Carthaginian Government

The government of Carthage was based on a system of elected officials accountable to a popular assembly. Unlike its founding city, Tyre in Phoenicia, Carthage did not have a monarchy but its politics was dominated by an aristocratic elite which was composed of competing clans and which held all important political, judicial, and military positions. As in other contemporary ancient cultures participation in political life and the popular assembly of the city was limited to those who held citizenship – indigenous and free males. Although the system was praised by such noted figures as Aristotle, some of the exact workings of the Carthaginian government have remained elusive, a situation further confused by Greek and Roman writers using their own familiar terminology to describe the political institutions of Carthage.