by Dexter Hoyos
coast.5
There is other evidence too for financial straits at Carthage. In or not long
after 247 another general, Hanno, captured the wealthy inland town of
‘Hecatompylus’, a Greek name for Theveste, today’s Tebessa 160 miles (260
kilometres) south-west of Carthage, with frankly imperialist aims according
to the historian Diodorus. Why a war in Africa when the one for Sicily was
still unfinished? Strategic and political reasons may have contributed—Regu-
lus’ invasion had encouraged Carthage’s Numidian neighbours to attack
Punic lands—but Diodorus implies the importance of booty and extra rev-
enues in the Carthaginians’ thinking around 247. In these same years their
own native Libyan subjects were charged taxes so oppressive that in the end
they were ready to revolt. The Carthaginians, ‘thinking that they had rational
grounds, governed the Libyans very harshly’, comments the historian Poly-
bius drily. Hanno again was a noted practitioner of such revenue-raising.6
Much if not most of Carthage’s wealth and revenues flowed from trade—
or had flowed before the war. Some of it was exotic: men told stories of
10
T H E H E I G H T S O F H E I RC T E A N D E RY X
barter with tribes on the West African coast, journeys to the Tin Isles north
of Spain, far-western sea routes jealously guarded and intruding ships sunk.
But the bulk of Punic commerce was with other Mediterranean lands, west
and east, and it is very likely that this suffered from the interminable war.
The occasional Roman fleet raiding on the coast would have had only pass-
ing effects on trade, but privateers could pose a bigger deterrent if they
plundered widely and repeatedly. The biggest blow, though, would have been
the closure of Sicily and Italy to Carthaginian merchants. Not only were these
lands commercially important themselves, but ancient merchant-ships also
needed to put in to land regularly on long trips, for fresh stores or to avoid
rough weather. Now no Punic merchant could safely use landing-places
under Roman control. Trade especially with the eastern Mediterranean and
beyond must have suffered, though it was still possible to get to and from
such places by sailing eastward along the Libyan and Egyptian coasts—a
longer route. When the Romans finally built a new fleet in 242, the
Carthaginians seem to have learned this not from merchants or intermedi-
aries but on its arrival outside Drepana. All this would damage revenues,
credit and war-making; and nothing suggests that doubling the Libyans’ taxes
and annexing new territory made up for all the damage.
Hamilcar, taking over from Carthalo in Sicily, thus had an unenviable mis-
sion. He had limited money, limited forces and only two surviving
strongpoints. The enemy controlled the rest of the island and every year still
sent two consular armies there, some 40,000 Roman and allied Italian troops.
Realistically then his task was not so much to win the war as to avoid losing it.
Big battles and large-scale campaigns were out of the question. At best he
might wear the Romans down to a point where they were finally willing to
make peace. At the least, he must keep the fight going one way or other until
the Carthaginians had the means for a major new effort, or till something else
turned up: for instance problems for Rome from some other quarter—
restiveness among the hard-pressed Italian allies, or moves by their old foes
the Gauls in Italy north of the peninsula.
To old, experienced Carthaginian generals this may have looked like a poi-
soned cup. Hamilcar was young and confident, and had his own ideas of how
to carry out his mission.
First he quelled the still-restive soldiers, with methods much harsher than
Carthalo’s. He ‘cut down many of them one night and had many others
thrown into the sea’, writes Zonaras in his résumé of the historian Cassius
Dio. But Hamilcar then, according to Zonaras, failed to recapture one of the
islets just outside the harbour of Drepana after the besieging consul seized it.
When he tried to retake it, the Romans drew him off by launching an assault
on the town. The story looks a little suspicious: Zonaras claims that capturing
the islet helped the Romans’ siege-efforts against the town, but in fact
Drepana remained firmly in Punic hands for years to come. If the islet was
lost, the blow was not so damaging after all. Still the episode, if true, illustrates
11
T H E H E I G H T S O F H E I RC T E A N D E RY X
Hamilcar’s problems with manpower and could help explain his coming
change in strategy.
Now he led a new naval raid on Italy, moving along the toe of the penin-
sula through the lands of Locri and the Bruttians, meeting it seems little
resistance. There was no Roman navy to worry about and Hiero of Syra-
cuse—despite becoming a permanent friend, amicus, of the Romans the year
before—no doubt thought it rash to challenge Hamilcar’s warships with any
of his own. It was on the return trip to Sicily that the new general pounced
on the heights of Heircte.7
III
Just where Hamilcar’s mountain stronghold was is still debated. Not, as origi-
nally thought, Monte Pellegrino, the mountain on the shore just north of
Panormus: it is too small for Polybius’ specification of a 100 stadia rim, not
to mention too close to the city, too sheer nearly everywhere, and without
access to a proper haven.
More recent candidates lie some 12 miles (16 kilometres) across the moun-
tains to Panormus’ west, overlooking the gulf of Castellammare—steep and
narrow Monte Pecoraro rising to nearly 1,000 metres above Terrasini or lower
Monte Palmita to its south. But again, both are too small, Pecoraro too steep.
Since Hamilcar could not have stationed all his army on the heights them-
selves as Polybius states, some (or most) of it must have camped on the coastal
lowlands beside them, and the 100 stadia would then have to include these.
Polybius’ emphasis on the nearness of Panormus becomes incomprehensible.
The heights of Heircte were most probably the broad and lofty mountain
mass bounding the plain of Panormus 5 miles (8 kilometres) west of the city,
its highest point being the 809-metre Monte Castellaccio. Much of it is steep-
sided but paths, one of them starting from the shore below, lead up to the
undulating plateau on the crest. To the south lie even higher mountains.
Below its eastern flank a pass separates it from the smaller but even steeper
cape of Monte Gallo. The pass may be where the fort of Heircte stood; the
small bay and sheltering island at the foot of the two headlands will have
been where Hamilcar’s fleet moored. Water is available at the harbour, as
Polybius states. The heights are about 100 stadia in circumference, with pas-
tures and with a suitable lookout on Monte Castellaccio.8
Hamilcar’s move was unexpected and debatable. Polybius stresses his isola-
tion from Lilybaeum and Drepana. He could not defend them from assault
where he now was; pressure on the enemy could only be indirect. But with
the forces available, that was
going to be true wherever he was. Carthage’s
Sicilian field army, which in battle outside Panormus only three years before
had numbered about 30,000, now probably amounted to some 10,000
infantry, mostly professional mercenaries from all over the western
Mediterranean (including at least 3,000 Gauls, we learn later), and a few
12
T H E H E I G H T S O F H E I RC T E A N D E RY X
hundred cavalry. For at war’s end 20,000 mercenaries left Sicily for North
Africa and these included the unbeaten garrisons of Lilybaeum and Drepana,
who must have numbered 10,000 or more. Losses over the years must be
allowed for, but given this total Hamilcar’s force too cannot have been sub-
stantially bigger. Besides, if it had been, he would have enjoyed much greater
flexibility. He could have pounced on Panormus or tried more aggressively to
raise the siege of Drepana.
The Romans reacted by camping a force close to his, it seems on a lower
hill to the south. Only 5 stadia, or about a kilometre, separated the camps, but
not much aggressive Roman élan was shown. Assaulting the Punic eyrie was
clearly an option with little appeal even when Hamilcar was away on one of
his raids. The Roman force was about the same size as the Punic and served
chiefly to protect Panormus, although constant skirmishing occurred. After
all, the bulk of the two consular armies sent yearly to Sicily, four legions plus
Italian allied contingents, was tied down outside Drepana (where the Romans
were also occupying the nearby heights of Eryx) and Lilybaeum. Hamilcar
felt secure enough to sail out, no doubt with only part of his force, on a new
sweep of the Italian coast, this time as far north as Cumae on the bay of
Naples. The resulting booty and prisoners it seems cheered his mercenaries
substantially: we hear of no more grumbles.9
Further Italian raids may have been made over the next three years, though
we are not told of any. The Romans founded new defensive centres on their
coasts in these years: citizen colonies, Alsium and Fregenae, on the Etruscan
coast near the Tiber in 247 and 245 or 244, and a colony of Latin status at
Brundisium on the Adriatic in 244. The first was probably a response to
Carthalo’s raid, but Fregenae even nearer to the Tiber suggests that still more
security was found necessary for the coast close to Rome. Does the colony at
Brundisium imply that Hamilcar had made descents in that area in 246–245?
Quite possibly: after his visitations to the Tyrrhenian side of Italy it might
have been a good idea to try a coast where he was less expected.
At Heircte itself Hamilcar handily held off the enemy troops over the way.
Polybius limits himself to generalizing about the two sides’ ambushes,
stratagems, sorties and counterattacks. The Carthaginians may have operated
more widely too. Diodorus, in another opaque and short excerpt, reports
‘Barca’ attacking ‘Italium, a fort of Catana’s near Longon’ (the outcome is not
known). Catana lay on the other side of Sicily, a long way from Heircte
though not impossible for a general accustomed to hitting at Italy. But no
Longon is known in that area, whereas a town Longane existed by a similarly
named river close to Mylae and Messana—the historic river where Hiero of
Syracuse had once shattered the Mamertines of Messana in battle and led
them to call in the Romans. Diodorus’ later copyist may have mistakenly
replaced Messana with Catana. Likely enough the Mamertines held the area
for their Roman allies to guard the coast-route to the west. The fort’s name
would fit Mamertine occupiers, as they originally hailed from Italy.10
13
T H E H E I G H T S O F H E I RC T E A N D E RY X
From time to time he may also have sailed over to the besieged towns on
the coast to keep up the defence; and occasionally too to Carthage itself. His
eldest son had been born in 247 but another arrived during the 240s (both
were to be with him on campaign in Spain in late 229 or early 228), and it is
not at all plausible that his wife was with him in his mountain camps. The
children—there were daughters as well—may have found him something of
a stranger, if an affectionate one, but their father must have welcomed the
brief respites from warfare, especially the piecemeal kind of warfare he was
waging.
Hamilcar may have aimed to obstruct Roman forces and supplies moving
to the sieges at Drepana and Lilybaeum, a reasonable strategy as we have
seen, given the resources he had. Already his presence near Panormus made
the coast road beyond there impossible for the enemy. Inland, the roads
zigzagged around one mountain ridge after another (and maybe with Punic
attackers lurking round the other side) or else a time-consuming detour was
required via Agrigentum and the south coast (the Romans had built a road
linking Panormus and Agrigentum some years earlier for other purposes).
The sea was a much easier way of travel and transport, but Hamilcar could
hit at ships too. Besides, ships had to put in regularly to land, and the sea itself
was perilous between autumn and spring of every year. Hamilcar’s guerrilla
methods thus had promise.
These methods probably earned him his famous nickname. A Carthaginian
had only one proper name but nicknames were often used—partly to sort
out different bearers of the few names common among leading men. Hamil-
car went down in history as ‘Barcas’ to the Greeks and ‘Barca’ in Latin. This
reflected most likely the Punic word for lightning, like the Semitic brq (with
vowels added, baraq) . Hamilcar’s swift and scorching sorties by sea and land
would fit it well. He had less scope for these, as we shall see, from Eryx later,
and so his countrymen probably attached it to him during his Heircte years.
Scintillating stories of his exploits circulated at Carthage. Beyond the city too,
for a few years later a Numidian prince was keen to ally himself—at some
risk—with a leader who had so roused his admiration.11
Yet all he achieved was a stalemate. The Romans could not take Drepana
and Lilybaeum, but neither could he force them to lift the sieges. Coastal
defences in Italy, as mentioned, were being improved. His forces were thin-
ning through military action and because, with funds short and pay already
falling into arrears, few recruits came his way. The besieged strongholds on
the west coast may have been in worsening straits too. One spring or summer
morning in 244 the Roman troops opposite his position awoke to find it
empty and no Punic ships in the bay. A fast rider would be sent off at once to
inform the consuls besieging Drepana and Lilybaeum, but they knew already:
the lightning had struck near Drepana.
14
T H E H E I G H T S O F H E I RC T E A N D E RY X
IV
Mount Eryx or Monte San Giuliano rises isolated to over 2,000 feet (750
metres), just inland from Drepana: a broad ridge with a vast view over both
coastal plain and sea—which may explain Polybius’ notion that it was the
second highest mountain in Sicily. On its crest stood a renowned temple of
the goddess known to
Phoenicians as Astarte, Greeks as Aphrodite and
Romans as Venus, whose servitors included priestess-prostitutes. On a shoul-
der below stood a little town also named Eryx, while a low spur jutting in
Drepana’s direction was called Aegithallus. The Romans had captured the
position in 249, their only success amid the disasters of that year (what their
view of the priestesses was we do not know).
Hamilcar sailed in at night to another small bay north of the mountain, took
his men up the zigzag road to the town and slaughtered the garrison. Captured
townsfolk were marched down to the ships and taken over to Drepana—for
some of them a second forced removal, as another Hamilcar had shifted the
entire citizenry of Eryx to the port 16 years earlier. If he had planned on
retaking the summit as well, he failed; Roman troops still held it, and Aegithal-
lus too. But the town of Eryx now became Hamilcar’s stronghold.
This was a far more ticklish, and puzzling, position than the heights above
Heircte. He was wedged halfway up a mountain, between two tenacious
enemy garrisons, with one twisting path down to his anchorage. On the plain
below him a Roman consular army was encamped, though facing it were his
forces in Drepana. Even if he had captured the summit as well, it would not
have added greatly to his flexibility of manoeuvre. Yet Hamilcar both chose
this position as his new base and maintained it for more than two years.
The change suggests that Heircte had become too remote and Drepana, at
least, too heavily pressed. If his losses were not being replaced then the range
and impact of his actions would be narrowing. The alternatives were unap-
pealing: either shut his field forces up in one of the two ports with the
garrison there or move around the open country harassing the besiegers and
their lines of supply. With his current strength the second option would
court disaster: even if the enemy detached only part of their armies against
him, one pitched battle could mean the end of his army. The other option
would concede all initiative to the Romans and leave the besieged ports with
even gloomier prospects.
But the problem at Eryx, which Hamilcar never really solved, was how to
use the position to make a real impact. He was supplied by sea, like the
