AND these grooves in the rock were worn by the wheels of the chariots.”

Sorry?

“This road would be used for taking, among other things, lions, to Rome, for the gladiators.”

Tunisia, stronghold of the Romans’ North African territory, is so steeped in history that one can get blasé until such a nugget of information burns itself on the psyche.

That calloused bit of stone, which I can run my fingers through and feel its weather-worn smoothness, is the same road that Roman chariots were clattering along two millennia ago.

And what about the lions? Here?

“Not any more,” says the guide. “They killed the last one in 1891.”

We are at the ruins of Bulla Regia, a Roman settlement on split levels: underground for the scorching summer months, and upstairs at other times.

Bulla Regia is also known for the amazing mosaics that adorn these subterranean villas. Shame it’s so weathered, scuffed, subdued, I lament – but the years will do that, I suppose.

Our guide dips her hand in a nearby puddle and rubs it across the intricate picture, bringing the vibrant tableau to life. The Romans made their mosaics by fossicking for the right colours of stained glass (the Byzantines simply dyed it) and this vividness is evident.

A quick history lesson, because several empires left their mark on Tunisia, and a historical tour will jump around the eras. Chronologically, it went Phoenician, Roman, Byzantine, Arab – with the odd Berber foray (from whom we get the word barbaric, which, originally, simply meant foreign).

When we talk about Rome and its empire, we tend to focus on the capital, straight roads and Monty Python sketches. And that’s why Tunisia came as an awesome surprise. How could I have been so ignorant of it?

The amphitheatres of Arles, Nimes or, of course, Rome, spring more readily to mind than that of El-Jem – but the latter was third only to the Colosseum (30,000 against 43,000 capacity, so still in the Champions League of barbaric spectator sports) and Capua. The colosseum was a message to Rome from the outpost – we can create a spectacle.

The cinematic Spartacus romanticism was something of a fallacy. The gladiators were trained professionals, the prize-fighters of their era. They fought lions (or, if the Tunis Express brought in a few panthers, them too) or one another, with some success.

The condemned, or slaves, fighting for freedom fought only the animals. They didn’t often win.

But while the Romans did barbarity well, they did culture far, far better, such as at Dougga. Even in its ruined state, this old Phoenician, then Berber, fortified town, taken over in the second century by the Romans, is evidence of the civilisation we overlook.

Sure, we’re pretty cocky about our iPod-frequent flyer-wifi world, but, of its time, the civilisation of ancient empires made exponentially impressive leaps.

Efficient sewage system, clean water and rudimentary refrigeration; heck, it’s better than the lot of Industrial Revolution slum-dwellers, although communal ablutions were as much of feature – a social event, in fact. Any guesses what those stone planks with holes in the middle might be for? Spot on.

After all that, Carthage is a bit of a let-down. Much of what was Carthage lies under modern development, and if that sounds sacrilegious, think about it: what happened to our great stadium of modern times, Wembley. We tore it down and rebuilt it.

Far more impressive was the holy city of Kairouan and its Great Mosque, built with stone taken from Roman ruins.

The city is one of Tunisia’s eight World Heritage sites and, by some accounts, the fourth-holiest city of Islam; seven pilgrimages here is equivalent to one trip to Mecca.

Religious grandeur aside, the medina, or old town, will draw you down its teeming alleyways and this is where to get that haggling technique off-pat.

Really want that elegant earthenware bowl? Pretend you really don’t, walk away, look uninterested, and soon the asking price will have halved. And beware of saffron.

Ah, saffron. Think North Africa and you think finely crafted rugs. What I hadn’t realised was how much saffron was produced, and at about £5 for a jam jar-full, I bought loads. A bargain. Well, as a friend pointed out, a bargain if it’s actually authentic.

When I threw it in a recipe, I may as well have bought a jar of air for all the effect the “saffron” had on it.

But, duff saffron apart, food-lovers will savour Tunisia.

The cuisine isn’t elaborate, but it is fresh, replete with vegetables, and plentiful.

There are stalls and stalls of citrus; huge boxes of dates for about £2 a kilo, and, when eating out, every dish begins with harissa, a ground chilli-based appetiser served with oil as a dip. Fiery but fabulous.

You’ll see tajine – not to be confused with the Moroccan stew of the same name – everywhere, a semi-circle of filo pastry stuffed with egg or meat, and make sure you pick up some makroudh, little, bite-sized date biscuits.

Tunisia is considered the most westernised of the Maghreb countries, a fairly secular, modern-day place, and crawling through the morning rush-hour traffic of Tunis presents the same old familiar names – Shell, Samsung, Lenovo – but also the curious juxtaposition of a cloaked man selling bits of scrap from his front yard, trying to scrape a few dinars just to get by.

As we conquered the queues, and reached the city limits, the half-finished dwellings and scrap merchants disappeared as the olive groves came into view.

Our passage was made that much speedier by government number plates; on the odd occasion we were pulled over it was for a cursory hello and to check all was well.

Our other secret weapon was our driver Hichem, a Chevy Chase-lookalike who made it his personal mission to use every back route and short-cut through the Tunis bottlenecks to get us where we wanted to be.

Back in Tunis, we stayed at the sumptuous Le Residence hotel, cocooned from the disparity of life in downtown Tunis.

Flower petals on the pillow and a hand-written card with tomorrow’s weather report were among the delightful touches.

The hotel’s three restaurants (traditional Tunisian, Chinese and modern Mediterranean cuisine) were all excellent, but the dining highlight was in Sidi Bou Said, a well-heeled neighbourhood north of Tunis.

An enchanting coastal village, it is also home to the restaurant Au Bon Vieux Temps – “the good old days”.

If I were a restaurateur, I fancy I’d like to plaster the walls with photos of the great and the good who have tasted my tajines.

And, not one to disappoint, there were mugshots of Nicolas Sarkozy, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, whom I thought existed only in a comedy sketch, and Tunisian President Zine el Abidine Ben Ali.

I couldn’t be certain the Tunisian president actually dined there, as his visage adorns most buildings (90 per cent of the vote does that for you) but Sarko and the first lady definitely did.

So where did they sit? “Right here, at your table.”

Course they did. Now, how about some harissa?