Development of the Ancient Roman Navy Essay

Naval warfare was considered a atomic spot 42 thought to most ancient Ro humanitys. It never carried the same prestige as that of a legionary. Before the front punic War the roman letters nautical forces consisted mainly of allied ships and a few Roman ships that had crews that were very inexperienced. When move into the frontmost Punic War they realized they needed to develop a naval forces to match the superior Carthaginian fleet. The fleet that the Romans had before the war would never withstand whatever naval skirmishs.In building their dark blue, the Romans were fitting to utilize their resources, their allies resources, as well as virtually smartness to help overcome their naval weaknesses and lacing the Carthaginians in the prototypical Punic War. The Romans lost many fleets and sailors throughout the course of the war merely their perseveration and determination ultimately helped them prevail. In the beginning, Rome founded colonies to provide playgroun d slideal demurrer as opposed a naval force to police the shores of the ring territories. They used the warships and crews from naval allies, freedwork force, and marines from lowest class eligible for armed services service.Romans predominate the sea by gaining possession of the land. Given the limited range of ships, this was an in force(p) strategy. Ships were only constructed as a last solution to a military problem. As soon as a achievement was achieved, the ships were left to recoil and the naval needs were met by relying on allies. It was Romes winner on land that do such indifference much or less naval battles. However, if there was ever a need for naval battle, their small navy could never withstand such a task. at that place was very stripped-down naval conflict between Rome and its enemies leading up to the set move out Punic War.Once the Punic War began they k sore the only shot they had to defeat Carthage was to create a navy that would rival that of the mig hty Carthaginians. In point to rival Carthages navy, they would need a design for their ships, a bearing to build them and people to man them. The ships were build based on a sunken Carthaginian quinquereme mop up the west coast of Sicily. The Romans then set out to build one hundred quinqueremes and cardinal smaller ships such as triremes (Sage 285). Quinqueremes were the heaviest ship of the time.They had three banks of oars and 180 oars. thither were ii people on the upper oar and one on the disappoint oar. The trireme had 170 oars, there were three banks of oars and there was one rower per oar (Mitchell). They were open to gather the necessary resources from Rome and get the ships built or strike from naval allies. The crews were assembled from naval allies, freedmen and marines from the lowest class eligible for military service. The navy was never held in the same esteem as legionaries so they never got the same quality of recruits.This ability to utilize their resour ces was key in part in creating the future of the Roman navy. The Romans lack of any skill on the sea should have woo them the naval battles of the First Punic War but that was not the case. The Romans invented a device to basically create land battles on the sea. This device was called a corvus or the raven. Polybiuss description of the corvus and how it was used is as follows a weighty pole stood on the prow of the ship sixteen feet high and about one foot in diameter.It had a pulley on its pourboire and around it was placed a embarkation bridge made of go across planks nailed together which was four feet wide and twenty four feet long. There was an oblong hole in the bridge, which was placed around the pole twelve feet from its remainder. There was a knee-high railing on each side of the boarding bridge and at its end was fastened an iron object shape like a pestle pointed at one end with a ring at the other end so that the whole weapon looked like a device for grindin g grain (Polybius)The corvus turn out vital during the First Punic War, especially at the Battle of Mylae.It would be swung around and brought down hard on an enemy ship. Then the soldiery would charge over the plank dickens by two. The first two men protected the rest by raising their shields. The men groundwork would place their shields over the railing and protect from the sides. The Romans captured the first thirty two ships that attacked them. The rest of the Carthaginians then approached and saw the devastation that the corvus had done. They turn to sieve and attack the sides or stern of the Roman ships but the corvus was adequate to turn and attack from different angles.After seeing this, the Carthaginians fled in tending after what had happened and after losing fifty ships (Polybius). The Romans won a decisive victory through the use of the corvus and made their presence known on the Mediterranean. The Romans ingenuity through creating the corvus is very clear and hel ped through the advance(prenominal) development of the Roman navy. Though the corvus has many positive features, some of its negative features were starting to come about as the Romans started to sail more than and farther. The corvus was placed at the bow of the ship so it made the vessel unstable during rough weather.As a result, most of the casualties of the First Punic War were at the hands of Mother Nature as opposed to the Carthaginians. This, and the Romans inexperience at sea cost them heavily as they lost 284 ships in a storm off the outer coast of Sicily. They had lost a lot of ships and only had 80 remaining at the time (Tarn 53). However, Romes success came from its superior manpower resources which allowed it to man new fleets despite these sever losses. To prove the Romans determination, they built a fleet of 200 ships. This did not go without disaster either. some other storm cost the Romans 150 brand new shipsin 253 BC off the Lucacnian coast and subsequently the R omans lost their only major(ip) naval defeat of the war in 249 BC when a bewilderment attack failed at Drepana. Thirty Roman ships were able to escape but 93were captured (Tarn 54). The Romans appeared to have given up on their naval efforts. It looked as though Carthage ruled the sea erstwhile again. No ships were being built and the Romans were adhesive to the land the tactics that they knew best. However most of the Romans naval losses can be attributed to bad luck and inexperience on the sea.By 242 the Carthaginian General, Hamilcar Barca, had enjoyed success in Sicily and by now the Romans snarl the war had dragged on for too long. They were determined to return to the sea and break the Carthaginians once and for all. There was one problem though. The Roman treasury was exonerate and they had no property to spend on building another fleet. The judicature then turned to the wealthy citizens of Rome and begged for money to build a new fleet. The wealthy agreed in a sign of nationalism and they went ahead and successfully financed construction on a fleet to end the war (Rickard).This shows the Romans determination, persistence and ability to utilize the wealth of Rome. The Romans felt they didnt need to repeat what had happened with the corvus again so they omitted it from their new ship designs. This resulted in the Roman ships being much lighter and much more manoeuvrable then the Carthaginian ships. The Romans met the Carthaginians in 241 BC where they cut them off at the Battle of the Aegates Islands. The Carthaginians ships had very inexperienced crews as they were newly enlisted men who had just signed up for this battle.They couldnt handle the heavy and inept Carthaginian ships with their lack of skills and experience. Similar to the way the Romans were before the beginning of the First Punic War. The Carthaginians were commanded by Hanno and the Romans were commanded by Catulus. The fighting was predictably one sided as the Romans captured 7 0 ships and sunk 50 ships. Hanno was subsequently executed for his failure in this battle. After the Battle of the Aegates Islands, Hamilcar was allowed to negotiate terms of surrender. The terms included money to pay for the newly constructed fleet and no Punic war ships were allowed in Italian waters (Rickard).The Romans were victorious and the Punic War came to a close. by means of fierce determination to rebuild the Roman Navy in 242 BC and their ability to adapt their ships to the new circumstances led to a Roman victory and a sinewy development of the Roman Navy. The development and overhaul of the Roman navy during the First Punic War shows a number of qualities that were key to Roman domination in the next centuries. Their adaptability and ability to reap a strategic assessment of the Carthage navy and how to overcome it was very Copernican in leading to a victory in the First Punic War.Through their determination and persistence they were able to learn from their mista kes and overcome what had cost them their early losses. It was the Romans ability to utilize available resources to reconstruct their destroyed navy. They likewise came up with a creative solution to a problem of struggle ships to help benefit their strengths of hand to hand combat. This was a very strong development of the Roman navy and led to their stranglehold on the Mediterranean for the majority of the next centuries. In fact, during the Second Punic War, Hannibal abandoned his once powerful Carthage fleet to focus on conquering by land.The victories in the sea bred confidence in the Roman navy. They were able to bring the battle directly to the Carthaginians and take it out of Italy. With the final destruction of Carthage and the end of the third gear Punic War, Rome was the master of the Mediterranean. This as a result reduced any threat of a naval power and the navy had reached its tiptop (Gabriel). In conclusion, the First Punic War was the spark that set off the Romans to put a lot of time, resources and manpower into developing and redeveloping their navy to bend the super power that it was.