trial, of a city
so situated and so peopled, needs no explanation; but the question
requires an answer--in what way did this settlement come to attain
a development of political power, such as no other Phoenician
city possessed?

Carthage Heads the Western Phoenicians in Opposition to the Hellenes

That the Phoenician stock did not even in Carthage renounce its policy
of passiveness, there is no lack of evidence to prove. Carthage paid,
even down to the times of its prosperity, a ground-rent for the space
occupied by the city to the native Berbers, the tribe of the Maxyes or
Maxitani; and although the sea and the desert sufficiently protected
the city from any assault of the eastern powers, Carthage appears to
have recognized--although but nominally--the supremacy of the great-
king, and to have paid tribute to him occasionally, in order to secure
its commercial communications with Tyre and the East.

But with all their disposition to be submissive and cringing,
circumstances occurred which compelled these Phoenicians to adopt a
more energetic policy. The stream of Hellenic migration was pouring
ceaselessly towards the west: it had already dislodged the Phoenicians
from Greece proper and Italy, and it was preparing to supplant them
also in Sicily, in Spain, and even in Libya itself. The Phoenicians
had to make a stand somewhere, if they were not willing to be totally
crushed. In this case, where they had to deal with Greek traders and
not with the great-king, submission did not suffice to secure the
continuance of their commerce and industry on its former footing,
liable merely to tax and tribute. Massilia and Cyrene were already
founded; the whole east of Sicily was already in the hands of the
Greeks; it was full time for the Phoenicians to think of serious
resistance. The Carthaginians undertook the task; after long and
obstinate wars they set a limit to the advance of the Cyrenaeans,
and Hellenism was unable to establish itself to the west of the desert
of Tripolis. With Carthaginian aid, moreover, the Phoenician settlers
on the western point of Sicily defended themselves against the Greeks,
and readily and gladly submitted to the protection of the powerful
cognate city.(2) These important successes, which occurred in the
second century of Rome, and which saved for the Phoenicians the south-
western portion of the Mediterranean, served of themselves to give to
the city which had achieved them the hegemony