Exploration & Expansion in the 3rd century BC

28 sourced entries, 297 BCE to 200 BCE, oldest first. Also see Exploration & Expansion across every century or everything else in the 3rd century BC.

• 297 BCEChandragupta Maurya goes to Sravana Belagola, near Mysore, to live in the way of Jains.source
• 279 BCEScordisci Celts found a city called Singidon (Roman Singidunum) which is today the Serbian city of Belgrade.source
• 268 BCEThe Romans found a colony at Ariminum.source
• 268 BCEThe Romans found a colony at Malventum which they, for superstitious reasons, call Beneventum (since male means bad and bene means good in Latin).source
• 264 BCEThe Roman consul Appius Claudius Caudex and his two legions are deployed to Sicily, the first time a Roman army has gone into action outside the Italian peninsula.source
• 262 BCEAfter the loss of Agrigentum, the Carthaginians retire to organise their fleet. In the meantime, the Romans sack Agrigentum and enslave its Greek inhabitants. The Romans are now determined to drive the Carthaginians out of Sicily.source
• 261 BCEThe Romans, determined to win control of Sicily from Carthage, build a fleet based on the model of a captured Carthaginian quinquereme.source
• 260 BCEHannibal Gisco returns to fight in Sicily as the admiral in charge of the Carthaginian fleet in the Strait of Messina. With the Romans about to launch their first ever navy, Carthage is determined that this innovation be thwarted. Gisco defeats part of the Roman fleet and captures the Roman consul Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Asina in an encounter near Lipari; the consul's nickname Asina (which means donkey) is earned in this encounter. However, this Carthaginian victory is of limited practical value as the bulk of the Roman fleet continues to manoeuvre in the surrounding waters.source
• 253 BCEA second Roman war fleet of 150 ships is wrecked on the voyage from Lilybaeum (in Sicily) to Rome.source
• 246 BCEWith Hamilcar Barca wearing the Romans down in Sicily, the Romans, by private subscription, build another fleet with the aim of regaining command of the sea.source
• 242 BCEThe Roman consul and commander, Gaius Lutatius Catulus, blockades the Sicilian cities of Lilybaeum and Drepanum with a fleet of 200 ships.source
• 239 BCEHaemosu, who is a descendant of the people of the empire of Gojoseon, establishes the ancient kingdom of Bukbuyeo in modern-day Jilin, northeast China.source
• 232 BCEThe Seleucid king Seleucus II Callinicus undertakes an expedition into the interior of Iran to try to regain Parthia, but his efforts come to nothing. According to some sources, he is even taken prisoner for several years by the Parthian king, Arsaces I. Other sources mention that he establishes a peace with Arsaces I by recognising his sovereignty over Parthia.source
• 231 BCEThe Romans send envoys to Massilia (modern Marseille, France) to negotiate with the Carthaginian general Hamilcar Barca who is based there.source
• 227 BCEGaius Flaminius becomes Rome's first governor of Sicily.source
• 226 BCEThe Greek merchants of Massilia, frightened by Carthaginian successes in Spain (including their exploitation of the Spanish silver mines), appeal to Rome. Rome makes an alliance with the independent Spanish port city of Saguntum south of the Ebro River.source
• 220 BCETogether with fellow Illyrian, Scerdilaidas, Demetrius of Pharos attacks Illyrian cities under Roman protection and leads a piratical squadron into Greek waters. They unsuccessfully attack Pylos, an Achaean town on the Messenian coast, in the Peloponnesus of Greece.source
• 220 BCEQin Shi Huang begins a system of tree-lined roads to interconnect all parts of China, and begins to join regional walls to form the beginnings of the Great Wall (Wan li chang cheng).source
• 220 BCEDuring his censorship, the Roman political leader, Gaius Flaminius, builds the Circus Flaminius on the Campus Martius and constructs the Via Flaminia from Rome to Ariminum (Rimini).source
• 220 BCEThe Gortynians occupy Matala, on the island of Crete.source
• 219 BCEThe Romans extend their area of domination around the head of the Adriatic Sea as far as the peninsula of Histria by the conquest of peoples who dwell to the east of the Veneti. Thus, with the exception of Liguria and the upper valley of the Po River, all Italy south of the Alps is brought within the Roman sphere.source
• 216 BCEHasdrubal is ordered by the Carthaginian government to march to Italy.source
• 212 BCEAntiochus III leaves for a campaign in Asia, where he will reach as far as India and mostly manage to recover the areas conquered earlier by Alexander the Great.source
• 206 BCEHasdrubal Gisco retreats to the coast and then crosses to North Africa, where he gives his daughter in marriage to Syphax, king of the Numidian Masaesyli tribe, to formalize their military alliance.source
• 206 BCEAntiochus III marches across the Hindu Kush into the Kabul valley and renews his friendship with the Indian king Sophagasenus.source
• 205 BCEReturning via the Persian provinces of Arachosia, Drangiana, and Carmania, Antiochus III arrives in Persis. He then leads a short expedition down the Persian Gulf and receives tribute of 500 talents of silver from the citizens of Gerrha, a mercantile state on the west coast of the Persian Gulf.source
• 200 BCEThe Roman consul, Publius Sulpicius Galba Maximus, asks Attalus I and his fleet to meet up with the Roman fleet off the Greek Aegean coast and they conduct a naval campaign against Philip V, harassing Macedonian possessions in and along the Aegean.source
• 200 BCELost-wax casting is known in China and Mesopotamia (approximate date).source