The Worst Defeat in Roman Naval History – Drepana 249 BC

The Battle of Drepana, 249 BC, was the worst defeat in Roman naval history. Fifteen years into the First Punic War, the Roman Republic had beaten Carthage at Mylae and Cape Ecnomus and pinned its enemy into two ports in western Sicily: Lilybaeum and Drepana. When the siege of Lilybaeum stalled, the consul Publius Claudius Pulcher gambled on a night voyage up the coast to trap the Carthaginian admiral Adherbal inside his own harbour. The fleet arrived strung out, Adherbal slipped out to open water, and the Roman quinqueremes were pinned against the shore with no room to turn. Polybius says ninety-three warships were captured in a single morning. Soon after, a storm wrecked the fleet of the other consul, Lucius Junius Pullus, and Rome all but abandoned the sea for years. Later Romans blamed the sacred chickens that Claudius supposedly threw overboard. This animated map documentary follows the siege, the plan, the battle, the trial that followed, and the Roman comeback at the Aegates Islands in 241 BC – and asks what really cost Rome its fleet. Chapters: 0:00 Ninety-Three Ships, One Morning 0:37 A Land Power Goes to Sea 4:47 The Siege of Lilybaeum 8:25 Claudius Takes Command 11:14 The Sacred Chickens 12:40 Midnight Voyage to Drepana 14:03 The Battle of Drepana 21:17 A Second Fleet Lost 24:33 Rome Puts Claudius on Trial 26:41 Revenge at the Aegates Sources: Polybius, Histories, Book 1.41–64 (Loeb translation, LacusCurtius) – https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Rom... Diodorus Siculus, Library of History, Book 24 fragments – https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Rom... Cicero, On the Nature of the Gods 2.7 – https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Rom... Cicero, On Divination 1.27–29 – https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Rom... Livy, Periochae 19 – https://www.livius.org/sources/content/liv... Suetonius, Life of Tiberius 2 – https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Rom... Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights 10.6 – https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Rom... Eutropius, Breviarium 2.26 – https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/eutropi... Scholia Bobiensia on Cicero, Against Clodius and Curio – https://www.attalus.org/translate/bobiensi... Valerius Maximus, Memorable Deeds and Sayings 8.1 – https://www.attalus.org/translate/valerius... J. Rickard, "Battle of Drepanum, 249 B.C." (History of War) – https://www.historyofwar.org/articles/batt... Battle of Drepana (Wikipedia) – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Dr... Maps: drawn by Wars in Ink · base data Natural Earth (public domain) · terrain AWS Terrain Tiles · Illustrations: original artwork created for this channel (AI-assisted) · Archival art: public-domain images of ancient reliefs, mosaics and engravings · Music: YouTube Audio Library #history #documentary #ancienthistory