These statements, though coming from valuable authors, convey so little information and are withal so difficult to reconcile, that both the structure and working of the political machine at Carthage may be said to be unknown.[880] But it seems clear that the general spirit of the government was highly oligarchical; that a few rich, old, and powerful families, divided among themselves the great offices and influence of the state; that they maintained themselves in pointed and even insolent distinction from the multitude;[881] that they stood opposed to each other in bitter feuds, often stained by gross perfidy and bloodshed; and that the treatment with which, through these violent party-antipathies, unsuccessful generals were visited, was cruel in the extreme.[882] It appears that wealth was one indispensable qualification, and that magistrates and generals procured their appointments in a great measure by corrupt means. Of such corruption, one variety was, the habit of constantly regaling the citizens in collective banquets of the curiæ or the political associations; a habit so continual, and embracing so wide a circle of citizens, that Aristotle compares these banquets to the phiditia or public mess of Sparta.[883] There was a demos or people at Carthage, who were consulted on particular occasions, and before whom propositions were publicly debated, in cases where the suffetes and the small Council were not all of one mind.[884] How numerous this demos was, or what proportion of the whole population it comprised, we have no means of knowing. But it is plain, that whether more or less considerable, its multitude was kept under dependence to the rich families by stratagems such as the banquets, the lucrative appointments with lots of land in foreign dependencies, etc. The purposes of government were determined, its powers wielded and the great offices held—suffetes, senators, generals, or judges,—by the members of a small number of wealthy families; and the chief opposition which they encountered, was from their feuds against each other. In the main, the government was conducted with skill and steadiness, as well for internal tranquillity as for systematic foreign and commercial aggrandizement. Within the knowledge of Aristotle, Carthage had never suffered either the successful usurpation of a despot, or any violent intestine commotion.[885]
The first eminent Carthaginian leader brought to our notice, is Mago (seemingly about 530-500 B.C.), who is said to have mainly contributed to organize the forces, and extend the dominion, of Carthage. Of his two sons, one, Hasdrubal, perished after a victorious career in Sardinia;[886] the other, Hamilkar, commanding at the battle of Himera in Sicily, was there defeated and slain by Gelon, as has been already recounted. After the death of Hamilkar, his son Giskon was condemned to perpetual exile, and passed his life in Sicily at the Greek city of Selinus.[887] But the sons of Hasdrubal still remained at Carthage, the most powerful citizens in the state; carrying on hostilities against the Moors and other indigenous Africans, whom they compelled to relinquish the tribute which Carthage had paid, down to that time, for the ground whereon the city was situated. This family are said indeed to have been so powerful, that a check upon their ascendency was supposed to be necessary; and for that purpose the select One Hundred Senators sitting as judges were now nominated for the first time.[888] Such wars in Africa doubtless tended to prevent the Carthaginians from farther interference in Sicily, during the interval between 480-410 B.C. There were probably other causes also, not known to us,—and down to the year 413 B.C., the formidable naval power of Athens (as has been already remarked) kept them on the watch even for themselves. But now, after the great Athenian catastrophe before Syracuse, apprehensions from that quarter were dissipated; so that Carthage again found leisure, as well as inclination, to seek in Sicily both aggrandizement and revenge.
It is remarkable that the same persons, acting in the same quarrel, who furnished the pretext or the motive for the recent invasion by Athens, now served in the like capacity as prompters to Carthage. The inhabitants of Egesta, engaged in an unequal war with rival neighbors at Selinus, were in both cases the soliciting parties. They had applied to Carthage first, without success,[889] before they thought of sending to invoke aid from Athens. This war indeed had been for the time merged and forgotten in the larger Athenian enterprise against Syracuse; but it revived after that catastrophe, wherein Athens and her armament were shipwrecked. The Egestæans had not only lost their protectors, but had incurred aggravated hostility from their neighbors, for having brought upon Sicily so formidable an ultramarine enemy. Their original quarrel with Selinus had related to a disputed portion of border territory. This point they no longer felt competent to maintain, under their present disadvantageous circumstances. But the Selinuntines, confident as well as angry, were now not satisfied with success in their original claim. They proceeded to strip the Egestæans of other lands indisputably belonging to them, and seriously menaced the integrity as well as the independence of the city. To no other quarter could the Egestæans turn, with any chance of finding both will and power to protect them, except to Carthage.[890]
The town of Egesta (non-Hellenic or at least only semi-Hellenic) was situated on or near the northern line of Sicilian coast, not far from the western cape of the island, and in the immediate neighborhood of the Carthaginian settlements,—Motyê, Panormus (now Palermo), and Soloeis or Soluntum. Selinus also was near the western cape, but on the southern coast of Sicily, with its territory conterminous to the southern portion of Egesta. When therefore the Egestæan envoys presented their urgent supplications at Carthage for aid, proclaiming that unless assisted they must be subjugated and become a dependency of Selinus,—the Carthaginians would not unreasonably conceive, that their own Sicilian settlements would be endangered, if their closest Hellenic neighbor were allowed thus to aggrandize herself. Accordingly they agreed to grant the aid solicited; yet not without much debate and hesitation. They were uneasy at the idea of resuming military operations in Sicily,—which had been laid aside for seventy years, and had moreover left such disastrous recollections[891]—at a moment when Syracusan courage stood in high renown, from the recent destruction of the Athenian armament. But the recollections of the Gelonian victory at Himera, while they suggested apprehension, also kindled the appetite of revenge; especially in the bosom of Hannibal, the grandson of that general Hamilkar who had there met his death. Hannibal was at this moment king, or rather first of the two suffetes, chief executive magistrates of Carthage, as his grandfather had been seventy years before. So violent had been the impression made upon the Carthaginians by the defeat of Himera, that they had banished Giskon, son of the slain general Hamilkar and father of Hannibal, and had condemned him to pass his whole life in exile. He had chosen the Greek city of Selinus; where probably Hannibal also had spent his youth, though restored since to his country and to his family consequence,—and from whence he brought back an intense antipathy to the Greek name, as well as an impatience to wipe off by a signal revenge the dishonor both of his country and of his family. Accordingly, espousing with warmth the request of the Egestæans, he obtained from the Senate authority to take effective measures for their protection.[892]
His first proceeding was to send envoys to Egesta and Selinus, to remonstrate against the encroachments of the Selinuntines; with farther instructions, in case remonstrance proved ineffectual, to proceed with the Egestæans to Syracuse, and there submit the whole dispute to the arbitration of the Syracusans. He foresaw that the Selinuntines, having superiority of force on their side, would refuse to acknowledge any arbitration; and that the Syracusans, respectfully invoked by one party but rejected by the other, would stand aside from the quarrel altogether. It turned out as he had expected. The Selinuntines sent envoys to Syracuse, to protest against the representations from Egesta and Carthage; but declined to refer their case to arbitration. Accordingly, the Syracusans passed a vote that they would maintain their alliance with Selinus, yet without impeachment of their pacific relations with Carthage: thus leaving the latter free to act without obstruction. Hannibal immediately sent over a body of troops to the aid of Egesta: five thousand Libyans or Africans; and eight hundred Campanian mercenaries, who had been formerly in the pay and service of the Athenians before Syracuse, but had quitted that camp before the final catastrophe occurred.[893]
In spite of the reinforcement and the imposing countenance of Carthage, the Selinuntines, at this time in full power and prosperity, still believed themselves strong enough to subdue Egesta. Under such persuasion, they invaded the territory with their full force. They began to ravage the country, yet at first with order and precaution; but presently, finding no enemy in the field to oppose them, they became careless, and spread themselves about for disorderly plunder. This was the moment for which the Egestæans and Carthaginians were watching. They attacked the Selinuntines by surprise, defeated them with the loss of a thousand men, and recaptured the whole booty.[894]
The war, as hitherto carried on, was one offensive on the part of the Selinuntines, for the purpose of punishing or despoiling their ancient enemy Egesta. Only so far as was necessary for the defence of the latter, had the Carthaginians yet interfered. But against such an interference the Selinuntines, if they had taken a prudent measure of their own force, would have seen that they were not likely to achieve any conquest. Moreover, they might perhaps have obtained peace now, had they sought it; as a considerable minority among them, headed by a citizen named Empedion,[895] urgently recommended: for Selinus appears always to have been on more friendly terms with Carthage than any other Grecian city in Sicily. Even at the great battle of Himera, the Selinuntine troops had not only not assisted Gelon, but had actually fought in the Carthaginian army under Hamilkar;[896] a plea, which, had it been pressed, might probably have had weight with Hannibal. But this claim upon the goodwill of Carthage appears only to have rendered them more confident and passionate in braving her force and in prosecuting the war. They sent to Syracuse to ask for aid, which the Syracusans, under present circumstances, promised to send them. But the promise was given with little cordiality, as appears by the manner in which they fulfilled it, as well as from the neutrality which they had professed so recently before; for the contest seemed to be aggressive on the part of Selinus, so that Syracuse had little interest in helping her to conquer Egesta. Neither Syracusans nor Selinuntines were prepared for the immense preparations, and energetic rapidity of movement by which Hannibal at once altered the character, and enlarged the purposes, of the war. He employed all the ensuing autumn and winter in collecting a numerous host of mercenary troops from Africa, Spain, and Campania, with various Greeks who were willing to take service.[897]
In the spring of the memorable year 409 B.C., through the exuberant wealth of Carthage, he was in a condition to leave Africa with a great fleet of sixty triremes, and fifteen hundred transports or vessels of burthen;[898] conveying an army, which, according to the comparatively low estimate of Timæus, amounted to more than one hundred thousand men; while Ephorus extended the number to two hundred thousand infantry, and four thousand cavalry, together with muniments of war and battering machines for siege. With these he steered directly for the western Cape of Sicily, Lilybæum; taking care, however, to land his troops and to keep his fleet on the northern side of that cape, in the bay near Motyê,—and not to approach the southern shore, lest he should alarm the Syracusans with the idea that he was about to prosecute his voyage farther eastward along the southern coast towards their city. By this precaution, he took the best means for prolonging the period of Syracusan inaction. The Selinuntines, panic-struck at the advent of an enemy so much more overwhelming than they had expected, sent pressing messengers to Syracuse to accelerate the promised help. They had made no provision for standing on the defensive against a really formidable aggressor. Their walls, though strong enough to hold out against Sicilian neighbors, had been neglected during the long-continued absence of any foreign besieger, and were now in many places out of repair. Hannibal left them no time to make good past deficiencies. Instead of wasting his powerful armament (as the unfortunate Nikias had done five years before) by months of empty flourish and real inaction, he waited only until he was joined by the troops from Egesta and the neighboring Carthaginian dependencies, and then marched his whole force straight from Lilybæum to Selinus. Crossing the river Mazara in his way, and storming the fort which lay near its mouth, he soon found himself under the Selinuntine walls. He distributed his army into two parts, each provided with battering machines and movable wooden towers; and then assailed the walls on many points at once, choosing the points where they were most accessible or most dilapidated. Archers and slingers in great numbers were posted near the walls, to keep up a discharge of missiles and chase away the defenders from the battlements. Under cover of such discharge, six wooden towers were rolled up to the foot of the wall, to which they were equal or nearly equal in height, so that the armed men in their interior were prepared to contend with the defenders almost on a level. Against other portions of the wall, battering-rams with iron heads were driven by the combined strength of multitudes, shaking or breaking through its substance, especially where it showed symptoms of neglect or decay. Such were the methods of attack which Hannibal now brought to bear upon the unprepared Selinuntines. He was eager to forestal the arrival of auxiliaries, by the impetuous movements of his innumerable barbaric host, the largest seen in Sicily since his grandfather Hamilkar had been defeated before Himera. Collected from all the shores of the western Mediterranean, it presented soldiers heterogeneous in race, in arms, in language,—in everything, except bravery and common appetite for blood as well as plunder.[899]
The dismay of the Selinuntines, when they suddenly found themselves under the sweep of this destroying hurricane, is not to be described. It was no part of the scheme of Hannibal to impose conditions or grant capitulation; for he had promised the plunder of their town to his soldiers. The only chance of the besieged was, to hold out with the courage of desperation, until they could receive aid from their Hellenic brethren on the southern coast,—Agrigentum, Gela, and especially Syracuse,—all of whom they had sent to warn and to supplicate. Their armed population crowded to man the walls, with a resolution worthy of Greeks and citizens; while the old men and the females, though oppressed with agony from the fate which seemed to menace them, lent all the aid and encouragement in their power. Under the sound of trumpets, and every variety of war-cry, the assailants approached the walls, encountering everywhere a valiant resistance. They were repulsed again and again, with the severest loss. But fresh troops came up to relieve those who were slain or fatigued; and at length, after a murderous struggle, a body of Campanians forced their way over the walls into the town. Yet in spite of such temporary advantage, the heroic efforts of the besieged drove them out again or slew them, so that night arrived without the capture being accomplished. For nine successive days was the assault thus renewed with undiminished fury; for nine successive days did this heroic population maintain a successful resistance, though their enemies were numerous enough to relieve each other perpetually,—though their own strength was every day failing,—and though not a single friend arrived to their aid. At length, on the tenth day, and after terrible loss to the besiegers, a sufficient breach was made in the weak part of the wall, for the Iberians to force their way into the city. Still however the Selinuntines, even after their walls were carried, continued with unabated resolution to barricade and defend their narrow streets, in which their women also assisted, by throwing down stones and tiles upon the assailants from the house-tops. All these barriers were successively overthrown, by the unexhausted numbers, and increasing passion, of the barbaric host; so that the defenders were driven back from all sides into the agora, where most of them closed their gallant defence by an honorable death. A small minority, among whom was Empedion, escaped to Agrigentum, where they received the warmest sympathy and the most hospitable treatment.[900]
Resistance being thus at an end, the assailants spread themselves through the town in all the fury of insatiate appetites,—murderous, lustful, and rapacious. They slaughtered indiscriminately elders and children, preserving only the grown women as captives. The sad details of a town taken by storm are to a great degree the same in every age and nation; but the destroying barbarians at Selinus manifested one peculiarity, which marks them as lying without the pale of Hellenic sympathy and sentiment. They mutilated the bodies of the slain; some were seen with amputated hands strung together in a row and fastened round their girdles; while others brandished heads on the points of their spears and javelins.[901] The Greeks (seemingly not numerous) who served under Hannibal, far from sharing in these ferocious manifestations, contributed somewhat to mitigate the deplorable fate of the sufferers. Sixteen thousand Selinuntines are said to have been slain, five thousand to have been taken captive; while two thousand six hundred escaped to Agrigentum.[902] These figures are probably under, rather than above, the truth. Yet they do not seem entitled to any confidence; nor do they give us any account of the entire population in its different categories,—old and young,—men and women,—freemen and slaves,—citizens and metics. We can only pretend to appreciate this mournful event in the gross. All exact knowledge of its details is denied to us.