Alfred Bradford answers these questions with authority while vividly detailing the full intensity of antique naval engagement. Describing the marine skirmishes, battle tactics and strategies of the ancient world, his book takes the reader through naval combat from the earliest records, artefacts and legends to the fall of the Roman Empire. The author addresses a diverse range of topics: the sophisticated trireme tactics of the Athenians, who transformed maritime confrontation into a contest of speed, manoeuvre and the ram; new developments in ship construction; the Punic Wars and the Roman-Carthaginian struggle for the western Mediterranean; and Germanic invaders beating a path to Britannia. He evokes power, action and struggle on the cruel seas of antiquity.