HISTORY: Carthage Must Be Destroyed: The Rise and Fall of an Ancient Civilisation, By Richard Miles, Allen Lane, 521pp, £30

IT IS a truth universally acknowledged that a nation or civilisation on the rise needs an enemy, an archetypal Other, against which to pit itself, and in relation to which it can define its essence and ideals. Medieval Europe and Byzantium had the Arabs, Renaissance Europe the Turks, and in our own times we have had the Soviet Union, fundamentalist Islam and even China to act as bugbears. In ancient times, the Greeks had the Persians, whom they beat off in 480-79 BC and whom they finally defeated under Alexander the Great in 332 BC; and the Romans in turn (with a peak of tension from 218 BC to 202 BC, during Hannibal’s invasion of Italy) had Carthage.

This fine book is an extended study of Rome's Other, the north African Phoenician colony of Carthage ( kart hadasht, "new town"), by a young Cambridge scholar who has been excavating the site for some years now and has taken the opportunity to produce a general historical and cultural study of the city-state which gave Rome such a run for its money.

If we may believe tradition, Carthage was actually founded from Tyre in 814 BC (earlier than Rome’s reputed foundation in 753 BC), but only came into its own as an independent state in the late sixth century BC, after the reduction of Tyre by Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon in 573 BC. It occupied a key position along the Phoenician trade routes into the western Mediterranean, as well as on the north-south route via Sicily and Sardinia to the Etruscan states in the mid-Italian peninsula. Sooner or later it was bound to come up against the rising young state of Rome, after it had shaken off Etruscan domination and begun to take over central Italy at the end of the sixth century BC, and during the two centuries following.

In fact, early contacts were amicable enough, and were primarily concerned with trading arrangements. An initial treaty in 509 BC, at the establishment of the Roman republic, was succeeded by another in 348 BC, setting out in more detail respective spheres of influence.

Carthage’s main area of concern at this time was Sicily, where it was engaged in a long-running struggle with the Greek states, particularly Syracuse for control of the island’s western half. Carthage also held Sardinia, from which it derived much wealth, and was just asserting its influence in Spain, where there had long been Phoenician colonies. Even down to 279 BC Carthage was in alliance with Rome against King Pyrrhus of Epirus, who was threatening Rome in southern Italy.

And yet just a few years later, in 264 BC, the first war (the so-called First Punic War) broke out between Carthage and Rome. What had happened? All that had happened was that the Romans had come up in the world, and could not be stopped. They had moved into Sicily, overcome Syracuse, and were confronting the Carthaginian settlements. And no matter how often they were beaten, the Romans would not give up. They reinvented themselves as a naval power and, by 241 BC, Carthage was reduced to suing for a humiliating peace.

Only 20 years later, however, it was back again, this time under the leadership of one of the greatest commanders of the ancient world, Hannibal Barca. This time the threat to Rome came from Spain, where Hannibal had built up a personal empire. Richard Miles gives an excellent account of his rise and fall, and his extraordinary achievements in between – crossing the Alps, thrashing the Romans at Lake Trasimene, Cannae and elsewhere – but also of the sophisticated propaganda war waged by both Hannibal and the Romans as to who was the real heir to Heracles and thus the champion of civilisation against barbarism.

Carthage’s fate was sad indeed, but Miles here has done much to bring it to dramatic life, and to indict the Romans for their ruthlessness – while recognising that it is just as well for western civilisation as we know it that they won.

John Dillon is regius professor of Greek (Emeritus) at Trinity College Dublin. His most recent book is an edition of the letters of the philosopher Iamblichus (with Wolfgang Polleichner), Society of Biblical Literature, 2009