sentences:  The next exponents of expeditionary warfare in the ancient world of the Mediterranean Basin were the Carthaginians who introduced two entirely new dimensions to the use of naval forces by staging not only operations that combined naval and land troops, but also eventuated in combining strategic multi-national forces during the land phase of the operation when Hannibal in his most famous achievement at the outbreak of the Second Punic War marched an army, which included war elephants, from Iberia over the Pyrenees and the Alps into northern Italy.Following on the example of Carthage, the Romans used expeditionary operations extensively to expand their Empire and influence in the Mediterranean and beyond, including the Roman conquest of Britain which was not only a limited expeditionary operation, but one conceived to include long-term occupation and Roman settlement of the territories.Shortly after the collapse of the Roman empire in Italy, the European Middle Ages began with an expedition of imperial Byzantine general Belisarius against the Vandals.