PREFACE
North Africa has always been a hotbed of conflict The
West should prepare for a long war’. Mohammar Gadaffi,
while reacting to NATO’s declaration of support for Libyan
rebels in the wake of the Arab Uprisings.
Apart from the unparalleled achievements of the Greeks which culminated in the utopian idea of universal domination of Alexander the Great, the most epochal phenomenon in the West was the gradual metamorphosis of Rome from a mere rural settlement on the Palatine Hill of Italy to become the capital of the ancient world. Before the twilight of the first century, Rome, motivated at different times by varied ambitions and interests, had used various means to conquer virtually all known territories – including the civilized Middle East.
Rome, therefore, became the most powerful and enduring empire in antiquity, and this was, perhaps, the first time that the West would plant its feet deeply into the Mediterranean soil.
Regardless of how Roman imperialism had been understood and interpreted in recent scholarship, there is no doubt that the Romans were western imperialists with conscious will for expansion – irrespective of its consequences. What motivated the planting of the Romans’ feet in the North African Mediterranean basin is the main thrust of this book which argues that Roman imperialism, rather than being defensive as may be considered elsewhere, was premeditated, deliberate and offensive and was evolved by a senate which desired and methodically schemed territorial expansion. The reason, as in the
contemporary period, was obvious. Africa, apart from being strategically located on trade routes between the great continents of Europe and Asia, boasted of enormous resources which largely contributed to the daily needs of the ancient world. And so even before the famous 19 century Scramble began, Africa had been a veritable economic mine in the world of the West. It is therefore, not an anomaly to defer to the claim of many Africans that the continent is a major conflict with the West.
This book provides a survey of the economic history of Roman Republic and North Africa, beginning in particular from Rome’s
overseas launch in 264 BC and ending with the conquest of Julius Caesar at the battle of Thapus on the Tunisian coast, when Numidia was annexed Africa as New Africa (Africa Nova)
‘Goke Akinboye’
Ibadan.
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