260 BC
The attack on the flanks
The rest of the Carthaginian fleet swings wide to attack the Romans from the sides and the rear, out of reach of the bridges. The corvi can be turned on their mountings, and 20 more Carthaginian ships are grappled and taken. The survivors, faster than the Roman ships, break off and escape.
The column of Gaius Duilius with the rams of captured ships, as reconstructed in an engraving published in Rome in 1575Wikimedia Commons, anonymous, CC0 (Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae- Column of Duilius MET DP870466.jpg)
These are Polybius’s figures. The inscription on Duilius’s column gives 31 ships captured and 13 sunk. Duilius sails on to relieve Segesta, which the Carthaginians are besieging. In Rome he celebrates the first triumph for a victory at sea, and a column decorated with the rams of the captured ships is set up in the Forum.
Sources
- Polybius, Histories, book 1, 23.
- John Lazenby, The First Punic War (1996).
- Adrian Goldsworthy, The Fall of Carthage (2006).
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