A 23-year war reaches a decisive fleet battle

The Battle of the Aegates was the decisive naval action at the end of a 23-year conflict. The estimates given are roughly 200 Roman quinqueremes and 250 Carthaginian warships, with another 150 to 350 Carthaginian transports. At about 450 people per quinquereme, the Roman fleet alone represented roughly 90,000 personnel, while the Carthaginian force may have exceeded 100,000. The comparison puts the earlier Battle of Ecnomus at about 290,000 combatants, so even Aegates was not the war's largest fleet action. The war began after mercenaries seized Messina and sought help from both Carthage and Rome while Syracuse tried to recover the city. Rome intervened despite having little prior interest in Sicily because it did not want Carthaginian power established immediately across the strait. By the closing campaign, most soldiers in the armies had not been born when the war began.