The epoch, at which this transformation of Carthage into the capital
of Libya took place, admits the less of being determined, because
the change doubtless took place gradually. The author just mentioned
names Hanno as the reformer of the nation. If the Hanno is meant who
lived at the time of the first war with Rome, he can only be regarded
as having completed the new system, the carrying out of which
presumably occupied the fourth and fifth centuries of Rome.

The flourishing of Carthage was accompanied by a parallel decline
in the great cities of the Phoenician mother-country, in Sidon and
especially in Tyre, the prosperity of which was destroyed partly by
internal commotions, partly by the pressure of external calamities,
particularly of its sieges by Salmanassar in the first, Nebuchodrossor
in the second, and Alexander in the fifth century of Rome. The noble
families and the old firms of Tyre emigrated for the most part to
the secure and flourishing daughter-city, and carried thither their
intelligence, their capital, and their traditions. At the time when
the Phoenicians came into contact with Rome, Carthage was as decidedly
the first of Canaanite cities as Rome was the first of the
Latin communities.

Naval Power of Carthage

But the empire of Libya was only half of the power of Carthage; its
maritime and colonial dominion had acquired, during the same period,
a not less powerful development.

Spain