No More Learning

Conflict on the Ticmo.
a68 THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book III
think of occupying the passes of the Alps. The Romans only learned that the passes were threatened, when in August the consul Publius Scipio returned without his army from Massilia to Italy, and perhaps even then they gave little heed to the matter, because, forsooth, the foolhardy attempt would be frustrated by the Alps alone. Thus at the decisive hour and on the decisive spot there was not even a Roman outpost Hannibal had full time to rest his army, to capture after a three days' siege the capital of the Taurini which closed its gates against him, and to induce or terrify into alliance with him all the Ligurian and Celtic communi ties in the upper basin of the Po, before Scipio, who had taken the command in the Po valley, encountered him.
Scipio, who, with an army considerably smaller and very
weak in cavalry, had the difficult task of preventing the -
advance of the superior force of the enemy and of repress ing the movements of insurrection which everywhere were spreading among the Celts, had crossed the Po presumably at Placentia, and marched up the river to meet the enemy, while Hannibal after the capture of Turin marched down- wards to relieve the Insubres and Boil In the plain between the Ticino and the Sesia, not far from Vercelli, the Roman cavalry, which had advanced with the light infantry to make a reconnaissance in force, encountered the Punic cavalry sent out for the like purpose, both led by the generals in person. Scipio accepted battle when offered, notwithstanding the superiority of the enemy ; but his light infantry, which was placed in front of the cavalry, dispersed before the charge of the heavy cavalry of the enemy, and while the latter engaged the masses of the Roman horsemen in front, the light Numidian cavalry,
after having pushed aside the broken ranks of the enemy's infantry, took the Roman horsemen in flank and rear. This decided the combat The loss of the Romans was very considerable. The consul himself, who made up as a
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
369
soldier for his deficiencies as a general, received a danger ous wound, and owed his safety entirely to the devotion of his son of seventeen, who, courageously dashing into the ranks of the enemy, compelled his squadron to follow him and rescued his father. Scipio, enlightened by this combat as to the strength of the enemy, saw the error which he had committed in posting himself, with a weaker army, in the plain with his back to the river, and resolved to return *o the right bank of the Po under the eyes of his antagonist As the operations became contracted into a narrower space and his illusions regarding Roman invincibility departed, he recovered the use of his considerable military talents, which the adventurous boldness of his youthful opponent's plans had for a moment paralyzed. While Hannibal was preparing for a pitched battle, Scipio by a rapidly
and steadily executed march succeeded in reaching the right bank of the river which in an evil hour
he had abandoned, and broke down the bridge over the
Po behind his army ; the Roman detachment of 600 men
charged to cover the process of destruction were, however, intercepted and made prisoners. But as the upper course
of the river was in the hands of Hannibal, he could not be prevented from marching up the stream, crossing on a
bridge of boats, and in a few days confronting the Roman
army on the right bank. The latter had taken a position The
in the plain in front of Placentia; but the mutiny of a piac^^
Celtic division in the Roman camp, and the Gallic insur rection breaking out afresh all around, compelled the consul to evacuate the plain and to post himself on the hills behind the Trebia. This was accomplished without notable loss, because the Numidian horsemen sent in pursuit lost their time in plundering, and setting fire to, the abandoned camp. In this strong position, with his left wing resting on the Apennines, his right on the Po and the fortress of Placentia, and covered in front by the
projected
370
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book iii
Trebia —no inconsiderable stream at that season — Scipio was unable to save the rich stores of Clastidium (Casteggio) from which in this position he was cut off by the army of the enemy ; nor was he able to avert the insurrectionary movement on the part of almost all the Gallic cantons, excepting the Cenomani who were friendly to Rome ; but he completely checked the progress of Hannibal, and compelled him to pitch his camp opposite to that of the Romans. Moreover, the position taken up by Scipio, and the circumstance of the Cenomani threatening the borders of the Insubres, hindered the main body of the Gallic insurgents from directly joining the enemy, and gave to the second Roman army, which meanwhile had arrived at Ariminum from Lilybaeum, the opportunity of reaching Placentia through the midst of the insurgent country without material hindrance, and of uniting itself with the army of the Po.
Scipio had thus solved his difficult task completely and
Battle on
the Trebia, brilliantly. The Roman army, now close on 40,000 strong,
and though not a match for its antagonist in cavalry, at least equal in infantry, had simply to remain in its existing posi tion, in order to compel the enemy either to attempt in the winter season the passage of the river and an attack upon the camp, or to suspend his advance and to test the fickle temper of the Gauls by the burden of winter quarters. Clear, however, as this was, it was no less clear that it was now December, and that under the course proposed the victory might perhaps be gained by Rome, but would not be gained by the consul Tiberius Sempronius, who held the sole command in consequence of Scipio's wound, and whose year of office expired in a few months. Hannibal knew the man, and neglected no means of alluring him to
The Celtic villages that had remained faithful to the Romans were cruelly laid waste, and, when this brought on a conflict between the cavalry, Hannibal allowed his
fight.
«ap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
271
opponents to boast of the victory. Soon thereafter on a raw rainy day a general engagement came on, unlooked for by the Romans. From the earliest hour of the morning the Roman light troops had been skirmishing with the light cavalry of the enemy ; the latter slowly retreated, and the Romans eagerly pursued it through the deeply swollen Trebia to follow up the advantage which they had gained. Suddenly the cavalry halted ; the Roman vanguard found itself face to face with the army of Hannibal drawn up for battle on a field chosen by himself; it was lost, unless the main body should cross the stream with all speed to its support. Hungry, weary, and wet, the Romans came on and hastened to form in order of battle, the cavalry, as
usual, on the wings, the infantry in the centre. The light troops, who formed the vanguard on both sides, began the combat : but the Romans had already almost exhausted their missiles against the cavalry, and immediately
gave way. In like manner the cavalry gave way on the wings, hard pressed by the elephants in front, and outflanked right and left by the far more numerous Carthaginian horse.
But the Roman infantry proved itself worthy of its name : at the beginning of the battle it fought with very decided superiority against the infantry of the enemy, and even when the repulse of the Roman horse allowed the enemy's cavalry and light-armed troops to turn their attacks against the Roman infantry, the latter, although ceasing to advance, obstinately maintained its ground. At this stage a select Carthaginian band of 1000 infantry, and as many horsemen, under the leadership of Mago, Hannibal's youngest brother, suddenly emerged from an ambush in the rear of the Roman army, and fell upon the densely entangled masses. The wings of the army and the rear ranks of the Roman centre were broken up and scattered by this attack, while the first division, 10,000 men strong, in compact array broke through the Carthaginian line, and made a passage for
*7a
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book ill
itself obliquely through the midst of the enemy, inflicting great loss on the opposing infantry and more especially on the Gallic insurgents. This brave body, pursued but feebly, thus reached Placentia. The remaining mass was for the most part slaughtered by the elephants and light troops of the enemy in attempting to cross the river : only part of the cavalry and some divisions of infantry were able, by wading through the river, to gain the camp whither the Carthaginians did not follow them, and thus they too reached Placentia. 1 Few battles confer more honour on the Roman soldier than this on the Trebia, and few at the same time furnish graver impeachment of the general in command ; although the candid judge will not forget that a commandership-in-chief expiring on a definite day was an unmilitary institution, and that figs cannot be reaped from thistles. The victory came to be costly even to the victors. Although the loss in the battle fell chiefly on the Celtic
1 Polybius's account of the battle on the Trebia is quite clear. If Placentia lay on the right bank of the Trebia where it falls into the Po, and if the battle was fought on the left bank, while the Roman encamp ment was pitched upon the right —both of which points have been dis puted, but are nevertheless indisputable —the Roman soldiers must certainly have passed the Trebia in order to gain Placentia as well as to gain the camp. But those who crossed to the camp must have made their way through the disorganized portions of their own army and through the corps of the enemy that had gone round to their rear, and must then have crossed the river almost in hand-to-hand combat with the enemy. On the other hand the passage near Placentia was accomplished after the pursuit had slackened ; the corps was several miles distant from the field of battle, and had arrived within reach of a Roman fortress ; it may even have been the case, although it cannot be proved, that a bridge led over the Trebia at that point, and that the tile de pont on the other bank was occupied by the garrison of Placentia. It is evident that the first passage
was just as difficult as the second was easy, and therefore with good reason Polybius, military judge as he was, merely says of the corps of 10,000, that in close columns it cut its way to Placentia (iii. 74, 6), without mentioning the passage of the river which in this case was unattended with difficulty.
The erroneousness of the view of Livy , which transfers the Phoenician camp to the right, the Roman to the left bank of the Trebia, has lately been repeatedly pointed out. We may only further mention, that the site of Clastidium, near the modern Casteggio, has now been established by inscriptions (Orclli-Henzen, 5117).
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
aj3
insurgents, yet a multitude of the veteran soldiers of
Hannibal died afterwards from diseases
that raw and wet winter day, and all the elephants perished except one.
The effect of this first victory of the invading army was, Hannibal that the national insurrection now spread and assumed ^J^^ shape without hindrance throughout the Celtic territory. Italy. The remains of the Roman army of the Po threw themselves
into the fortresses of Placentia and Cremona : completely
cut off from home, they were obliged to procure their
supplies by way of the river. The consul Tiberius Sempronius only escaped, as if by miracle, from being
taken prisoner, when with a weak escort of cavalry he went
to Rome on account of the elections. Hannibal, who
would not hazard the health of his troops by further
marches at that inclement season, bivouacked for the winter
where he was; and, as a serious attempt on the larger fortresses would have led to no result, contented himself
with annoying the enemy by attacks on the river-port of Placentia and other minor Roman positions. He employed
himself mainly in organizing the Gallic insurrection : more
than 60,000 foot soldiers and 4000 horsemen from the
Celts are said to have joined his army.
Military campaign of 537. The senate thought, and not unreason- ^ P[ai7.
-l
•*
1 t. 11
position of Hannibal,
e1
means fraught with serious danger. Besides the coast-
garrsons, which were despatched to Sardinia, Sicily, and Tarentum, and the reinforcements which were sent to Spain, the two new consuls Gaius Flaminius and Gnaeus Servilius obtained only as many men as were necessary to restore the four legions to their full complement ; additions were made to the strength of the cavalry alone. The consuls had to protect the northern frontier, and stationed themselves accordingly on the two highways which led
VOL. II
50
engendered by
No extraordinary exertions were made in Rome for the ably, that, despite the lost battle, their position was by no
274
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book in
from Rome to the north, the western of which at that time terminated at Arretium, and the eastern at Ariminum ; Gaius Flaminius occupied the former, Gnaeus Servilius the latter. There they ordered the troops from the fortresses on the Po to join them, probably by water, and awaited the commencement of the favourable season, when they proposed to occupy in the defensive the passes of the Apennines, and then, taking up the offensive, to descend into the valley of the Po and effect a junction somewhere near Placentia. But Hannibal by no means intended to defend the valley of the Po. He knew Rome better per haps than the Romans knew it themselves, and was very well aware how decidedly he was the weaker and continued to be so notwithstanding the brilliant battle on the Trebia; he knew too that his ultimate object, the humiliation of Rome, was not to be wrung from the unbending Roman pride either by terror or by surprise, but could only be
gained by the actual subjugation of the haughty city. It was clearly apparent that the Italian federation was in political solidity and in military resources infinitely superior to an adversary, who received only precarious and irregular support from home, and who in Italy was dependent for primary aid solely on the vacillating and capricious nation of the Celts; and that the Phoenician foot soldier was, notwithstanding all the pains taken by Hannibal, far in ferior in point of tactics to the legionary, had been completely proved by the defensive movements of Scipio and the brilliant retreat of the defeated infantry on the Trebia. From this conviction flowed the two fundamental principles which determined Hannibal's whole method of operations in Italy — viz. , that the war should be carried on, in somewhat adventurous fashion, with constant changes in the plan and in the theatre of operations ; and that its favourable issue could only be looked for as the result of political and not of military successes —of the
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
and final breaking up of the Italian federation. That mode of carrying on the war was neces
sary, because the single element which Hannibal had to throw into the scale against so many disadvantages — his military genius — only told with its full weight, when he constantly foiled his opponents by unexpected combina tions ; he was undone, if the war became stationary. That aim was the aim dictated to him by right policy, because, mighty conqueror though he was in battle, he saw very clearly that on each occasion he vanquished the generals and not the city, and that after each new battle the Romans remained just as superior to the Carthaginians as he was personally superior to the Roman commanders. That Hannibal even at the height of his fortune never deceived himself on this point, is worthier of admiration than his most admired battles.
It was these motives, and not the entreaties of the Hannibal Gauls that he should spare their country —which would ^pen** not have influenced him — that induced Hannibal now to nine*, forsake, as it were, his newly acquired basis of operations
against Italy, and to transfer the scene of war to Italy itself. Before doing so he gave orders that all the prisoners should be brought before him. He ordered the Romans to be separated and loaded with chains as slaves —the statement that Hannibal put to death all the Romans capable of bearing arms, who here and elsewhere fell into his hands, is beyond doubt at least strongly exaggerated. On the other hand, all the Italian allies were released without ransom, and charged to report at home that Hannibal waged war not against Italy, but against Rome ; that he promised to every Italian community the restora tion of its ancient independence and its ancient boundaries ; and that the deliverer was about to follow those whom he had set free, bringing release and revenge. In fact, when the winter ended, he started from the valley of the Po to
gradual loosening
275
Flaminius.
search for a route through the difficult defiles of the Apennines. Gaius Flaminius, with the Etruscan army, was still for the moment at Arezzo, intending to move from that point towards Lucca in order to protect the vale of the Arno and the passes of the Apennines, so soon as the season should allow. But Hannibal anticipated him. The passage of the Apennines was accomplished without much difficulty, at a point as far west as possible or, in other words, as distant as possible from the enemy; but the marshy low grounds between the Serchio and the Arno were so flooded by the melting of the snow and the spring rains, that the army had to march four days in water, without finding any other dry spot for resting by night than was supplied by piling the baggage or by the sumpter animals that had fallen. The troops underwent unutterable sufferings, particularly the Gallic infantry, which marched behind the Carthaginians along tracks already rendered impassable : they murmured loudly and would undoubtedly have dispersed to a man, had not the Carthaginian cavalry under Mago, which brought up the rear, rendered flight impossible. The horses, assailed by a distemper in their hoofs, fell in heaps ; various diseases decimated the soldiers ; Hannibal himself lost an eye in consequence of ophthalmia.
But the object was attained. Hannibal encamped at Fiesole, while Gaius Flaminius was still waiting at Arezzo until the roads should become passable that he might blockade them. After the Roman defensive position had thus been turned, the best course for the consul, who might perhaps have been strong enough to defend the mountain
passes but certainly was unable now to face Hannibal in the open field, would have been to wait till the second army, which had now become completely superfluous at Ariminum, should arrive. He himself, however, judged otherwise. He was a political party leader, raised to
276
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL BOOK III
CHAT, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
277
distinction by his efforts to limit the power of the senate ;
at the government in consequence of the aristocratic intrigues concocted against him during his consulship; carried away, through a doubtless justifiable opposition to their beaten track of partisanship, into a scornful defiance of tradition and custom ; intoxicated at once by blind love of the common people and equally bitter hatred of the party of the nobles ; and, in addition
to all this, possessed with the fixed idea that he was a military genius. His campaign against the Insubres of 531, which to unprejudiced judges only showed that good 223. soldiers often repair the errors of bad generals 226), was regarded by him and by his adherents as an irrefragable proof that the Romans had only to put Gaius Flaminius at
the head of the army in order to make speedy end of Hannibal. Talk of this sort had procured for him his second consulship, and hopes of this sort had now brought
to his camp so great multitude of unarmed followers eager for spoil, that their number, according to the assurance of sober historians, exceeded that of the legion
aries. Hannibal based his plan in part on this circum stance. So far from attacking him, he marched past him,
and caused the country all around to be pillaged by the Celts who thoroughly understood plundering, and his numerous cavalry. The complaints and indignation of the multitude which had to submit to be plundered under the eyes of the hero who had promised to enrich them, and
the protestation of the enemy that they did not believe
him possessed of either the power or the resolution to undertake anything before the arrival of his colleague, could not but induce such man to display his genius for strategy, and to give sharp lesson to his inconsiderate
and haughty foe.
No plan was ever more successful. In haste, the consul followed the line of march of the enemy, who
indignant
a
a
a
by
a
(p.
Battle
passed by Arezzo and moved slowly through the rich valley of *^e Chiana towards Perugia. He overtook him in the district of Cortona, where Hannibal, accurately informed of his antagonist's march, had had full time to select his field of battle—a narrow deSle between two steep mountain walls, closed at its outlet by a high hill, and at its entrance by the Trasimene lake. With the flower of his infantry he barred the outlet ; the light troops and the cavalry placed themselves in concealment on either side. The Roman columns advanced without hesitation into the unoccupied pass; the thick morning mist concealed from them the position of the enemy. As the head of the Roman line approached the hill, Hannibal gave the signal for battle ; the cavalry,
behind the heights, closed the entrance of the pass, and at the same time the mist rolling away revealed the Phoenician arms everywhere along the crests on the right and left There was no battle ; it was a mere rout Those that remained outside of the defile were driven by the cavalry into the lake. The main body was annihilated in the pass itself almost without resistance, and most of them, including the consul himself, were cut down in the order of march. The head of the Roman column, formed of 6000 infantry, cut their way through the infantry of the enemy, and proved once more the irresistible might of the legions ; but, cut off from the rest of the army and without knowledge of its fate, they marched on at random, were surrounded on the following day, on a hill which they had occupied, by a corps of Carthaginian cavalry, and — as the capitulation, which promised them a free retreat, was rejected by Hannibal —were all treated as prisoners of war.
Trastaene lake.
878
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book III
advancing
15,000 Romans had fallen, and as many were captured; in other words, the army was annihilated. The slight Carthaginian loss— 1500 men —again fell mainly upon the Gauls. 1 And, as if this were not enough,
immediately 1 The date of the battle, 23rd. June according to the uncorrected
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
279
after the battle on the Trasimene lake, the cavalry of the army of Ariminum under Gaius Centenius, 4000 strong, which Gnaeus Servilius had sent forward for the temporary support of his colleague while he himself advanced by slow marches, was likewise surrounded by the Phoenician army, and partly slain, partly made prisoners. All Etruria was lost, and Hannibal might without hindrance march on Rome. The Romans prepared themselves for the worst ; they broke down the bridges over the Tiber, and nominated Quintus Fabius Maximus dictator to repair the walls and conduct the defence, for which an army of reserve was formed. At the same time two new legions were summoned under arms in the room of those annihilated, and the fleet,
which might become of importance in the event of a siege, was put in order.
But Hannibal was more farsighted than king Pyrrhus. Hannibal
He did not march on Rome ; nor even against Gnaeus Servilius, an able general, who had with the help of the fortresses on the northern road preserved his army hitherto uninjured, and would perhaps have kept his antagonist at bay. Once more a movement occurred which was quite unexpected. Hannibal marched past the fortress of Spoletium, which he attempted in vain to surprise, through Umbria, fearfully devastated the territory of Picenum which was covered all over with Roman farmhouses, and halted
on the shores of the Adriatic. The men and horses of his army had not yet recovered from the painful effects of their spring campaign ; here he rested for a considerable t'me to allow his army to recruit its strength in a pleasant district and at a fine season of the year, and to reorganize his Libyan infantry after the Roman mode, the means for
? . ? "*
calendar, must, according to the rectified calendar, fall somewhere In thaginlafi April, since Quintus Fabius resigned his dictatorship, after six months, army.
in the middle of autumn (Liv. xxii. 31, 7 ; 32, 1 ), and must therefore hare
entered upon it about the beginning of May. The confusion of the
calendar (p. 117) in Rome was even at this period very great.
Reorgan-
l? "i£! Lof
War In ^wer
2&> THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book ni
which were furnished to him by the mass of Roman arms among the spoil. From this point, moreover, he resumed his long-interrupted communication with his native land, sending his messages of victory by water to Carthage. At length, when his army was sufficiently restored and had been adequately exercised in the use of the new arms, he broke up and marched slowly along the coast into southern Italy.
He had calculated correctly, when he chose this time for remodelling his infantry. The surprise of his antagon ists, who were in constant expectation of an attack on the capital, allowed him at least four weeks of undisturbed leisure for the execution of the unprecedentedly bold ex periment of changing completely his military system in the heart of a hostile country and with an army still compara tively small, and of attempting to oppose African legions to the invincible legions of Italy. But his hope that the con federacy would now begin to break up was not fulfilled. In this respect the Etruscans, who had carried on their last wars of independence mainly with Gallic mercenaries, were of less moment ; the flower of the confederacy, particularly in a military point of view, consisted —next to the Latins — of the Sabellian communities, and with good reason Hanni bal had now come into their neighbourhood. But one town after another closed its gates; not a single Italian community entered into alliance with the Phoenicians. This was a great, in fact an all-important, gain for the Romans. Nevertheless it was felt in the capital that it would be imprudent to put the fidelity of their allies to such a test, without a Roman army to keep the field. The dictator Quintus Fabius combined the two supplementary legions formed in Rome with the army of Ariminum, and when Hannibal marched past the Roman fortress of Luceria towards Arpi, the Roman standards appeared on his right flank at Aeca. Their leader, however, pursued a
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE »8i
course different from that of his predecessors. Quintus Fahfat Fabius was a man advanced in years, of a deliberation and firmness, which to not a few seemed procrastination and obstinacy. Zealous in his reverence for the good old
times, for the political omnipotence of the senate, and for the command of the burgomasters, he looked to a method ical prosecution of the war as — next to sacrifices and prayers — the means of saving the state. A political antagonist of Gaius Flaminius, and summoned to the head of affairs in virtue of the reaction against his foolish war- demagogism, Fabius departed for the camp just as firmly resolved to avoid a pitched battle at any price, as his predecessor had been determined at any price to fight one ; he was without doubt convinced that the first elements of strategy would forbid Hannibal to advance so long as the Roman army confronted him intact, and that accordingly it would not be difficult to weaken by petty conflicts and gradually to starve out the enemy's army, dependent as it was on foraging for its supplies.
Hannibal, well served by his spies in Rome and in the Roman army, immediately learned how matters stood, and, wt"? as usual, adjusted the plan of his campaign in accordance Apulia, with the individual character of the opposing leader. Pass
ing the Roman army, he marched over the Apennines into
the heart of Italy towards Beneventum, took the open town
of Telesia on the boundary between Samnium and Campania,
and thence turned against Capua, which as the most im portant of all the Italian cities dependent on Rome, and the
only one standing in some measure on a footing of equality
with had for that very reason felt more severely than any
other community the oppression of the Roman government
He had formed connections there, which led him to hope
that the Campanians might revolt from the Roman alliance
but in this hope he was disappointed. So, retracing his steps, he took the road to Apulia. During all this march
March to
;
it,
War in ApuU"-
28a THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book hi
of the Carthaginian army the dictator had followed along the heights, and had condemned his soldiers to the melancholy task of looking on with arms in their hands, while the Numidian cavalry plundered the faithful allies far and wide, and the villages over all the plain rose in flames. At length he opened up to the exasperated Roman army the eagerly-coveted opportunity of attacking the enemy. When Hannibal had begun his retreat, Fabius intercepted his route near Casilinum (the modern Capua), by strongly
garrisoning that town on the left bank of the Volturnus and occupying the heights that crowned the right bank with his main army, while a division of 4000 men encamped on the road itself that led along by the river. But Hannibal ordered his light-armed troops to climb the heights which rose immediately alongside of the road, and to drive before them a number of oxen with lighted faggots on their horns, so that it seemed as if the Carthaginian army were thus marching off during the night by torchlight The Roman division, which barred the road, imagining that they were evaded and that further covering of the road was super fluous, marched by a side movement to the same heights. Along the road thus left free Hannibal then retreated with the bulk of his army, without encountering the enemy ; next morning he without difficulty, but with severe loss to the Romans, disengaged and recalled his light troops. Hanni bal then continued his march unopposed in a north-easterly direction ; and by a widely-circuitous route, after traversing and laying under contribution the lands of the Hirpinians, Campanians, Samnites, Paelignians, and Frentanians with out resistance, he arrived with rich booty and a full chest once more in the region of Luceria, just as the harvest there was about to begin. Nowhere in his extensive march had he met with active opposition, but nowhere had he found allies. Clearly perceiving that no course remained for him but to take up winter quarters in the open field, he began
CHAP, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
S83
the difficult operation of collecting the winter
requisite for the army, by means of its own agency, from the fields of the enemy. For this purpose he had selected the broad and mostly flat district of northern Apulia, which furnished grain and grass in abundance, and which could be completely commanded by his excellent cavalry. An entrenched camp was constructed at Gerunium,
miles to the north of Luceria. Two-thirds of the army were daily despatched from it to bring in the stores, while Hannibal with the remainder took up a position to protect the camp and the detachments sent out
The master of the horse, Marcus Minucius, who held temporary command in the Roman camp during the absence of the dictator, deemed this a suitable opportunity for approaching the enemy more closely, and formed a camp in the territory of the Larinates ; where on the one hand by his mere presence he checked the sending out of detach ments and thereby hindered the provisioning of the enemy's army, and on the other hand, in a series of successful con flicts in which his troops encountered isolated Phoenician divisions and even Hannibal himself, drove the enemy from their advanced positions and compelled them to concentrate themselves at Gerunium. On the news of these successes, which of course lost nothing in the telling, the storm broL forth in the capital against Quintus Fabius. It was not altogether unwarranted. Prudent as it was on the part of Rome to abide by the defensive and to expect success mainly from the cutting off of the enemy's means of sub sistence, there was yet something strange in a system of defence and of starving out, under which the enemy had laid waste all central Italy without opposition beneath the eyes of a Roman army of equal numbers, and had provisioned themselves sufficiently for the winter by an organized method of foraging on the greatest scale. Publius Scipio, when he commanded on the Po, had not adopted
supplies
twenty-five
Fabius and M,nud,1,.
284
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book hi
this view of a defensive attitude, and the attempt of his successor to imitate him at Casilinum had failed in such a way as to afford a copious fund of ridicule to the scoffers of the city. It was wonderful that the Italian communities had not wavered, when Hannibal so palpably showed them the superiority of the Phoenicians and the nullity of Roman aid; but how long could they be expected to bear the burden of a double war, and to allow themselves to be
plundered under the very eyes of the Roman troops and of their own contingents? Finally, it could not be alleged that the condition of the Roman army compelled the general to adopt this mode of warfare. It was composed, as regarded its core, of the capable legions of Ariminum, and, by their side, of militia called out, most of whom were likewise accustomed to service; and, far from being dis couraged by the last defeats, it was indignant " at the but little honourable task which its general, Hannibal's lackey," assigned to and demanded with loud voice to be led against the enemy. In the assemblies of the people the most violent invectives were directed against the obstinate old man. His political opponents, with the former praetor Gaius Terentius Varro at their head, laid hold of the quarrel—for the understanding of which we must not forget that the dictator was practically nominated
the senate, and the office was regarded as the palladium of the conservative party—and, in concert with the dis contented soldiers and the possessors of the plundered estates, they carried an unconstitutional and absurd resolu tion of the people conferring the dictatorship, which was destined to obviate the evils of divided command in times of danger, on Marcus Minucius,1 who had hitherto been the lieutenant of Quintus Fabius, in the same way as
The inscription of the gift devoted by the new dictator on account of his victory at Geranium to Hercules Victor — Hercolei sacrom M. Minuci(uj) C. dictator vovit —was found in the year 862 at Rome, near S. Lorenso.
f.
1
by
1
a
it, it
a
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
385
on Fabius himself. Thus the Roman army, after its hazardous division into two separate corps had just been appropriately obviated, was once more divided ; and not only so, but the two sections were placed under leaders who notoriously followed quite opposite plans of war.
Quintus Fabius of course adhered more than ever to his methodical
inaction; Marcus Minucius, compelled to justify in the field of battle his title of dictator, made a hasty attack with inadequate forces, and would have been annihilated had not his colleague averted greater misfortune by the season able interposition of a fresh corps. This last turn of matters justified in some measure the system of passive resistance. But in reality Hannibal had completely attained in this campaign all that arms could attain : not a single material operation had been frustrated either by his impetuous or by his deliberate opponent ; and his foraging, though not unattended with difficulty, had yet been in the main so successful that the army passed the winter without complaint in the camp at Gerunium. It was not the Cunctator that saved Rome, but the compact structure of its confederacy and, not less perhaps, the national hatred with which the Phoenician hero was regarded on the part of Occidentals.
Despite all its misfortunes, Roman pride stood no less New unshaken than the Roman symmachy. The donations paraSom
which were offered by king Hiero of Syracuse and the Greek cities in Italy for the next campaign — the war affected the latter less severely than the other Italian allies of Rome, for they sent no contingents to the land army— were declined with thanks; the chieftains of Illyria were informed that they could not be allowed to neglect pay ment of their tribute; and even the king of Macedonia was once more summoned to surrender Demetrius of Pharos. The majority of the senate, notwithstanding the
semblance of legitimation which recent events had given to the Fabian system of delay, had firmly resolved to depart
■ ■■■*
Pauiius
286 THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book hi
from a mode of war that was slowly but certainly ruining the state; if the popular dictator had failed in his more energetic method of warfare, they laid the blame of the failure, and not without reason, on the fact that they had adopted a half-measure and had given him too few troops. This error they determined to avoid and to equip an army, such as Rome had never sent out before—eight legions, each raised a fifth above the normal strength, and a
number of allies — enough to crush an who was not half so strong. Besides this, a legion under the praetor Lucius Postumius was destined
for the valley of the Po, in order, if possible, to draw off the Celts serving in the army of Hannibal to their homes. These resolutions were judicious ; everything depended on their coming to an equally judicious decision respecting the supreme command. The stiff carriage of Quintus
Fabius, and the attacks of the demagogues which it
had rendered the dictatorship and the senate generally more unpopular than ever : amongst the people, not without the connivance of their leaders, the foolish report circulated that the senate was intentionally pro longing the war. As, therefore, the nomination of a dictator was not to be thought of, the senate attempted to procure the election of suitable consuls ; but this only had the effect of thoroughly rousing suspicion and obstinacy. With difficulty the senate carried one of its candidates,
corresponding opponent
provoked,
Lucius Aemilius Paullus, who had with judgment con- 219. ducted the Illyrian war in 535 (p. 220); an immense majority of the citizens assigned to him as colleague the
candidate of the popular party, Gaius Terentius Varro, an incapable man, who was known only by his bitter opposition to the senate and more especially as the main author of the proposal to elect Marcus Minucius co-dictator, and who was recommended to the multitude solely by his humble birth and his coarse effrontery.
cha*. T TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
While these preparations for the next campaign were Battle at being made in Rome, the war had already recommenced Cannae- in Apulia. As soon as the season allowed him to leave
his winter quarters, Hannibal, determining as usual the
course of the war and assuming the offensive, set out from Gerunium in a southerly direction, and
Luceria crossed the Aufidus and took the citadel of
Cannae (between Canosa and Barletta) which commanded
the plain of Canusium, and had hitherto served the Romans as their chief magazine. The Roman
which, since Fabius had conformably to the constitution
resigned his dictatorship in the middle of autumn, was now
commanded by Gnaeus Servilius and Marcus Regulus, first
as consuls then as proconsuls, had been unable to avert a
loss which they could not but feel. On military as well as
on political grounds, it became more than ever necessary
to arrest the progress of Hannibal by a pitched battle. With definite orders to this effect from the senate, accord ingly, the two new commanders-in-chief, Paullus and Varro, arrived in Apulia in the beginning of the summer of 538. 219. With the four new legions and a corresponding contingent
of Italians which they brought up, the Roman army rose to 80,000 infantry, half burgesses, half allies, and 6000 cavalry, of whom one-third were burgesses and two-thirds allies; whereas Hannibal's army numbered 1 0,000 cavalry, but only about 40,000 infantry. Hannibal wished nothing so much as a battle, not merely for the general reasons which we have explained above, but specially because the wide Apulian plain allowed him to develop the whole
of his cavalry, and because the providing supplies for his numerous army would soon, in spite of that excellent cavalry, be rendered very difficult by the proximity of an enemy twice as strong and resting on a chain of fortresses. The leaders of the Roman forces also had, as we have said, made up their minds on the general
marching past
army
387
superiority
288 THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book ill
question of giving battle, and approached the enemy with that view ; but the more sagacious of them saw the position of Hannibal, and were disposed accordingly to wait in the first instance and simply to station themselves in the vicinity of the enemy, so as to compel him to retire and accept battle on a ground less favourable to him. Hannibal encamped at Cannae on the right bank of the Aufidus. Paullus pitched his camp on both banks of the stream, so that the main force came to be stationed on the left bank, but a strong corps took up a position on the right immedi ately opposite to the enemy, in order to impede his supplies and perhaps also to threaten Cannae. Hannibal, to whom it was all-important to strike a speedy blow, crossed the stream with the bulk of his troops, and offered battle on the left bank, which Paullus did not accept But such military pedantry was disapproved by the democratic consul—so much had been said about men taking the field not to stand guard, but to use their swords—and he gave orders accordingly to attack the enemy, wherever and whenever they found him. According to the old custom foolishly retained, the decisive voice in the council of war alternated between the commanders-in-chief day by day ; it was necessary therefore on the following day to submit, and to let the hero of the pavement have his way. On the left bank, where the wide plain offered full scope to the superior cavalry of the enemy, certainly even he would not fight ; but he determined to unite the whole Roman forces on the right bank, and there, taking up a position between the Carthaginian camp and Cannae and seriously threatening the latter, to offer battle. A division of 10,000 men was left behind in the principal Roman camp, charged to capture the Carthaginian encampment during the conflict and thus to intercept the retreat of the enemy's army across the river. The bulk of the Roman army, at early dawn on the and August according to the uncorrected, perhaps in
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
389
June according to the correct, calendar, crossed the river which at this season was shallow and did not materially hamper the movements of the troops, and took up a position in line near the smaller Roman camp to the west ward of Cannae. The Carthaginian army followed and likewise crossed the stream, on which rested the right Roman as well as the left Carthaginian wing. The Roman cavalry was stationed on the wings : the weaker portion consisting of burgesses, led by Paullus, on the right next the river ; the stronger consisting of the allies, led by Varro, on the left towards the plain. In the centre was stationed the infantry in unusually deep files, under the command of the consul of the previous year Gnaeus Servilius. Opposite to this centre Hannibal arranged his infantry in the form of a crescent, so that the Celtic and Iberian troops in their national armour formed the advanced centre, and the Libyans, armed after the Roman fashion, formed the drawn- back wings on either side.
On the side next the river the whole heavy cavalry under Hasdrubal was stationed, on the side towards the plain the light Numidian horse. After a short skirmish between the light troops the whole line was soon engaged. Where the light cavalry of the Carthaginians fought against the heavy cavalry of Varro, the conflict was prolonged, amidst constant charges of the Numidians, without decisive result In the centre, on the other hand, the legions completely overthrew the Spanish and Gallic troops that first encountered them ; eagerly the victors
pressed on and followed up their advantage. But mean while, on the right wing, fortune had turned against the Romans. Hannibal had merely sought to occupy the left cavalry wing of the enemy, that he might bring Hasdrubal with the whole regular cavalry to bear against the weaker right and to overthrow it first. After a brave resistance, the Roman horse gave way, and those that were not cut down were chased up the river and scattered in the plain ;
tol. n
51
39o
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book hi
Paullus, wounded, rode to the centre to turn or, if not, to share the fate of the legions. These, in order the better to follow up the victory over the advanced infantry of the enemy, had changed their front disposition into a column of attack, which, in the shape of a wedge, penetrated the enemy's centre. In this position they were warmly assailed on both sides by the Libyan infantry wheeling inward upon them right and left, and a portion of them were compelled to halt in order to defend themselves against the flank attack ; by this means their advance was checked, and the mass of infantry, which was already too closely crowded, now had no longer room to develop itself at all. Mean while Hasdrubal, after having completed the defeat of the wing of Paullus, had collected and arranged his cavalry anew and led them behind the enemy's centre against the wing of Varro. His Italian cavalry, already sufficiently occupied with the Numidians, was rapidly scattered before the double attack, and Hasdrubal, leaving the pursuit of the fugitives to the Numidians, arranged his squadrons for the third time, to lead them against the rear of the Roman infantry. This last charge proved decisive. Flight was not possible, and quarter was not given. Never, perhaps, was an army of such size annihilated on the field of battle so completely, and with so little loss to its antagonist, as was the Roman army at Cannae. Hannibal had lost not quite 6000 men, and two-thirds of that loss fell upon the Celts, who sustained the first shock of the legions. On the other hand, of the 76,000 Romans who had taken their places in the line of battle 70,000 covered the field, amongst whom were the consul Lucius Paullus, the pro consul Gnaeus Servilius, two-thirds of the staff-officers, and eighty men of senatorial rank. The consul Gaius Varro was saved solely by his quick resolution and his good steed, reached Venusia, and was not ashamed to survive. The garrison also of the Roman camp, 10,000 strong, were for
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
191
the most part made prisoners of war ; only a few thousand men, partly of these troops, partly of the line, escaped to Canusium. Nay, as if in this year an end was to be made with Rome altogether, before its close the legion sent to Gaul fell into an ambush, and was, with its general Lucius Postumius who was nominated as consul for the next year, totally destroyed by the Gauls.
This unexampled success appeared at length to mature the conse-
I"8"0" °* great political combination, for the sake of which Hannibal the battle
0r'
had come to Italy. He had, no doubt, based his plan of Cannae.
primarily upon his army; but with accurate knowledge of the power opposed to him he designed that army to be
merely the vanguard, in support of which the powers of the
west and east were gradually to unite their forces, so as to
prepare destruction for the proud city. That support how- Prevention ever, which seemed the most secure, namely the sending of jrJ^V reinforcements from Spain, had been frustrated by the bold- from
pa^n"
ness and firmness of the Roman general sent thither, Gnaeus Scipio. After Hannibal's passage of the Rhone Scipio had sailed for Emporiae, and had made himself master first of the coast between the Pyrenees and the Ebro,
and then, after conquering Hanno, of the interior also (536). 218. In the following year (537) he had completely defeated the 217. Carthaginian fleet at the mouth of the Ebro, and after his brother Publius, the brave defender of the valley of the Po,
had joined him with a reinforcement of 8000 men, he had even crossed the Ebro, and advanced as far as Saguntum. Hasdrubal had indeed in the succeeding year (538), after 216. obtaining reinforcements from Africa, made an attempt in accordance with his brother's orders to conduct an army over the Pyrenees ; but the Scipios opposed his passage of
the Ebro, and totally defeated him, nearly at the same time that Hannibal conquered at Cannae. The powerful tribe of the Celtiberians and numerous other Spanish tribes had joined the Scipios ; they commanded the sea, the passes of
292
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL BOOK III
the Pyrenees, and, by means of the trusty Massiliots, the Gallic coast also. Now therefore support to Hannibal was less than ever to be looked for from Spain.
On the part of Carthage as much had hitherto been done in support of her general in Italy as could be expected.
Phoenician squadrons threatened the coasts of Italy and of the Roman islands and guarded Africa from a Roman land ing, and there the matter ended. More substantial assist ance was prevented not so much by the uncertainty as to where Hannibal was to be found and the want of a port of disembarkation in Italy, as by the fact that for many years the Spanish army had been accustomed to be self- sustaining, and above all by the murmurs of the peace party.
Hannibal severely felt the consequences of this unpardon able inaction ; in spite of all his saving of his money and of the soldiers whom he had brought with him, his chests were gradually emptied, the pay fell into arrear, and the ranks of his veterans began to thin. But now the news of the victory of Cannae reduced even the factious opposition at home to silence. The Carthaginian senate resolved to place at the disposal of the general considerable assistance in money and men, partly from Africa, partly from Spain, including 4000 Numidian horse and 40 elephants, and to
prosecute the war with energy in Spain as well as in Italy. The long-discussed offensive alliance between Carthage and Macedonia had been delayed, first by the sudden death
of Antigonus, and then by the indecision of his successor Philip and the unseasonable war waged by him and his 220-217. Hellenic allies against the Aetolians (534-537). It was
only now, after the battle of Cannae, that Demetrius of Pharos found Philip disposed to listen to his proposal to cede to Macedonia his Illyrian possessions—which it was necessary, no doubt, to wrest in the first place from the Romans—and it was only now that the court of Pella came to terms with Carthage. Macedonia undertook to land an
Reinforce ments from Africa.
Alliance between Carthage and Mace donia.
chap, V TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
293
invading army on the east coast of Italy, in return for which she received an assurance that the Roman possessions in Epirus should be restored to her.
In Sicily king Hiero had during the years of peace main- Alliance tained a policy of neutrality, so far as he could do so with ^! ^en safety, and he had shown a disposition to accommodate the and Carthaginians during the perilous crises after the peace with syracuso- Rome, particularly by sending supplies of corn. There is
no doubt that he saw with the utmost regret a renewed breach between Carthage and Rome ; but he had no power to avert and when occurred he adhered with well- calculated fidelity to Rome. But soon afterwards (in the autumn of 538) death removed the old man after reign
216.
The grandson and successor of the veteran, the young and incapable Hieronymus,
of fifty-four years.
prudent
entered at once into negotiations with the Carthaginian
and, as they made no difficulty in consenting to secure to him treaty, first, Sicily as far as the old
diplomatists
frontier, and then, when he rose in the arrogance of his demands, the possession even of the whole island, he entered into alliance with Carthage, and ordered the Syracusan fleet to unite with the Carthaginian which
had come to threaten Syracuse. The position of the Roman fleet at Lilybaeum, which already had to deal with second Carthaginian squadron stationed near the Aegates, became all at once very critical, while at the same time the force that was in readiness at Rome for embarkation to
Sicily had, in consequence of the defeat at Cannae, to be diverted to other and more urgent objects.
Carthagino-Sicilian
Above all came the decisive fact, that now at length the
Capua and fabric of the Roman confederacy began to be unhinged, ""muni. 8
after had survived unshaken the shocks of two severe ties of
years of war. There passed over to the side of Hannibal lilMV Ital ^^
Arpi in Apulia, and Uzentum Messapia, two old towns over to which had been greatly injured the Roman colonies of
by in
it
a
by
;
a
it,
it
394
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book in
Luceria and Brundisium ; all the towns of the Bruttii—who took the lead—with the exception of the Petelini and the Consentini who had to be besieged before yielding; the greater portion of the Lucanians ; the Picentes transplanted into the region of Salernum; the Hirpini; the Sam- nites with the exception of the Pentri ; lastly and chiefly, Capua the second city of Italy, which was able to bring into the field 30,000 infantry and 4000 horse, and whose secession determined that of the neighbouring towns Atella and Calatia. The aristocratic party, indeed, attached by many ties to the interest of Rome everywhere, and more especially in Capua, very earnestly opposed this change of sides, and the obstinate internal conflicts which arose re garding it diminished not a little the advantage which Hannibal derived from these accessions. He found him self obliged, for instance, to have one of the leaders of the aristocratic party in Capua, Decius Magius, who even after the entrance of the Phoenicians obstinately contended for the Roman alliance, seized and conveyed to Carthage ; thus furnishing a demonstration, very inconvenient for himself, of the small value of the liberty and sovereignty which had just been solemnly assured to the Campanians by the Carthaginian general. On the other hand, the south Italian Greeks adhered to the Roman alliance — a result to which the Roman garrisons no doubt contributed, but which was still more due to the very decided dislike of the Hellenes towards the Phoenicians themselves and towards their new Lucanian and Bruttian allies, and their attach ment on the other hand to Rome, which had zealously em braced every opportunity of manifesting its Hellenism, and had exhibited towards the Greeks in Italy an unwonted gentleness. Thus the Campanian Greeks, particularly Neapolis, courageously withstood the attack of Hannibal in person: in Magna Graecia Rhegium, Thurii, Meta- pontum, and Tarentum did the same notwithstanding their
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
295
very perilous position. Croton and Locri on the other hand were partly carried by storm, partly forced to capitulate, by the united Phoenicians and Bruttians ; and the citizens of Croton were conducted to Locri, while Bruttian colonists occupied that important naval station. The Latin colonies in southern Italy, such as Brundisium, Venusia, Paestum, Cosa, and Cales, of course maintained unshaken fidelity to Rome. They were the strongholds by which the con querors held in check a foreign land, settled on the soil of the surrounding population, and at feud with their neigh bours ; they, too, would be the first to be affected, if Hanni bal should keep his word and restore to every Italian com munity its ancient boundaries. This was likewise the case with all central Italy, the earliest seat of the Roman rule, where Latin manners and language already everywhere pre ponderated, and the people felt themselves to be the com rades rather than the subjects of their rulers. The opponents of Hannibal in the Carthaginian senate did not fail to appeal to the fact that not one Roman citizen or one Latin community had cast itself into the arms of Carthage. This groundwork of the Roman power could only be broken
up, like the Cyclopean walls, stone by stone.
Such were the consequences of the day of Cannae, in which Attitude
the flower of the soldiers and officers of the confederacy, a £ seventh of the whole number of Italians capable of bearing arms, perished. It was a cruel but righteous punishment for the grave political errors with which not merely some foolish or miserable individuals, but the Roman people them selves, were justly chargeable. A constitution adapted for
a small country town was no longer suitable for a great power ; it was simply impossible that the question as to the leadership of the armies of the city in such a war should be left year after year to be decided by the Pandora's box of the balloting-urn. As a fundamental revision of the constitution, if practicable at all, could not at least be
396 THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book hi
undertaken now, the practical superintendence of the war, and in particular the bestowal and prolongation of the command, should have been at once left to the only authority which was in a position to undertake it—the senate —and there should have been reserved for the comitia the mere formality of confirmation. The brilliant successes of the Scipios in the difficult arena of Spanish warfare showed what might in this way be achieved. But political demagogism, which was already gnawing at the aristocratic foundations of the constitution, had seized on the management of the Italian war. The absurd accusa tion, that the nobles were conspiring with the enemy without, had made an impression on the "people. " The
saviours to whom political superstition looked "for deliver" ance, Gaius Flaminius and Gaius Varro, both new men and friends of the people of the purest dye, had accordingly been empowered by the multitude itself to execute the plans of operations which, amidst the approbation of that multitude, they had unfolded in the Forum ; and the results were the battles on the Trasimene lake and at Cannae. Duty required that the senate, which now of course understood its task better than when it recalled half the army of Regulus from Africa, should take into its hands the management of affairs, and should oppose such mis chievous proceedings ; but when the first of those two defeats had for the moment placed the rudder in its hands, it too had hardly acted in a manner unbiassed by the interests of party. Little as Quintus Fabius may be com pared with these Roman Cleons, he had yet conducted the war not as a mere military leader, but had adhered to his rigid attitude of defence specially as the political opponent of Gaius Flaminius ; and in the treatment of the quarrel
with his subordinate, had done what he could to exasperate at a time when unity was needed. The consequence was, first, that the most important instrument which the wisdom
chap, V TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
397
of their ancestors had placed in the hands of the senate just for such cases —the dictatorship —broke down in his hands ; and, secondly —at least indirectly —the battle of Cannae. But the headlong fall of the Roman power was owing not to the fault of Quintus Fabius or Gaius Varro, but to the distrust between the government and the governed—to the variance between the senate and the burgesses. If the deliverance and revival of the state were still possible, the work had to begin at home with the re- establishment of unity and of confidence. To have per ceived this and, what is of more importance, to have done
and done with an abstinence from all recriminations however just, constitutes the glorious and imperishable honour of the Roman senate. When Varro—alone of all the generals who had command in the battle—returned to Rome, and the Roman senators met him at the gate and thanked him that he had not despaired of the salvation of his country, this was no empty phraseology veiling the disaster under sounding words, nor was bitter mockery over poor wretch was the conclusion of peace between the government and the governed. In presence of the gravity of the time and the gravity of such an appeal, the chattering of demagogues was silent; henceforth the only thought of the Romans was how they might be able jointly to avert the common peril. Quintus Fabius, whose tenacious courage at this decisive moment was of more service to the state than all his feats of war, and the other senators of note took the lead in every movement, and restored to the citizens confidence in themselves and in the future. The senate preserved its firm and
unbending attitude, while messengers from all sides hastened to Rome to report the loss of battles, the secession of allies, the
capture of posts and magazines, and to ask reinforcements for the valley of the Po and for Sicily at time when Italy
was abandoned and Rome was almost without
garrison.
a a
it
a
; it
it,
it
«98
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL BOOK ill
Assemblages of the multitude at the gates were forbidden ; onlookers and women were sent to their houses ; the time of mourning for the fallen was restricted to thirty days that the service of the gods of joy, from which those clad in mourning attire were excluded, might not be too long interrupted —for so great was the number of the fallen, that there was scarcely a family which had not to lament its dead. Meanwhile the remnant saved from the field of battle had been assembled by two able military tribunes, Appius Claudius and Publius Scipio the younger, at Canusium. The latter managed, by his lofty spirit and by the brandished swords of his faithful comrades, to change the views of those genteel young lords who, in indolent despair of the salvation of their country, were thinking of escape beyond the sea. The consul Gaius Varro joined them with a handful of men ; about two legions were gradually collected there ; the senate gave orders that they should be reorganized and reduced to serve in disgrace and without pay. The incapable general was on a suitable pretext recalled to Rome ; the praetor Marcus Claudius Marcellus, experienced in the Gallic wars, who had been destined to depart for Sicily with the fleet from Ostia, assumed the chief command. The utmost exertions were made to organize an army capable of taking the field. The Latins were summoned to render aid in the common peril. Rome itself set the example, and called to arms all the men above boyhood, armed the debtor-serfs and criminals, and even incorporated in the army eight thousand slaves purchased by
the state. As there was a want of arms, they took the old spoils from the temples, and everywhere set the workshops and artisans in action. The senate was completed, not as timid patriots urged, from the Latins, but from the Roman burgesses who had the best title. Hannibal offered a release of captives at the expense of the Roman treasury ; it was declined, and the Carthaginian envoy who had
chap, v TO THE BATTLE OF CANNAE
299
arrived with the deputation of captives was not admitted into the city : nothing should look as if the senate thought of peace. Not only were the allies to be prevented from
that Rome was disposed to enter into negotia tions, but even the meanest citizen was to be made to understand that for him as for all there was no peace, and that safety lay only in victory.
believing
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book hi
CHAPTER VI
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL FROM CANNAE TO ZAMA
The crisis. The aim of Hannibal in his expedition to Italy had been to break up the Italian confederacy : after three campaigns that aim had been attained, so far as it was at all attain able. It was clear that the Greek and Latin or Latinized communities of Italy, since they had not been shaken in their allegiance by the day of Cannae, would not yield to terror, but only to force ; and the desperate courage with which even in Southern Italy isolated little country towns, such as the Bruttian Petelia, maintained their forlorn defence against the Phoenicians, showed very plainly what awaited them among the Marsians and Latins. If Hannibal had expected to accomplish more in this way and to be able to lead even the Latins against Rome, these hopes had proved vain. But it appears as if even in other respects the Italian coalition had by no means produced the results which Hannibal hoped for. Capua had at once stipulated that Hannibal should not have the right to call Campanian citizens compulsorily to arms ; the citizens had not forgotten how Pyrrhus had acted in Tarentum, and they foolishly imagined that they should be able to withdraw at once from the Roman and from the Phoenician rule. Samnium and Luceria were no longer what they had been, when king Pyrrhus had thought of inarching into Rome at the head of the Sabellian youth.
chap, vi FROM CANNAE TO ZAMA
301
Not only did the chain of Roman fortresses everywhere cut the nerves and sinews of the land, but the Roman rule, continued for many years, had rendered the inhabitants unused to arms —they furnished only a moderate contingent to the Roman armies — had appeased their ancient hatred, and had gained over a number of individuals everywhere to the interest of the ruling community. They joined the conqueror of the Romans, indeed, after the cause of Rome seemed fairly lost, but they felt that the question was no longer one of liberty ; it was simply the exchange of an Italian for a Phoenician master, and it was not enthusiasm, but despair that threw the Sabellian communities into the arms of the victor. Under such circumstances the war in Italy flagged. Hannibal, who commanded the southern part of the peninsula as far up as the Volturnus and
Garganus, and who could not simply abandon these lands again as he had abandoned that of the Celts, had now likewise a frontier to protect, which could not be left un covered with impunity ; and for the purpose of defending the districts that he had gained against the fortresses which everywhere defied him and the armies advancing from the north, and at the same time of resuming the difficult offensive against central Italy, his forces—an army of about 40,000 men, without reckoning the Italian contingents— were far from sufficient.
Above all, he found that other antagonists were opposed Maredlna. to him. Taught by fearful experience, the Romans
adopted a more judicious system of conducting the war,
placed none but experienced officers at the head of their
armies, and left them, at least where it was necessary, for a longer period in command. These generals neither looked down on the enemy's movements from the mountains, nor did they throw themselves on their adversary wherever they found him ; but, keeping the true mean between in action and precipitation, they took up their positions in
3oa
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book hi
Hannibal
entrenched camps under the walls of fortresses, and accepted battle where victory would lead to results and defeat would not be destruction. The soul of this new mode of warfare was Marcus Claudius Marcellus. With true instinct, after the disastrous day of Cannae, the senate and people had turned their eyes to this brave and ex perienced officer, and entrusted him at once with the actual supreme command. He had received his training in the troublesome warfare against Hamilcar in Sicily, and had given brilliant evidence of his talents as a leader as well as of his personal valour in the last campaigns against the Celts. Although far above fifty, he still glowed with all the ardour of the most youthful soldier, and only a few years before this he had, as general, cut down the mounted general of the enemy 228) — the first and only Roman consul who achieved that feat of arms. His life was consecrated to the two divinities, to whom he erected the splendid double temple at the Capene Gate—to Honour and to Valour; and, while the merit of rescuing Rome from this extremity of danger belonged to no single in dividual, but pertained to the Roman citizens collectively and pre-eminently to the senate, yet no single man contri buted more towards the success of the common enterprise
than Marcus Marcellus.
From the field of battle Hannibal had turned his steps
Siinpania! > to Campania. He knew Rome better than the simpletons, who in ancient and modern times have fancied that he might have terminated the struggle march on the
Modern warfare, true, decides war on the field of battle; but in ancient times, when the system of attacking fortresses was far less developed than the system of defence, the most complete success in the field was on numberless occasions neutralized by the resistance of the walls of the capitals. The council and citizens of Carthage were not at all to be compared to the
enemy's capital.
it
is by a
a
(p.
chap, vi FROM CANNAE TO ZAMA
303
senate and people of Rome ; the peril of Carthage after the first campaign of Regulus was infinitely more urgent than that of Rome after the battle of Cannae ; yet Carthage had made a stand and been completely victorious. With what colour could it be expected that Rome would now deliver her keys to the victor, or even accept an equitable peace ? Instead therefore of sacrificing practicable and important successes for the sake of such empty demonstrations, or losing time in the besieging of the two thousand Roman fugitives enclosed within the walls of Canusium, Hannibal had immediately proceeded to Capua before the Romans could throw in a garrison, and by his advance had induced this second city of Italy after long hesitation to join him. He might hope that, in possession of Capua, he would be able to seize one of the Campanian ports, where he might disembark the reinforcements which his great victories had wrung from the opposition at home.
When the Romans learned whither Hannibal had gone, Renewal of
the war in Campania*
they also left Apulia, where only a weak division was re tained, and collected their remaining forces on the right bank of the Volturnus. With the two legions saved from Cannae Marcus Marcellus marched to Teanum Sidicinum, where he was joined by such troops as were at the moment disposable from Rome and Ostia, and advanced — while the dictator Marcus Junius slowly followed with the main army which had been hastily formed — as far as the Volturnus at Casilinum, with a view if possible to save Capua. That city he found already in the power of the enemy ; but on the other hand the attempts of the enemy on Neapolis had been thwarted by the courageous resistance of the citizens, and the Romans were still in good time to throw a garrison into that important port. With equal fidelity the two other large coast towns, Cumae and Nuceria, adhered to Rome. In Nola the struggle between
the popular and senatorial parties as to whether they should
304
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book ill
attach themselves to the Carthaginians or to the Romans, was still undecided. Informed that the former were gain ing the superiority, Marcellus crossed the river at Caiatia, and marching along the heights of Suessula so as to evade the enemy's army, he reached Nola in sufficient time to hold it against the foes without and within. In a sally he even repulsed Hannibal in person with considerable loss ; a success which, as the first defeat sustained by Hannibal, was of far more importance from its moral effect than from its material results. In Campania indeed, Nuceria, Acerrae, and, after an obstinate siege prolonged into the following
SIB. year (539), Casilinum also, the key of the Volturnus, were conquered by Hannibal, and the severest punishments were inflicted on the senates of these towns which had adhered to Rome. But terror is a bad weapon of proselytism ; the Romans succeeded, with comparatively trifling loss, in surmounting the perilous moment of their first weakness. The war in Campania came to a standstill ; then winter came on, and Hannibal took up his quarters in Capua, the luxury of which was by no means fraught with benefit to his troops who for three years had not been
315. under a roof. In the next year (539) the war acquired another aspect. The tried general Marcus Marcellus, Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus who had distinguished himself in the campaign of the previous year as master of the horse to the dictator, and the veteran Quintus Fabius Maximus, took—Marcellus as proconsul, the two others as consuls —the command of the three Roman armies which
were destined to surround Capua and Hannibal ; Marcellus resting on Nola and Suessula, Maximus taking a position on the right bank of the Volturnus near Cales, and Gracchus on the coast near Liternum,
covering Neapolis and Cumae. The Campanians, who marched to Hamae
three miles from Cumae with a view to
Cumaeans, were thoroughly defeated by Gracchus ; Han
surprise the
chap, vi FROM CANNAE TO ZAMA
joS
nibal, who had appeared before Cumae to wipe out the
stain, was himself worsted in a combat, and when the
pitched battle offered by him was declined, retreated in ill
humour to Capua. While the Romans in Campania thus
not only maintained what they possessed, but also recovered Compulteria and other smaller places, loud complaints
were heard from the eastern allies of Hannibal. A Roman The war in army under the praetor Marcus Valerius had taken position APuli«'
at Luceria, partly that it might, in connection with the Roman fleet, watch the east coast and the movements of the Macedonians ; partly that it might, in connection with the army of Nola, levy contributions on the revolted Samnites, Lucanians, and Hirpini. To give relief to these, Hannibal turned first against his most active opponent, Marcus Marcellus ; but the latter achieved under the walls of Nola no inconsiderable victory over the Phoenician army, and it was obliged to depart, without having cleared off the stain, from Campania for Arpi, in order at length to check the progress of the enemy's army in Apulia. Tiberius Gracchus followed it with his corps, while the two other Roman armies in Campania made arrangements to proceed next spring to the attack of Capua.
The clear vision of Hannibal had not been dazzled by
his victories. It became every day more evident that he
was not thus gaining his object Those rapid marches, defensive, that adventurous shifting of the war to and fro, to which Hannibal was mainly indebted for his successes, were at
an end ; the enemy had become wiser ; further enterprises
were rendered almost impossible by the inevitable necessity
of defending what had been gained. The offensive was
not to be thought of; the defensive was difficult, and threatened every year to become more so. He could not
conceal from himself that the second half of his great
task, the subjugation of the Latins and the conquest of
Rome, could not be accomplished with his own forces and
VOL. II
52
Hannibal Jr5"? "
u'toreio-
3o6
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book III
Hii those of his Italian allies alone. Its accomplishment
depended on the council at Carthage, on the head-quarters forcements. at Cartagena, on the courts of Pella and of Syracuse. If
all the energies of Africa, Spain, Sicily, and Macedonia should now be exerted in common against the common enemy ; if Lower Italy should become the great rendezvous for the armies and fleets of the west, south, and east ; he might hope successfully to finish what the vanguard under his leadership had so brilliantly begun. The most natural and easy course would have been to send to him adequate support from home ; and the Carthaginian state, which had remained almost untouched by the war and had been brought from deep decline so near to complete victory by a small band of resolute patriots acting of their own accord and at their own risk, could beyond doubt have done this. That it would have been possible for a Phoenician fleet of any desired strength to effect a landing at Locri or Croton, especially as long as the port of Syracuse remained open
to the Carthaginians and the fleet at Brundisium was kept in check by Macedonia, is shown by the unopposed dis embarkation at Locri of 4000 Africans, whom Bomilcar about this time brought over from Carthage to Hannibal, and still more by Hannibal's undisturbed embarkation, when all had been already lost But after the first impression of the victory of Cannae had died away, the peace party in Carthage, which was at all times ready to purchase the downfall of its political opponents at the expense of its country, and which found faithful allies in the shortsightedness and indolence of the citizens, refused the entreaties of the general for more decided support with the half- simple, half- malicious reply, that he in fact
needed no help inasmuch as he was really victor; and thus contributed not much less than the Roman senate to save Rome. Hannibal, reared in the camp and a stranger to the machinery of civic factions, found no popular leader
cftAP. vi FROM CANNAE TO ZAMA
307
on whose support he could rely, such as his father had found in Hasdrubal ; and he was obliged to seek abroad the means of saving his native country — means which itself possessed in rich abundance at home.
For this purpose he might, at least with more prospect of success, reckon on the leaders of the Spanish patriot army, on the connections which he had formed in Syracuse, and on the intervention of Philip. Everything depended on bringing new forces into the Italian field of war against Rome from Spain, Syracuse, or Macedonia; and for the attainment or for the prevention of this object wars were carried on in Spain, Sicily, and Greece. All of these were but means to an end, and historians have often erred in accounting them of greater importance. So far as the
Romans were concerned, they were essentially defensive wars, the proper objects of which were to hold the passes of the Pyrenees, to detain the Macedonian army in Greece, to defend Messana and to bar the communication between Italy and Sicily. Of course this defensive warfare was, wherever it was possible, waged by offensive methods ; and, should circumstances be favourable, it might develop into the dislodging of the Phoenicians from Spain and Sicily, and into the dissolution of Hannibal's alliances with Syra cuse and with Philip. The Italian war in itself fell for the time being into the shade, and resolved itself into con flicts about fortresses and razzias, which had no decisive effect on the main issue. Nevertheless, so long as the Phoenicians retained the offensive at all, Italy always re mained the central aim of operations ; and all efforts were directed towards, as all interest centred in, the doing away, or perpetuating, of Hannibal's isolation in southern
Italy.
Had it been possible, immediately after the battle of
Cannae, to bring into play all the resources on which Han nibal thought that he might reckon, he might have been
308
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book iii
The send- tolerably certain of success. But the position of Hasdrubal
at tIlat time in SPain after thc battle 0n the Ebr0 WaS S0 temporarily critical, that the supplies of money and men, which the
victory of Cannae had roused the Carthaginian citizens to furnish, were for the most part expended on Spain, without
fofcele^te ^utra
much improvement in the position of affairs there. The Scipios transferred the theatre of war in the SIB. following campaign (539) from the Ebro to the Guadalquivir;
and in Andalusia, in the very centre of the proper Cartha ginian territory, they achieved at Illiturgi and Intibili two brilliant victories. In Sardinia communications entered into with the natives led the Carthaginians to hope that they should be able to master the island, which would have been of importance as an intermediate station between Spain and Italy. But Titus Manlius Torquatus, who was sent with a Roman army to Sardinia, completely destroyed the Carthaginian landing force, and reassured to
115. the Romans the undisputed possession of the island (539). The legions from Cannae sent to Sicily held their ground in the north and east of the island with courage and success against the Carthaginians and Hieronymus; the
S15. latter met his death towards the end of 539 by the hand of an assassin. Even in the case of Macedonia the ratification of the alliance was delayed, principally because the Macedonian envoys sent to Hannibal were captured on their homeward journey by the Roman vessels of war. Thus the dreaded invasion of the east coast was temporarily suspended; and the Romans gained time to secure the very important station of Brundisium first by their fleet and then by the land army which before the arrival of Gracchus was employed for the protection of Apulia, and even to make preparations for an invasion of Macedonia in the event of war being declared. While in Italy the war thus came to a stand, out of Italy nothing was done on the part of Carthage to accelerate the movement of
producing
chap, vi FROM CANNAE TO ZAMA
309
new armies or fleets towards the seat of war. The Romans, again, had everywhere with the greatest energy
put themselves in a state of defence, and in that defensive attitude had fought for the most part with good results wherever the genius of Hannibal was absent Thereupon
the short-lived patriotism, which the victory of Cannae
had awakened in Carthage, evaporated ; the not inconsider
able forces which had been organized there were, either through factious opposition or merely through unskilful attempts to conciliate the different opinions expressed in
the council, so frittered away that they were nowhere of
any real service, and but a very small portion arrived at
the spot where they would have been most useful. At the close of 539 the reflecting Roman statesman might assure 215. himself that the urgency of the danger was past, and that
the resistance so heroically begun had but to persevere in its exertions at all points in order to achieve its object
First of all the war in Sicily came to an end. It had War la
' y'
formed no part of Hannibal's original plan to excite a war
on the island ; but partly through accident, chiefly through
the boyish vanity of the imprudent Hieronymus, a land
war had broken out there, which — doubtless because Hannibal had not planned it — the Carthaginian council
took up with especial zeal. After Hieronymus was killed
at the close of 539, it seemed more than doubtful whether 216. the citizens would persevere in the policy which he had pursued. If any city had reason to adhere to Rome, that Siegt of
city was Syracuse ; for the victory of the Carthaginians over the Romans could not but give to the former, at any rate, the sovereignty of all Sicily, and no one could seriously believe that the promises made by Carthage to the Syra- cusans would be really kept Partly induced by this consideration, partly terrified by the threatening pre parations of the Romans —who made every effort to bring once more under their complete control that important
^raoae.
Carthagi nian expedition to Sicily.
3io
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL BOOK III
island, the bridge between Italy and Africa, and now for 914. the campaign of 540 sent their best general, Marcus
Marcellus, to Sicily—the Syracusan citizens showed a
to obtain oblivion of the past by a timely return to the Roman alliance. But, amidst the dreadful confusion in the city—which after the death of Hieronymus was agitated alternately by endeavours to re-establish the ancient freedom of the people and by the coups de main of the numerous pretenders to the vacant throne, while the captains of the foreign mercenary troops were the real masters of the place — Hannibal's dexterous emissaries,
and Epicydes, found opportunity to frustrate the projects of peace. They stirred up the multitude in the name of liberty; descriptions, exaggerated beyond measure, of the fearful punishment that the Romans were said to have inflicted on the Leontines, who had just been re-conquered, awakened doubts even among the better portion of the citizens whether it was not too late to restore
their old relations with Rome ; while the numerous Roman deserters among the mercenaries, mostly runaway rowers from the fleet, were easily persuaded that a peace on the part of the citizens with Rome would be their death- warrant. So the chief magistrates were put to death, the armistice was broken, and Hippocrates and Epicydes under took the government of the city. No course was left to the consul except to undertake a siege ; but the skilful conduct of the defence, in which the Syracusan engineer Archimedes, celebrated as a learned mathematician, especi ally distinguished himself, compelled the Romans after besieging the city for eight months to convert the siege
into a blockade by sea and land.
In the meanwhile Carthage, which hitherto had only sup
ported the Syracusans with her fleets, on receiving news of their renewed rising in arms against the Romans had de spatched a strong land army under Himilco to Sicily, which
disposition
Hippocrates
chap, vi FROM CANNAE TO ZAMA 31 1
landed without interruption at Heraclea Minoa and imme diately occupied the important town of Agrigentum. To effect a junction with Himilco, the bold and able Hippocrates marched forth from Syracuse with an army : the position of Marcellus between the garrison of Syracuse and the two hostile armies began to be critical. With the help of some reinforcements, however, which arrived from Italy, he main tained his position in the island and continued the blockade
of Syracuse. On the other hand, the greater portion of
the small inland towns were driven to the armies of the Carthaginians not so much by the armies of the enemy, as by
the fearful severity of the Roman proceedings in the island, more especially the slaughter of the citizens of Enna, suspected of a design to revolt, by the Roman garrison which was stationed there. In 542 the besiegers of Syracuse 212. during a festival in the city succeeded in scaling a portion
of the extensive outer walls that had been deserted by the
guard, and in penetrating into the suburbs which stretched
from the "island" and the city proper on the shore (Achradina) towards the interior. The fortress of Euryalus,
which, situated at the extreme western end of the suburbs, protected these and the principal road leading from the
interior to Syracuse, was thus cut off and fell not long after
wards. When the siege of the city thus began to assume The Car- a turn favourable to the Romans, the two armies under ^*^*n Himilco and Hippocrates advanced to its relief, and destroyed, attempted a simultaneous attack on the Roman positions, combined with an attempt at landing on the part of the Carthaginian fleet and a sally of the Syracusan garrison ; but
the attack was repulsed on all sides, and the two relieving armies were obliged to content themselves with encamping before the city, in the low marshy grounds along the Anapus, which in the height of summer and autumn engender pesti lences fatal to those that tarry in them. These pestilences had often saved the city, oftener even than the valour of its
Conquest Syracuse
mercy was to be shown in any case, might, even according t0 ^e ^ar ^rom 'audable principles of Roman public law as to the treatment of perfidious communities, have been ex tended to this city, which manifestly had not been at liberty to act for itself, and which had repeatedly made the most earnest attempts to get rid of the tyranny of the foreign soldiers. Nevertheless, not only did Marcellus stain his
3H
THE WAR UNDER HANNIBAL book hi
citizens ; in the times of the first Dionysius, two Phoenician armies in the act of besieging the city had been in this way destroyed under its very walls. Now fate turned the special defence of the city into the means of its destruc tion ; while the army of Marcellus quartered in the suburbs suffered but little, fevers desolated the Phoenician and Syracusan bivouacs. Hippocrates died ; Himilco and most of the Africans died also ; the survivors of the two armies, mostly native Siceli, dispersed into the neighbouring cities. The Carthaginians made a further attempt to save the city from the sea side ; but the admiral Bomilcar withdrew, when the Roman fleet offered him battle. Epicydes himself, who commanded in the city, now abandoned it as lost, and made his escape to Agrigentum.