The 2nd Punic War

Part Four

By Terry Gore


More 2nd Punic War

The Carthaginian victory at Cannae meant Hannibal had achieved one of his major aims in invading Italy. He had destroyed the Roman field armies. He must have been very disheartened when his peace envoys returned from Rome with a Roman refusal to even consider ending hostilities so long as enemy forces remained in Italy. Hannibal went so far as to allow for the ransoming of the 20,000 prisoners captured at Cannae, but Rome sent back word that it did not want such fighters back! A prideful refusal, and one that had to dampen Hannibal's spirits after his tremendous victory.

Rome wasted no time in raising fresh levies. Scouring the city and environs, an emergency call-up of troops filled the ranks for two legions. Slaves were used to man two more and thousands of criminals found their sentences remanded in return for fighting for Rome. Two legions also remained from the Cannae disaster and they moved to block Hannibal's expected march on Rome.

Hannibal realized again that although he had won a decisive victory, Rome could not be taken by direct assault. It would have to be a war of attrition. Rome's ability to to raise legions so quickly killed any chance of a major military defeat leading to the surrender of the city, or even of a treaty of peace.

The War in Southern Italy

The Battle of Cannae did have positive ramifications for the Carthaginians. Hannibal's troops took their pick of Roman arms and armor, becoming much better equipped than before. Also, the morale of his troops was sky high after this tremendous victory. They had fought the best Rome could send against them and they had won decisively.

The expected mass defections of Italian allies did not occur, however. Hannibal must have been extremely frustrated as his major victories did nothing to destroy Roman power and influence. He considered attacking Rome, but the Carthaginians possessed nothing in the way of siege equipment and by the time the Carthaginian army had made the forced march to the city from Cannae, the Roman Senate would have been able to call in large numbers of defenders.

Hannibal instead moved south. This seemed to be a successful strategy at first. The fearful Samnites as well as other tribes of Apulia defected from their alliance with Rome. The city of Capua also made overtures to Hannibal. Capua was the major city in Campania. A stipulation of their defection was that Hannibal would not require Capuans to fight in his, as Rome made them do. Hannibal accepted this, preventing him from adding troops to his depleted forces, but giving him an important major Italian city. He also expected the Capuan defection to lead to more Italian defections, but in this he again was frustrated.

Sicily

Throughout this period, the dictator, Hiero of Syracuse, had steadfastly remained loyal to Rome. In 215, he died, leaving the reins of power in the hands of his son, Hiernymus. Not happy with his alliance with Rome, Hiernymus sent word to Hannibal that he would like to open communications. Hannibal responded by sending as diplomats two Carthaginians who were Greeks. Through a series of mechanizations, Hiernymus ended up being killed by assassins and the two Carthaginian envoys managed to persuade the Syracusans to let them rule! In less than a year, Syracuse defected and declared war on Rome.

Hannibal, bouyed by his success, also captured the Greek port city of Tarentum (Pyrus' old ally) by use of guile. Between the sudden alliance with Syracuse and capture of Tarentum, some of the ethnic Greek coastal cities defected to Carthage.

Rome, Italy and Sicily

Instead of retreating behind the walls of Rome and allowing the Carthaginians to have their way in Italy, the Romans fought back. Rebuilt new legions were used to harass Hannibal and retake towns that had defected or been captured. Capua was the largest target. The Romans began to lay siege to the city in 212, forcing Hannibal to make a march toward Rome, hoping to bring the Roman besiegers after him. The Romans fearfully watched the polyglot army of Carthage as it set up camp outside the gates of Rome.

Hannibal had no intention of actually attacking Rome and soon broke camp, fully expecting to find the Capuan besiegers marching to relieve Rome. The Roman army had remained at Capua. The city did not hold out very long and those supporters of the Carthaginians were summarily killed. Capua now became a Roman city.

Syracuse contined to be a thorn in the side of Rome as well. Her defection was a morale lowering situation at a time Rome could ill afford any more losses. The Roman general M. Claudius Marcellus sailed to Syracuse and began to besiege it. The Carthaginians refused to aid the Syracusans. The question is why? Hannibal certainly had time to inform the rulers at home of his need for help in relieving the siege of Capua. The same with Syracuse, that siege dragged on for two years.

Carthage had lost a fleet to the Romans in 217. There was also a revolt in Africa in 214-13, resulting in possible reinforcements for Hannibal being used to put down the revolt. Carthage relied on mercenaries and there was never enough money to hire the numbers needed to offset Rome's advantage of using citizen-soldiers. In no way would Carthage be able to match the personnel resources of Rome. Even with Hannibal's military brilliance and the defection of several Roman allies, Carthage would never be able to capitalize on these things. Two years after the siege of Syracuse began, the city was forced to surrender, despite the advanced inventions put into play by Archimedes. Rome had once again pulled itself up out of despair and had dealt Carthage another punishing blow.

Macedonia and Rome

The Macedonian royal family had not given up on remaining a major player in the Mediterranean. Since Alexander's invasion and subjugation of Persia a hundred year earlier, Macedonia had striven to maintain its strength in relation to her neighbors. Philip V had assumed the throne in 221 and wasted little time in sending a treaty to Hannibal asking for an alliance against Rome. Unfortunately for them both, the treaty fell into the hands of the Romans.

Philip started to build a fleet of ships and in 214 began to actively fight the Romans. The Romans wasted little time in demonstrating their control of the sea and sent a fleet to the Adriatic. That quickly ended the Macedonian maritime endeavors. Philip ending up burning his own ships to keep them from falling into Roman hands.

By 213, Philip had fought in Illyria and had actually captured some towns. Rome, even though controlling the sea lanes, could not fight a two front war without allies. To this end, the Romans praetor, M. Valerius Laevinus sought to add some help to the Roman cause.

Fortunately for him, Philip had enemies, and one of these, Aetolia, readily joined with Rome to redress the situation in Greece. Though the treaty brought relief in respect to a land army to oppose Philip, the Romans gained little else. They even acquiesced to letting the Aetolians keep control of the areas taken from the Macedonians, as at this point in time Rome had not settled on its latter policies of "world conquest".

For four years, from 211-207, the war dragged on without much advantage to either side. Then Philip finally had enough and campaigned against Aetolia itself. The Romans, having no interest at all in internal Greek affairs, did not become militarilly involved. The next year, Aetolia made peace with Macedonia. A year later, Rome did as well. Hannibal's dream for a two-front war thus never developed.

The War in Spain

Hannibal's trust in allowing Spain to be his base for reinforcements was checkmated by Rome. As early as 218, a Roman army had been placed in Spain, preventing Carthaginian reinforcements from getting through to Italy. The sea routes were equally as interdicted. In fact, when Hasdrubal tried to send a fleet to Italy, Roman ships met it and defeated it.

In response to the revolts at home, Carthage did not attempt to try to even reinforce Spain, so that in 212, Saguntum fell to the Romans. The elder Scipio, along with his brother Gnaeus, then found themselves faced with Carthaginian forces intent on reclaiming Spain. Hasdrubal's armies totally defeated the Romans, each in turn, killing both Scipio brothers and forcing the Roman survivors back to the Ebro River.

At this point, in 210, the elder Scipio's son, R. Cornelius Scipio arrived in Spain to take command of the Roman armies and avenge the deaths of his father and uncle. The 25,000 troops accompanying him would be needed to defeat a total of three Carthaginian armies in Spain. This task did not seem so difficult as it might have looked.

For one thing, the three armies were scattered because of supply problems and all were distant from the naval port of New Carthage. Besides this, all three commanders were not amiable towards each other. Professional jealousy and a desire to be seen as the best commander meant that there would be little cooperation between the generals.

Scipio waited until spring and then quickly captured New Carthage. Through use of bribes and flattery (and the fact that he had control of this important city) many local tribes defected to the Romans.

Hasdrubal drew his forces together and met Scipio's army in southern Sapain at the Battle of Baecula in 208, but met defeat, though not a crippling one. It did cause hiom to leave Spain and make the march overland to Italy, Carthage cooperating by sending new reinforcements to hold the province (at the same time refusing again Hannibal's request for more troops in Italy, where they would have done the most good.) Scipio brought the new army to battle at defeated it at the Battle of Illipa in 206.

The Last Battles in Italy

The knowledge that Hasdrubal was marching to Italy to reinforce Hannibal again caused trepidation in Rome. What devastation could two Barcas wreak? Hasdrubal had over 20,000 seasoned fighters and soon crossed into Italy in 207. This was no mean feat, imitating his brother and crossing the Alps with elephants. The Romans knew that if Hasdrubal's army ever managed to join together with Hannibal's, it would be an army of incredible strength. The reunion had to be prevented.

Rome had Claudius Nero, one of their consuls, move into southern Italy to tie up Hannibal, hoping that no word of his brother's arrival had yet reached him. The other Roman consul remained stationed legions to block the routes Hasdrubal would likely take to join Hannibal.

It is probable that Hannibal received word of Hasdrubal's arrival in Italy. Why didn't he march north, smash the blocking Roman army and join his brother? The fragile alliances that Hannibal had worked so hard to cement with the southern Italian towns would be quickly broken without the Carthaginian army to keep the romans at bay. If Hannibal had simply pulled up stakes and marched north, the Romans would not have wasted any time inre-capturing the defecting towns. Hannibal thus awaited his brother.

Claudius Nero, sensing that Hannibal would be reticent about leaving southern Italy, marched the majority of his army north, covering an incredible 240 miles in only six days and joined the other Roman consul, Lucius Salnator before Hasdrubal realized his peril.

At the Metaurus River, the Carthaginian dream of capturing Rome died, as did Hasdrubal. The Romans simply overwhelmed the Carthaginians, cutting their entire army to pieces. Nero had Hasdrubal's head cut off and quickly marched back south. Hannibal, unaware that a battle had even been fought, learned of the disaster when his brother's head was delivered to his camp. This had to be the lowest point of Hannibal's life…thus far.

Rome Invades Africa

For four more years, Carthage tried to maintain Hannibal's army in Italy. Reinforcements were sent to northern Italy to take the pressure off Hannibal, who was continually harassed by Roman armies, as they slowly captured back town after town. Hannibal, his army depleted and suffering losses each day, could not rebuild and could only react to Roman pressures. Unfortunately, the reinforcements did absolutely nothing to help Hannibal. He fought a battle in 203, but was defeated.

The young Scipio, elected to consulship in 203, on a platform of his success in Spain and a promise to defeat Hannibal and end the war, prepared to invade Africa. Since he did not have many troops, he raised volunteers and attempted to lure some of Carthage's oldest mercenaries away from their paymaster.

He was partially successful. Scipio managed to split the Numidians, with Masinissa defecting to Rome and Syphax keeping to his alliance with Carthage.

By 203, Scipio had fought a battle against Carthage and won, and was besieging the port of Utica. Carthage sent a second army into battle and Scipio defeated that one as well. Carthage was now desperate.

A treaty was hastily drawn up, with Carthage agreeing to leave Gaul, Spain and Italy to the Romans. The city of Carthage would also be required to pay a huge indemnity for reparations of 5,000 talents to Rome, give up their navy except for a handful of ships, accept the defector Masinissa as the Numdian ruler and give Libya autonomy. With their backs to the wall, Carthage accepted the terms and duly sent to Rome for ratification.

Then Hannibal arrived from Italy. It was no small matter to accomplish this feat. With Rome controlling the sea lanes, Hannibal had to figure a way to extract his army from Italy and get to Africa without being destroyed. For two years Hannibal had tried to return to Africa without success, but he finally succeeded in 202.

Unable to accept the harsh treaty that the Carthaginians had signed, Hannibal looked for an incident to renew hostilities. It did not take long. A Roman fleet, forced to make landfall near Carthage was captured by starving Carthaginians. Scipio's newly arriving envoys were then attacked.

Unfortunately, these envoys were carrying news that the treaty had been ratified by Rome. Hannibal's hand can be easily seen in all of this. Scipio had no choice but to renew the war. He actually was not averse to this, as with Hannibal still at large with an army, no peace could be assured unless the Carthaginian general was decisively beaten and his army destroyed.

Scipio immediately set about attacking African towns and sent word to Mesinissa to join him with Numidian cavalry. Hannibal, desiring to rid Africa of the Romans once and for all, marched his army to meet Scipio. His own Numidian allies joined him on the march. In total numbers, the Carthaginians had an advantage, but the Romans held the qualitative edge. About 50 miles from Carthage, the two armies met in a battle to decide the fate of Carthage.

The Battle of Zama

Numbers for each army have been exaggerated through time, but a fair total would be 25-30,000 for the Carthaginians and slightly less for the Romans. Scipio had the advantage in cavalry of three to two, while Hannibal had over eighty elephants. As the armies were forming up, the cavalry moved to each flank, as was usual, while Hannibal placed his elephants in the center of his army, in front of his infantry.

This was a risky move, considering the unreliability of elephants. They could turn and run straight back, causing the Carthaginian army to fall apart. Hannibal knew, though, that he needed a decisive stroke to win the battle. The elephants could provide that by smashing through the center of the Roman army.

Scipio, seeing the type of enemy he had to deal with, gave instructions to his troops. The trained Roman legionnaires could deploy rapidly from line of battle in columns, leaving paths for the elephants to charge through. To make certain the elephants did this, the Roman troops were told to make a tremendous racket, screaming, blowing on horns, banging their swords and pila on their shields, anything to distract and frighten the beasts.

As the two sides began the battle, the elephants duly charged while the Romans changed formation and made plenty of noise. The elephant attack harmlessly passed through the Roman lines and Hannibal's gambit had failed. In hindsight, the elephants should have been closely followed by the Carthaginian foot, who could exploit the Roman troops formed into columns by raining missiles upon them and then attacking them.

Scipio's cavalry charged their outnumbered counter-parts and easily broke them, pursuing them across the plain.

The main lines then came together. Scipio again used a strategem. He placed his best troops in the rear, leaving less skilled fighters to face the brunt of Hannibal's attack. True to form, Hannibal's troops beat back the first line of Romans. The Carthaginians sent in their second line to the attack while Scipio waited. Keeping his reserves ready, Scipio finally released them to attack just as the victorious Numidian cavalry returned and hit the Carthaginian army in the rear. Over half the troops were killed in the ensuing rout and most of the rest were captured as Hannibal managed to retreat to Carthage in defeat.

The End of the War

With her army destroyed and their famous general defeated, Carthage had no choice but to sue for peace. Roman terms were not generous. The new treaty of peace ended Carthage as a major power in the Mediterranean. Only the city of Carthage itself remained as the rest of the Carthaginain holdings were taken away. Besides this, all elephants were turned over to Rome, a huge indemnity would be paid to Rome for the next fifty years, the Carthaginian fleet would be cut to fifty ships and the army was disbanded.

Carthage, in effect, had become a Roman province. It could not declare war without Roman approval. The leadership at first could not believe the terms and it took Hannibal's urging for them to accept. Even then, Rome at first balked, as if the imposed terms were not severe enough. But Scipio urged the Roman Senate to accept them and he had his way, earning himself the title of Scipio Africanus. Hannibal himself went into exile, another condition of the treaty. The Second Punic War ended in complete Roman victory.

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© Copyright 2000 by Terry Gore
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