From Wikipedia

Rome

Episode Two

Legions Of Conquest

The Punic Wars are a series of three wars fought between Rome and Carthage from 264 to 146 BC. They were probably the largest wars yet of the ancient world. The term Punic comes from the Latin word Punicus (or Poenicus), meaning "Carthaginian", with reference the Carthaginians' Phoenician ancestry.

The main cause of the Punic Wars was the clash of interests between the existing Carthaginian Empire and the expanding Roman Republic. The Romans were initially interested in expansion via Sicily, part of which lay under Carthaginian control. At the start of the first Punic War, Carthage was the dominant power of the Western Mediterranean, with an extensive maritime empire, while Rome was the rapidly ascending power in Italy, but lacked the naval power of Carthage. By the end of the third war, after more than a hundred years and the deaths of many hundreds of thousands of soldiers from both sides, Rome had conquered Carthage's empire and razed the city, becoming the most powerful state of the Western Mediterranean. With the end of the Macedonian Wars — which ran concurrently with the Punic Wars — and the defeat of the Seleucid King Antiochus III the Great in the Roman–Syrian War (Treaty of Apamea, 188 BC) in the eastern sea, Rome emerged as the dominant Mediterranean power and one of the most powerful cities in the classical world.

Greece and the Aegean on the eve of the Second Macedonian War (200 BC)