Hamilcar Barca

Carthaginian general and statesman

• Born: c. 275 b.c.e.
• Birthplace: Carthage (now in Tunisia)
• Died: Winter, 229/228 b.c.e.
• Place of death: Central eastern Spain

Hamilcar Barca led Carthaginian forces in the last stages of the First Punic War (264-241 b.c.e.) against Rome. He compensated for the loss of Carthage’s colonies of Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica by founding new ones rich in minerals and agricultural resources in Spain. Hannibal, his eldest son, was pledged by the father to continue the conflict and maintain the enmity of the Barcids against Rome.

Early Life

The years from the end of the second millennium b.c.e. to the beginning of the first witnessed a fundamental economic and social transition in the ancient world. The Bronze Age gave way to the Iron Age, which emerged from a greater exploitation and distribution of mineral, agricultural, and manufactured resources.

Semitic peoples in the eastern Mediterranean port cities of northern Canaan were in a particularly advantageous position to take advantage of and contribute to this development. The ancient Greeks referred to this maritime coastal region as Phoenicia. The modern world knows it as Lebanon. The Phoenician city-state of Tyre, under the protection of its gods Melqart and Baal, opened maritime frontiers across the Mediterranean Sea, establishing trading stations in Crete, Sicily, Sardinia, northern Africa, and beyond Gibraltar, in Morocco and Spain.

During the ninth century b.c.e. a group of dissident elite from Tyre founded a port city in North Africa near present-day Tunis. Named Carthage, the new city flourished as the western flank of the Phoenician trading realm. Eventually it rivaled and surpassed the older Phoenician cities. A handful of families emerged to control the economic, military, and political affairs of the Carthaginian Empire. One of the later emerging families of this oligarchy, the landowning Barcids, came to produce some of the city’s greatest military leaders. This leadership arose as the Empire faced its greatest threat in the third and second centuries b.c.e.—the advancing Roman Empire.

Some time during the mid-270’s b.c.e., Hamilcar (huh-MIHL-kahr—“Aided by Baal”) Barca (BAHR-kuh—“Lightning”) was born. He was raised in a prominent and wealthy family and in a culture focused on maritime trade supported by naval and military prowess. During his childhood the first of the three Punic Wars began, in 264. The wars became a life-or-death struggle for Carthage and its empire against the advancing power of Rome across the Mediterranean. These struggles steeled Hamilcar Barca and his children to military leadership.

Life’s Work

The heart of the struggle in the First Punic War was for control of Sicily. Lasting from 264 to 225 b.c.e., the war became a stalemate in which the Roman army could advance against Carthaginian land forces but could not achieve final victory for lack of Roman naval power. Romans even confronted the African elephants, capturing some, which the Carthaginians brought to battle. By steadily building ships and accumulating maritime skills, Rome eventually massed a considerable navy. Despite early defeats, even humiliations, this navy came to match and then decisively defeat the Carthaginian fleet, ending the war in Rome’s favor.

By 247, after nearly two decades of war and having exhausted much of its armed forces, Carthaginian power in Sicily had become isolated to the far western region. Under such reduced circumstances, Carthage passed command of its army, overwhelmingly composed of non-Carthaginian mercenaries, to Hamilcar Barca. Using guerrilla tactics, he became successful in reversing Carthaginian losses, challenged Roman forces, and raided along the Italian coast. However, Rome had by now mounted sufficient naval power to defeat Carthage on the sea.

Late in the winter of 241, a massive Roman naval force met its Carthaginian counterpart off the northwest tip of Sicily and decimated the fleet. Authorities in Carthage ordered Hamilcar to end his military efforts and sue for peace. When Hanno, admiral of the Carthaginian fleet, returned home, the same authorities ordered him crucified. Rome required that Carthage pay huge annual indemnities for ten years to cover the cost of the war. The Romans desperately needed these funds to finance their renewed conflicts with the warrior Celts (or Gauls) to the north of Rome.

The peace that Hamilcar obtained with Rome did not follow him to Carthage. There, unpaid mercenaries and impoverished peasant groups from the countryside besieged the city. Although victory had been denied Hamilcar in Sicily, it did not escape him on his home territory. He suppressed the uprisings and became the supreme authority of Carthage.

Hamilcar’s last duties in Sicily were to return his mercenary troops to Carthage for payment of their back wages. However, Carthaginian finances were now in a dire situation. With rich colonies lost, ships decimated, and a huge indemnity due to Rome, Carthaginian officials could not pay the mounting number of unemployed soldiers entering the city or settling in outlying regions. Increasingly furious at the delays in receiving their back wages, the angered troops adhered to the leadership of a renegade Italian mercenary, Spendios, who appealed to them to lay siege to Carthaginian cities until the troops were paid.

The mercenaries were joined by thousands of native peasants whose own situation had worsened with the decline of the Carthaginian economy. These natives were led by Matho, who, joining the hordes of Spendios, created a mass of tens of thousands of rebels laying siege to Carthaginian cities. When Hamilcar returned to Carthage, he was entrusted with the task of suppressing this massive rebellion.

Hamilcar’s task now was to combat the very soldiers he had once led. He had as recruits only the untrained citizen volunteers of Carthage, their experience as weak as their numbers against the rebel mass. Under such limited circumstances, Hamilcar nonetheless demonstrated how exceptional were his military and leadership skills.

Moving quickly and surreptitiously, as he had against the Romans, he defeated a large contingent of the rebel forces to the north of Carthage. Attracting back to himself the allegiance of some mercenaries who now deserted the rebels, Hamilcar enlarged his troops. He lured the besiegers of Carthage to move south of the city, where he trapped them in a gorge. Spendios was crucified and Matho, captured in a later battle, brutally tortured and killed. By 237, Hamilcar had subdued all rebellions on mainland Carthaginian territory, amassing great popularity. To many among the elite, there arose suspicions about his dictatorial potential. Hamilcar, though, was about to leave Carthage forever to find fortune for himself and his country in Spain.

Determined to restore the power and treasure of Carthage, he resolved with his sons to rebuild the Carthaginian Empire by expanding west into Spain. Once enriched and reinvigorated by colonies in that region, Carthage would be able successfully to renew its struggle with Rome for dominance of the Mediterranean.

In 237 he set out with his troops, trekking westward across North Africa. From what is today Morocco, he crossed the Atlantic, passing through the Straits of Gibraltar. In ancient times these straits were known as the Pillars of Herakles, guarding the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea. To Carthaginians, the Greek hero Heracles, son of Zeus, was associated with Melqart, the deity of Phoenician imperial expansion.

Hamilcar entered Spain at Gades (today, Cádiz), one of the oldest and largest Phoenician ports on the Atlantic. From there he moved eastward, encountering older Phoenician settlements or founding new Carthaginian ones. Along the Mediterranean coast he founded New Carthage (today, Cartagena). The allure of this southeastern territory of Spain lay in its minerals, including gold and silver, and rich agricultural land. The precious metals were mined and shipped to Carthage. Hamilcar also maintained a mint, producing coins that presented his profile as reminiscent of Herakles/Melqart.

To many in Carthage, he was virtually establishing a Barcid kingdom in Spain. However, such suspicions were set aside before the wealth he was returning to the city’s coffers. Among the Romans, too, his rising wealth and power raised suspicions. However, such concerns were again cloaked. The wealth he sent to Carthage in good part passed on to Rome, paying the Carthaginian indemnity and financing Rome’s Celtic wars.

In Spain Hamilcar found Celtic natives hostile to his incursions. An encounter with warriors of one of their tribes in the winter of 229-228 ended Hamilcar’s life. The exact time and circumstances of the death are lost. One tradition maintains he was struck as he retreated on horseback across the Jucar River (between Alicante and Valencia), trying to protect his sons Hannibal and Hamilcar the Younger from the enemy onslaught. If so, he was true, then, in death to his lifelong pledge: to preserve the forces of opposition to Rome.

Significance

The life of Hamilcar Barca must be understood in conjunction with his sons, most famously Hannibal, whose lives were consumed in military efforts to counter the advance across the Mediterranean of the Roman Empire against the Carthaginian. The conflicts of the Punic Wars over two centuries were the most momentous in ancient Mediterranean history, changing the area from a Phoeno-Semitic region to a Hellenized Latin one. Only the rise of Islam in the seventh century eventually restored the southern Mediterranean to a Semitic character. The northern Mediterranean has maintained its Hellene-Latin characteristics to the present day. In the mid-third century b.c.e. Hamilcar Barca slightly stalled this direction of history by compensating for the loss of Carthaginian dominance in the central Mediterranean as he secured territory and dominance along the western part of the sea.

Bibliography

Goldsworthy, Adrian. The Punic Wars. London: Cassell, 2000. The first section of this three-part work masterfully elaborates the complex of military, naval, geographic, and historic details of the First Punic War.

Lancel, Serge. Carthage: A History. Translated by Antonia Nevill. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell, 1997. Richly detailed study of Carthage from its founding and rise in the early centuries of the first millennium to its defeat and Roman absorption by the end of the period. Lancel is a French scholar and among the foremost modern authorities on Carthage.

Lancel, Serge. Hannibal. Translated by Antonia Nevill. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 1998. Well-documented and detailed life of the son of Hamilcar Barca, the first chapters of the work detailing Hamilcar’s family, military, and political background.

Lazenby, J. F. The First Punic War: A Military History. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1996. Based on close reading of primary sources, this work details the military action of the First Punic War, the last chapters concentrating on the efforts of Hamilcar Barca to retake the offensive against the Romans in the closing years of the conflict.

Vega, Luis Antonio. Amílcar Barca, fundador de España = Amílcar Barca, Founder of Spain. Madrid: Cultura Clásica y Moderna, 1960. Considered founders of ancient Spain, Hamilcar Barca and his family have received considerable scholarly attention in Spanish. The name of the city of Barcelona is derived from the Barca family name.

Wise, Terence. Armies of the Carthaginian Wars, 265-146 B.C. London: Osprey, 1982. This amply illustrated work displays the armor, dress, and environment of Carthaginian military personnel.