WI : No Carthaginian Empire

[LSCatilina]

Assuming that Carthage fails to take the leadership upon the other Punic cities on the African coast, or doing so only in a ceremonial role comparable to Sidon and Tyre over their own colonies, ending up with a series of independent city-states (possibly grouped as alliances, hegemonies, etc.) in Northern Africa and Spain, what would be the consequences?

Some I could immediately think of would be a different balance between Greek and Punic powers in Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica either turning up much more Hellenized or conversely more mixed culturally without repeated Puno-Greek wars and generally a greater Greek commercial presence in the Mediterranean "Far-West". I wouldn't see Puno-Iberic influence on Hispano-Celtic and Iberian societies disappear but maybe more diffuse and with a lesser devellopment of Iberian networks along the coast?

 

[raharris1973]

How does this influence the later history of you know who?

The Romans

Sorry, I had to ask about them.

 

[LSCatilina]

ISPOILER]The Romans[/ISPOILER]

It could actually have significant consequences : *if* we assume a lesser Punic pressure on Sicily, you easily enough have a lesser call for Gaulish mercenaries historically employed not only by Carthage on the island but also by Dinoysius of Syracuse whose rise is directly related to Carthaginian pressure and who was a big employer of Gauls in Sicily, Southern Italy and Adriatic basin, and a possible historical basis for the story (if true) of a certain Latin city getting bullied into tribute by a wandering Gaulish army.

I don'(t think a lesser mercenary employ in the Western Mediterranean basin would necessarily be "counter-weighted" but it could be used as a reasoning for a somewhat bigger pressure on Northern Italy or involvement on Italian conflicts proper?

 

[Max Sinister]

Is it inevitable that some power has to arise? But under which conditions, if yes?

 

[LSCatilina]

Is it inevitable that some power has to arise? But under which conditions, if yes?

I'm not sure about inevitable, but any geopolitical sphere with multiple actors is perpetually recomposing. It doesn't means its inherently unstable, but it offers opportunities for a potential hegemonic power to emerge from inside or its periphery. although there's no inevitability this potential hegemon would maintain itself either long term.

So for the sake of the WI, we could have an Afro-Punic city (including Carthage if existing ITTL) maintaining some form of local power but not to the point being uncontested : maybe with a set of polities comparable to Greek, Etruscan, Gaulish, etc. petty-states in size and respective power.

 

[heraclius]

The effects on Rome could be huge as it would lack its major enemy and stimulus to military and naval development in the C3rd BC - the Roman fleet was created in the late 260s BC in order to combat the Carthaginian one and without the First Punic War we would probably see Rome advancing from its recent conquest of the Greek city-states of S Italy to overrun Sicily without a major struggle. (Quite apart from Roman elite military aggressiveness linked to ambitious current and would-be consults wanting to add to their reputation and clientage by success, the 270s intervention in S Italy by Pyrrhus of Epirus to try to stop Rome would lead to a decisive argument in the Senate ranks that Rome needed to control Sicily to stop any new Greek warlords from there or the Greek mainland threatening them). Arguably Rome would then have more time and troops available either to push back the 'Gauls'/ Celts in N Italy and set up a stronger colonization process in the Po valley at an earlier date .

There was an endemic fear since the Gaulish march on and sack of Rome in 390/ 387 of the Northern tribes so a preventive conquest of them was on the cards aided by Roman propaganda being likely to glorify the winner of any such war as a 'new Camillus' (saviour of Rome in 390/ 387) so it would be a useful war for any ambitious general. With no Second Punic War and no attack on Italy from Carthaginian-ruled Spain - and Hannibal at best the chief general of a smaller and ally-less city-state Carthage or of a small 'Confederacy of Utica', so he is likely to be only fighting with a small army in Africa and never go to Spain - do the Scipio family never rise to fame and power in Rome at all, or does their ambition push them to urge the Senate to 'finish off the Gaulish threat for good' by crossing the Alps to overrun Provence and set up a Roman province around Greek city-state Massilia/ Marseilles? Or do they take on an earlier war in Illyria across the Adriatic to punish pirates and aid Roman traders, then tackle Macedon as a 'threat to do a Pyrrhus and invade S Italy' under Philip V in the 210s or 200s? (In this scenario Scipio Africanus' father and uncle don't get killed by the Carthanigians in Spain in 211 but are available to command later on , as is the rash and ambitious general Flaminius who in OTl is killed by Hannibal at Lake Trasimene in 217, so Scipio Africanus is only a son of the family head not the family leader in the 200s and so isn't consul until rather later than in OTL. Do we have the Scipios, with a larger army as Rome does not lose large numbers of men at Cannae in 216, takin on Philip V in the 210s or 200s with anti-Macedonian Greek allies, or in the early 190s as Rome did in OTL?

No existential threat of conquest for the Sicilian Greeks - do they unite , probably under pushy tyrants/ chief generals of the rising city of Syracuse, to conquer the Punic ports of W Sicily, or does the lack of an enemy to aid the rise of Syracuse (as leader of the Gk cities) and its generals push back the timeline - or end - the chances of Syracuse seizing the lead in Sicily and achieving a degree of Sicilian/ S Italian (forced) unity under Dionysius I? If Athens still attacks Syracuse in 415 and is defeated Syracuse will presumably have the prestige to lead Sicily and the political feuds there will lead to D seizing power, but he does not have the excuse of Carthaginian aggression to force the alarmed minor cities to join his 'empire' to save themselves - or does he manufacture an excuse to invade W Sicily or even Africa, eg a mercantile dispute with the Punic cities/ league there? Does his regime collapse earlier, or never take control? Do the Punic trading cities of Africa bother with colonizing S Spain at all as they are disunited and short of a coherent leadership, and if so do the ambitious Sicilian Greeks set up a trading and possible colonial armed force of ships to grab some of the Carthaginian trading bases eg Gades/ Cadiz? The lure of controlling the W Med trade and the tin trade to Cornwall could appeal to ambitious merchants in Syracuse and lead to a successful expedition some time in the mid-late C5th to take over the Pillars of Heracles/ Gibraltar and cut the Punic cities out of their Atlantic trade, boosting Syracuse's riches - and enabling its leaders, with Spanish tribal mercenaries, to fight off an aggressive and greedy Athens easier? So we end up with a mega-Syracuse by c. 400 as a rival to Athens, and possibly no dynasty of Dionysius at all if it is stable (a big ask for a faction-hit Greek city-state). Then we have a 'Rome vs Syracuse' not 'Rome vs Carthage' war once Rome has reached the Straits of Messina?

 

[LSCatilina]

There was an endemic fear since the Gaulish march on and sack of Rome in 390/ 387

It's something of an historical trope, but not one that's really that rooted down in Roman politics: campaigns against Gauls were largely driven by the same priorities and objectives that guided Roman against other neighbouring peoples as Samnites that is a general concern of military pressure as well as territorial control (especially on the fertile and rich Padan basin), and not a "preventive conquest". How Rome expands or not in central Italy is going to factor a lot IMO onto its expansion and politics in both southern and northern parts of the peninsula more so than an irrational fear of Gaulish peoples.

set up a Roman province around Greek city-state Massilia/ Marseilles?

No Carthaginian Empire essentially means a different development of the Phocean cities since the Vth century BCE : now, there's no hard, definitive evidence of what Trogus Pompey considered the wars between Masslia and Carthage, but there's circumstantial clues that there were conflicts between Massalia (and local allies?) and local peoples maybe under Carthaginian employ (for instance the partial destructions of Lattara and the subsequent "switch" to Massaliote presence).
At this point, we could likely see the Hérault river as a limit between Massaliote and Ibero-Punic influence being butterflied away (possibly no Iberization of the peoples between the river and the Pyrénées (maybe even up to the Ebre?) and a broader Greek i.e. Massaliote, but Rhodanian as well since there's a fair chance the city of Rhodè might survives in situ without Punic challenge to control the "Gallic Isthmus"^.
While Massalia would probably have a better chance at establishing a presence in Corsica (no or different Battle of Alalia) this could potentially lead to a division of Greek influence between Marseille and its colonies on the Lower Rhône and coastal Provence roughly as IOTL plus maybe in eastern Languedoc and Corsica whereas Rhodè might have a comparable place in Languedoc and Catalonia. I don't think it'll necessarily end up with regular infighting, but it would make an interesting situation.

I wouldn't be overly surprised either if this lack of Punic and Ibero-Punic influence and a stronger Rhodanian presence wouldn't have a similar societal and structural influence over Gaulish peoples Massalia had, namely a drive for a network of commercial and military alliances directed at dealing with Greeks (a set of "Kebennoi" peoples along "Keltoi* in Greek geographies? Assuming both don't merge). A very interesting focus, nevertheless, I think no Carthaginian empire might have important consequences on the region , regardless if Roman history goes as IOTL or not,

(A rather maximalist take, I agree, and the depicted "trade influence" is definitely not something I'd see as mutually exclusive as Massaliote and Ibero-Punic presence on the Aude/Garonne axis is evidenced IOTL, but I'm lazy)​

No existential threat of conquest for the Sicilian Greeks - do they unite , probably under pushy tyrants/ chief generals of the rising city of Syracuse, to conquer the Punic ports of W Sicily, or does the lack of an enemy to aid the rise of Syracuse (as leader of the Gk cities) and its generals push back the timeline - or end - the chances of Syracuse seizing the lead in Sicily and achieving a degree of Sicilian/ S Italian (forced) unity under Dionysius I?

What happens in Sicily is indeed pretty much an open question, but I wouldn't really see the Greek cities somehow united themselves against Punic establishment on the sole basis of origin and culture.

That said, what would you think of using Ancient Cyprus as a point of comparison? The island was divided in several city-states at least some had a marked mixed Greek and Phoenician aspect.
Maybe TTL Sicily could see something comparable (and, indeed, it's what partly happened IOTL under Carthaginian dominance) with Siculo-Punic cities being more broadly Hellenized and integrated within a Sicilian ensemble without being necessarily conquered while maintaining and claiming a strong distinct identity.

It's not impossible Syracuse would manage to get an even earlier upper hand on the island under Gelon's dynasty all the more without Carthaginian pressure (and maybe getting involved in the Second Persian War?), along with Agrigente or other important cities but even these fights would lead IMHO to local tyrants to search for powerful allies : if not IOTL Carthaginians, maybe ITTL non-imperial Carthage/Utica, Athens as IOTL, some other power, etc. so an Hermocrates-like figure remains likely.
That said, would Syracusae in a dual opposition between Carthage/Greek cities be as dominant it was? I'm not so sure, and either of the rise of a Dionysius-like figure whose own military power and focus came from this opposition.

Do the Punic trading cities of Africa bother with colonizing S Spain at all as they are disunited and short of a coherent leadership

I mean, Phoenician establisments in Spain already existed before the rise of imperial Carthage : Gades was reportedly founded ca. 1100 BCE for instance. So the problem wouldn't as much if they would still exist, but how deep and how far the settlement would go. IOTL, Carthage mostly was content with occupying or informally "protecting" Ibero-Punic cities until the Barcid conquest, so I'd say the Alborran Sea would be pretty much a Punic lake altogether.
That said ITTL, I'd also see more successful Greek establishment on the peninsula as Mainake with a greater Greek influence on Iberian peoples along the coast (Ibero-Greek, I suppose?) while Punic influence over Spain's atlantic coast (and consequent societal/structural influence over Hispano-Celtic people) might be less important.

You made really interesting and stimulating points, thanks!