If we may credit the ancient historians, the Etrurians or Tyrrhenians, even before the reign of Minos, had been for a long time masters of the greatest part of the Mediterranean Sea, and had given their name to the Tyrrhenian Sea, upon which they were situate. Piracy, as well as commerce, was followed by them; and they became at last so expert, successful, and dangerous, for their piracies, that they were attacked, and their maritime power greatly abridged, by the Carthaginians and the Sicilians. Their most famous port was Luna, which was situated on the Macra, a river which, flowing from the Apennines, divided Liguria from Etruria, and fell into the Tyrrhenian Sea. There seems good reason to believe that Luna was a place of great trade before the Trojan war; it was extremely capacious, and in every respect worthy of the commercial enterprise and wealth of the Tuscans. Populonium, a city which was situate on a high promontory of the same name, that ran a considerable way into the sea, also possessed a very commodious harbour, capable of receiving a great number of ships. It had an arsenal well supplied with all kinds of naval stores, and a quay for shipping or landing merchandize. One of the principal articles of export consisted in copper vessels, and in arms, machines, utensils, &c. of iron: these metals were at first supplied to the inhabitants from the island of Æthalia (now Elba); but the copper-mines there failing, iron alone, from the same island, was imported for the purpose of their various manufactures; the trade in these flourished in very remote times, and continued in the days of Aristotle and Strabo.

But the most direct and unequivocal testimony to the power of the Tuscans, and that that power was principally, if not entirely, derived from their maritime skill and commerce, is to be found in Livy. This historian informs us, "that before the Roman empire, the Tuscan dominions extended very far both by sea and land, even to the upper and lower sea, by which Italy is surrounded, in form of an island. Their very names are an argument for the vast power of this people; for the Italian natives call the one the Tuscan Sea, and the other the Adriatic, from Adria, a Tuscan colony. The Greeks call them the Tyrrhenian and Adriatic Seas. This people, in twelve cities, inhabited the country extending to both seas; and by sending out colonies equal in number to the mother cities, first on this side of the Apennines towards the lower sea, and afterwards as many on the other side, possessed all the country beyond the Po, even to the Alps, except the corner belonging to the Venetians, who dwelt round a bay of the sea." Homer, Heraclides, Aristides, and Diodorus Siculus, all concur in their representations of the maritime power and commercial opulence of the Tuscans at a very early period. Diodorus Siculus expressly says, that they were masters of the sea; and Aristides, that the Indians were the most powerful nation in the east, and the Tuscans in the west.

Of the Grecian colonies in the south of Italy, that of Tarentum was the most celebrated for its commerce. Polybius expressly informs us, that Tarentum, their principal city, was very prosperous and rich, long before Rome made any figure, and that its prosperity and riches were entirely the fruit of the extensive and lucrative trade they carried on, particularly with Greece. The city of Tarentum stood on a peninsula, and the citadel, which was very strong, was built on the narrowest and extremest part of it; on the east was a small bay, on the west the main sea; the harbour is represented by ancient historians as extremely large, beautiful and commodious. Its vicinity to Greece, Sicily, and Africa, afforded it great opportunities and facilities for commerce. The inhabitants are represented by some authors as having been the inventors of a particular kind of ship, which retained in some degree the form of a raft or float. Their government, which at first was aristocratical, was afterwards changed to a democracy; and it is to this popular form of government that their prosperity and wealth are ascribed. The number of people in the whole state amounted to 300,000; Tarentum had twelve other cities under its dominion. Besides a considerable fleet in the Mediterranean Sea, they had constantly on foot a very large army, principally of mercenaries. Eighteen years before the first Punic war, the Romans had entered into a maritime treaty with the Tarentines; according to this treaty, neither party were to navigate beyond the Cape of Lacinia. Soon afterwards, however, the Roman fleet accidentally appearing near Tarentum, the inhabitants took the alarm, sunk four of the ships, killed or took prisoners the commander and some other officers, sold the seamen for slaves, and behaved with great insolence to the ambassador whom the Romans sent to remonstrate and demand satisfaction. They were soon, however, obliged to submit to the superior power of the Romans. In the second Punic war, it was finally subdued, and a Roman colony planted there.

The Spinetes, Liburnians, and Locrians, were also celebrated for their skill in naval affairs, and for their commerce, before Rome manifested the slightest wish to distinguish herself in this manner. Indeed, the situation of Italy naturally turned the attention of its inhabitants (especially of those who were early civilized, as the Tuscans, or those who had emigrated from a civilized country, as the nations in the south of Italy,) to naval affairs and maritime commerce. Washed by three seas, the Adriatic on the north-east, the Tyrrhenian on the west, and the Ionian on the south, Italy enjoyed advantages possessed by few nations of antiquity. Of the first of these seas, the Spinetes became masters, of the second the Tuscans, and of the third the Tarentines. The Spinetes, were originally Pelasgi, who had emigrated and settled by chance rather than design, on the south banks of the Po. Spina, their capital, was situated on the north side of the southernmost mouth of that river. We do not possess any particular account of their commerce, but that it rendered them powerful and rich we are assured; and their dominion over the Adriatic is a decisive proof of the former, while their magnificent offerings to Delphos may as justly be deemed a proof of the latter. Spina was strong both by nature and art, on the sea side, but the reverse on the land side; so that at last it was abandoned by its inhabitants not being able to withstand the attacks of their neighbours, who were either jealous of their prosperity, or attracted to the assault by the love of plunder. In the reign of Augustus it was reduced to a small village; and the branch of the Po, on which it was situated, had changed its course so much, that it was then upwards of fifteen miles distant from the sea, on the shore of which it had been built. The gradual alteration in the course of the river, it is probable, contributed with the other cause already mentioned to reduce it to comparative insignificance.

Opposite to the Spinetes across the Adriatic, on the coast of Dalmatia, the Liburnians dwelt. In some respects their coast was preferable to that of Italy for maritime affairs, as it is studded with islands, which afforded shelter to ships, and likewise possessed many excellent harbours; but the Liburnians, as well as most of the inhabitants of Illyria, were more eager after piracy than commerce; and, as we shall afterwards see, carried their piracies to such a daring and destructive extent, that the Romans were compelled to attack them. Their devotedness to piracy explains what to Mons. Huet appears unaccountable. He observes, that it is remarkable that neither the Dalmatians, who were powerful at sea by means of their port Salona, which was their capital, nor the Liburnians themselves, according to all appearance, had the use of money among them. Commerce cannot be carried on to great extent, or in a regular and expeditious manner, by natives ignorant of the use of money; but money seems to be not at all requisite to the purposes of piracy. The Liburnian ships, or more properly speaking, those ships which were denominated Liburnian, from having been invented and first employed by this people, were of two kinds; one large, fit for war and long voyages, but at the same time built light and for quick sailing. After the victory of Actium, which Augustus gained in a great measure by means of these ships, few were built by the Romans of any other construction. The other Liburnian vessels were small, for fishing and short voyages; some of these were made with osiers and covered with hides. But strength and lightness, and quick sailing, were the qualities by which the Liburnian ships were chiefly distinguished and characterised.

At what precise period the Romans directed their attention to maritime affairs we are not accurately informed: that the opinion of Polybius on this subject is not well founded, is evident from several circumstances. He says, that before the first Punic war the Romans had no thought of the sea; that Sicily was the first country, out of Italy, in which they ever landed; and that, when they went to that island to assist the Mamertines, the vessels which they employed in that expedition were hired, or borrowed from the Tarentines, the Locrians, &c. He is correct in his statement that Sicily was the first country in which the Romans had any footing; but that he is inaccurate with respect to the period when the Romans first applied themselves to maritime affairs, will appear from the following facts.

In the first place, the Romans (as we have already shown in our account of the Carthaginian commerce,) had several treaties with the Carthaginians, which may properly be called commercial treaties, before the first Punic war. The earliest treaty, according to Polybius himself, was dated about 250 years before the war; and in this treaty the voyages undertaken by the Romans on account of trade to Africa, Sardinia, and that part of Sicily at that time possessed by the Carthaginians, are expressly mentioned and regulated. The second treaty, about 100 years before the first Punic war, is not so specific respecting commerce. The third treaty, occasioned by the invasion of Italy by Pyrrhus, points out a decline in the naval power of the Romans; for it stipulates, that the Carthaginians should furnish them with ships, if required, either for trade or war. Secondly, seventy-four years before the first Punic war, the Romans having subdued the Antiates, and thus become masters of their fleet, among which were six armed with beaks, the tribune was ornamented with these beaks, the ships to which they belonged were burnt, and the others were brought to Rome and laid upon the place allotted to the building and preservation of ships. Lastly, the circumstances which gave rise to the war between the Romans and Tarentines, to which we have already adverted, plainly prove that Polybius is wrong in his assertion. Valerius, who commanded the Roman fleet, which was attacked by the Tarentines, according to Livy, was one of the duumviri navales, officers who had been already appointed nearly thirty years (that is, nearly fifty years before the first Punic war), on the motion of Decius Mus, expressly for the purpose of equipping, repairing, and maintaining the fleets.

From these circumstances, it appears that the Romans possessed ships both for war and commerce, previous to the commencement of their wars with the Carthaginians, though it is extremely probable that their commerce was very limited, and for the most part carried on in vessels belonging to the other maritime nations of Italy, and that their ships of war were very small and rude in their construction and equipment.

It is foreign to the object of this work to enter into a detail of the wars between the Romans and the Carthaginians: but as the great efforts of the Romans to become powerful at sea were made during these wars; as these efforts, being successful, laid the foundation of the future commerce of Rome; and as by the destruction of Carthage, in some measure caused by the naval victories gained by the Romans, the most commercial nation of antiquity was utterly ruined, and their commerce transferred to Rome, it will be proper briefly to notice the naval contests between these rival powers during the three wars in which they were engaged.

The first Punic war was occasioned by a desire on the part of the Carthaginians to enlarge and secure their acquisitions in Sicily, and to preserve their dominion of the sea, and by a determination on the part of the Romans to check the progress of the Carthaginians in that island, so immediately adjoining the continent of Italy. An opportunity soon occurred, which seemed to promise to each the accomplishment of their respective objects: the Mamertines, being hard pursued by Hiero king of Syracuse, and shut up in Messina, the only city which remained to them, were divided in opinion; some were for accepting the protection offered them by Hannibal, who at that time commanded the Carthaginian army in Sicily; others were for calling in the aid of the Romans. Both these powers gladly accepted the proffered opportunity of extending their conquests, and checking their rival.