How Did Carthage Raise its Mercenary Armies? DOCUMENTARY
Vložit
- čas přidán 13. 05. 2024
- A history documentary on how to raise a Carthaginian Army! Thank you to Masterworks for sponsoring this video! Skip the waitlist and invest in blue-chip art for the very first time by signing up for Masterworks: masterworks.art/invicta Purchase shares in great masterpieces from artists like Pablo Picasso, Banksy, Andy Warhol, and more. See important Masterworks disclosures: www.masterworks.com/about/dis...
In this history documentary we continue to explore ancient Carthage. While prior episodes have looked at its social structure or military campaigns in this episode we marry the two by seeing how Carthage raised its mercenary armies.
We begin with a brief history of Carthage and the Punic military. This begins in its early colonial years when the small town boasted but a small, unremarkable militia. Within a few centuries however the city would blossom and begin to deploy more formidable forces of infantry, cavalry, and chariots. It would be these which fought the early Punic Wars against the Greeks in Sicily. However upon facing devastating losses of citizen life in these conflicts, Carthage reformed its military to rely more on its auxiliaries, allies, and mercenaries. It would be this new army that would win it a vast Empire and come face to face with the Romans.
With this in mind we look at how war was declared, how troops were mustered, and how armed forces were deployed to various theaters of war. Such an understanding will hopefully enrich your study of Carthaginian history and the Punic Wars with Rome.
You can learn more about the armies of Carthage through our Units of History episodes:
The Sacred Band of Carthage : • Units of History - The...
Carthaginian War Elephants : • Units of History - Car...
Numidian Cavalry : • Units of History - The...
Balearic Slingers : • Units of History - The...
Sources and Suggested Reading:
"The Library of History - Book 19, 20" by Diodorus Siculus
"Philippic Histories - Book 21, 22, 23, 24" by Justinus
"The Carthaginians" by Dexter Hoyos
"Carthage's Other Wars" by Dexter Hoyos
"Carthage Must Be Destroyed" by Richard Miles
Credit:
Research = Vaughn Fenton
Script = Vaughn Fenton
Narration = Invicta
Art = Penta Limited
0:00 Intro
2:32 Carthage's Military Evolution
6:35 The Call to War
10:44 Mustering the Troops
11:30 The Auxiliaries
12:55 The Allies
13:40 The Mercenaries
17:26 The Navy
19:31 The Supplies
20:34 Deployment for War
#history
#documentary
#military
Skip the waitlist and invest in blue-chip art for the very first time by signing up for Masterworks: www.masterworks.art/invicta
Purchase shares in great masterpieces from artists like Pablo Picasso, Banksy, Andy Warhol and more.
See important Masterworks disclosures: www.masterworks.com/about/disclaimer?+Subscriber&
Sooo you basically want us to buy NFT that actually exist but are just as worthless?
Masterworks is not better than NFTs or Raid Shadow Legend or Bitcoin. Your fans will lose money, thanks to you. Hope you can sleep well.
I can't help but imagine mercenaries from Gaul arriving to Carthage only to find out that their war against a nearby African kingdom had already been over.
Or...you could invest in actual investment vehicles such as index funds, stocks, and bonds.
I gotta say I love your channel but only scum peddle weird art sponsorships with imaginary waiting lists while preying on people's financial worries and fomo.
Great topic! I always thought that this was a huge disadvantage that Carthage had in contrast to Rome. Though, apparently they did it because they found that there were economic advantages.
What would somebody have to pay you to march over the Alps into the greatest military power in the region and straight into a hoard of trained legionares?
A mad genius called Hannibal Barca, apperently.
Hannibal did exceptionally well to make his multi-ethnic mercenary army so cohesive and unified. You don't really hear of mass desertions from his army outside of the famously fickle Gauls and even they were trained to high discipline.
The fact that Hannibal made an army of 100% mercs cross the Alps, then cross the swamps of Central Italy on foot and come out of it without mutiny, desertion and winning a spectacular victory afterwards is a testament to his genius
not enough
@@literalantifaterrorist4673 based
I wish Carthage understood you can't just throw money at a problem sometimes.
Wish?
@@MuddieRain Yeah, it's a sort of a desire you want to come true. Hope that helps :)
The concept of Danegeld wasn't invented yet, so Carthage and Byzantium had to make those mistakes until their doom.
Russia still does that
The Mental Health crisis in the USA suffers from this problem as well, my mayor of my city threw hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars at the mental health care system and told them hey get better.
Yet money isn't the issue it's how they tell people to handle their emotions and trauma.
Mental Health Care Facilities here in my town won't even recommend parent-child therapy sessions if there are problems at home.
I appreciate how this video provides a detailed history of Carthage's military strategy and organization. It's fascinating to learn about the importance of economic stability in raising armies, and the impact of financial downturns on military strength. It's also interesting to see how Carthage evolved over time, from a small colony ruled by appointed governors to an oligarchic republic with a robust military force. The presentation of this history is engaging and informative. Though I found the segue to contemporary economic trends and the Masterworks sponsorship a bit jarring, I'm grateful for the opportunity to learn about Carthage and its military traditions. Thanks for sharing!
A Gaelic mercenary marine on a Carthagian war ship? Incredible! Can you imagine that man's life? The traveling he must of done, the wonders and stories he would bring back home?
Fantastic episode, thank you!
If he gets a chance to come back home...that is.
@@sushruttewari144 BIG if there. True true
There is something kind of fishy with the sponsor of this, and many other, videos recently. Most of the time, advertisment is used to get customers. In this instance, the sponsor has a waiting list of people trying to invest, but not only is the sponsor trying to get more customers, it's letting them "jump the line", and get in ahead of all these other investors who are on a waiting list. I'm glad it has sponsored this video, however I suggest that anyone thinking of investing check it out thoroughly. It probably is all on the up and up, but all investments are risks, and you should know what those risks are.
This channel low key Leftist leaning. Considering it is the Leftist policies that which has led to the recession I wouldn't trust any investment sponsor ads coming from them.
Yep suckers fall for that form of advertising.
Hell yeah new doc just dropped 🙌
I'm definitely excited to be doing more Carthage content as it has long fascinated me and is woefully undercovered.
"When dragons belch and hippos flee
My thoughts, Ankh-Morpork, are of thee
Let others boast of martial dash
For we have boldly fought with cash
We own all your helmets, we own all your shoes
We own all your generals - touch us and you'll lose.
Morporkia! Morporkia!
Morporkia owns the day!
We can rule you wholesale
Touch us and you'll pay.
We bankrupt all invaders, we sell them souvenirs
We ner ner ner ner ner, hner ner hner by the ears
Er hner we ner ner ner ner ner
Ner ner her ner ner ner hner the ner
Er ner ner hner ner, nher hner ner ner (etc.)
Ner hner ner, your gleaming swords
We mortgaged to the hilt
Morporkia! Morporkia!
Hner ner ner ner ner ner
We can rule you wholesale
Credit where it's due."
I'm sorry, couldn't resist
I salute you of Your love of Discworld
@@james_t_huntley33 I love it, so many levels to its comedy.
Excellent. That was pretty funny.
may I get a crumb of context?
Roman General: Field your armies, Carthaginians, show us the might of your people
Carthaginian General: We are too RICH too fight our self.
That is why you shall be Roman slaves
You should do a video on games played by roman soldiers while on duty like ludus latrunculi or merels. As a security guard, i found it hilarious to know roman soldiers would often play a board game while on watch. It got to the point that even when they didnt have the access to a board they would carve one in the stone of wherever they were working. And to this day these game board carvings can be found all over the old world.
Outstanding. Thank you!
Another awesome and fascinating video, Invicta!
Wonderful stuff! This channel seems to get better each week.⚔🔥🙌
Fantastic video, of the highest quality! Carthage is always a very understudied subject yet I sense there is a massive interest to learn more about this civilization. Please consider making more videos on Carthage...I certainly would watch!
Reconstructions, narration, informations are so good and demand a lot o work. I think Invicta and King and Generals are equals in content and the best ancient hitory makers on YT
Huge thanks for this valuable information about Carthaginian army ❤❤❤
Love your videos
Invicta rules in details. Excellent!!!
Well thought out, nice vid
Awesome video!
Very interesting subject, love this channel.
Great Documentary 💯
The sad thing is the way to read Carthage’s writing has been lost. Most of what we know about them comes from the Romans and Greeks. We have some of their writing but it can’t be translated. So we have nothing from Carthage’s perspective
I’d love to read or watch an alternate history of Carthage winning the Punic wars. I’ve played it in Imperator Rome but I’d love a good story.
A wonderful historical coverage about Carthaginian mercenaries military raising .thanks for sharing....foundations of strong economic power require width commercial (outer & internal) activities ...outer commercial expansion requires marine dominant...for that Carthaginian empires created its war fleets besides its commercial fleets...thanks (Invicta) channel ...for sharing
Great content
Carthage: Outsourcing on a massive scale before it was cool.
Great video.
Carthaginian army mosty wasn't composed of actual mercenaries, but of combination of citizens (who were mostly used as heavy cavalry), subject levies and allias/vassals, mercenaries in proper sense did exist but were rare.
Carthaginian Northern African subjects (Lybo-Phoenicians who were Punic and Lybians, whose elite was partially punicized) made core of their army (heavy infantry and heavy cavalry). These people came from areas that were under carthaginian rule, they had status of carthaginian subjects, paid taxes to carthage, were recruited, organized and equiped by the state. Many of thoese people became carthaginian half-citizens after Truceless war, since many cities in Northern Africa gained that status.
Hamilcar moved many of them to Iberia where he would create semi-autonomous province, to which these people would de facto be citizens (although to Carthage they would still be half-citizens).
Barcas gave land to these soldiers, and Hannibal in his speaches clearly says that he plans to give his soldiers land in Italy after he defeats Romans. There can be no way that these people are mercenaries, they were citizen army.
This is interesting! Do you happen to know where to learn more about this?
@@ryancrowell2658 Dexter Hoyos books primarly, also Adrian Goldsworthy. I suggest not taking informations about history from video games and youtube channels, they are very missleading, for the most part.
@@ivandicivan4189 Ah, most of what we know comes from Roman sources, so it’s hard to get an accurate image. Thanks for sharing!
Will you do more videos on ancient Egyptian military?
This was a very interesting and educational video thank you for sharing with us
That was fun! Carthage is interesting.
how did they communicate ? a punic officer or general with such a motley army?
thanks for this great video & a very interesting topic
Most people in the Mediterranean at the time spoke Greek as at least a second language so I'm guessing that Punic generals would give orders to their Mercenary Captains in Greek
I also guess generals were well educated and were fluent in several languages, like Hannibal Barca who spoke about 7 languages and could easily communicate with his multi-ethnic army.
They were not a motely army but mostly Punics (western Phoenicians. this dosen't mean dirrect genetic origin from Levant, but native people of different origins in western mediteranean used Punic).
Most of cities in western mediteranean in 3rd century BC were founded by Phoenicians and Punic was lingua franca of the area before roman conquest.
Still asking for the name of the song at 16:53 . This song appears in nearly every Invicta video yet is never mentioned in the credits 😢
We need a mount and blade game that takes place in ancient times
Aye with some ship combat to boot. Feel like ship combat could fit the game perfectly.
Let's hope that Bannerlord popularity will soar. Still not a triple A game but there is so much potential.
Wish For Honor and Bannerlord would get married and be set in Greek/Roman times. The Era after Alexander would be a nice start with a ton of different factions to choose from. From Carthage, Egypt, Rome, Greek, Germania/Dacian, and Parthia to name a few.
Screw historic era add some Asian cultures into the mix too.
Aren't they already in ancient time tho lol
@@fatumgermanicus1483 medieval
@Diana Pennepacker even the Bronze age would be perfect. So many historical texts talking about mercenaries from back then
You can try Rome 2
Watching a video like this it seems all really straight forward, but then when you start reading history books about Carthage you realise just how much we don't know (and every author stresses that over and over... and over and over again). Most sources about Carthage come from their enemies. Usually they were building a strawman with their writing being tailored for a domestic audience. So it is so difficult to know how Carthage actually operated.
Exactly. Most of sources come from their enemies side, and most confusion comes from older 19th century historiography whose approach towards Carthage was that they did not look at Carthaginian policy-making as such, but rather its structure in a fundamental contrast to that of Rome.
This approach is flawed and carthaginian military traditions most likely didn't differ much from other Mediteranean powers at that time.
@@ivandicivan4189 It's like watching an SNL skit to see how the Soviet Union was operated.
Which is why we cross reference the written record with paleontological remains to corroborate or correct the inaccuracies of written account. This is where science meets history.
There’s a really good book on Carthage
This is the type of stuff i like.
"Amators talk tactics, but professionals study logistics." 120% true. Love Carthage, hate Rome.
Ok but why hate Rome?
@@Progamermove_2003 are u serious
Is it me or does anyone else notice the similarities between the Carthaginians using mercenaries and the Byzantines using their mercenaries? Between the rise and fall of the Barca family with the rise and fall of the Phocas family? There's emery similarities. A 1000 years apart they both repeat the same cycle.
"The sinews of war are infinite money." --Marcus Tullius Cicero
“If one holds his state based on mercenaries, he will be neither secure nor peaceful; for they are divided, disloyal, ambitious and without discipline… have neither the fear of God nor are loyal to fellow men…”
- Niccolo Machiavelli
Still lasted for nearly 600 years.
Of course the person with the ukrainian flag quotes one of the biggest fools in history
Carthage: Skill Issue
I kept thinking this throughout the video. I think the Prince is fairly harsh in its criticisms vis-á-vis the mercenary's uses, however I think history has proven Machiavelli correct in that a core of professionally trained compatriots remain the superior system. It is a shame we have so few contemporaneous works from his era
You do realise his republican militia lost to a Medici/French mercenary force, right?
Roman "Auxilia", Carthaginian "Mercenaries".
American and Russian "PMC", Chinese "Fishing Militia"
These are nice drawings. Whom should we give the credit of our admiration to?
If you want to hire mercenaries, it helps if you can actually afford them.
That's where Carthage had the advantage.
Hey oakley, I really enjoy your videos and want to start making my own. I have a question, in the Jerusalem video you show a map with different units on its. Is that hand drawn or is it an app? If it is an app please tell me
Great video! Thanks and congrats for it! Carthage was a great Power. Prosperous and bright. But...there was a Rome in her way...
How long did that last?
Essentially Carthage were the Ferengi
The Romans were "Romulans"
The Celts - Klingons
Macedonia/Greek City States - Federation
Ancient Chinese - The Dominion
7:20 ALL THIS APPLIED TO THE dUTCH REPUBLIC IN 17TH cENTURY AS WELL:
commercial..getting new markets...monopolies..once had a STRONG army , but turned into a mercenary army and keep dutch men rather in 'control'professions instead of standing army.. aiding one side against the other to GAIN wealth (denmark-sweden, Ottomans vs Spain, variety of competing sultans in indonesia, etc..).
...and then after the French -Dutch war which was much more devastating than erstwhile thought...king Willem and the WHOLE banking and investment system went from Amsterdam to London after the invited glorious revolution..and the whole business (literally) started on a grander scale..
OMG !!! stop spinning Art" investments" ??? !! Great video subject.
Baal rubs his hands together...
Make us watch ads then a stupid sponsor ad right after? Dick move guys.
You'll live, cupcake
Man an art sponsor in times like these? I love your channel but that was sketchy. A Gold/Silver sponsor would make much more sense during these bad economic times
CIA:....how is this classified file known to the public? WHO SCREWED THIS UP?
What’s the difference between Tactics and Logistics?
Tactics is what’s done on the battlefield. Logistics is what makes the battle possible
Tactics are use on the battlefield and logistics where they provide they needed for the army/navy
Ahh, there’s that silky beautiful voice.
Money buys time and loyalty
Hey guys. Don't forget to credit Paradox Interactive for the help / inspiration ;)
Video starts at 2:32
Fun fact is that in Greece even today we call "misthos" μισθός our monthly wage !!!!😊
The length of the opening advertisement was annoying.
skip it
@robo5013 yea I did after a while - but I perfer they go ahead and make their pitch I don't mind a commercial here and there it's how the market economy works. I get they got to make money. Just too long that one was.
The problem with mercenaries is that while they'll willingly fight for pay they will never die for pay.
Yeeee baby
The british took note of Carthage's navy
Did they recruite Creechan......archers?
👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
How did they make money at that time, like i know they ruled the waves but did they tax ships passing their waters , or did they export their surplus of goods , or if they even had a surplus of goods ,which goods .
what happened to the old voice? : (
But how did the horses get off the ships?
Dew eet!
I don't speak punic but I understood the word "rab mananet" it's proves the semitic culture and dialect of the Carthagian people..because I speak Arabic I could somewhat disifer🗃 the the language
If you can't solve your problems with money, you can solve your problems with a lot of money. Unless the problem is The Roman :)
I wonder how their civilian population would have responded if Carthage imposed conscription during the 2nd Punic War
Reminds me of the Sea People.
Same ethnic origins: the Sea Peoples =the Phoenicians founded Tyre,who founded Carthage.👍
a huge thanks to the senate of Carthage for losing the fooking war!
And our defense budget went up by $80 billion 😂😂😂
Carthage is overrated.
I used to love Carthage and certainly there is a mystique about a lost civilization that we don’t know much about.
But it’s not hard to imagine what Carthage was really like. A gang of merchants and a small, entitled citizenry, enslaving and using peoples of the Mediterranean as cannon fodder without wanting to risk their own precious lives and never extending franchise to others.
In a way Carthage was similar to what Rome eventually became. When Italians were refusing to fight and Roman armies were entirely composed of Germanic war bands.
Carthage was a naval power who used their citizens in navy, it the antiquity naval battles had much higher casualties than land ones. For example Carthage had large losses of their citizens in battles of First Punic war (just in one battle of cape Ecnomus they lost between 30-40000 men and still they kept rising new fleets).
The idea of Carthage didn't risk losing its citizens is most likely Greco-Roman war propaganda, we have no records of carthaginians themselves, and historians tend to stress this over in any book about Carthage.
They also used citizens in land engagements through most of their history , they had a period of rhoughly 100 years (out of 700 years of their existance) where subject levies would outnumber citizens grately but this only happened on Sicily, we don't know much about their wars in Africa and Iberia. This period ended with Truceless war when every male Carthaginian citizen was mobilized to fight rebels. Many of these citizen soldiers later went to Iberia with Hamilcar where they lied foundation of Barcid army in Iberia, which Hanibal would inherit.
Most of large powers use their subjects and vassals as cannon fodder, this is universal.
This whole narrative of carthaginians being rich assholes is based on their enemies war propaganda, if you search deeper into this you see that most of this ideas and narratives are wrong. Carthaginian economy was based on production much more than on trade etc.
How did any society? Money from land or trade
Tyre to Carhage: Bruh you abandoned us when we are being sieged by Alexander the Great.
The connections had already been severed in an earlier siege of Tyre (probably by Babylonians or Persians)
Carthage should have expanded a little more they stayed on the coast basically and that's how or main reason Rome was able to beat them that and the fact they didn't have any strong allies passed thier borders thier geography made it easy to flank their territory and or surround them from the Sea and land
Not really they lost because in the first war they disbanded their fleet because they thought the war was over but rome used every single penny they had to win the war,occupying galaxies of useless sand is useless
@@titanicisshit1647 well that too many self inflicted reasons Carthage lost
@@bravocarlos1752 what i'm saying is that not owning huge swathes of useless rocks is not one of them
Hannibal my son...
Nah dude, in such markets, write option spreads, and bank the $$$. If you get crushed, do it again, works 90% of the time. Better than a one armed bandit.
Carthage? Only thing I know is that they got into the salt market at te end of their run...
Man, you gotta drop the masterworks ad. It's gonna go the way of established titles and others in a couple years. All their profit claims are based on cherry-picked datasets with extremely small sample sizes. Art is so "stable" because volume of sales is extremely low, and pieces that are truly proven to hold value are even rarer still. To combat this, masterworks has the internal market where you can offload shares onto other masterworks members. This creates an incentive for old members to enlist new members and pawn off their own shares of dubious value onto the new members. It may not technically be a ponzi scheme or illegal, but it's very close. Especially during "economic downturn", as you say yourself, it makes very little sense to invest in it.
We just want to watch history videos, nobody is doing investments here...
"Gold wins wars not soldiers"
Nomads have entered the chat
Genghis Khan: lol
Just buy mercs bro
(POV: You are an EU4 bankrupt player
@Invicta I come to CZcams History videos to escape the harsh reality of our world and its state, not be reminded of it. Ad's got me sad.
Investing now you will make rich some crooks
Moneyyy 😂
🗿👍🏿
The elephants we're almost useless.... Psychological warfare...
Archers and slingers were more useful....
It depends on how you use them. In India, elephants formed the core of many armies for centuries.
People are struggling and great depression 2 electric boogaloo is just around the corner.
Ah yes.... Invest in ART....BRUH please tell me you guys didn't write that segment....
If you want something done right, You raise the legions yourself.
- Rome.
And that was not a good investment
It was for a time. But I don't think that even the Romans expected that they could recover from a disaster like Cannae.
Again; why refer to the whole iberian peninsula as "spain" instead of hispania? Since you call france by the time appropriate name of gaul
Baby Killers.
Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous; and if one holds his state based on these arms, he will stand neither firm nor safe; for they are disunited, ambitious and without discipline, unfaithful, valient before friends, cowardly before enemies; they have neither the fear of God nor fidelity to men, and destruction is deferred only for so long as the attack is; for in peace one is robbed by them, and in war by the enemy. The fact is, they have no other attraction or reason for keeping the field than a trifal of a stipend, which is not sufficient to make them willing to die for you.
-Machiavelli, Niccolo The Prince XII How Many Kinds of Soldiery There Are and Concerning Mercenaries
TO BE PUTTING ONES NAME TO BACK AN INVESTMENT COMPANY IN SOMETHING SO SKETCHY AS "ART". I DONT KNOW. SKETCHY TO HAVE IT ADVERTISED HERE. A recession is coming, buy artworks.. sounds very fukn odd
Shame they sacrificed their kids to the gods
The story is great and all, but guys please don't take your investment tips from a random history youtuber, for fucks sakes.