eriod of this long constitutional struggle, Rome and her
kinsfolk had first been engaged in a stubborn and ultimately successful
contest with the non-Aryan Etruscan race; and then Italy had been
attacked by the migrating Aryan hordes of the Celts, known as Gauls, who
sacked Rome, but retired to North Italy; events giving birth to many
well-known stories, probably in the main mythical. But the practical
effect was to impose a greater solidarity of the Latin and kindred
races, and a more decisive acceptance of Roman hegemony.

That hegemony, however, had to be established by persistent compulsion,
and there were three stages in its completion. First, the subjection of
the Latins and Campanians; then the struggle of Rome with the
Umbrian-Samnites; finally, the decisive repulse of the Epirote invader
Pyrrhus--in effect a Hellenic movement. The Roman supremacy established
through the exhaustion of the valiant Samnites required to be confirmed
by stern repression of attempts to recover liberty. But the Hellenic
element in Italy, antagonistic to the growing Roman power, in effect
invited the intervention of the Epirote chief. But his scheme was not
that of an imperial statesman, but of a chivalrous and romantic warrior.
His own political blunders and the iron determination of the Romans,
destroyed his chances of conquest. His retirement left Rome undisputed
lord of Italy; which in part shared full citizenship, in part possessed
only the more restricted Latin rights, and in part only rights conceded
under varying treaties.

A sense of common Italian nationality was developing. But if Rome was
queen of Italy, Carthage was queen of the seas. Maritime expansion was
precluded, though Rome's position fitted her for it. Carthage was the
one Phoenician state which developed political as well as commercial
power. The commercial cities of North Africa were in subordination to
her, in the Western Mediterranean she had no rivals, her domestic
government was oligarchical.

Roman intervention in the affairs of Sicily, where Carthage was the
dominant power, produced the rupture between the two great states which
was bound to come sooner or later. Sicily itself was the scene of the
initial struggle, which taught Rome that her victories on land were
liable to be nullified by the Carthaginian sea power. She resolved to
build a navy, on the plan of adopting boarding tactics which would
assimilate a naval engagement to a battle on land. These t