The Carthaginian Empire

Carthage was a powerful maritime city-state founded by Phoenician settlers from Tyre in the 9th or 8th century BCE. Situated in modern Tunisia, Carthage grew into the dominant power in the western Mediterranean. Developing into a vast trading empire with colonies across North Africa, Iberia, Sardinia, Sicily, and beyond.

Carthage’s military strength lay not in citizen levies, but in its ability to hire and command diverse mercenary forces. These forces included Iberians, Gauls, Numidians, Balearic slingers, and Greek hoplites. The Carthaginian navy was one of the most formidable in antiquity, with swift war galleys that rivalled those of Greece and Rome.

Carthaginian armies were often led by aristocratic generals, the most famous being Hannibal Barca, who famously crossed the Alps with war elephants during the Second Punic War (218–201 BCE).

Carthage fought a series of brutal conflicts with Rome — the Punic Wars — ultimately ending in disaster. In 146 BCE, after a long siege, Rome razed Carthage to the ground, killing or enslaving the population and salting the earth — though this last detail may be more legend than fact.

Carthage 15mm STL Files

The army list here is intended to represent Carthaginian armies from ca. 235 – 146BCE

Where possible I have sculpted models to be self supporting. Where needed, I add supports during my sculpting process rather than afterward. The integration of supports into design allows me to reduce the number of supports needed, and to position them more favourably. My supports need to be removed with clippers or a scalpel. All models requiring supports are also supplied in an unsupported format in case you would prefer to have full control over support placement.

Some infantry models are also supplied in 13.5mm scale strips. Strip mounted models are supplied on strips intended for use on 60mm wide bases. If you wish to print my 15mm sculpts in 13.5mm please scale them by 0.9.

Please see unit descriptions to see the variety of helmet and shield options included. The Carthage army consists of home troops and militia. The full diversity of the Carthage army can be represented with the Carthage and allies pack which includes Numidian and Iberian troops.

Map credits:
Basemap and geographic features from Natural Earth (naturalearthdata.com). Map built in QGIS.
Historical overlays digitised by the author from historical sources for educational and illustrative use.