After the collapse of the Hittite empire, the Phoenicians began to prosper. The were a seafaring people intent on trade, not territorial hegemony. With the press of the growing Assyrian empire in the ninth century, and perhaps an increase in population, the Tyrians sent colonists to the site of what they called 'New City', Carthage. Carthage would grow to rival her mother city of Tyre and she is the only colony that founded new colonies in Spain, Sardinia, Sicily and North Africa. Ship. For more information on commericial shipping, see Lancel (1992, 1995), pages 121-133. Last year a virtual graveyard of ships have been found in the waters between Sicily and Carthage. Most of the wrecks appear to be Roman transport ships.

When the settlers arrived in what is Tunisia, they encountered the native population of Berbers who had been in the area since the ninth millennium BCE. The resulting culture we call Punic was an amalgamation of native and Punic elements. The Berbers, who had been semi-nomadic, adopted urban living.