ars before had left the heart of Asia and who had in
the eleventh century before our era pushed their way into the rocky
peninsula of Greece and who, since then, have been known to us as the
Greeks. And I told you the story of the little Greek cities that
were really states, where the civilisation of old Egypt and Asia was
transfigured (that is a big word, but you can "figure out" what it
means) into something quite new, something that was much nobler and
finer than anything that had gone before.

When you look at the map you will see how by this time civilisation has
described a semi-circle. It begins in Egypt, and by way of Mesopotamia
and the AEgean Islands it moves westward until it reaches the European
continent. The first four thousand years, Egyptians and Babylonians and
Phoenicians and a large number of Semitic tribes (please remember that
the Jews were but one of a large number of Semitic peoples) have carried
the torch that was to illuminate the world. They now hand it over to the
Indo-European Greeks, who become the teachers of another Indo-European
tribe, called the Romans. But meanwhile the Semites have pushed westward
along the northern coast of Africa and have made themselves the rulers
of the western half of the Mediterranean just when the eastern half has
become a Greek (or Indo-European) possession.

This, as you shall see in a moment, leads to a terrible conflict between
the two rival races, and out of their struggle arises the victorious
Roman Empire, which is to take this Egyptian-Mesopotamian-Greek
civilisation to the furthermost corners of the European continent, where
it serves as the foundation upon which our modern society is based.

I know all this sounds very complicated, but if you get hold of these
few principles, the rest of our history will become a great deal
simpler. The maps will make clear what the words fail to tell. And after
this short intermission, we go back to our story and give you an account
of the famous war between Carthage and Rome.

ROME AND CARTHAGE

THE SEMITIC COLONY OF CARTHAGE ON THE NORTHERN COAST OF AFRICA AND THE
INDO-EUROPEAN CITY OF ROME ON THE WEST COAST OF ITALY FOUGHT EACH
OTHER FOR THE POSSESSION OF THE WESTERN MEDITERRANEAN AND CARTHAGE WAS
DESTROYED

THE little Phoenician trading post of Kart-hadshat stood on a low hill
which overlooked the African Sea, a stretch of water ninety miles
wide which separates Africa from Europe. It was an ideal sp