II.

First Punic War

The First Punic War (264-241 bc) was the outcome of growing political and economic rivalry between the two nations. It was initiated when a band of Campanian mercenary soldiers (Mamertines), besieged in the city of Messana (now Messina), in Sicily, requested aid from both Rome and Carthage against Hiero II, king of Syracuse. Carthage already controlled part of Sicily, and the Romans, responding to this request with the intention of driving the Carthaginians from the island, provoked a declaration of war. After building their first large navy, the Romans defeated a Carthaginian fleet off the Sicilian port of Mylae (see Mylae, Battle of) in 260 bc, but failed to capture Sicily. In 256 bc a Roman army under Roman general Marcus Atilius Regulus established a base in North Africa, but the following year the Carthaginians forced it to withdraw. For the next 13 years the war was fought in the area of Sicily. It ended with a major naval victory for the Romans in 241 bc. Sicily was then ceded to the Romans, who also seized the Carthaginian islands of Sardinia and Corsica in 237 bc.