The First Punic War

Dr Eve MacDonald joins Tristan Hughes for a proper treatment of the First Punic War — the 23-year struggle for Sicily that turned Rome into a naval power. The episode covers the corvus boarding bridges, the Battle of the Aegates Islands, and how Rome built and lost entire fleets learning to fight at sea. MacDonald is a genuine Carthage specialist and the operational detail on the naval engagements is well above what you'd expect from a general ancients podcast.