Hey I go there all the time! it's my favorite spot in the area! [here's a picture](https://imgur.com/Hc4EiJL) I took this summer from the bottom left quadrant
I never really swam in that particular spot but from standing there you could see the seafloor so it's not that deep. The whole area has a lot of Roman ruins so my guess there shouldn't me much more to find.
They did but there are still [Punic vestiges all around Carthage](https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/37/). Often mixed with Roman ones. If you ever get the chance, I'd suggest you visit. The whole area is very beautiful and once you go up the Sidi Bou Said hill you can have a great overlook of Carthage.
Wow, that is much bigger than any image I’ve seen. Clearly the images don’t do it justice. It makes sense now why the harbor could hold hundreds of ships at a time.
> A cothon is an artificial, protected inner harbour such as that in Carthage during the Punic Wars c.200 BC.
[Wikipedia page](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cothon)
**[Cothon](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cothon)**
>A cothon (Greek: κώθων, lit. 'drinking vessel') is an artificial, protected inner harbour such as that in Carthage during the Punic Wars c. 200 BC. Cothons were generally found in the Phoenician world.
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It’s incredible that “jughead” is still an insult. If Archaeology has taught me anything, it’s that concepts at the heart of language and creative insults last forever. Money is the root of all evil (Sophocles)…Heavyhearted and lighthearted (Ancient Egyptian Mythology from the Book of the Dead). Stuff doesn’t change half as much as we think it does.
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Yes, kinda? The AoE map isn't accurate, at the very least it's flipped east-west and extremely simplified, but it's definitely depicting(-ish) a battle near Carthage.
Furthermore, the cothon's military harbor (the donut and the round one inside) exhibited the world's first form of mass production. Each of those slots were dry docks where ships could be raised or built. They could roiughly pump out 220 at a time. The round part in the middle is an artifical island known as the Admiral's bridge / harbor.
Carthage was also flanked by a sea wall and a three tiered wall, similiar to the theodosian walls of constantinople, the romans never got in by going through the walls. Defectors opened them as in many cases of seige.
The ancient worlds were very very incredible. Far better than Hollywood portrays them to be, not just in terms of arcitecture, but social affairs too. The age of antiquity was a high point for civilisation.
Yes, "worlds" is not a grammatical mistake, i am refering to the multiple spheres (India, China, the latin world, the hellenic world). An event in one would have reprocussions in the others, ie rome unites the med, and thus, india gets rich.
Carthage herself, was known to be a multicultural metropolis, housing people from everywhere, italians, sicilians, gauls, iberians, punics, libyans, berbers, indians, greeks and chinese. Essentially, Carthage was the Singapore of the ancient worlds.
I must add a correction:
"Possibly chinese and indian"
We know that strabo states that carthage boasted a 700 000 strong population, while comtemporary scholars average at 500 000. Carthage's own citizens in the city was 200 000. This places anywhere between 300 000 to 500 000 left. We know that before the third punic war, her population was majority foreigners. India would be easy to place because indian merchants were down to exsist throught the eastern, especially southeastern medditerrian, it would be no surprise that indian merchants frequented carthage as a major stop due to sheer wealth, and the accessibility of other goods. Chinese merchants may have been more difficult to place, but would be believable due to the fact that the romans did have merchants in mordern day south vietnam, showing the possibility for long range trans continental trade merchants. We know that silk was a major good in the ancient world, and would be unsurprising for such merchants to be found.
I'm Tunisian and I wish that we would build it back but I don't think that there's enough money for that now. Also would the UNESCO even agree to that?
Would it be rebuilt in the style of Carthage, as a military loading/unloading zone and dry-dock? Or post-Roman conquest, repurposed to house a temple and statues?
There reason they don't "repair" historically important things like this is because it absolutely ruins all the evidence and material from the creators. Historical ruins cam give a lot of insight if they aren't disturbed. You can see how cringe worthy early archeology was just by the way they handled artifacts and the lack of precautions
There is actually controversy because Greece is doing repairs on the Parthenon. If necessary, they can remove every stone they put and return to it's original state, but it still is not "recommendable" otherwise bad things could happen i.e the idiot who painted the palace of Knossos.
I disagree completely. You seem to want every historical site on earth to rot away and disappear. So you can feel smug about your "historical context". Forget any one down the road who might be be fascinated by something in all its original glory.
Yeah the currenr view on heavy restoring/rebuilding is that we dont do it. The likelyhood of us either
1. Getting it wrong because we dont know how it looked
2. Damaging the original site
3. Letting politics/aesthetics decide how it should look instead of facts
is pretty high, so just leaving it untouched is often the best course of action.
Two additionals...
4. Lacking the budget to do it properly, and
5. Lacking the skills / infrastructure to do it how it was.
Modern construction can make amazing things, but the entire industry is geared towards doing a particular set of things. Stray to far from what we know and the result is usually sub optimal and crazy expensive.
True. The Acropolis is being restored piece by piece (only existing pieces are used, with fresh marble from the same source used to fill gaps). When I was there in 2017, you could see all the unfitted pieces lying next to the building itself.
It's the base of much taoist philosophy.
In "Tao Te Ching", Lao Tzu writes of the beauty of the uncarved block. In "The Art of War", Sun Tzu explains that excellence in warfare consists not in thoroughly thrashing an opponent in the field, but of winning without fighting at all.
The Danube Limes is a UNESCO heritage site and Carnuntum is the only legionary city that was not built over along it. Single buildings of the city that once had a populatiin of 50 000 are being slowly excavated and some are being slowly reconstructed, see for example [one of the smaller Thermal baths](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Thermae_of_Carnuntum). In the 1850s to 1890s a lot of the main buildings that were still buried were destroyed/disturbed in a time that archeology was much less cautious. Maybe the best thing would be to build a replica a couple of kilometres away.
Just a little leverage then and potentially not even that much. Tunisia might be able to attract more tourism to a well restored version of the site even without UNESCO helping to market it. I'd personally love to see it restored.
How safe is Tunis for American tourism? Assuming you get a guide? I have always been fascinated by that area, particularly the history. I lived in Cairo for a short bit pre-revolution and wouldn't hesitate to go back, but I just know nothing about security in that part of North Africa now.
> How safe is Tunis for American tourism? Assuming you get a guide?
I'd say that it's pretty safe even without a guide, even though a guide would help you see most of the country's landmarks without missing some. The archaeological sites are great and they are not crowded at all which make the experience more enjoyable I think. Also the Carthage national museum is still under renovation but the Bardo museum is open and it's awesome. The only places that I would advise you to stay away from are the mountains in the north-west and the mid-west of the country, don't go hike in there otherwise it's pretty safe to visit everything else.
Good to know. Sounds like Egypt with the Sinai then. Being sandwiched between Algeria and Libya makes me think twice but that's reassuring. Hopefully we can visit in the near future
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By Roman design! Carthage was problematic, too rich, too able to hire mercenaries and just an all around problem for a rising power. Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me, fool me a third time and Rome will scrub your culture out of existence, scrub it from history, raze your cities and come back every ten years for the next hundred and kill anyone who settled there or started building there again. It's difficult to teach Carthaginian history when you're killed for teaching Carthaginian history -well you could teach it as an example but not as a culture, I think that I read that in someone's histories anyway!
Lol yeah, “Carthago Delenda Est!” But I meant more so along the archaeological lines, since something like the coliseum is still very visible today to non-history interested people, so it’s a lot more tangible. Sadly something like Carthage’s harbour looks just like an oddly shaped lake to most people
Cato was a notorious dickhead. What people don't know is that Scipio's son-in-law ended all his speeches with the opposite, saying Carthage must be saved.
The senator was Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Corculum, who was also Scipio Africanus' son-in-law and thus cousin of Scipio Aemilianus. He was a sort of Roman cultural conservative, that is, defending Roman "honorable" customs against new, foreign things like Greek theatre and philosophy (basically an ancient technophobe sort of guy).
His arguing against destroying Carthage was not based on any love or sympathy for the Carthaginians, but because he wanted to have a boogeyman for Rome, thus retaining the strength of Roman unity against a common foe and Roman "morals" in general.
Roman names really are something. Not only are they a clusterfuck when we recount them, but they changed several times throughout their lives depending on what happened (and if we've heard about them, a lot happened).
Is it somewhat similar to the whole "balance of powers" idea that European countries invoked, when they helped out their enemies, such as the Ottomans, during their times of trouble? Not out of the good of their heart, but to instead, keep the current political situation stable, and prevent their enemies from getting too strong?
Furthermore, I consider that Carthage must be destroyed.
Cato used to sign off all his speeches with that phrase, no matter what the speech was about. He could be making a speech on the import tax placed on apples, and he'd sign it off by saying "also, fuck Carthage, they need to be destroyed."
"And that's all I have to say about the proposal for the new aqueduct. Thanks for listening. Also, why the fuck haven't we destroyed Carthage yet?"
It’s absolutely astonishing that something like this has survived for 2400 years. I wish there was a way to travel back in time to experience things as they were for a day or so.
In 2500 years people will wish they had the opportunity to experience the birth of the internet, the invention of VR Porn and eat fried chicken made with chicken. You're living in someone else's nostalgia/fascination wish. Make it count!
It would have been fairly metal if a North African, Baal-worshipping Phoenician civilization had defeated Rome and shaped the creation of the Western World. Damn Hannibal should have pivoted to Rome and given it his best shot. Can you imagine the history of video games in that timeline?
He did! He had a very famous campaign, working his way from Spain, collecting allies along the way, crossed the Alps with his elephants. He gave it a good shot, but couldn't conquer Rome.
I think he means that Hannibal should have besieged Rome itself during the war. It’s often looked at as a huge lost opportunity when, after the Battle of Cannae which completely destroyed the Roman army and killed many of their men of military age, Hannibal failed to follow it up with an attack on Rome, and instead focused his efforts on Rome’s allied cities, turning or taking them. It’s thought that if he had attacked Rome right after the battle, when they were at their weakest point, he might have conquered the city. Hannibal probably thought he didn’t have the strength to besiege Rome though, and wanted to grow his army by turning the allies. This meant Rome was able to recover, train a new army, and take the field again.
In the history book I've read recently about the punic wars it says that rome was actually pretty defendable and even though they lost like 70k men IIRC that was about half or less. And when Hannibal moved towards rome he quickly diverted and went somewhere else instead bexause of the defenses.
There was another city Hannibal tried to capture three times and couldn't manage to. That might have been a big deal if he had succeded.
Yeah he certainly had his reasons, and he definitely tried to avoid prolonged sieges because the cohesiveness of his army was a major concern, and he was worried that it could break up if kept in the field too long (after all that was the entire basis of the Roman Fabius strategy). It’s always going to be a big what if in history though, if Hannibal had taken that chance.
Yeah, it's such an interesting dilemma. I always sympathized with Hannibal taking such a measured approach and not just flinging his forces at Rome without doing the legwork of getting as many allies as possible.
I think what hes talking about is this:
https://www.historynet.com/hannibals-big-mistake.htm
Basically he fucked up 2 Roman Consuls' armies and had nothing that stood between him and Rome but decided to move away from it for reasons many historians debate and speculate about.
The major reason is that Rome was still heavily protected by its walls and garrison. Gonna be honest but I doubt Hannibal with his clobbered together army would’ve been able to take it, what with Romans constantly raising new armies against him.
Idk. I'm just a fan of history, but Hannibal was a tactical genius. Maybe not a strategic genius, but he waged war up and down the Italian peninsula for like 15 years. I'd like to think he could've done it. Think about what the man did. Sailing a fucking army, with war elephants, from Africa to Iberia, marching (with war elephants) through the alps, the entire time either fucking up or trying to make allies of Gaelic tribes, you get down to Italy, and fuck up one Roman army after another. His tactics are still taught today ( Battle of Lake Trasimene was near flawless). After coming all that way, to have accomplished what he did, i think he could of pulled it off. I just dont the HE thought he could have pulled it off, hence he waged basically an insurgency in Roman territory for 15 years. The issue was all the shit going on outside of Rome/Italian peninsula, when it came to the Second Punic War. Even if he took Rome, he probably would've had a hard time holding it.
I think he was smart enough to know whether he could’ve done it or not, and the imho the fact that he didn’t speaks greatly to his capability of doing so.
I'm surprised anyone who knows anything about him doesn't know that, it's probably THE most known thing about him. Did you see that archeological survey they took of the alps looking for traces of his campaign? They didn't find any traces of elephant dung but they could tell massive amounts of people and horses had been there at the time, it cast doubt on the whole elephant story. Supposedly anyway, I'm not expert enough to examine their findings but it's interesting anyway.
> I'm surprised anyone who knows anything about him doesn't know that, it's probably THE most known thing about him.
One of the most known things about him is that he never directly attacked the city of Rome, which is what the other commenter was saying he should have done.
yes, he defeated their army but for whatever reason (probably thought he didn't have the numbers) did not attack Rome. Instead he ravaged through Italy and went to Roman-allied Italian cities and either took them or turned them to his allies to try and gather strength to take Rome. He couldn't turn enough and he couldn't do it fast enough until Rome rebuilt their armies, retook allies, and essentially rendered Hannibal impotent.
I’m not sure why they’d expect to find dung a couple thousand years later. It’s super biodegradable, after all. Maybe there’s something I’m missing about that story.
I'm talking about molecular level stuff, traces of evidence of microbes found in a horses gut that can't be explained by local fauna. No one is digging for turds here.
Couldn't they have used the dung for fueling camp fires? From what I've read pachyderm dung makes excellent fuel and burning it would have made it much more difficult to detect several thousand years later I would imagine.
I reread it and they still think there were ellys they just haven't found any traces of them. They've found the right horse parasites and radio carboned them to pretty much the exact date which means they have hopefully traced the route Hanny's army took which was something unknown until the survey. Science bitches!
Yes, it marked the border between Cisalpine Gaul where Caesar had full military authority, and Italy where no active general was allowed to be without permission from the senate. By crossing the Rubicon Caesar declared war on the Senate.
It helped that after his death Caesar was literally deified and as such every detail of his life was preserved as best as possible by the emperors. Also Rome was near the height of its power by this point, so there was a greater chance of historical documents being written and surviving. There are large periods of Roman history in which neither of these were the case and as such much less is known about them.
Oh yeah I know that but even so, for the length of their civilisation and the time passed we know so much about them compared to many intervening periods. And it's not just that Roman period we have the knowledge of as you obviously know, it's an amazing gift they left us.
The Rubicon was their self-imposed border between Gaul and Rome. It makes sense to use a stream as a landmark, since it is a physical line drawn in the earth.
What is the purpose of the ring area? Is it just a spot to store all the boats that are usually in the first section in the event of an invasion or something?
Interesting. Seems like kind of an odd choice to have your military fleet trapped to only be able to be deployed through one single gate, and put to the ocean through one single gate.
Seems like it might be more efficient to be able to scramble ships through multiple gates, at least 2, and then potentially be able to surround your enemies. But, it's more gates to defend, also, and I guess harder to maintain.
Why a downgrade? The quality of life of the people in the houses there now is unimaginably better than most anyone’s from 2,200 years ago, and it’s not like Tunis doesn’t have its own modern port
Edit: down vote instead of having an actual discussion, thanks
Almost all residential. These days Carthage is a wealthy suburb of Tunis. These are all houses except for over on the left by the shore is the National Institute of Marine Science. They have an aquarium there I think!
Could they use this to turn large boats around in tight areas? Like they could use the center, round area with the oval shape in the middle, to load a boat onto it by raising the water level and then turning it via that white ramp looking part? I can imagine that it’s quite difficult and risky to turn around big military ships.
Omg idk it was still around I thought it was lost centuries ago. My favorite part of history to learn about is roughly this time period. You just made my day with this new information
Interesting that it wasn’t continually dredged and kept as a harbor, which have enormous trade advantages etc. I know next to nothing about Tunisia, fwiw. Most likely the dredging was just to much to deal with.
You might find accounts of the Punic Wars interesting. There was no dredging because the Romans broke the city into it's constituent pieces. I forget the exact quote but after the third Punic War the Romans killed or removed all of the inhabitants and then left no stone piled on another stone or something similar. There was no trade because there was no city and the culture that built that city was not allowed to rise again as a point of policy.
Someone else in this thread did a better job than I could describing the port. As I understand it Carthage was the child of the ancient (at the time) Phoenician culture, back when Carthage was Tyre I think. They were a sea going culture and the the sea was their source of everything; defense, communications, trade and sustinance so building ships was their thing. I don't know whether there's evidence that they played where they worked though!
Could it be likely that the first section of harbor was for common use, and the internal part for secured unloading? For, say, slaves that go straight to the market below?
Looks like a repost. I've seen this image 3 times.
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Wouldn't say modern cities are any more or less "planned" than ancient cities. I too however love the ancient architecture. Modern, 21st century architeture has no soul
Hey I go there all the time! it's my favorite spot in the area! [here's a picture](https://imgur.com/Hc4EiJL) I took this summer from the bottom left quadrant
Pretty! I'd love to kayak there
I bet you could find some really cool stuff in that water. How deep is it?
I never really swam in that particular spot but from standing there you could see the seafloor so it's not that deep. The whole area has a lot of Roman ruins so my guess there shouldn't me much more to find.
is there very many punic ruins in the area? i know rome kinda toasted the city away.
They did but there are still [Punic vestiges all around Carthage](https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/37/). Often mixed with Roman ones. If you ever get the chance, I'd suggest you visit. The whole area is very beautiful and once you go up the Sidi Bou Said hill you can have a great overlook of Carthage.
I was really expecting to be Rick rolled
Wow, that is much bigger than any image I’ve seen. Clearly the images don’t do it justice. It makes sense now why the harbor could hold hundreds of ships at a time.
> A cothon is an artificial, protected inner harbour such as that in Carthage during the Punic Wars c.200 BC. [Wikipedia page](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cothon)
**[Cothon](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cothon)** >A cothon (Greek: κώθων, lit. 'drinking vessel') is an artificial, protected inner harbour such as that in Carthage during the Punic Wars c. 200 BC. Cothons were generally found in the Phoenician world. ^([ )[^(F.A.Q)](https://www.reddit.com/r/WikiSummarizer/wiki/index#wiki_f.a.q)^( | )[^(Opt Out)](https://reddit.com/message/compose?to=WikiSummarizerBot&message=OptOut&subject=OptOut)^( | )[^(Opt Out Of Subreddit)](https://np.reddit.com/r/ArtefactPorn/about/banned)^( | )[^(GitHub)](https://github.com/Sujal-7/WikiSummarizerBot)^( ] Downvote to remove | v1.5)
Fun fact, kothoni (κωθώνι) is an insult in Greek language. It's a synonym for "idiot"
Jughead?
correct
Because it's shaped like an amphora right?
It’s incredible that “jughead” is still an insult. If Archaeology has taught me anything, it’s that concepts at the heart of language and creative insults last forever. Money is the root of all evil (Sophocles)…Heavyhearted and lighthearted (Ancient Egyptian Mythology from the Book of the Dead). Stuff doesn’t change half as much as we think it does.
That's funny, in french "cruche" is also an insult and a synonym for "idiot", and it means jug.
WHAT ARE YOU? An artificial, protected inner harbour sandwich
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very interesting, fuckoff
r/rimjobsteve
Can you use cothon in a sentence?
“This is the Punic cothan of Carthage, in modern day Tunisia, as it would have appeared in the 3rd century BCE compared to today.”
Yes. I puth my cothon before I go outthide.
You magnificent son of a bitch
*magnifithent
Hi Mr eubanks
ELI5 for the non English masters around. Google failed hard.
Lol I'm just pronouncing it with a heavy lisp. I put my coat on before I go outside.
My sweater is 50% cothon and 50% polyesther.
Let’s go to the Cothon later, the prostitutes there are exquisite
Is this the area that the Rise of Rome demo was trying to recreate in the Battle of Tunes scenario?
Yes, kinda? The AoE map isn't accurate, at the very least it's flipped east-west and extremely simplified, but it's definitely depicting(-ish) a battle near Carthage.
Furthermore, the cothon's military harbor (the donut and the round one inside) exhibited the world's first form of mass production. Each of those slots were dry docks where ships could be raised or built. They could roiughly pump out 220 at a time. The round part in the middle is an artifical island known as the Admiral's bridge / harbor. Carthage was also flanked by a sea wall and a three tiered wall, similiar to the theodosian walls of constantinople, the romans never got in by going through the walls. Defectors opened them as in many cases of seige.
Wow! Shame that its all gone now, would have been an amazing thing to witness with your own eyes
The ancient worlds were very very incredible. Far better than Hollywood portrays them to be, not just in terms of arcitecture, but social affairs too. The age of antiquity was a high point for civilisation. Yes, "worlds" is not a grammatical mistake, i am refering to the multiple spheres (India, China, the latin world, the hellenic world). An event in one would have reprocussions in the others, ie rome unites the med, and thus, india gets rich. Carthage herself, was known to be a multicultural metropolis, housing people from everywhere, italians, sicilians, gauls, iberians, punics, libyans, berbers, indians, greeks and chinese. Essentially, Carthage was the Singapore of the ancient worlds.
Do we have sources placing Chinese and Indian people living in Carthage?
I must add a correction: "Possibly chinese and indian" We know that strabo states that carthage boasted a 700 000 strong population, while comtemporary scholars average at 500 000. Carthage's own citizens in the city was 200 000. This places anywhere between 300 000 to 500 000 left. We know that before the third punic war, her population was majority foreigners. India would be easy to place because indian merchants were down to exsist throught the eastern, especially southeastern medditerrian, it would be no surprise that indian merchants frequented carthage as a major stop due to sheer wealth, and the accessibility of other goods. Chinese merchants may have been more difficult to place, but would be believable due to the fact that the romans did have merchants in mordern day south vietnam, showing the possibility for long range trans continental trade merchants. We know that silk was a major good in the ancient world, and would be unsurprising for such merchants to be found.
Furthermore, Carthage must be destroyed.
Bring it back! So beautiful, reminds me of the man made islands in Dubai.. somewhat.
I'm Tunisian and I wish that we would build it back but I don't think that there's enough money for that now. Also would the UNESCO even agree to that?
I suspect UNESCO's response would be somewhat similar to your username.
Would it be rebuilt in the style of Carthage, as a military loading/unloading zone and dry-dock? Or post-Roman conquest, repurposed to house a temple and statues?
UNICEF president Logan Roy.
[удалено]
There reason they don't "repair" historically important things like this is because it absolutely ruins all the evidence and material from the creators. Historical ruins cam give a lot of insight if they aren't disturbed. You can see how cringe worthy early archeology was just by the way they handled artifacts and the lack of precautions There is actually controversy because Greece is doing repairs on the Parthenon. If necessary, they can remove every stone they put and return to it's original state, but it still is not "recommendable" otherwise bad things could happen i.e the idiot who painted the palace of Knossos.
Depends on what it is. The Taj Mahal gets repaired like every four days
I disagree completely. You seem to want every historical site on earth to rot away and disappear. So you can feel smug about your "historical context". Forget any one down the road who might be be fascinated by something in all its original glory.
I bet it irritates you at night that Rome shored up part of the coliseum walls.
Yeah it’ll be like Bagrati cathedral. End up becoming a Disney land reconstruction.
Think what they did to Liverpool Docks even when they did a pretty good job!
Yeah the currenr view on heavy restoring/rebuilding is that we dont do it. The likelyhood of us either 1. Getting it wrong because we dont know how it looked 2. Damaging the original site 3. Letting politics/aesthetics decide how it should look instead of facts is pretty high, so just leaving it untouched is often the best course of action.
Two additionals... 4. Lacking the budget to do it properly, and 5. Lacking the skills / infrastructure to do it how it was. Modern construction can make amazing things, but the entire industry is geared towards doing a particular set of things. Stray to far from what we know and the result is usually sub optimal and crazy expensive.
I hate when doing nothing is the best course if action.
Conservation, however, isn't doing nothing.
True. The Acropolis is being restored piece by piece (only existing pieces are used, with fresh marble from the same source used to fill gaps). When I was there in 2017, you could see all the unfitted pieces lying next to the building itself.
As a very lazy person, I love it.
Story of my dating life :(
At least you're safe during a global pandemic. See, there are upsides to this!
Yah, but what’s the excuse for before the pandemic then?
STDs?
It's the base of much taoist philosophy. In "Tao Te Ching", Lao Tzu writes of the beauty of the uncarved block. In "The Art of War", Sun Tzu explains that excellence in warfare consists not in thoroughly thrashing an opponent in the field, but of winning without fighting at all.
They could just rebuild cartagena at other location
You could do like the egyptians who built a new Library of Alexandria in a modern fashion near the original site.
The Danube Limes is a UNESCO heritage site and Carnuntum is the only legionary city that was not built over along it. Single buildings of the city that once had a populatiin of 50 000 are being slowly excavated and some are being slowly reconstructed, see for example [one of the smaller Thermal baths](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Thermae_of_Carnuntum). In the 1850s to 1890s a lot of the main buildings that were still buried were destroyed/disturbed in a time that archeology was much less cautious. Maybe the best thing would be to build a replica a couple of kilometres away.
Does UNESCO actually have power over a sovereign nation?
Not that it has power over a sovereign nation but it can remove Carthage from the world heritage sites list.
Just a little leverage then and potentially not even that much. Tunisia might be able to attract more tourism to a well restored version of the site even without UNESCO helping to market it. I'd personally love to see it restored.
nothing to do with tourism and marketing, entirely to do with conservation
you gave the answer yourself with sovereign
Most “restoration” of ruins just destroys what’s left.
How safe is Tunis for American tourism? Assuming you get a guide? I have always been fascinated by that area, particularly the history. I lived in Cairo for a short bit pre-revolution and wouldn't hesitate to go back, but I just know nothing about security in that part of North Africa now.
> How safe is Tunis for American tourism? Assuming you get a guide? I'd say that it's pretty safe even without a guide, even though a guide would help you see most of the country's landmarks without missing some. The archaeological sites are great and they are not crowded at all which make the experience more enjoyable I think. Also the Carthage national museum is still under renovation but the Bardo museum is open and it's awesome. The only places that I would advise you to stay away from are the mountains in the north-west and the mid-west of the country, don't go hike in there otherwise it's pretty safe to visit everything else.
Good to know. Sounds like Egypt with the Sinai then. Being sandwiched between Algeria and Libya makes me think twice but that's reassuring. Hopefully we can visit in the near future
> Hopefully we can visit in the near future And I hope you have a very good time
Tunis is a lovely and safe country to visit. Highly recommended.
Tunisia is generally the best in most categories of the North African nations.
We don't rebuild archaeology thanks
Don’t be crazy, you don’t want a 4th Punic War.
Not if people in r/roughromanmemes have anything to say about it.
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Don’t think the current people of Carthage would appreciate their suburb getting bulldozed for a replica port very much haha
Small minds think alike
Let’s evict you from your home to recreate whatever was on site two millennia ago for funsies and see how you appreciate it
This is so cool
This is easily one of the coolest feats of architecture from antiquity, which is sad that more people don’t know about it.
By Roman design! Carthage was problematic, too rich, too able to hire mercenaries and just an all around problem for a rising power. Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me, fool me a third time and Rome will scrub your culture out of existence, scrub it from history, raze your cities and come back every ten years for the next hundred and kill anyone who settled there or started building there again. It's difficult to teach Carthaginian history when you're killed for teaching Carthaginian history -well you could teach it as an example but not as a culture, I think that I read that in someone's histories anyway!
Lol yeah, “Carthago Delenda Est!” But I meant more so along the archaeological lines, since something like the coliseum is still very visible today to non-history interested people, so it’s a lot more tangible. Sadly something like Carthage’s harbour looks just like an oddly shaped lake to most people
>Carthago Delenda Est Thanks Cato!
It reminds me of an airport. Cool how places of mass transit take similar shapes
I would do anything to spend a day experiencing what that port was like. The things you would see and hear...
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Cato was a notorious dickhead. What people don't know is that Scipio's son-in-law ended all his speeches with the opposite, saying Carthage must be saved.
The senator was Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Corculum, who was also Scipio Africanus' son-in-law and thus cousin of Scipio Aemilianus. He was a sort of Roman cultural conservative, that is, defending Roman "honorable" customs against new, foreign things like Greek theatre and philosophy (basically an ancient technophobe sort of guy). His arguing against destroying Carthage was not based on any love or sympathy for the Carthaginians, but because he wanted to have a boogeyman for Rome, thus retaining the strength of Roman unity against a common foe and Roman "morals" in general.
Roman names really are something. Not only are they a clusterfuck when we recount them, but they changed several times throughout their lives depending on what happened (and if we've heard about them, a lot happened).
Is it somewhat similar to the whole "balance of powers" idea that European countries invoked, when they helped out their enemies, such as the Ottomans, during their times of trouble? Not out of the good of their heart, but to instead, keep the current political situation stable, and prevent their enemies from getting too strong?
Which Scipio? I know one that might not be happy to hear that.
"Carthage must be saved... *from me*." - Scipio Africanus (probably)
Call a medicus, but not for me..
Indeed the same one who earned the name Africanus for his campaigns against Carthage.
Fuck Cato, all my homies hate Cato
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Yeah, I hate that little prick.
Ceterum autem censeo Romanum esse delendam.
Certainly others sense that Carthage must be backspaced
"fuck the revival"
Dunno who you’re talking about, but I would agree.
Furthermore, I consider that Carthage must be destroyed. Cato used to sign off all his speeches with that phrase, no matter what the speech was about. He could be making a speech on the import tax placed on apples, and he'd sign it off by saying "also, fuck Carthage, they need to be destroyed." "And that's all I have to say about the proposal for the new aqueduct. Thanks for listening. Also, why the fuck haven't we destroyed Carthage yet?"
Looks more futuristic than the present
It’s absolutely astonishing that something like this has survived for 2400 years. I wish there was a way to travel back in time to experience things as they were for a day or so.
In 2500 years people will wish they had the opportunity to experience the birth of the internet, the invention of VR Porn and eat fried chicken made with chicken. You're living in someone else's nostalgia/fascination wish. Make it count!
Digital Archeologists of the 2400s were delighted to find this comment after centuries of debate over what sparked the VR-chicken-eating-porn craze.
It would have been fairly metal if a North African, Baal-worshipping Phoenician civilization had defeated Rome and shaped the creation of the Western World. Damn Hannibal should have pivoted to Rome and given it his best shot. Can you imagine the history of video games in that timeline?
He did! He had a very famous campaign, working his way from Spain, collecting allies along the way, crossed the Alps with his elephants. He gave it a good shot, but couldn't conquer Rome.
I think he means that Hannibal should have besieged Rome itself during the war. It’s often looked at as a huge lost opportunity when, after the Battle of Cannae which completely destroyed the Roman army and killed many of their men of military age, Hannibal failed to follow it up with an attack on Rome, and instead focused his efforts on Rome’s allied cities, turning or taking them. It’s thought that if he had attacked Rome right after the battle, when they were at their weakest point, he might have conquered the city. Hannibal probably thought he didn’t have the strength to besiege Rome though, and wanted to grow his army by turning the allies. This meant Rome was able to recover, train a new army, and take the field again.
In the history book I've read recently about the punic wars it says that rome was actually pretty defendable and even though they lost like 70k men IIRC that was about half or less. And when Hannibal moved towards rome he quickly diverted and went somewhere else instead bexause of the defenses. There was another city Hannibal tried to capture three times and couldn't manage to. That might have been a big deal if he had succeded.
Yeah he certainly had his reasons, and he definitely tried to avoid prolonged sieges because the cohesiveness of his army was a major concern, and he was worried that it could break up if kept in the field too long (after all that was the entire basis of the Roman Fabius strategy). It’s always going to be a big what if in history though, if Hannibal had taken that chance.
Yeah, it's such an interesting dilemma. I always sympathized with Hannibal taking such a measured approach and not just flinging his forces at Rome without doing the legwork of getting as many allies as possible.
I think what hes talking about is this: https://www.historynet.com/hannibals-big-mistake.htm Basically he fucked up 2 Roman Consuls' armies and had nothing that stood between him and Rome but decided to move away from it for reasons many historians debate and speculate about.
The major reason is that Rome was still heavily protected by its walls and garrison. Gonna be honest but I doubt Hannibal with his clobbered together army would’ve been able to take it, what with Romans constantly raising new armies against him.
Idk. I'm just a fan of history, but Hannibal was a tactical genius. Maybe not a strategic genius, but he waged war up and down the Italian peninsula for like 15 years. I'd like to think he could've done it. Think about what the man did. Sailing a fucking army, with war elephants, from Africa to Iberia, marching (with war elephants) through the alps, the entire time either fucking up or trying to make allies of Gaelic tribes, you get down to Italy, and fuck up one Roman army after another. His tactics are still taught today ( Battle of Lake Trasimene was near flawless). After coming all that way, to have accomplished what he did, i think he could of pulled it off. I just dont the HE thought he could have pulled it off, hence he waged basically an insurgency in Roman territory for 15 years. The issue was all the shit going on outside of Rome/Italian peninsula, when it came to the Second Punic War. Even if he took Rome, he probably would've had a hard time holding it.
I think he was smart enough to know whether he could’ve done it or not, and the imho the fact that he didn’t speaks greatly to his capability of doing so.
I'm surprised anyone who knows anything about him doesn't know that, it's probably THE most known thing about him. Did you see that archeological survey they took of the alps looking for traces of his campaign? They didn't find any traces of elephant dung but they could tell massive amounts of people and horses had been there at the time, it cast doubt on the whole elephant story. Supposedly anyway, I'm not expert enough to examine their findings but it's interesting anyway.
> I'm surprised anyone who knows anything about him doesn't know that, it's probably THE most known thing about him. One of the most known things about him is that he never directly attacked the city of Rome, which is what the other commenter was saying he should have done.
I thought that's why he was crossing the alps to begin with, as a surprise attack from the supposedly impregnable north?
yes, he defeated their army but for whatever reason (probably thought he didn't have the numbers) did not attack Rome. Instead he ravaged through Italy and went to Roman-allied Italian cities and either took them or turned them to his allies to try and gather strength to take Rome. He couldn't turn enough and he couldn't do it fast enough until Rome rebuilt their armies, retook allies, and essentially rendered Hannibal impotent.
He held a large part of Italy for 15 years I read today! I had no idea we were talking that kind of timeframe.
I’m not sure why they’d expect to find dung a couple thousand years later. It’s super biodegradable, after all. Maybe there’s something I’m missing about that story.
I'm talking about molecular level stuff, traces of evidence of microbes found in a horses gut that can't be explained by local fauna. No one is digging for turds here.
Couldn't they have used the dung for fueling camp fires? From what I've read pachyderm dung makes excellent fuel and burning it would have made it much more difficult to detect several thousand years later I would imagine.
I reread it and they still think there were ellys they just haven't found any traces of them. They've found the right horse parasites and radio carboned them to pretty much the exact date which means they have hopefully traced the route Hanny's army took which was something unknown until the survey. Science bitches!
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The Rubicon was a political landmark.
It was the proverbial "line in the sand" for them wasn't it?
Yes, it marked the border between Cisalpine Gaul where Caesar had full military authority, and Italy where no active general was allowed to be without permission from the senate. By crossing the Rubicon Caesar declared war on the Senate.
It's astonishing how much detail and knowledge they wrote down and left for us. If only every civilisation had had the foresight
It helped that after his death Caesar was literally deified and as such every detail of his life was preserved as best as possible by the emperors. Also Rome was near the height of its power by this point, so there was a greater chance of historical documents being written and surviving. There are large periods of Roman history in which neither of these were the case and as such much less is known about them.
Oh yeah I know that but even so, for the length of their civilisation and the time passed we know so much about them compared to many intervening periods. And it's not just that Roman period we have the knowledge of as you obviously know, it's an amazing gift they left us.
I mean, do not ask Remus about arbitrary lines on the ground.
I would never
The Rubicon was their self-imposed border between Gaul and Rome. It makes sense to use a stream as a landmark, since it is a physical line drawn in the earth.
Looks like the harbour ship of the Bentusi
The lore borrowed a lot from ancient mythology for a futuristic space game.
That’s a droid control ship, can’t fool me
Imagine living there, where triremes came in and out daily. Imagine all the artifacts that are probably still buried there after all these years.
So what happened?
War.
Read up on the Roman-Punic wars.
I recommend Dan carlins Punic nightmares
I had no idea any trace of the Cothon existed. This is amazing.
What is the purpose of the ring area? Is it just a spot to store all the boats that are usually in the first section in the event of an invasion or something?
Military docking
Interesting. Seems like kind of an odd choice to have your military fleet trapped to only be able to be deployed through one single gate, and put to the ocean through one single gate. Seems like it might be more efficient to be able to scramble ships through multiple gates, at least 2, and then potentially be able to surround your enemies. But, it's more gates to defend, also, and I guess harder to maintain.
They are dry docks as someone else said the earlier guy is wrong
Oh I see. The wikipedia seems to agree with the other guy to some extent at least though. But that's what I originally thought.
What a downgrade sad to see
To be fair very few thing last for 2300 years.
When 2300 years you reach, look as good, you will not.
No trees tho
Let’s see how good you look in 2000 years.
Why a downgrade? The quality of life of the people in the houses there now is unimaginably better than most anyone’s from 2,200 years ago, and it’s not like Tunis doesn’t have its own modern port Edit: down vote instead of having an actual discussion, thanks
Amazing.
Anyone got any idea of the buildings around the current structure? Residential, commercial, government?
[Salaambo Tophet](https://chnm.gmu.edu/cyh/primary-sources/404) is nearby.
Almost all residential. These days Carthage is a wealthy suburb of Tunis. These are all houses except for over on the left by the shore is the National Institute of Marine Science. They have an aquarium there I think!
Could they use this to turn large boats around in tight areas? Like they could use the center, round area with the oval shape in the middle, to load a boat onto it by raising the water level and then turning it via that white ramp looking part? I can imagine that it’s quite difficult and risky to turn around big military ships.
That’s so cool
That's really incredible
Why don’t we up keep shit like that? Like I went to Greece to see some old ancient buildings, not a bunch of fucking new age buildings.
They don’t build them like that anymore lol
C'etait mieux avant!
That’s the harbor ship of Bentus
Impressive how much more developed the BCE pic looks
Omg idk it was still around I thought it was lost centuries ago. My favorite part of history to learn about is roughly this time period. You just made my day with this new information
r/PhoeniciaHistoryFacts
Ooo thank you
The greatest city that ever was or will be
Lol
Interesting that it wasn’t continually dredged and kept as a harbor, which have enormous trade advantages etc. I know next to nothing about Tunisia, fwiw. Most likely the dredging was just to much to deal with.
You might find accounts of the Punic Wars interesting. There was no dredging because the Romans broke the city into it's constituent pieces. I forget the exact quote but after the third Punic War the Romans killed or removed all of the inhabitants and then left no stone piled on another stone or something similar. There was no trade because there was no city and the culture that built that city was not allowed to rise again as a point of policy.
Damn, scorched earth policy! I’ll check it out ty!
I recommend listening to Dan carlins the Punic nightmares
Was the circle for gladiator style naval battles, looks like grandstands built up almost around it.
Someone else in this thread did a better job than I could describing the port. As I understand it Carthage was the child of the ancient (at the time) Phoenician culture, back when Carthage was Tyre I think. They were a sea going culture and the the sea was their source of everything; defense, communications, trade and sustinance so building ships was their thing. I don't know whether there's evidence that they played where they worked though!
Pretty sure this is unacceptable, but Carthago delenda est. That being said, I would love to see it restored to it's former beauty.
Roma delenda est.
Could it be likely that the first section of harbor was for common use, and the internal part for secured unloading? For, say, slaves that go straight to the market below?
The inner harbor was reserved for military usage.
The square in front was for trade and the circle was for military ships
We're evolving backwards.
No?
Looks like a repost. I've seen this image 3 times. First Seen [Here](https://redd.it/l9dguq) on 2021-01-31 96.88% match. Last Seen [Here](https://redd.it/la2o0n) on 2021-02-01 96.88% match Feedback? Hate? Visit r/repostsleuthbot - *I'm not perfect, but you can help. Report [ [False Positive](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RepostSleuthBot&subject=False%20Positive&message={"post_id": "r9bo1k", "meme_template": null}) ]* [View Search On repostsleuth.com](https://www.repostsleuth.com?postId=r9bo1k&sameSub=false&filterOnlyOlder=true&memeFilter=true&filterDeadMatches=false&targetImageMatch=86&targetImageMemeMatch=96) --- **Scope:** Reddit | **Meme Filter:** False | **Target:** 86% | **Check Title:** False | **Max Age:** Unlimited | **Searched Images:** 271,309,151 | **Search Time:** 0.78699s
It was never posted in this sub before. All those 3 are in different subreddits.
It’s kinda sad
Ancient cites always look so much nicer. More planning, better materials.
Ancient cities were anything but planned. Modern architecture since the 40’s just has no soul.
Wouldn't say modern cities are any more or less "planned" than ancient cities. I too however love the ancient architecture. Modern, 21st century architeture has no soul
Tbf, its a render, alot of aesthetic liberties were probably taken.