the Carthagenian Senate.

I wonder how the world would have changed if Hannibal would have conquered Rome?

One thing people forget about the Romans was their tenacity. This trait is what won them their empire. I think they would have eventually ran off the Carthaginians even if they were conquered. They had been defeated many times before, and would be again, but, they always came back. It was just in their dynamics at the time, they could almost be considered an accidental empire for the most part.

Anyone else see it?

It really is amazing how this Carthaginian, who knew nothing about mountaineering, amassed an army, complete with elephants, and crossed the alps and threatened the Roman Republic.

The only thing that stopped him from overthrowing Rome was the weak will of the Carthagenian Senate.

I wonder how the world would have changed if Hannibal would have conquered Rome?

I think I remember this point being discussed during the show, and that experts agreed that even if Hannibal had taken Rome, the Republic, or at least the concept of Repulican forms of government would not have been defeated. The main reason being simply because to many people were successful within the Republic form of government compared to anything anyone else was offering during the time.

One thing people forget about the Romans was their tenacity. This trait is what won them their empire. I think they would have eventually ran off the Carthaginians even if they were conquered. They had been defeated many times before, and would be again, but, they always came back. It was just in their dynamics at the time, they could almost be considered an accidental empire for the most part.
Good point.


I think I remember this point being discussed during the show, and that experts agreed that even if Hannibal had taken Rome, the Republic, or at least the concept of Repulican forms of government would not have been defeated. The main reason being simply because to many people were successful within the Republic form of government compared to anything anyone else was offering during the time.
It also deserves mention that Carthage, which was a Phonecian colony in what is now Tunisia, was a mercantile rather than military culture. Phonecia was really not an empire but a loosely organized series of city-states. This was a culture which produced the greatest sea-travelers of its day. Hanno actually went all the way around Africa to the land of Punt, or Somalia as we know it today.

But as a military power, the Phonecians were not. Carthage did have a brief surge of expansion under Hannicar and his son Hannibal. But in the end it was the Romans, who were great empire builders who won in the end.


One side note, anyone noticed how the Carthagenians practiced human sacrefice? It was actually something that the Romans found very revolting. Not that Roman gladitorial battles were any more humane, but it was known that the Carthagenians in times of extreme hardship sacreficed children to the god Maloch, a tradition which came originally from the Caananite-phonecians.