In 146 BC, the victorious armies of Scipio Aemilianus — otherwise known as Scipio Africanus — convincingly destroyed Punic Carthage, burning and razing the city once the remaining population were evacuated. The destruction was so complete that when Julius Caesar decided to reinstate Carthage as a Roman colony 98 years later, the city had to be rebuilt entirely.

However, the Romans did not quite manage to destroy every last remnant of the Punic town. Archaeologists excavating under the former Roman forum on Byrsa Hill have discovered the remains of the houses, streets and shops frequented by ordinary Carthaginians before 146BC — revealing a great deal about Punic civilization.

Carthage at the Time of the Punic Wars

By the time of the final Punic Wars in 150BC, Carthage had expanded to within 400 metres of the Tophet. However, the Byrsa hill, which overlooked the harbour of Carthage and was the site of the city’s original settlement, remained the centre of urban life. On its peak were Carthage’s most important buildings and principal temples. From here, streets radiated down the hill, following the natural contours.

The buildings discovered under what later became the Roman forum date from this time. Despite their prominent location, they did not belong to Carthage’s elite but to ordinary merchants and public officials.

The Destruction of Carthage

Preservation Under the Roman Forum

These Punic houses survived by chance. Left in ruins after the Romans razed the city, they lay abandoned until Roman rebuilding commenced.

 The new Roman forum was symbolically placed over the old Carthaginian civic centre. However, unlike their predecessors, the Romans did not choose to work in harmony with the hill. Instead, they flattened the summit of the Byrsa and supported the new forum with arched foundations erected over the Punic remains. 

Surplus earth from the excavation of Bysra hill was pushed downwards over the Carthaginian’s ruined homes, covering them completely. They lay preserved until the 20th century when archaeologists rediscovered the remains of streets and blocks of houses, with walls surviving up to 3m in places.

The Streets of Carthage

A 5-7metre wide street separated each block of houses. Unpaved and of beaten earth, these streets were extremely steep, with a 1:7 gradient. As the construction of this area was in sympathy with the topography, the Carthaginians built flights of steps to allow pedestrians to move between different levels. It would have been impossible to have used wheeled transport on these streets.

Punic Houses

The houses were identified as Punic by finds and the techniques used to build them. Bronze Punic coins lay amongst the ruins, as did black glazed Campanian pottery brought back from Italy with Hannibal. The typical floor style of the Punic houses was pavimenta punica, a style dated to the last 50 years of Carthage’s history. It was a uniquely Punic style consisting of a grey base overlaid with shards of green and yellow pot.

Each house was an elongated rectangle, with a back and front entrance opening onto the streets. A side corridor ran uninterrupted through each building, connecting both entrance ways. Depressions have been found in these corridors indicating the location for eliminating household waste into stone-lined soak ways built in the streets.

Some buildings were purely residential, with large, often ornate rooms flanking the front and back entrances. Others were dual purpose, with shops on one of the street fronts.

 All the houses were built around a central courtyard, which formed its primary light source. The courtyard was also the site of the household’s water cistern. This area either directly adjoined the house’s main corridor or was partitioned off from the rest of the house. One house with a partitioned courtyard had several small rooms built directly onto it. Some seemed to be for storage purposes, but one was a bathroom, complete with water and waste pipes and a terracotta mosaic floor.

Appian described Punic houses as being six stories high. Although it is impossible to verify whether this was the case, there is evidence of internal stairways. So the pre-Roman houses of Carthage were certainly more than one story high.

Resources

Lancel, Serge (1992). Carthage: A History. Blackwell: Oxford and Cambridge