Weekly national intelligencer., 1864-03-31
NATIONAL INTELLIGENCER.
A QUESTION In ETHEoLoGY,

over the Pyrennees aud Alps, and 70 the means W
which he subsisted his army
MypplETowN, (MD) MARCH "a, 1864
M.ssrs FprroRs Yur interesting historical account
of the subsistence ancient armies has suggested an
inquiry in regard 10 the extraction OF Hannibal one OF the
greatest generals of ancient times Souo contend mat
was of African or negro race and DINERS lnaL no
prang from branch Of the Semitic race. Not doubling
hut thai you have historical data at hand to arrive a
conclusion beg to say that rehearsal OF the
through your columns cannot fail to interest many Oh
reiders Yours, very respectfully, f'"t.
The question whether Hannibal was negro or
not, is, so far we are aware, purely modern IN
its origin and local in its prevalence, being con-
fined to the United States. In no other age or
land than ours would it be possible perhaps for
such an inquiry to have been started-betrayipg
as it does rare degree of Ignorance in conJunc-
ton with that pbilantkropic fanaticism which feels
itself called to exalt the negro race in proportion
70 the vulgar contempt in which it is held by
another species of fanaticism.
1t is true that an offce- of the Government, Mr.
William Whiting, the Solicitor of the War Depart
ment, has made himself responsible for the modern
statement with regard to the negro extraction OF
Hannibal; but Mr.. Whiting, We fear, is not much
stronger in history than he is in constitutional
law. We have no doubt that the Solicitor fully
believes Hannibal was negro, because born in
Africa, and, IS it appears from the suggestion of
our correspondent that there are others who labor
under the same chronological delusion, We may be
permitted to state the facts in the far enough
to correct such misapprehension
We may say, then, that Carthage was founded
by the Phenicians, and, unless people change
their color and extraction by the mere fact of
changing their sky, we must suppose that Pha-
nician born in Carthage would not differ much
from Phencian born in Tyre. And, as we have
never heard it asserted that the Tyrians were ne
groes, we know of no possible ground on which it
oan be supposed that their descendants became
negroes in Carthage, merely because they lived in
a country where negroes are the aborigines. We
suppose that even Mr.. Whiting would not con-
tend that Gen. Butler, the present renowned
military commander of the Department Of Virginia
and North Carolina, is a Pequot or Narragansett
Indian, simply because his English ancestors may
have originally settled among one of the Indian
tribes inhabiting New England. But we submit
that it would be quite rational to predicate such
an chronological statement of our Happy W r
rior" as to affirm that Hannibal was = negro be-
cause he was born In country where negroes
were part of the native population.
According to Appian, Carthage was settled
by the Phenicians about $50 years before Rome
was founded. A little more than two centuries
after the first settlement was made on the African
coast, the city had extended her sway over Africa
from the pillars of Hercules to the frontiers of
Peutapolis, while towards the south, among the
Moors and Lybians, her boundaries were underlined,
because they were limited only by her desire o
conquest in that direction Justin informs us that
she treated the native populations of Africa,
whether Moorish or Numidian, with great rigor
She used them precisely as Great Britain uses the
natives of EastIndia, and it would be as reason
able to call British subject born on the Ganges
a Hindoo as to call Hannibal negro because he
was born in northern Africa SO little it true that
the Carthaginians were negroes and so strong was
the old Phenician pride of caste in Carthage, such
the pre-emDepce Of the sangre aru that the half
breeds" springing from the union of Carthaginians
with the native Lybian or Moorish races were not
admitted to terms of political or social equality in
tne CITY. anu IHest races, DC IL were
very far from being "negroes'' y "It was a usual
practice" says DR.. Arnold, "for the moth,r city
to send out colonies of these halfbreed, to the At
lantic coasts of Africa, and probably of Spain Also
beyond the pillars Of Hercules" appears, indeed
if the Creek version Of the Periplus Of Hanno may
be trusted, that the circumnavigatsry voyage, SO
named, was undertaken mainly for the settling of
thirty thousand of these Afro Pheenicians on the
African coast south of the Straits of Gibraltar.
The classical reader is aware that the poet
Terence was a Carthaginian by birth. About
twenty years before Carthage fell under the blows
of Scipio Africauus Eve beg to suggest to the un-
classical reader that Scipio was not a negro al
though surnamed the Atrican) he was carried to
Rome as Punic prisoner Of war, and was there
sold in slavery to the Senator Terentius Lucanus,
whose name he adopted. 1t has never been sup,
posed that Terence was negro, nor is the only
sxtant literary fragment of the Punic tongue, as
preserved in the Panulus, Ii. e. "Little Carthsgi-
man. one of the plays of Pautu,, where Hanno
is introduced, supposed by any body that we ever
heard of to belong to native dialect of Africa
We know from Appian and from other sqEces
that Roman colony founded on or near the
remains of Punic Carthage in the time Of G. Grac-
. chus and +. Fulvius. We have never read that
these Romans became negroes by being trans