Login

11-06-2002, 09:56 PM

I am looking to discover what contemporary Romans called the 1st Punic War - both at the time and in the intervening period before the 2nd Punic War. I've checked Lazenby, Craven, Goldsworthy and Connelly without coming across any references. Though it's certainly possible I just missed them. 
 
I suspect the war went by a succession of names, depending upon where in 'Italy' you were from and what part your community was playing at the time. 
 
It would be illuminating to know what contemporary Greeks and/or Sicels called the war as well. 
 
Any thoughts?

Goffredo · 11-07-2002, 07:57 AM

Are you sure the Romans called the war by name? 
Are't historians those really responsible for giving convenient names to events of the past like wars? 
During the fighting did the English call the Boer War the "Anglo-Boer War"? 
Did our parents really call WW2 "WW2"? I don't think so, and I don't even think the politicians in Washington, London, Moscow, Berlin, Tokyo did either. Only when necessary they would distinguish theaters (fronts); e.g. the war in Russia, the war in the Pacific or,... the war against the Boers. 
 
If a person is directly living a war I really find it difficult to believe he will call it by a name. If he does lets not take it too seriously unless there is some explicit war propaganda at work. 
 
Is that the real question you are asking? Was there some name the romans called it to get the crowds willing to fight? e.g. the Romans might have called the first Punic War the "War for Freedon at Sea". 
Edited by: <A HREF=http://pub45.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showUserPublicProfile?gid=goffredo>goffredo</A> at: 11/7/02 9:05:31 am

11-07-2002, 11:22 AM

Salve, 
 
Wars were usually named after the principal opponent, thus called bellum with a suitable adjective (eg Dacicum, Sarmaticum or Germanicum), or after its main theatre of operations (eg maritimum). Such names were not applied only after the conclusion of the conflict, but also while it was in progress. The war would thus have been called by the Romans the bellum Punicum or - Poenicum, the Punic war, the addition primum ofcourse only being added with the benefit of hindsight. See the comments on Naevius, mostly of considerable later date though, for examples of the names used for the conflict. 
 
Regards, 
 
Sander van Dorst

Goffredo · 11-07-2002, 01:24 PM

Yep 
just like we do today. 
Names but practical ones (where the fighting is).

11-07-2002, 02:02 PM

The Gulf War comes to mind. 
Magnus/Matt 
Optio 
Legio XXX "Ulpia Victrix"

11-07-2002, 08:38 PM

Thanks for your reference, Sander. Very helpful, as always. 
 
I find it hard to imagine that a people, community or army involved in a war wouldn't call it by some name almost immediately. As Tiberius points out, the Gulf War is a good example. It was named almost before it started. And the name stuck. However, there are still different names for the various parts and pieces of the recent 'wars' in the Balkans, depending on nationality, language, alignment or personal involvement. I agree with you, Goffredo, that historians will eventually pull one name out of the hat - so my children's children will, perhaps, learn all about the 4th Balkan War. 
 
But that still leaves me looking for more references that might hint at what a coastal Greek community like Heraclea or Locri called the war they were in, until they were overruled by the likes of Polybius and Livy. I'm sure they had some name for a war that likely swept away a tremendous number of young men every time a fleet failed to make it back to Italy. And their name for the war may well have been different from what the folks in Ariminum or Asculum called it. And probably different from whatever the Sicels chose to call it. 
 
Logically, the responsibility for 'naming' a war would fall to the consuls. And as Goffredo points out, how do you best sell this war to the roman people and allies? But was it clear that this was a war against Carthage when the legions crossed from Rhegium to Messana and then laid seige to Syracuse? For the first four years, common Romans could well have considered this 'the war in Sicily'. 
 
David

11-12-2002, 01:21 AM

I think if I'd been one of them I'd have called it nothing printable...so Bellum Poenicum would have to do for the Acta Diurna assuming they were around at the time. 
 
For other wars, I don't know if you'd find a consistent pattern; if you did it would probably be geographic. I was born in 1949, and remember the BBC mentioning 'the War in Korea'...it was certainly the Korean War by 1955 at latest...we called Vietnam the Vietnam War or the War in Vietnam at college in the late 60s. Having a developed media will certainly speed up widely-accepted labelling. 
 
As to World Wars I and II, WWI was called The Great War until the next one began, but I have no idea what it was called during the actual fighting. Easy to find clippings to tell us. World War II was certainly called that by name by mid-1942, once America and Japan were in it, but it was not a common reference, only in more rarefied discussions. As a boy, I had a treasured stack of National Geographics from about 1941 through 45 and I swear I read every word and looked at every picture twice. They definitely referred to World War II by name, though rarely. 
 
E

Login
Username:
Password:	Lost Password?
	Remember me