Hannibal: A Hellenistic Life (34 page)

Hannibal first camped about twelve kilometres from the city.
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Rome was not undefended: the proconsul Fulvius Flaccus marched there with his army and entered the city while Polybius claims there was also a newly raised legion inside the walls at the time (9.6.6).
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Hannibal then moved closer to Rome, to the river Anio about five kilometres away. He settled his army there and with a contingent of two thousand cavalry approached the walls of Rome ‘as far as the temple of Hercules, near the Porta Collina’. At the temple of Hercules Hannibal paid homage to his protector, the god he claimed as his own, flaunting the relationship in front of the Romans.
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One can imagine the sight of Hannibal ‘brazenly and nonchalantly’ riding up to the walls of Rome, inspecting them and the layout of the city (Livy 26.10.3). People in their thousands must have taken the chance to view the
great enemy in the flesh. The Romans were perhaps not so impressed when they finally saw that Hannibal, no monster, was just a man like any other. A story in Livy claimed that the land Hannibal was camped on outside Rome came up for sale and was sold ‘with no diminution in the price’. The sale struck Hannibal as ‘so outrageously presumptuous that he immediately summoned the auctioneer and ordered the bankers’ shops around the Forum to be put up for sale’ (26.11.7).

The proconsul Flaccus eventually sent out a cavalry contingent to drive Hannibal back to his camp but the moment is etched in history – the Carthaginian at the gates of Rome (Livy 26.10.4). Outside Rome the two sides skirmished but reports provide conflicting scenarios. Livy claimed that bad weather (twice) caused a battle to be broken up, and that Hannibal then retreated from the city. He made a fast march down to the south of Italy and the proconsul Flaccus returned to the siege of Capua. Polybius’ account records that the newly raised legions in the city drew up outside the walls and ‘thus checked Hannibal’s attack’. The countryside was plundered and Hannibal withdrew, because, Polybius argued, he thought sufficient time had passed for the siege of Capua to have been lifted enough for him to have achieved his purpose (9.6–7). Hannibal was harried on the retreat and when he heard that the siege of Capua continued, he marched straight to the tip of Italy and appeared there ‘so unexpectedly’ that he almost managed to take the Roman-allied city of Rhegium by surprise (Livy 26.12.2; Polyb. 9.7.10).

Knowing Hannibal’s interest in the art of surprise it may be, as Livy claims, that the whole exercise had been a spontaneous act and that the ‘urge took him’ (26.7.2). It is possible that the march on Rome was a more thoughtful exercise and it is tempting to consider the wider picture. If Hannibal was aware of simultaneous pressure being exerted by his brothers on the Romans in Iberia that year (see pp. 170–174 below) he may have been encouraged to try to force the Romans’ hand. The march could have been part of a wider Carthaginian strategy. Perhaps Hannibal believed that if he could conjure up some element of surprise and appear before the walls of Rome, he might cause such dismay and alarm as to ‘gain some advantage’ (Polyb. 9.4.7).

The reality of his extraordinary march from Capua to Rome and then down the whole of southern Italy to Rhegium also reveals his sense of futility as the Romans blocked each move. Hannibal had taken a last gamble and hoped that his march to Rome would relieve his allies trapped in Capua, but that gamble failed. The people inside Capua inevitably felt betrayed: Hannibal had not returned, nor had he been able to lift the siege. The commanders of the Carthaginian garrison inside the city, Bostar and Hanno, wrote an angry letter
to their general. They accused Hannibal of turning his back on his allies and leaving them to ‘all manner of torture’. The letter continued, calling the Romans ‘far more dedicated an enemy than the Carthaginian was a friend’. The Carthaginian commanders attempted to sneak the missive out of the city with some Numidians posing as deserters.
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The men managed to get out of the city into the Roman camp but when one was recognized by a Capuan woman in the camp (she had been his mistress) the letter was confiscated. These men and other Numidian deserters in the Roman camp were rounded up and returned to Capua. They had been flogged and had their hands cut off (Livy 26.12.10–19).

Livy claims that ‘the sight of such savage punishment broke the Capuans’ spirit’ (26.13.1), especially since these were not strangers, but men who had been living among them during the siege. The citizens began to debate surrendering to Rome. The Senate of Capua decided to send a delegation to the Romans to negotiate the surrender. The decision was not universal, and twenty-seven of the Capuan senators withdrew to the house of Vibius Virrius who had been a leading supporter of Hannibal’s cause. There they feasted and drank wine, then took poison and ‘breathed their last before the gates were opened to the enemy’.

The surrender of the city resulted in the execution of seventy of the surviving senators; 300 Campanian nobles were imprisoned in Rome; the population was dispersed and the rest of the citizens sold into slavery. The city remained populated by its non-citizens, while its wealthy agricultural lands and civic buildings became the property of the Roman people. The riches of Capua became the wealth of Rome. Not surprisingly, there was no sign of clemency and the Romans were resolute in imposing their absolute power on their rebellious former ally (Livy 26.16.6–11, 13). Moreover, now freed from their battles in Campania and around Capua, the Romans could redirect more resources to operations in other theatres of the war, and especially in Iberia where their forces were under immense pressure from Hannibal’s brothers.
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Hannibal’s war with Rome continued in Italy during these crucial years but the perspective from Carthage was, of necessity, focused more on the battle for Iberia. The Carthaginians do not seem to have been interested in taking over Italy and Hannibal was there to defeat Rome, not conquer the peninsula in the name of Carthage. In Iberia the situation was profoundly different and in many respects more vital to the final outcome of the war than were events in Italy.
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There were long-standing cultural and economic associations with parts of southern Iberia that connected the city of Carthage to the region. We have seen how Carthage directly controlled territory in the
Iberian peninsula for over two decades prior to Hannibal’s invasion of Italy. For centuries before, the region had been a source of key resources for Carthage in the form of precious metals and soldiers. Carthaginian territory in Iberia would have been populated by many citizens of Carthage who lived and flourished in newly established cities on the peninsula. The longer the Carthaginians could hold their territory in the Iberian peninsula, the more difficult it would be for Rome to defeat them.

Hannibal’s two brothers Hasdrubal and Mago, commanding the Carthaginian forces in Iberia, had been engaged in an intense struggle whilst Hannibal remained in Italy. The conflict fought by the Barcid brothers, whom their father Hamilcar had referred to as ‘lion’s cubs’, was chiefly with two Roman brothers, Gnaeus and Publius Scipio, known by the epithet ‘thunderbolts’ of Rome (Valerius Maximus 9.3. ext.2; Silius Italicus 7.106; Cicero,
Pro Balb
. 34). The epic battles that ensued sapped a great deal of Carthage’s resources and reduced the supply of troops and reinforcements that were available for Hannibal in Italy.

As early as 216
BCE
, before Cannae, Hasdrubal Barca had been ordered to march to Italy to support his brother and open a new front in the war (Livy 23.27.12).
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The battle plan that Hannibal had constructed from early on in the war may have relied on this. Hasdrubal’s departure was delayed by an uprising of his Iberian allies (perhaps the Turdetani), which had led to severe fighting in the spring of that year (Livy 23. 26–7).
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Another Carthaginian general, named Himilco, arrived in Iberia with infantry and cavalry and helped to put down the rebellion. When rumours swirled that Hasdrubal had been ordered to march to Italy even greater turmoil ensued among the allies. The impression gained from Livy is that the Iberian soldiers were unwilling to follow another Carthaginian into Italy. Hasdrubal’s army marching north met the Romans at the Ebro river in the autumn of 216
BCE
, perhaps a month or two after Cannae. The Scipio brothers chose their ground south of the Ebro, meaning to stop Hasdrubal and his army crossing the river. When the two sides clashed, a weakness in Hasdrubal’s battle line caused the middle to give way. The Iberian troops had failed to hold the centre. In Livy’s estimation the Iberians preferred to be defeated at home than risk the route across the Alps (23.29.6–13).

Hasdrubal Barca escaped the field but lost much of his army and with it a great deal of Carthaginian prestige in Iberia. In the aftermath of Hannibal’s victories in Italy, while the Romans counted the devastating losses at Cannae, the Carthaginians found themselves in a more precarious position in Iberia than they had previously imagined possible. In the late summer of 216
BCE
we have seen that Mago Barca journeyed to Carthage with news of Cannae and a
mission to muster reinforcements and supplies for his brother in Italy. Just as he was about to return to Italy, accompanied by a force of 12,000 infantry, 1,500 cavalry and twenty elephants, plus a treasury of 1,000 silver talents and an ‘escort of sixty warships’, news arrived from Iberia of his brother’s military disaster and the defection of Iberian allies to the Romans (Livy 23.32.5–6).
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The Carthaginians quickly changed plans and sent Mago to Iberia.
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Closely tied to Carthaginian efforts in Iberia were events in Africa. A complicated diplomatic endeavour unfolded as both sides courted the rulers of the Numidian kingdoms that bordered Carthaginian territory. Carthage worked to keep, and Rome vied to win over, these important allies. Thus when Syphax, the king of the Masaesyli, received a toga
praetexta
and an ivory curule chair from Roman envoys as gifts to consolidate their alliance, the significance of his status was confirmed. Similar gifts had been given to Ptolemy of Egypt, putting the Numidian king on a par with the powerful Hellenistic ruler as a Roman ally (Livy 27.4.8).
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Syphax was thus flattered and coaxed by the Romans into an agreement. He first ordered his troops serving with the Carthaginian armies in Iberia to desert and then staged a rebellion at home between 214
BCE
and 213
BCE
(Livy 24.48–49). Syphax’s cooperation with the Romans further diminished Carthaginian efforts to reinforce the Barcid brothers. In the same period, Livy makes reference to many Roman victories in Iberia.
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Carthage had to withdraw a significant army to fight against the Numidian king in Africa, leaving Hasdrubal and Mago Barca without the manpower needed to defend themselves against the Roman armies.
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The narrative during these years details significant Carthaginian losses but raises many questions about the location and even the realities of the defeats. Livy stands accused of exaggerating his accounts and conflating different events.
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There is no doubt that there was fierce fighting in Iberia and Africa in this period but the specific details prove elusive and the situation was fluid.
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Substantial Roman pressure continued through 212–211
BCE
, although the degree to which Rome had the advantage in Iberia seems overplayed by the sources. As Livy tells it, the two Roman commanders ‘joined forces after leaving their winter quarters’ in a concerted effort to ‘bring the war in Iberia to an end’ (Livy 25.32.1–2).
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By 211 a force of about 20,000 Celtiberian troops supported the Roman armies in Iberia.
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There were three Carthaginian commanders now active in opposition to the Romans. Hannibal’s brothers Hasdrubal and Mago each led an army, and another Hasdrubal, known as the son of Gisgo, led a third. Hasdrubal Gisgo and Mago had combined their armies whilst Hasdrubal Barca was stationed near a city called Amtorgis in the region of the upper Baetis river (Livy 25.32.9).
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Early in the year both the Carthaginian and Roman armies would have followed the events in Italy and Sicily. Hannibal was under deep strain with the fall of Syracuse and the city of Capua was under a tight blockade. The Roman commanders decided to split their army in two in order to tackle the divided Carthaginian forces. The armies of Hasdrubal Barca and the other Carthaginian commanders significantly outnumbered the Romans. They may have positioned themselves so as further to drive apart their enemy and capitalize on the numerical advantage.
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The combined armies of Mago Barca and Hasdrubal Gisgo set out to take on Publius Scipio, whose army was made up of about two-thirds of the combined Roman and allied troops. Hasdrubal Barca was left to encounter the other Scipio, whose force was a combination of the remaining Roman army and Celtiberian allies. Fighting in the company of Mago Barca was ‘a new enemy. This was the young Masinissa … an ally of the Carthaginians’ (Livy 25.34.1–5).
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The prince Masinissa was from the Massyli kingdom. The Massyli were an important Numidian people bordering the territory of Carthage whose alliance had been sought once Syphax had gone over to the Romans. Masinissa was the son of King Gaia whose realm sat between Carthage and Syphax. The prince had been brought up and educated at Carthage and was related to the Barcid clan through marriage; his aunt was Hannibal’s niece.
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Close in age to Mago Barca, at twenty-seven years old Masinissa had already shown great qualities of leadership, strength and promise (Livy 24.48.13–49.6).
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The young Numidian prince had gone to Iberia at the head of a powerful contingent of cavalry to confront and harass the Romans. His surprise attacks spread confusion among the Roman troops and panic in the camps.