Second Punic War
War between Rome and Carthage (218–201 BC)
The Second Punic War was the second in a series of three wars fought between Carthage and the Roman Republic, who were at the time the two main powers in the western Mediterranean. The protracted war was fought across the region, incurring immense materiel and human losses on both sides. Carthaginian general Hannibal Barca initially led his army on its infamous crossing of the Alps and invaded Italy, where he would lead an extended campaign. In Iberia, Roman troops invaded and eventually conquered the Carthaginian territories there. The final confrontation of the war occurred with the Roman invasion of North Africa. Roman general Scipio Africanus and Hannibal faced off at the Battle of Zama, which the Romans won, resulting in Carthage’s surrender. The war also drew in other powers. Macedon allied with Carthage, triggering the First Macedonian War, which caused Rome to seek its own allies in the Eastern Mediterranean. The Sicilian city state of Syracuse initially allied with Carthage, but switched sides to support Rome. The Carthaginians and Romans also both made use of Numidian, Gallic, and Iberian allies.
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This entry incorporates text from “Second Punic War” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.