“To be taken with a pinch of salt” 😂

One of my favorite Simpsons exchanges is when Homer steals all of Flanders's flowers from his garden to decorate a float. Flanders says something like "I don't mind that you took all my flowers to decorate your float, but did you have to salt the earth as well?"

My history lessons made it sound like Carthage became a desolate landscape. But then I read The Confessions of Saint Augustine and learned that it was still a major city by 300 A.D. It just no longer had the power that it once had.

North Africa, specifically the area around coastal Tunisia was a major breadbasket of Imperial Rome, so even before I looked further into it, I always assumed the salting the earth was just an exegeration to show the destuctivness of the Roman sack.

Roman soldiers, looking at millions of tonnes of salt: You want us to what

Maybe salting the Earth was some sort of ritual to show that Carthage was indeed destroyed.

Well for one thing they wouldn't have wasted the salt, salt was an important commodity. the Romans rebuilt Carthage and it was part of their empire for centuries after that, so salting the earth so nothing would grow there again would have been really dumb.

Confused time traveller with AR-15 and platoon of marines: We're here for the peppering of Baalbek.

The equivalent phrase to salting the earth now would be to glass them. It was probably a turn of phrase.

My history professor pushes that the salting of Carthage did happen, but to only a minor plot of land. He talks about how when Rome declares war on others they throw a spear into their land. But as Rome got bigger, it took longer to go to the border to throw the spear. So Rome “gave” a plot of land (think of a small section of a garden or lawn) to the enemy so they could throw the spear into it to declare war. My history professor believes that they salted that little plot in Rome for symbolism. A lot cheaper then salting the actual land of Carthage

An interesting tidbit: here in Ireland we have something very similar to salting the earth but it works in reverse for us. We plough bog land with crushed lime to make it mimic arable soil. It goes from swampy marsh that can only sustain peat moss, reeds, and some root vegetables and forageable shrubs into actually usable farmland you can grow a range of edible crops in.

I never thought about it and took it for granted. But it is true, salt would have been too expensive for making the land infertile. Thank you for this video!

I always presumed that's what the phrase meant. "Making the area virtually uninhabitable on a scale required for civilization" (interesting video tho, as always, to be clear)

Have any archaeologists tested the soil around old Carthage?

Most likely was that the romans used saltwater to salt the soil around the immediate area of Carthage as a symbolic act

Salt was also extremely expensive. Soldiers were often paid with bags of salt. Perhaps the Romans pumped seawater and flooded the land, which dried up, leaving a layer of salt behind

You learn something new every day. Thanks.

there is also the idea of salt having a purifying role and Carthage being in need of such action

*LOL. Setting aside the fact the reports of Carthage being salted didn't emerge until the mid-Nineteenth Century, the whole reason why Rome went to war with Carthage for the third - and final - time was to gain control of the rich, agricultural hinterlands around the city. This fertile farmland was the real basis for Carthaginian greatness, the key to Carthage's recovery after she lost her empire at the end of the Second Punic War. The Romans taking control of this cornucopia just to turn around and sterilize it makes absolutely no sense, whatsoever.*

1. Motive: They already destroyed the city and its inhabitants. The rich land is yours to profit from. What would be the point of ruining it? 2. Execution: Where would they get the vast amount of expensive salt necessary to do so? 3. History: The city, soon rebuilt by Romans, continued to be agriculturally productive after the conquest. 4. Record: There is no actual record of salting the land.

Pronunciation note: you'd do a better job pronouncing Shechem if you pretended it's written as "Shkhem". The "CH" in "Shechem" is not pronounced as it is in "Change". It's כ, which is pronounced in this context very close to the common Modern Hebrew Pronunciation of ח (the "incorrect" one). If you've ever heard an Israeli (or someone imitating one) say Hanukka, you'll know the sound I mean. As for the first "E" in "ShEchem", the common modern pronunciation doesn't commonly include it, and there's an argument over the original pronunciation, so "Shekhem" and "Shkhem" would both be fine - but "Shkhem" would be more recognizable to most native speakers. As always, thanks for the video!

Seems Romans did a pretty good job leveling Carthage without the salt. Can't imagine they'd waste that much money anyway, salt was pretty expensive stuff those days.

I always wondered where Roman got all the salt that would have been required to actually salt the land with salt. I mean, just think about how much salt would have been required and the logistics of getting it there and spreading it out over a HUGE area.

HC, a question about the Peloponnesian war. I have never heard about a Spartan attempt at attacking Athena's walls directly at any point during the war, they've roamed and pillaged the countryside just outside the walls. Have there actually been none or I am not aware of it? I know Phillip of Macedon had siege weapons, and that is not chronologically far apart and there were siege weapons in other cultures much earlier then that so this question itches me in a wrong way

It's not boring. It's fascinating!

Carthage: "Hi-diddily-ho neighbor! I couldn't help but notice you picked all of my empire." Romer:"Cant have and empire without an empire." Carthage:"True enough, but did you have to salt the earth so nothing will ever grow again?" Romer:'Yeah." (NOTE: Carthage's wheat fields were fine in the next episode, to be Romer's breadbasket, but Hannibal died on the way to his home planet).

they probably salted like the top flowers in the main temple as a symbolic gesture and a long game of telephone later we got were we are

i've wondered about this salting because another factoid i've heard is that salt was so valuable people were paid with it, so it seems like a very expensive activity? would the latter method...the making of the ground more hospitable to weeds have also required tons of salt though?

Relating to the older bronze age civilisations, where would they get enough salt to render a significant amount of land infertile?

Sounds interesting to me!

yea its from a 1848 book. the salting. or 1824?28?

3:15 Future generations will remember the 19th century as the golden age of historical mendacity, followed closely by the 18th.

Maybe breaking down sea walls and/or pumping sea water into agricultural fields is a more cost effective way to salt the earth.

And wasn’t salt at the time extremely valuable? Would they want to use so much for this somewhat abstract purpose?

Wasn't salt used as a partial pay to Roman soldiers? (the word salary comes from salt) Not sure it would make sense to use it for the purpose of killing the soil.

Could natron have been used in the biblical accounts?

I would have liked you to mention the value of salt as a commodity. Ive heard that aalt was extremely valuable in the ancient world

Thank you! Another boring truth: the Carthaginian "genocide" didn't happen. The Romans killed or enslaved the city's inhabitants, yes. But that was the usual fate of a city that forced a costly siege at that time (although they definitely did it with prejudice). But the Carthaginians' Punic identity, language and culture was spread right across the Western Mediterranean, and we know it survived. Punic was still the common tongue around the city in St Augustine's time (5th century AD). The supposed genocide is just a sensationalist and pervasive historical trope. It's like claiming all Romans were wiped out when Gaiseric or Alaric sacked the city or the Sicilian Greeks disappeared with Syracuse's fall - it ignores centuries of empire, colonization, and the simple fact that cities need hinterlands. If the Romans really wanted to expunge Carthage from the record, why didn't they rename it when they rebuilt it?

"obliterated" vs "conquered and returned to nature as if it never existed" seems like the same thing to me

I dud a calculation with my son and friends about how much human effort would be required to truly "salt the earth" using sea water.. even if the entire Roman army spent a year doing nothing else, they wouldn't have made much impact!..I.e. you woukd need around 10-100 million litres of sea water per hectare to do it properly depending on rainfall levels. So a legion 10,000 strong carrying 150 litres of sea water each a day would manage to do a hectare in 1 year!

Wow. The harbor back in the day really looks like the Great Harbor Ship of Bentus!

what is karsetsch ?

Considering that salt was a very valuable resource at the time, the claim is laughable from the beginning. In history class as a child though, I surely believed it.

I always thought they just screwed up some fields to make a point. Water them with sea water, maybe even a canal or two (romans liked them) and done, I'd imagine. Or that it might be a metaphor for "we littered the place with dead bodies" (because soldiers where paid with salt and their name basically means salt boy^^) or just a metaphor for ruining the place, because they might as well just salt the place up, and it wouldn't have made a difference.

I have all notifications from you on.

I tried salting the weeds on a little patch of my driveway. Didn't work.

Quick note about pronunciation. In Semitic languages "ch" is pronounced more like "kh". Think Scottish "lach" instead of English "church". So "Shechem" is going to sound like "Shekhem".

I think I heard somewhere that what actually happened was that Rome set aside a very small plot of land in or near the city of Rome that they “let” Carthage annex and then salted that small plot with salt as a symbolic gesture.

I salted my backyard with water softner salt I bought from Home Depot. Weeds didn't care.

It comes from the same bag as the story of soldiers in besieged castles throwing boiling oil at attackers. Considering how valuable salt and oil were... I don't think so.

It is a metaphore ....

I think it was actually done on a ceremonial basis on a small plot.

I got added to the mythos as symbolism, it's complete destruction but also because Carthage became great because of it's food exports before it was force to relly on Silver from Spain after the First Punic war.

So you can't tell us if it was salted or not - and if it was salted you can't tell us what it was salted with?

It's a thing that was done in ancient times for various reasons but often it was because the place had been a dedicated site for demon-god worship and human sacrifices.

I always thought this was odd, considering the region would become an important source of grain and food for Rome later.

Thank you for your boring story.

A metaphor for not letting Carthage rise again? 🤷🏻‍♀️

4:13 It looked better in 3 BC. They really should restore the area. Putin a museum and other culture facility, plus top notch resulraunts and cafes. It would create lots of jobs, bring people to the area etc. Hire me Tunisia, I'll take care of it.

It makes more sense that someone might say the land was reduced to ash. Everything was burned and the land was blackened.

One of the first unconditional surrenders imposed, general Patton saw himself as Hannibal

There are also claims that William The Conqueror also 'salted' virtually the whole area of the northern most parts of England during his infamous 'Harrying of the North'. But I've always wondered if that would really have been feasible, even considering that there are still until this very day salt works not far in places like Nantwich, etc. Seems a ridiculous amount of 'man hours' would be needed to be able to do such a thing, even today.

Interesting point at the end, I would’ve thought that there could’ve been some sort of ritual where salt was cast into a single furrow. Thereby symbolically destroying the city. Kinda like the Columna Bellica

Has anyone done the calculations to see how much salt would be required to ruin a square kilometer of land?

In the days of the Roman Empire salt was highly prized and expensive. No one with any sense would have wasted it on revenge.

Salting could come from intensive cereal agriculture at that latitude. Deep rooted plants keep the water table down. When the deep rooted plants are ripped up, the water table to rises, leaving salt on the surface of the productive ground.

Even though it seems to not have happened, I think the most powerful aspect of salting the earth is that though Rome could have benefited from using the fertile north African land, causing harm to the Carthaginians remnant, where they dwelled, or their memory was so important that Rome was willing to harm itself.

the geologist-archaeologist could, in theory, take soil core samples drilled down several feet and test them for layers of soil with a high salt content, could they not? Or, maybe they have done this before?

Having visited modern Carthage I can confirm that there is plenty of plant life, & how does this fit with the phrase 'salt of the earth' as a positive idea?

Given how rare and expensive salt was during the era, it seems unlikely anyone truly salted fields. It would be expensive and likely not practical. I agree they likely used something else.

Considering how expensive salt was throughout antiquity, the story makes sense as a way of saying the Romans were so ruthless in their ending of Carthage that they 'spared no expense'.

If the romans had salted carthage, wouldn't regular rainfall have washed all the salt out by now?

Perhaps Rome had salted soils used for gardens of the city rather than vast farm land in the region. The city might have been too large to destroy all the structures so after the defeat they simply spoiled the smaller gardens inside the city to keep people away from immediate re-settlement and over time Rome had build up local administration and authority over the area. You can see this today when a military takes over an area they may do things to prevent civilians from getting back in to some area by destroying access roads or paths, water and infrastructure overall.

I think we are way overthinking it in our modern mind. Carthage was conquered and the people enslaved, salting the earth could have been more of a symbolic gesture that did not damage the soil for more than a few decades or a century. And here we are 2200 years later, doubt any trace of the salting is left.

I once had to deal with weeds growing on the edges of my driveway and decided to use this method. Using bags of pool salt I applied so much that it sat on the ground like snow. The weeds came back within 3 months like nothing ever happened! It was no more effective than cheap weed killer. Which is probably why you never hear of gardeners using salt to kill weeds.

We salt the earth here in the north all winter long and it seems to have no to little effect. The amount of salt it would take to make enough of a nations farmland unproductive to the point that the nation would be unviable would be cost prohibitive (effectively imposable) even to a modern superpower.

That much salt would’ve been way too expensive

What city is now?

For anyone listening, I suggest giving Dan Carlin's "Punic Nightmares" series a chance. It covers this event in detail.

Wait, you're telling their actually were cities that were salted?! Not Carthage but some in the Near East... I do seem to remember that Mesopotamia had a lot of problems dealing with salt build up in their soil, possibly a side-effect of irrigation. Maybe it didn't take much effort there to ruin the soil for wheat.

SOOOO it wasn't pink Himalayan salt??? Ayeee first again!

We know that climate in north afica has been changing to a more arid scene in the last few thousand years, a consequence of this is the increase of the salinity of lakes, their evaporation and the formation of the sabkhas, the sality of bodies of water ranges from fresh water in the north to brine/salt flats in the south (chottt jrid), my hypothesis is that climate change is what changed the salinity due to reduced precipitation. We are observing the same thing today with modern climate change.

I just came back from Tunisia, and of course I visited Carthage. It was nice but the Roman structures such as Anthony's bathhouse were much better. If you visit Carthage, make sure to visit Sidi Bou Said as well, it's very pretty.

Salt was very expensive back then.

The City became a Roman Colony under the aegis of the Gracchan reforms around 145 BC.

There were two peanuts walking down the street and one of them was assaulted... peanut.

So they did do it. Just not as dramatically as it's hyped up to be.

I think it did but not on the scale we think it happened, they might have done it just as a statement, statement that Augustus kinda never considered, add that to the fact that even if you do it is just like you said wilderness will take over, so maybe they did it but only for the important parts of the city

Carthage destruction is very similar to the site of Jericho’s (Aykent) genocide even the animals killed in Aykent apparently.

Salt water, they flooded the fields with the sea.

I dont believe it happened, but for arguments sake COULD they have used sea water? Just a though experiment

Considering how rare and valuable salt was back then this should have been obvious.

That last part about the simple logistics of getting enough salt to make the whole area desolate is what I asked my teacher long ago. And she just said "whatever, it happened." But the other big red flag to me is, how far did they supposedly salt the Earth? I mean, what if it was just the surrounding area? Nothing is stopping the people of Carthage just farming a couple miles away. Or importing food from one of their many colonies. I also feel like there could have been a way to "salt the Earth" by letting sea water flood the land. But again, why go to all that effort after you've just conquered something? The Romans could just use it themselves. And they did.

May not be factual, but it's still decent metaphor to get across just how determined the Romans were to not only defeat Carthage, but wipe them off the face of the earth. The idea that they would resort to such an extreme measure just to ensure the city itself could never come back again certainly sounds like something they'd do if it were possible. What we do know is that the area was completely depopulated and a new city wouldn't arise in its place until roman settlers started rebuilding there a century later.

Expensive thing to do back in the time period.

I wonder if part of the reason the myth stuck around is that the destruction of Carthage and the associated economic/political structure was so complete that it was *as if* the city had been salted. Even the language of the Carthaginian people would die out.

I thought we all assumed it was an expression. Wow, idiom turns out to mean something figuratively and not literally, not actually that surprising. Consider how many of our phrases like skin a cat etc aren't literal

Well, here’s the thing about salt in soil. It can be a pretty serious issue if you are short of rain fall or you have drainage problems. The thing is, 🙄 none of these problems are actually insurmountable. It’s possible that you don’t get the same choices of crops, it’s possible that some years might have to be “fallow” years but “salted” soil isn’t going to remain permanently unproductive. This actually makes the investigation of the historical events substantially harder. It really might have happened 🤷 we probably wouldn’t be able to tell anyway!

Did anyone really think that they actually salted the earth?

Salt was expensive in those times. I don't think Romans waste huge amounts of it just to show the point.