Seguntum asked Rome to arbitrate a treaty of peace between Carthage and itself. Hannibal immediately recognized this as Roman complicity. In 219, a Roman delegation to New Carthage warned Carthage not to attack Seguntum. Hannibal refused and laid siege to the city, figuring that Rome had its hands full with Demetrius and the Illyrians. They would not be able to respond quickly.
Surprisingly, Seguntum withstood the siege for eight months, refusing offers to surrender, until finally the Carthaginians assaulted it and captured the city. Some of the wealth of the city as well as the populace was sent to Carthage to be sold as slaves, while the rest Hannibal allocated to his loyal fighters and to himself.
The Treaty of Cataulus, which ended the 1st Punic War had been broken by Hannibal. Rome demanded that Carthage give him up or at the least, decry his actions and remove him from command or face certain war. Carthage rejected the demand.
In March of 218, Rome elected new consuls. Since Carthage had defied Roman warnings, and Hannibal could be expected to push his conquests beyond the treaty lines established at the Ebro River, Rome had little choice but to go to war…an honorable war in retaliation for an unprovoked attack upon a Roman client. The Roman senate did not fear the Carthaginian army and when Carthage was beaten, Rome would walk in and take over Spain…and the silver mines.
The war proved popular in Carthage as well. Honor could be restored and military victory could bring untold riches. Carthage appeared to be stronger and wealthier than in the first war. Though Rome held the balance of power at sea, Spain could easily be reinforced. Besides, Hiero of Syracuse was getting old and a Syracusan insurrection could allow for Carthaginian interests to be rekindled in Sicily.
Hannibal refused to consider a simple, defensive war. He wanted to take the war to Rome itself and destroy the hated enemy once and for all. Figuring that once Rome had been militarily defeated, the Italian allies would rise up in revolt. His prognosis was based upon his own experiences and that of Carthage. The situation on the Italian peninsula would not be the same as in northern Africa, however.
Plans for the War
Hannibal came up with a strategic plan that took into account the Roman propensity to attack him in both Spain and in Africa. His brother Hasdrubal would stay south of the Ebro River with an army large enough to deal with the Gauls and Spanish. He would also actively recruit more troops to fight against the Romans.
Hannibal would cross the Ebro, defeat any tribes opposing him up to the Pyrenees and then wait to destroy the expected Roman response with his 80,000 men and elephants. Once defeated, the Romans would be demoralized when the Carthaginian army crossed into northern Italy, attracting the Gallic tribes to fight alongside of them. Rome would be unable to use any armies outside of Italy, being forced to concentrate on the invaders. This would allow Hasdrubal to bring a second army into Italy to finally defeat the hated Romans.
Spanish troops were duly sent to fight in Africa, thus freeing up numbers of Libyans (and also removing the rebellious elements from their own homelands) to fight against Rome. These troops, as well as Balaerics, Ligurians and Numidians were assigned to Hasdrubal to train along with elephants and a fleet of forty ships. Hasdrubal's army of 15,000 would have to be enough to hold Spain.
In June of 218, Hannibal crossed the Ebro once again. Rome countered by sending Scipio with an army of 22,000 foot, 2,200 cavalry and sixty ships to intercept him. The Roman senate also allocated an army to attack Africa. The war had truly begun.
Hannibal Invades Italy: 218-217 B.C.
The Carthaginian leadership wasted little time in preparing to avenge itself on Rome. Hannibal traveled to Gades where he prayed and made vows to destroy the power of Rome. In May, once word came from Carthage that Rome had repudiated the treaty of peace, Hannibal prepared for war. He gathered an immense army of 60,000 foot, 12,000 cavalry and forty elepahnts as well as two chroniclers to record his progress. The army crossed the Ebro River and marched upon the Celtic tribes, most of which did not oppose him. In fact, some tribes took the opportunity to rise up fight against the Roman colonists occupying their lands.
Roman plans were to send an army into Celtic Gaul to deal with Hannibal and launch an invasion of Libya in conjunction with it. Rome counted on the northern Spanish tribes supporting them, figuring that they would be viewed as liberators, helping them to throw off Carthaginian domination. Hannibal's brother Hasdrubal remained behind with barely 10,000 men to oppose any Roman invasion.
Hannibal's First Moves
Hannibal sought to bring Spain into the Carthaginian orbit and he therefore let 10,000 Spanish fighters go home as a goodwill gesture. Only those men who truly wanted to fight remained. Figuring that the Romans would not launch a winter invasion of Spain, he took his remaining army of 50,000 foot and 9,000 cavalry along with the elephants over the Pyrenees. Meeting the native Gallic tribes, he persuaded them to join him until he came to the Rhone River. What was he planning on doing?
Hannibal realized that Rome had at her disposal huge numbers of potential soldiers, thanks to her control over the Italian tribes of the peninsula. He felt that these "allies" would not continue to support an oppressor when they could join the Carthaginians and regain their lost freedoms. To convince the Italian tribes of the value of joining the Punic forces against Rome, Hannibal knew he would have to show them that Rome could be defeated. The only way to do that would be to invade Italy itself and defeat the Romans on their own soil. Besides, the Carthaginian army would be living off Roman largess, not their own. Hannibal therefore would invade Italy. But several obstacles stood in his way, not least of which was the Rhone River.
A tribe of Gauls barred the Rhone crossing, as they assembled an army on the other side, waiting for the Carthaginians to wade the cold waters and arrive exhausted and ripe for destruction. Hannibal had other ideas. He sent a force upstream and they crossed, moving back down the river and catching the Gauls in the flank as Hannibal attacked them from the front, routing them. This was the first of what would be many successes over the next two decades of war.
The Romans Attack
Though late in the year, Publius Scipio took his two freshly recruited legions and sailed to the mouth of the Rhone River, intending to intercept the Carthaginian army as it moved toward Italy. Sending some cavalry out to reconnoiter, they ran headlong into Hannibal's Numidian scouts who got the worst of the fight and fled back to the Carthaginian camp. The Roman cavalry followed and quickly rode back to Scipio with news that Hannibal had already crossed the Rhone.
The Romans moved to contact the Carthaginian army, but Hannibal did not want to fight a pitched battle at this point and moved on. Scipio knew he could not catch the Carthaginians as they had a two-day head start on him. Figuring, most probably, that the Punic army would be severely weakened in its endeavor to cross the mountains in the fall (the Carthaginian army would not begin the ascent until October 14), the Roman commander left Spain.
Scipio returned to Italy, but only after giving his army orders to fight in Spain and harass the Carthaginians left behind. The Roman forces were left in command of Scipio's brother. Scipio intended to gather the consular army in Italy as well as two other legions and confront Hannibal if and when he entered the Po River valley.
The Alps
While many Romans doubted that Hannibal would actually dare to try a northern invasion across the formidable and dangerous Alps, Hannibal felt it would be worth the risk. In Rome, it was understood that the war would be fought in Spain. It was inconceivable that an army of any size could traverse the treacherous Pyrenees mountain ranges, much less the Alps. Besides, a Roman army stood between Hannibal and the Alps, or so the Romans thought until Scipio arrived and told them they were wrong.
Thus far, Hannibal had managed to either coerce or defeat any and all tribes that opposed him. The Celtic tribes living in the Alps did not fear him or his reputation, however. They simply saw the huge army of invaders as rich targets for plunder. Time and again, the long columns were forced to move in single file along slippery paths, only to be attacked by the wild mountain tribesmen. Thousands died, as well as large numbers of horses and elephants. Hannibal had to continually devise strategems to survive. Each time, he managed to push onward as snow blinded the troops and cold froze their feet and hands. The narrow trails sometimes disappeared and new ones had to be carved out of the icy rock ledges. At one point, a huge rock blocked the trail and had to be broken up before passage continued.
Finally, after over two weeks of slow, harsh marching, the Carthaginians saw before them the fertile green fields of northern Italy. They had at last arrived.
More 2nd Punic War
- Part One: Second Punic War: Preliminaries
Part Two: Second Punic War: Spain to the Alps
Part Two: Second Punic War: First Battles in Italy
Part Three: Second Punic War: To Battle of Cannae 216BC
Part Three: Second Punic War: The Battle of Cannae 216BC
Part Four: Second Punic War: The Battle of Zama and the End of the War
Back to Saga #74 Table of Contents
Back to Saga List of Issues
Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List
© Copyright 2000 by Terry Gore
This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com