CHAPTER 12
Andrew Dufton
Introduction
‘I, Dido, Queen and mother of Carthage, greet you on behalf of the Phoenicians.’ A woman welcomes me in spoken Phoenician, dressed in a sleeveless, belted chiton of deep Tyrian purple, tight dark curls held up and back by a single band, and wearing an elaborate array of chunky, golden jewellery (Figure 12.1). In the background is the prow of a ship, with a second tucked behind, entering into a natural harbour. Thus are players of the popular turn-based strategy game Civilization VI introduced to the figure of Dido, mythical founder of Carthage and potential ally or antagonist in the quest for victory.
Images of the Punic world, and especially Punic women such as Dido, are hardly a new phenomenon. From the Romans onwards, a handful of historical figures have dominated representations of Punic Carthage and – aside from the obvious exception of the general Hannibal Barca and his African elephants crossing the Alps – the most frequently invoked Punic individuals tend to be women. It is no surprise, therefore, that as game developers look to increase the number of female protagonists in ancient settings, they often turn to Carthaginian women for inspiration. Why and how these characters are invoked, however, rarely registers for players, and the representation of Punic women in gaming is given little attention within the wider scholarship on the Phoenician world.
Figure 12.1 An initial meeting with Dido in Civilization VI.
This paper places the current trend toward female Phoenician or Punic player characters firmly within a longer history of reimagining the Punic Mediterranean. Questions of orientalism, Classicism, and gender have often structured the way Phoenician materials are reinterpreted, and the realm of videogames is no exception. I consider both games relying on a pretense of historical accuracy (the Civilization franchise) and those drawing from sensational fictional accounts (Salammbô: Battle for Carthage) to analyse how Punic women are characterized and the impact of these representations on player interactions. Both sets of games ultimately rely on common historical, archaeological and literary perceptions of the Phoenicians to structure their content. If videogames are to take up the mantle of popular representation of the Punic past, we must interrogate how these recurring tropes reinforce earlier receptions and continue to distance Carthage from the more traditional Greek and Roman narratives of the ancient Mediterranean.
The reception of the Punic world
The current study follows a growing interest in the reception of the Phoenician and Punic Mediterranean.1 Recent scholarship has considered, for example, the uses of the Phoenician or Punic past in the development of modern identities in Sardinia, Tunisia and Lebanon, as well as the place of the Phoenician world and Carthage in the Western imagination more broadly.2 Quinn goes so far as to suggest that the Phoenicians as we know them, as a cohesive people or civilization, did not exist at all until the reception of Punic materials in later periods – first, by the Greeks and Romans in antiquity, followed by the subsequent reinterpretation and appropriation of Phoenician and Punic culture by nationalist movements.3 We cannot properly understand the portrayal of Punic women in videogames, therefore, unless we situate these twenty-first-century developments within a much longer history of the Phoenician and Punic world and its reception. Orientalism and gender emerge as two central themes that have structured both which materials or historical figures feature most heavily and how these objects, sites and people are represented.
Orientalism and gender
Images of ancient Carthage have been more involved in the discourse at the heart of postcolonial studies than one might expect. A discussion of the literary depiction of Carthage (and Carthaginian women) features in Edward Said’s Orientalism (1978), a foundational text that has shaped how we understand the creation and repetition of a fictional, idealized East in the Western imagination.4 In the most basic terms, Said’s orientalism refers to an ideological formation of non-Western culture – as lazy, untrustworthy, overtly sexual, dangerous, ‘other’ – that was created by Europeans in support of colonial rule and perpetuated through a system of representations of the East in literature, art and history.5
This othering has long been an integral feature in how historians, art historians and archaeologists have understood the Punic world. The first attempts at identifying ‘Phoenician’ culture justified the classification not on any known connection to the peoples of the Levant but rather based on the notable differences of certain monuments or materials from the more established cultures of the Greeks, Egyptians or Assyrians.6 Since these early disciplinary beginnings, our knowledge has often followed the example of the primary texts to keep the Phoenicians neatly compartmentalized, a one-dimensional people closely connected to commercial prowess and the maritime economy. An inherent Classicism in ancient Mediterranean studies that has treated the Phoenician and Punic world not as central to Mediterranean history but rather as a peripheral and, often, ephemeral presence further compounds this simplified narrative in the modern scholarship.7 As a result, early Phoenician exploration is often described solely in terms of its commercial nature – in direct contrast to the civilizing mission of the Greeks and effectively erasing the many similarities between Greek and Phoenician colonization efforts.8
The reception of the Punic world is further defined by acrimonious debate surrounding ritual practices, specifically the nature of the sanctuary known as the tophet. Sanctuaries containing cremated remains of infants and animals have been excavated across the central Mediterranean and, most famously, at Carthage itself. Archaeologists almost immediately connected these sites to historical mentions of infant sacrifice practiced by the Carthaginians, and thus named the sanctuaries tophets after a comparable location of ritual noted in the Hebrew Bible. The extent to which these spaces can be directly associated with ritual infant sacrifice is still in question; there are strong differences in scholarly interpretation on the perceived motives of ancient authors describing the rites, on the nature of the archaeological remains and on the associated epigraphic and iconographic corpus.9 Regardless, the prominence given to this question of sacrifice and the savagery of Punic ritual, combined with the focus on commerce and the Phoenician trader, has clearly been created by – and, in turn, perpetuated – an orientalist other that shares many characteristics with images of the non-European in much later periods. The Phoenician and Punic world as it exists in the Western imagination has long been engaged in greed, sacrificial infanticide and overall depravity that scholars are only recently beginning to deconstruct.10
Gender plays an additional role in shaping these perceptions. The contrast between Western and non-Western women – especially regarding the open sexuality of the latter – is a central tool of orientalist discourse. The sexual promiscuity of Phoenician women has often been highlighted by both ancient and modern authors, particularly a connection between sexuality and ritual.11 This issue is compounded by the fact that many of the most prominent historical figures from the Phoenician and Punic past carried into the literature or art of later periods were women; the way these women are presented further reinforces many of the orientalist tropes outlined here.
Dido and Salammbô
A few women warrant specific discussion. The first is Dido (also known as Elissa), mythical founder of the city of Carthage.12 Two distinct stories of Dido are known from primary texts. The first, and likely more accurate, account is that of the Gallo-Roman historian Pompeius Trogus within his Philippic Histories; this first-century BCE text is known only from a later summary (c. second century CE) provided by the writer Justin.13 In this version of events, the queen Dido flees the city of Tyre after the murder of her husband Acerbas (head priest of the temple of Melqart) by her brother, the king Pygmalion. Dido must use her considerable wits first to escape the city with the wealth of the temple, then to collect a number of sacred prostitutes from the island of Cyprus to form part of the founding population, and finally to secure land on the North African coast by famously cutting a hide into strips to encircle a greater area than promised by the indigenous population. Dido ultimately chooses to take her own life rather than be forced to marry the local king Hiarbas, throwing herself on a funeral pyre to preserve her honour and the memory of her husband.
In a second, more well-known version of the story by the Roman poet Virgil, Dido founds Carthage under similar terms but in the early years of the city she encounters, and falls in love with, the hero Aeneas.14 Aeneas, fleeing from the destruction of the fall of Troy, ultimately decides to abandon Dido and continue to the Italian peninsula where he founds the city of Alba Longa – a site that eventually contributes to the founding of Rome. Dido, heartbroken at the betrayal, impales herself on a sword gifted by Aeneas and sets herself alight on a funeral pyre, as the ships of Aeneas retreat from the coast.15 Reception of Dido has been shaped largely by this second account provided by Virgil, and the tragic picture of Dido longing for a lost love has inspired numerous operas and artistic works.16 In the North African cultural sphere, she holds yet a different meaning, as the ruler Elissa is celebrated for her loyalty to her murdered husband, for her chastity and for her resistance.17
A second notable female also bears mention at the confluence of the parallel influences of orientalism and gender in Phoenician reception. The titular character of Gustav Flaubert’s best-selling historical novel Salammbô (1862) continues to hold an outsized influence on popular imaginings of Carthage, over 150 years since the work’s initial publication.18 Flaubert, better known for his account of French rural life in Madame Bovary (1856), presents in Salammbô a stylized and evocative take on the city of Carthage during the Mercenary War (242–238 BCE). The plot follows the events of the conflict between Carthaginian forces and rebellious mercenaries, drawing rough inspiration from the historical account of Polybius’ Histories but adding lavish flourishes that greatly increase the fantastical nature of the narrative.19 The fictional Salammbô holds a central role. A priestess at the temple of Tanit and daughter of the (historical) general Hamilcar Barca, Salammbô becomes sexually entangled with the mercenary leader Matho (also a historical figure) after the latter breaks into the temple to steal the sacred veil of the goddess (the zaïmph). This connection ultimately leads to her demise, as Salammbô dies at the exact moment that Matho is executed by the Carthaginians in the novel’s final passages – again, we see the centrality of romantic tragedy in the portrayals of Punic women.
Beyond tragedy, however, Salammbô presents numerous over-the-top tropes that explain both why the work was addressed by Said and why it has featured so heavily in subsequent explorations of orientalist discourse and the ancient past. In a suggestive scene in chapter 10, Salammbô dances naked with a large snake that wraps around her waist and between her legs, a not particularly subtle evocation of the dangerous sexuality of the East that would have been even more shocking at the time the work was written. Both the Carthaginians and the mercenaries are particularly savage in their military strategy throughout the conflict to an extent that distances the events from more ‘civilised’ practices of violence.20 Most memorably, in chapter 13, Flaubert depicts a writhing crowd of unhinged Carthaginians chanting and tossing the infants of the city into a giant pit of flames inside a colossal brass statue to the god Moloch (i.e. the Carthaginian deity Baal Hammon). Flaubert was creating a deliberately provocative and orientalist world. That this work was produced in the same period as the early stages of French colonization of North Africa only makes the othering of Carthage vis-à-vis the Classical (European) past all the more striking. Moreover, this work carried an important cultural impact, with its orientalist themes reproduced repeatedly in art, opera, and film.21
How, then, does this history of Punic reception interact with the representation of the Punic world and specifically Punic women in the games? In the following discussion, I focus on examples of both games striving for historical accuracy (the Civilization franchise) and those relying on Punic Carthage as a backdrop for orientalist fantasy (Salammbô: Battle for Carthage). In each case, there is a clear connection to the questions of orientalism and gender that have structured much interaction with Punic materials in other media.
Historical realism: The Civilization franchise
Since its initial release in 1991, the Civilization franchise has dominated the field of turn-based, historical strategy games, and the release of the latest iteration, Civilization VI (Civ6), only consolidated this dominance. Firaxis, the company currently developing the franchise, announced in August 2019 that the latest version is the fastest selling ever and had recorded 5.5 million sales.22 The game also regularly features in industry lists and awards, including two wins from five nominations at the British Academy Games Awards hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.
Gameplay mechanics have evolved considerably across the various releases. In basic terms, the player selects a civilization – including both ancient options such as the Romans, Nubians, or Qin Dynasty and modern powers like America, the Republic of India or the union of Gran Colombia – controlled by a historically relevant leader. In the earliest versions the number of options was reasonably slim and the choice of civilization had little impact on gameplay. Subsequent releases, however, have featured a growing diversity of playable leaders, each with distinct personalities and cultural traits that encourage different styles of play and fill different roles as competition. Beginning with ‘the dawn of civilization’, usually a fixed point at 4000 BCE, play moves forward chronologically from the first permanent settlement through to the mid-twenty-first century. Precise parameters or conditions for victory change across the different releases but usually include territorial expansion or military conquest, scientific discovery, or exerting a degree of diplomatic, cultural or religious domination.23
One of the key strengths of the Civilization franchise, and likely one of the reasons for its enduring popularity, is the attention to historical detail and a widespread perception of authenticity amongst its players.24 This historical specificity also means the game has featured frequently in discussions on the role of gaming in classroom pedagogy or as a form of meaningful historical engagement.25 However, Civilization has also been rightly criticized for a heavy Western focus and the teleological development of ‘civilization’ that forms the game’s core concept. While the latest release has been commended for a more balanced representation of leaders and non-European natural and built developments,26 concerns over the centrality of colonial narratives of exploitation and conquest remain.27 Even the inclusion of non-Western characters and – by extension – non-Western histories into the explicitly colonial framework of the game can be seen as a form of co-opting non-colonial societies into an imperialist paradigm.28 Rather than encourage players to explore underrepresented historical peoples, this in effect silences the subaltern voices that should be at the heart of attempts to decolonize history curricula. These issues are not unique to Civilization; Mukherjee has observed that alternative narratives in videogames are only possible ‘within the system that the game provides’; whether players choose to or not, in many games they are actively engaging with and reinforcing colonialism and orientalist discourses.29
Civilization and the Punic world
Critiques of the overtly colonial nature and Western lens of the Civilization franchise are entirely valid. However, the question of how Civilization engages with non-Western material is what makes the reception of the Punic world within the historical confines of the game an interesting avenue for analysis. Carthage first appears as a playable option or opponent in Civilization II (as either Dido or Hannibal) and later versions usually continued to allow for play as Carthage – in each case under the leadership of Hannibal. It is not until the Gods and Kings expansion of Civilization V (Civ5) – released in June 2012 – that Dido makes her first solo appearance as a playable character. She reigns as leader of the Carthaginians, with units appropriately distinguished by elephant icons in Tyrian purple, a grant of free harbours in all coastal cities, and a special ability for military troops to cross mountains that is clearly inspired by the events of the Second Punic War.30 When encountering Dido as an opponent, her avatar appears at night – wearing a long, belted robe with hair covered by a veil – on an open terrace overlooking the sea.31 The AI is characterized by a focus on naval units, maritime connectivity and a likeliness to be deceptive in her quest for military or diplomatic victory.32
Dido did not return as one of the original leaders in the most recent release (Civ6). She was later added as a character option representing not the Carthaginians but the Phoenicians as part of the second major expansion pack, released in February 2019. To explore the parameters of gameplay as Dido for this discussion, I focused on this version of Dido in the latest Civilization offering, Civilization VI: Gathering Storm.
Playing Dido
From the first moments of gameplay as Dido, the influence of the ancient sources on the game design is clear. ‘Queen Dido, Mother of Carthage, all your life you faced great threats and overcame them through wit and cunning’ exclaims the narration as the game loads and I await my fate (emphasis added). I read briefly about Dido’s special features and abilities as the narration continues and an orchestral theme swells. ‘The seas are your roads, the far horizon is your destiny and your refuge.’
In Civ6, each leader is provided with unique bonuses roughly associated with either their personal biography or that of their civilization. These can include special military units, buildings or urban districts, resource bonuses, or other perks that steer the player into adopting a certain strategy that aligns with the history of the civilization in question. As is the case with all leaders, Dido’s civilization-specific characteristics heavily structure gameplay as this character. Her ‘Founder of Carthage’ ability allows the Phoenicians to shift capitals to various cities across the diaspora and grants additional trading capacities. Dido’s second ability, ‘Mediterranean colonies’, secures the loyalty of coastal cities and provides additional movement for settlers moving across bodies of water.33 Phoenicia’s unique unit, the bireme, and specialty city district, the cothon, are clearly inspired both by historical accounts of the maritime capacity of the Phoenicians and excavated archaeological remains.34
In each playthrough as Dido, these historical traits did affect my choices somewhat but not nearly as much as other game mechanics, suggesting that attempts by the developers to accurately portray Dido and mould a unique experience of play as Phoenicia were only moderately successful. The civilization’s characteristics did encourage the spread of cities overseas, and this facilitated a play style with a heavy focus on commerce (thanks to the extra trade capacity associated with the ‘Founder of Carthage’ trait). The option to easily move across bodies of water also consistently helped to maintain good diplomatic relations with opponents, who were less threatened by the addition of Phoenician colonies dispersed across a large geographic area. This overseas gameplay meant that, as Dido, I often struggled to exert effective territorial control, which, in turn, impeded the spread of Phoenician religion and culture. Yet, considerations completely unrelated to the choice of Dido as leader were much more important in dictating gameplay. Geography, the availability of resources, the proximity of opponents and personal preference all featured more heavily than any perceived attempts at historical accuracy or Punic cultural specificity. Dido’s gender was a complete non-factor and made no meaningful difference to the choices available to me as player, nor to the ways in which AI opponents interacted with my civilization.
Playing against Dido
If the overall impression of playing as Dido is one of indifference to both her gender and her heritage, playing against Dido offers a different experience of her personality and wider Phoenician culture. Across the Civilization franchise, players regularly see leaders from a new light when they are acting as protagonists rather than player characters. It is only when encountering Phoenicia as an adversary that the player can meaningfully interact with the AI and observe the depictions of Dido – her speech and dress, her motivations and her personality.
I encountered the welcoming image of Dido that opens this chapter (Figure 12.1) in games I had configured specifically to ensure Phoenicia as a rival. In most cases I was visited a few turns after this first meeting by a Phoenician delegation with gifts of ‘murex purple, Lebanon cedar, and olives’. My first impressions of this representation are, thankfully, that it avoids many of the most obvious and outrageous orientalist tropes. Dido’s dress, styling, and posture are understated. The direct inspiration for the character’s likeness are not immediately apparent but broad similarities are noted between her jewellery and excavated Phoenician materials as well as her wreathed hairstyle and the frequent image of the goddess Tanit on coins minted in Carthage from the late fourth century until the mid-second century BCE.35 This latest iteration of the character also thankfully avoids, for the most part, the mystical romanticism, extremely pale complexion and moonlit setting of the character in Civ5 and moves towards a more realistic skin tone given the character’s Levantine origins. The use of spoken Phoenician in voiceovers, with translations provided alongside the character’s avatar, adds an additional air of authenticity.
In Civ6 the game introduced a unique goal for each leader that largely dictates the way the AI interacts with both human and other computer players. Dido’s agenda – ‘Sicilian Wars’ – places a premium on coastal settlement.36 If a player avoids settling on the coast and leaves the shore to Dido, the AI offers praise and, potentially, friendship or alliance. Settling along the coast, however, is met with disapproval. This agenda had a significant impact in the games I completed with Dido as an adversary. When playing a map dominated by islands and archipelagos we were in direct or indirect conflict throughout; ‘the seas and the shores are Phoenician’, Dido reminded me disapprovingly. If this resulted in outright war, Dido’s language referred to the strength of the Phoenician fleet and to Carthaginian victories over Pyrrhus of Epirus in Sicily and the Romans at Saguntum.
It was not immediately obvious to what degree, if at all, the non-Western nature of the Phoenicians structured interactions with Dido as antagonist. The importance of Phoenician commerce and seafaring was evident but Dido’s gender was not especially prevalent in her dealings with players.37 Whenever I was not competing for Dido’s desired coastal territory, in other words, Phoenicia made a reliable ally. The Dido AI was a consistently strong performer in terms of scientific output and, especially, culture and religion. This was a marked difference from my own perceived strengths for the character and, as outlined below, the impressions of most users.
Wider perceptions in the Civ6 community
The large and dedicated fanbase for the Civilization franchise serves as a helpful resource to situate my own experiences playing Dido within wider impressions of the character. As part of the current work, I consulted a number of online fora discussions debating the strengths and weaknesses of various leaders, the most annoying or treacherous AI adversaries, and surveys on the best player characters for various victory conditions and styles of gameplay.38 Reading through comments and analysing surveys gives a solid qualitative impression of how players more broadly interact with Dido and the ways in which her biography, origins and gender may play into these perceptions.
A first impression from online discussions is that Dido does not make much of an impact, either positively or negatively. In the most well-documented survey of leader and victory preferences (L&V poll) Dido is chosen as a favourite leader by less than 1 per cent of all users (n=763). She is similarly poorly rated for various victory conditions in the survey, only just surpassing 1 per cent for diplomatic victory (n=728) and not passing the 1 per cent threshold for any other victory type. Extended online discussions of the best (and worst) characters support these general views: Dido tends to appear either in the middle or towards the bottom of the pack.39 The fine-grained detail of the L&V poll also provides some idea of what styles of gameplay are encouraged by playing as Dido and the Phoenicians. In response to a question asking what type of victory is best suited to Dido (n=459), an overwhelming number of responses selected domination (60 per cent); this was followed by a roughly even preference for diplomacy (15 per cent), science (12 per cent) and culture (10 per cent), with a notable distaste for the religious victory condition (2 per cent). These results are best contextualized through comparison to player preferences across all leaders (n=21,029). Dido far exceeds the overall inclination for domination-style victories (+25 per cent above the average across all leader responses), is slightly above the average for diplomacy (+6 per cent), slightly below the average for science-based gameplay (−6 per cent), and far below the average for religion (−14 per cent) and culture (−15 per cent). This presents a paradox with the heavy focus on Carthaginian ritual and culture in the historical record, modern scholarship and the reception of Punic materials.
Examining the responses to additional survey questions – predominantly surrounding the nature of Dido as adversary – helps to further break down the broader player perceptions that might connect to questions of gender and heritage. Even as an AI opponent, Dido makes few strong impressions on the Civ6 community. She is ranked by users as the fifth ‘hottest’ leader (at 4 per cent) in a category unsurprisingly (and disappointingly) dominated by female rulers.40 On the question of the ‘most treacherous’ opponent, Dido receives only 1 per cent of the overall community vote (n=333). This result is somewhat surprising given the backstory of the flight of Elissa and a common portrayal of Dido and Phoenicians as crafty or conniving in other forms of media; on the whole, however, female leaders are perceived as far less treacherous than their male counterparts.41 Dido receives zero votes as either the friendliest or the most annoying opponent. The voting for friendliest in particular shows a strong gender bias, with female leaders receiving only 8 per cent of the total vote (n=348), far below the proportion of female character options (31 per cent). Finally, in response to the question of which leader is ‘the most poorly modelled (with regard to historical references)’, 3.1 per cent of users selected Dido (n=161). It is unclear on what basis this question was judged but worth noting that female leaders received a far higher share of the vote (45 per cent) than would be warranted given the gender breakdown of the character options. These results are, at least in part, probably connected to a wider misogynistic pushback against the portrayal of female leaders in antiquity.
Orientalist sensationalism: Salammbô: Battle for Carthage42
If the various Didos of Civilization show at least a sincere attempt at faithfulness to the historical record, a second release set in ancient Carthage offers no such pretense. The 2003 title Salammbô: Battle for Carthage (SBfC) draws heavily on the work and tone of Flaubert, as reimagined in a space/fantasy setting by a series of graphic novels by Philippe Druillet (who also served as an artist in the game’s development).43 Any direct comparison between SBfC and Civilization must take into account that the former is a much shorter game, offering little of the in-depth content presented by the various Civilization offerings.44 The impact of SBfC was also limited; although the game did receive some moderately positive reviews its sales were low, particularly in an American market largely unfamiliar with the source material.45 Nonetheless, the orientalist sensationalism of SBfC presents a useful counterpoint to the attention to detail that characterizes the appearance of Carthage, and particularly Carthaginian women, elsewhere.
In SBfC the player controls Spendius, captured by Carthaginians and enslaved in an especially fantastical and cruel version of the ancient city. The opening credits set the scene. Two large temples loom over Carthage. One, to the god Moloch, has a façade mirroring a squat, humanoid face with sinister teeth; the second, taller, and less architecturally distinct temple is dedicated to the goddess Tanit, as we are told by the female narrator. Both a blacked-out sun and a moon in the midst of a lunar eclipse simultaneously shine from the heavens, one over each temple, as orchestral music builds to a crescendo.46 Finally, the priestess Salammbô is revealed, scantily clad and wrapped in a thin, diaphanous veil (Figure 12.2). ‘Salammbô, the grand priestess of Tanit, is resplendently beautiful’ proclaims the narration.
Play opens with Spendius locked in a forgotten dungeon in the temple precinct. After resourcefully clubbing the dungeon guard with a stray femur, the player escapes into a dark courtyard and meets the titular Salammbô, who, in turn, sends Spendius to the camp of the mercenary Matho to deliver a statuette as a token of her love. In subsequent scenes, Spendius steals the gold meant for payment for the mercenaries and starts a full-scale revolt; sneaks into Carthage to steal the sacred veil (the zaïmph) allegedly protecting the city; and flees the city atop a stolen elephant and wrapped in the zaïmph. Ultimately, the player leads the mercenary forces in a successful conquest of the weakened Carthage. Matho and Salammbô are united as lovers, and Spendius claims the riches of the city as his own. Gameplay unfolds as an extended first-person puzzle sequence, with the player using basic point-and-click commands to move through spaces, pick up items, investigate surroundings, and combine materials. Wrong decisions are met with gruesome and varied deaths. These action elements are interspersed with extended voiceover dialogue that serves as exposition for the overall plot and allows the player to make basic choices to shape the interactions between characters.
Figure 12.2 The first appearance of the titular character in Salammbô: Battle for Carthage.
The game takes obvious inspiration from Flaubert, including the rough outline of the action and the names and motivations of many characters, but following the work of Druillet the plot diverges significantly. More importantly, in its imagination of Punic Carthage the game design presents a dark and mysterious fantasy completely divorced from any semblance of historical reality. The mercenary camp includes a stable of tamed sand dragons that can be ridden like horses. Despite the omnipresent sun and moon shown in the introductory cutscene, all of the action takes place in the dark. Military characters such as Matho or Hamilcar are dressed in full-body armour, covered in skull motifs with elaborate, often horned headpieces that recall cinematic representations of Batman far more than ancient North Africans. Character skin tones are pale grey, sometimes marked with scars and tattoos, with deep-set, red eyes, without whites or pupils. Some Numidian forces are depicted with dark charcoal skin with white warpaint while others, such as the general Narr’ Havas, are almost albino in complexion. Women exist only in relation to the temple of Tanit and, with the exception of Salammbô, wear highly suggestive, strapless halters that resemble two hands grasping the breasts from behind.
The Carthage players experience in SBfC is clearly deliberately exaggerated and disorienting.47 The combination of specific design choices and the extravagant graphic novels used as source material results in a game that feels more set in a post-apocalyptic landscape or on an alien planet than anything related to the peoples of the Classical Mediterranean. However, this overt othering of a real event from Mediterranean history (the Mercenary War) presents the Punic world not as part of a shared past but rather as something entirely foreign and, in some cases, even inhuman.48 SBfC relies heavily on orientalist and anti-Semitic tropes to entrench this othering, from the frequent description of the greedy merchants inhabiting Carthage, to the violent and largely ineffective choices of the mercenaries, to the overt sexualization of all Punic women.
This title emerged in the years immediately following the September 11 al-Qaeda terrorist attacks in 2001 in the USA, a time during which Islamophobic and anti-Muslim sentiment was increasingly featured in, amongst other media, the mainstream press, film, comics and graphic novels.49 The latter of these categories is of particular relevance given the source material for SBfC and a wider history of crossover with the videogame industry. The game’s dark design also bears more than a passing resemblance to the illustration of the Persians in Frank Miller’s graphic series 300; note that both the 2007 cinematic adaptation of this work and the other writings of Miller have been rightly questioned for their overtly Islamophobic views.50 Rather than merely a sensationalist take on ancient materials in the vein of Flaubert – itself already plagued by orientalist undertones – the depictions of SBfC are connected to much larger concerns cutting across various media. This is particularly problematic, as I turn to below, for an audience that may be unaware of other, more appropriate narratives.
Discussion
A few final points emerge from the examples introduced here. First, it is noteworthy the degree to which videogames follow the same trends that have defined the reception of the Punic world (and Punic women) across ancient sources, artistic and literary tradition, and modern scholarship. In fact, one could argue the Punic world represented in games is shaped as much by a close engagement with later receptions of the Punic past as by any consideration of the ancient materials themselves. As such, both titles draw on and reinforce orientalist stereotypes established in earlier art and literature in both flagrant and subtle forms. The attempt at providing a historically faithful Dido in Civ6 falls back on traditional strengths in trade, seafaring and the provision of the alphabet to structure play, at the expense of other possible facets of Phoenician culture. This Dido thankfully avoids the tragic suicide that plagues the biographies of Punic women but also lacks in its place the strong personality that characterizes many other Civ6 leaders; players tend to view her as peripheral to the key powers of the game. The orientalist image of Carthage created in the more sensationalist SBfC, on the other hand, is distinguished almost exclusively in terms of its difference and depravity from Western traditions. The inspiration for this difference is drawn not from a look at archaeology or history but rather a view of the Punic world, first seen through the eyes of the Romans and Greeks, since refracted through the work of Flaubert, then the graphic novels of Druillet, and finally into the videogame format. Gender is intrinsically linked to questions of orientalism and representation, and the gender of the characters did structure player interactions and contribute to the orientalist fantasy of the game, yet it was a far more salient feature of the characters the player meets rather than those the player controls themselves.
Surprisingly, the two facets of the ancient Phoenicians that have dominated their modern coverage – trade and ritual – are treated almost mutually exclusively in the videogames in question. The realism of Civ6 avoids the more sensational elements of the Carthaginian past; note that there is no mention of the tophet in game despite its frequent mention in other media.51 In fact, the overall impression of players is that Dido is significantly worse in the areas of culture and religion than both the average character and many female leaders – even though playing against Dido she tended to excel in these areas and, indeed, religion is seen as a central feature holding together the communities of the Punic world.52 There is seemingly little appetite for integrating the most debated, sensational aspects of Punic culture into realistic portrayals. SBfC, in contrast, focuses almost exclusively on these ritual elements as a means of drastically othering the plot, characters, and setting. The Phoenician trader stereotype is only used to describe the excesses of the greedy merchants of Carthage and set up the extreme, depraved wealth held by the city.
These observations are brought into sharp relief by the potential reach of historical videogames. The Punic past has long been of interest in popular culture, and gaming is one of the most likely media to continue this representation. The Phoenicia created by Civ6 presents a necessary counterpoint to earlier titles like SbfC. A practical need to focus on a few key characteristics flattens the character of Dido and the complexity of Punic culture. Nonetheless, the game introduces a number of uniquely Punic elements – the cothon, the Phoenician language, the names of specific ancient cities, and perhaps even Dido herself – to an audience largely unfamiliar with this history. Videogames may ultimately bring the Punic world, and Punic women, to a new and potentially more diverse public. We must thus continue to dissect the ways in which the gaming industry both shapes new narratives and refines existing representations. In the Punic case, these portrayals reinforce an artificial distance between the traditional Greek and Roman confines of the Classical world and the many contemporary, non-Western peoples that formed an integral part of Mediterranean history.
Notes
1.An ongoing debate surrounds the chronological and geographic distinction between the cultural labels Phoenician, Punic and Carthaginian (e.g. Bondì 2014; van Dommelen and Gómez Bellard 2008). In video games, these tend to be used interchangeably; I follow this example here even though more nuance is possible in archaeological or historical contexts.
2.Van Dommelen (2014), Lafrenz Samuels and van Dommelen (2019), Doumet-Serhal (2019) and Garnand (2019).
3.J. C. Quinn (2017: 24).
4.Said (1978: 184–91). See also van Dommelen (2014) and Garnand (2001).
5.Van Dommelen (2006).
6.Vella (2014).
7.Van Dommelen (2014).
8.Hodos (2009).
9.Xella, Quinn, Melchiorri and van Dommelen (2013).
10.Garnand (2019).
11.Ibid., 703–4.
12.Dido is, according to Virgil, the name taken by the queen after she founds the city, whereas Elissa is how she appears in earlier texts. The latter is a more faithful naming and carries less weight in a modern setting (see Quinn 2017: 13–14). However, I use Dido here as this is how she is named in the video games at the heart of this paper.
13.Justin, Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus XVIII.3–6. The account of a chaste, noble Dido is further reinforced by Ovid’s Heroides and Metamorphoses (Orr 2016: 430–1).
14.Dido first appears at the end of Book 1 of Virgil’s Aeneid; the bulk of the romance between Dido and Aeneas falls within Book 4.
15.The account of Dido/Elissa may be the best-known instance of a tragic ending for the women of Carthage, but it is certainly not the only such example. The Carthaginian noblewoman Sophonisba also features heavily in later reception in no small part because she follows the same doomed trajectory that has come to define Punic women in the eyes of later generations.
16.The most frequently restaged operatic take on Dido is Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas; see Harris (2017) on the history and impact of this work. On the representation of Dido in Renaissance art, see De Jong (2009). Orr (2016) outlines the competing moral and comic depictions of Dido from the eighteenth century.
17.Zayzafoon (2005).
18.For a collection of essays on Salammbô and its historical connections, see Fauvel and Leclerc (1999).
19.Polybius, The Histories 1.65–88.
20.Toumayan (2009).
21.Garnand (2001).
22.Jones (2019).
23.The review of Civilization VI by Mol, Politopoulos and Ariese-Vandemeulebroucke (2017) includes a longer explanation of the history and characteristics of the game.
24.French and Gardner (2020).
25.On Civilization as a teaching tool for (mostly pre-university) students, see Squire (2005), Squire, Giovanetto, Devane and Durga (2005), Lee and Probert (2010), Pagnotti and Russell (2011) and Senrick (2013). On Civilization as a legitimate historical experience, see Gardner (2012) and Chapman (2013).
26.See Mol, Politopoulos and Ariese-Vandemeulebroucke (2017) for a comparison between earlier releases and Civ6.
27.Salter (2011: 367).
28.Ford (2016).
29.Mukherjee (2018: 518).
30.See: https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Dido_(Civ5) (accessed 27 October 2020).
31.This representation is clearly inspired by a work by Pierre-Narcisse Guérin (‘Énée racontant à Didon les malheurs de la ville de Troie’, 1815), in which Aeneas describes the fall of Troy to a reclining Dido.
32.In Civ5 leader AIs were programmed on fixed attributes, each ranking from 1 (low) to 10 (high). See: https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Dido_(Civ5) (accessed 27 October 2020) for Dido’s AI character breakdown.
33.See: https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Dido_(Civ6) (accessed 27 October 2020).
34.The cothon is the name given to an artificial circular harbour, most notably that at Carthage (Hurst and Stager 1978). There is ongoing debate on whether similar basins excavated at other Punic cities represent active ports or symbolic ritual sites – see the sacred cothon on the island of Motya (Nigro and Spagnoli 2014).
35.On jewellery, see Pisano (1988) and Flourentzos and Vitobello (2009). On coinage, see Acquaro (1988).
36.See: https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Dido_(Civ6) (accessed 27 October 2020).
37.This is not to suggest that all gendered representations are equally balanced. The game falls back on many clichéd caricatures: a flirtatious Cleopatra with the ‘Mediterranean Bride’ ability; a conniving Catherine de Medici; a giddy Eleanor of Aquitaine and her unique ‘Court of Love’.
38.There are, unsurprisingly, a large number of threads dedicated to this topic. This discussion relies on one survey of leader attributes with an admirably high response rate and good variety of questions on characters and playing styles (see: https://www.reddit.com/r/civ/comments/alwwdg/poll_vote_for_best_leader_in_each_victory_type/?sort=old). I am grateful to Reddit user u/ascitien for making the data openly available for reuse (accessed 5 August 2020).
39.Cunningham (2020) and Desatoff (2019) and ‘The best civilisations in Civilization 6’. See also the fan poll at: https://www.reddit.com/r/civ/comments/g62iix/civ_6_favorite_leader_poll_results_if_you_want_to/ (accessed 27 October 2020).
40.Women received 65 per cent of votes (n=680) for hottest ruler, despite comprising only 31 per cent of playable characters. The only male in the top five is a rather muscular Sumerian king Gilgamesh, depicted in an asymmetrical tunic, presumably inspired by Neo-Assyrian palace relief.
41.Female characters received only 19 per cent of the ‘most treacherous’ vote. The two most perfidious rulers – Cyrus II of the (Achaemenid) Persians and Alexander the Great of the Macedonians – were essentially tied, making it difficult to pinpoint a possible tendency to perceive non-Western rulers as less trustworthy.
42.See also Clare (2021: 120–5) for an excellent coverage of Salammbô’s gameplay and the fantastical representations within.
43.Druillet and Flaubert (1980, 1982 and 1985).
44.Total playtime comes in at just under three hours, with little of the replayability that has made the Civilization franchise successful. A full run-through is available online at: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL6iNuXuk2gdjbTjf2wDyKlU_1H6Hmdh3C (accessed 27 October 2020). These recordings formed the basis of much of this discussion. SBfC is also still available for purchase on the Steam platform.
45.‘Interview with Dreamcatcher Europe’ (2004).
46.The game relies on the first movement of Dvorak’s Symphony Number 9 for its key scenes and, oddly, not one of the musical adaptations of Salammbô.
47.Clare (2021: 156).
48.In the final battle against the Carthaginians, a sacrifice to the god Moloch results in stone demons perched atop the city’s ramparts coming to life and fighting on behalf of the Carthaginian forces.
49.Dar (2010), El-Aswad (2013), Awan (2010) and Shaheen (2008).
50.Dar (2010).
51.An oblique reference to infant sacrifice appeared only after repeatedly annoying Dido by stealing prime coastal locations, at which point the AI promptly denounced me with a call hinting at the heart of the tophet debate: ‘I pray you are sent into the fire of Moloch! I pray you be made an offering to Mot! I pray Yam rises and devours you!’
52.Lancel (1995: 193). See also J. C. Quinn (2017) on the circle of the tophet and the cult of Melqart.