1st Edition

A History of the Pyrrhic War

By Patrick Alan Kent Copyright 2020
    152 Pages
    by Routledge

    152 Pages
    by Routledge

    A History of the Pyrrhic War explores the multi-polar nature of a conflict that involved the Romans, peoples of Italy, western Greeks, and Carthaginians during Pyrrhus’ western campaign in the early third century BCE.



    The war occurred nearly a century before the first historical writings in Rome, resulting in a malleable narrative that emphasized the moral virtues of the Romans, transformed Pyrrhus into a figure that resembled Alexander the Great, disparaged the degeneracy of the Greeks, and demonstrated the malicious intent of the Carthaginians. Kent demonstrates the way events were shaped by later Roman generations to transform the complex geopolitical realities of the Pyrrhic War into a one-dimensional duel between themselves and Pyrrhus that anticipated their rise to greatness. This book analyses the Pyrrhic War through consideration of geopolitical context as well as how later Roman writers remembered the conflict. The focus of the war is taken off Pyrrhus as an individual and shifted towards evaluating the multifaceted interactions of the peoples of Italy and Sicily.



    A History of the Pyrrhic War is a fundamental resource for academic and learned general readers who have an interest in the interaction of developing imperial powers with their neighbors and how those events shaped the perceptions of later generations. It will be of interest not only to students of Roman history, but also to anyone working on historiography in any period.

    List of Abbreviations

    Maps

    Chapter 1: Remembering the Pyrrhic War

    Chapter 2: Conflict and Competition before Pyrrhus

    Chapter 3: The Military Campaigns of 280 and 279 BCE

    Chapter 4: The Diplomatic Negotiations of 280 and 279 BCE

    Chapter 5: In Sicily

    Chapter 6: A War Ends

    Epilogue

    Bibliography

    Index

    Biography

    Patrick Alan Kent is an Adjunct Professor at Jackson and Mid-Michigan Colleges in Michigan, USA. His research interests include the development of Roman relations with the peoples of Italy in the fourth and third centuries BCE.