The capital of the great power of Phoenician seafarers, Carthage, in an irreconcilable and centuries-long confrontation with its no less great rival Rome, was defeated and mercilessly destroyed. Ancient sources speak sparingly and biasedly about Carthage, portraying it as the gloomy center of the bloody cult of Moloch. But archaeological research is increasingly convincing scientists that this does not correspond to reality, which was distorted, as often happens, during a brutal military confrontation. Now historical justice is being restored, and in the book of the researcher of ancient Mediterranean cultures, writer and journalist Alexander Viktorovich Volkov, the proud stronghold of the urban culture of North Africa appears in all the grandeur and splendor of its difficult and tragic fate.