Roman operations in Sicily could only be
conducted at considerable risk and the coasts of Italy remained exposed to
continued raids as long as Carthage had undisputed control of the sea.
Consequently the Romans decided to build a fleet that would put an end to
the Carthaginian naval supremacy. They constructed 120 vessels, of which
100 were of the type called quinquiremes, the regular first class
battleships of the day. The complement of each was three hundred rowers
and one hundred and twenty fighting men.(6) With this armament, and some
vessels from the Roman allies, the consul, Gaius Duilius, put to sea in
260 B. C. and won a decisive battle off Mylae on the north coast of
Sicily. As a result of this battle in the next year the Romans were able
to occupy Corsica and attack Sardinia, and finding it impossible to force
a decision in Sicily, they were in a position to attack Carthage in Africa
itself.

*The Roman invasion of Africa, 256 B. C.* Another naval victory, off
Ecnomus, on the south coast of Sicily, cleared the way for the successful
landing of an army under the consul Marcus Atilius Regulus. He defeated
the Carthaginians in battle and reduced them to such extremities that they
sought to make peace. But the terms which Atilius proposed were so harsh
that in desperation they resumed hostilities. At this juncture there
arrived at Carthage, with other mercenaries, a Spartan soldier of fortune,
Xantippus, who reorganized the Carthaginian army. By the skilful use of
cavalry and war elephants he inflicted a crushing defeat upon the Romans
and took Atilius prisoner. A Roman fleet rescued the remnants of the
expedition, but was almost totally lost in a storm off the southern
Sicilian coast (255).

*The war in Sicily, 254-241 B. C.* The Romans again concentrated their
efforts against the Carthaginian strongholds in Sicily, which they
attacked from land and sea. In 254 they took the important city of
Panormus, and the Carthaginians were soon confined to the western
extremity of the island. There, however, they successfully maintained
themselves in Drepana and Lilybaeum. Meantime the Romans encountered a
series of disasters on the sea. In 253 they lost a number of ships on the
voyage from Lilybaeum to Rome, in 250 the consul Publius Clodius suffered
a severe defeat in a naval battle at Drepana, and in the next year a third
fleet was destroyed by a storm off Phintias in Sicily.

In 247 a new Carthaginian general, Hamilca