The Battle of Utica was fought in 203 BC between armies of Rome and Carthage during their second war for dominance over the Western Mediterranean. By a sudden attack the Roman commander Publius Cornelius Scipio managed to destroy a numerous force of the Carthaginians and their Numidian allies not far from the outflow of the Medjerda River in modern Tunisia. Thus he gained a decisive strategic advantage, switched the focus of the war from Italy and Iberia to the Carthaginian northern Africa and contributed largely for the final victory of Rome.