Why is Hannibal considered so great?

[pannonian]

Sure, that as well. By exchanging the lives of half of his army, he managed to avoid engagements in an uninteresting area and instead hit the enemy right in his heartlands. There's a price for everything but in the end, it allowed Hannibal to go more far than anyone would have ever expected.

And the important point about any criticism of Hannibal crossing the Alps is that, if he doesn't cross the Alps, then he's doing exactly what the Romans expected him and planned for him to do. The Romans expected to hold him in Gaul/Iberia for a while, while further reinforcements were called up. And while he was held there, an expeditionary force would be sent to Africa to ravage the Carthaginian heartland. If Hannibal doesn't cross the Alps, the Roman heartland is untouched while the Carthaginian counterpart is torched, and the Romans get to execute their plans without interruption or surprises.

[Rex Anglorvm]

Considering that Hannibal had such a mixture of cultures, fighting styles, languages, and abilities that made up his armies, as the war dragged on, he did pretty well with a polyglot bunch.

Sure he made errors and mistakes of judgements, but remember he still terrorized the whole of Rome for nearly twenty years. I doubt anyone else could have done that, although I concede that Polybian legions were not as strong as the later reformed legions, they still had a massively well organized state machinery behind them churning out army after army.

Not an Alexander, but not Nivelle either.

You may enjoy the story below set in and around the 2nd Punic war. Excuse the historical inaccuracies.

[Spartan JKM]

Well, I'm sorry StandardUser, but the lone source your scepticism of Hannibal's greatness as a general is borne out of is about as far removed from viable critical judgment of a high caliber as can be. HannibalB is inspiring with his acuity, and the others here who support Hannibal's positive status have offered outstanding analyses, clearly based on works of higher scholarship.

Because, much like British during WW2, Roman needed to find an excuse why their perfomance sucked in Second Punic War.

Goodness, that's not true. The British sucked in WWII? I find that as fanciful as your comment here (post #189), where you 'corrected' me that there was really no Battle of Nomonhan (Халх гол), that it didn't really count as a battle, but rather the culmination of an amalgam of border skirmishes. Actually, the Soviet Chief of Staff at the time Grigori Shtern hailed the Soviet victory over the Japanese as the 'second greatest battle of encirclement', alluding to Cannae as the greatest. However hyperbolic, he did not just pull that verdict out of the air! I hope that slight relevance to our subject spares me from being reprimanded for going off topic to bring up a personal issue from almost two years ago, but I never 'got over' that comment.

...Like destroyed Scipio's force in Iberia before moved into Italy? Afterall, his Alp campaign was completely worthless since Scipio still intercepted him successfully in Italy and forced him to fight a battle...

His Alp campaign was worthless, because.... what?? Double goodness. He very well would have destroyed Scipio had they arrived before he left NE Iberia, which was imminent sans any unexpected delays. Ironically, the Roman expeditionary force ready for Iberia was unexpectedly delayed by the uprising of the Cisalpine Boii and Insubres, who were stimulated by the announcement of Hannibal's emissaries that he was coming lest they not welcome him in tackling a common enemy. Scipio did not intercept him and force a battle, as if he wasn't fooled by Hannibal and wound up foiling him, let alone rendering the Alpine trek worthless. That is absurd. Hannibal displayed military gambit and sowed confusion on a masterful level, and this parroting notion that he ruined his army in the alpine trek is completely refuted by its immediate performance in movement and battlefield action upon arrival in Northern Italy against the legionnaires sent against them. Scipio returned to Genoa with a token force, then on to Pisa (a SE direction); he then crossed Etruria in a NE route to take command of the troops around Modena (modern names, of course), those who had been battered earlier by the Boii and Insubres. He then marched NW to meet Hannibal, setting up camp around Placentia (modern Piacenza).

When the mauling of the Romans by the rising Boii and Insubres occurred earlier, Scipio had to relinquish a legion to stave off the threat and recruit a fresh legion for his Spanish charge, hence delaying him from embarking for Iberia perhaps 1-2 months - thus he planned to arrive in Catalonia when Hannibal was still there, which would have been a nasty fate for him without doubt! Paradoxically, the Romans were spared a massive blow exclusively because they were delayed by Hannibal's reconnaissance from Iberia to Cisalpine Gaul. Bona Fortuna in the extreme for Rome! The entire Spanish expeditionary force would have been wiped out, and Hannibal still would have arrived in Italy by November. Once on the move with logistics as paramount, avoiding a Roman army was the prudently circumspect move. His force of 11,000 left in NE Spain was specifically to hold and guard the defiled passes inland from the coastal region surrounding Emporiae (modern Ampurias), which was practically ignored by Hannibal when he consolidated his position in the regions of NE Iberia where the routes across the Pyrennes existed. This coastal region was rendered expendable for the Grand Design, thus to hold the passes and draw a defensive line at the Ebro was almost surely the Carthaginian object, which explains why Hasdrubal was positioned south of the Ebro upon Gnaeus Scipio's landing. An important element of a strategic design is discarding the inessentials; a fleet did not figure at this point, hence no need to waste time in establishing a position amid the Catalonian littoral, where an obvious Roman landing was impossible to prevent. The coastal corridor of NE Iberia was not important (albeit hardly totally insignificant) even though the Romans could land here. It was feasible they couldn't compromise Hannibal's lines so long as his stationed forces didn't become enfiladed, which is what did occur. It is a supreme credit to Gnaeus Scipio's aggression - and perhaps the subaltern Hanno's lack of better judgment - to move south and inward and force the Carthaginians and their allies here into a fight to protect their influence in this sector. The result was the Romans won convincingly, and were now athwart Hannibal's lines from Spain to Italy, a condition many critics erroneously impute to Hannibal's lack of foresight. It's the other way round, forgive me. Fortune worked both ways. The Scipio brothers really came through for Rome in this theater before they were crushed after dogging it out for eight years. Both sides were fighting a conflict which carried a broad window of chance, contingency and high margin for error/miscalculation. Hannibal's true genius was a sound reason why Rome struggled; they didn't have to concoct or even augment anything about him whatsoever. That's one of the more nonsensical assertions from these Hannibal non-admirers. The Roman annalists attacked his character with plenty of apocryphal rhetoric to obscure his greatness - an overall historical failure, even if they had been right!

Scipio's route following his return to Italy clearly shows he expected Hannibal to descend into Cisalpine Gaul farther NE than he actually did, or if he thought Hannibal would indeed descend into Piemonte - where he did arrive - there was nothing he could do as these regions were hostile and cut off from Roman controlled areas. Either way, Hannibal's arrival was a strategic triumph. Hannibal had informed himself and his army of the Alpine passes more acutely than Roman extant knowledge, and knew he could arrive at a point where they likely could not soon ascend to meet him. Hence he could gain some invaluable time to rest just enough. Moreover, when Hannibal and Scipio bumped into each other near the Ticinus (in the vicinity of the modern comune of Lomello), Scipio did not lack confidence in facing a force constituting only Carthaginian-led cavalry far outnumbering him. Scipio had cavalry deployed with javelineers. Why so confident? Because that prior 'victory' of his 300 equites over Hannibal's 500 Numidians near the Rhone gave him that very sense of confidence - clearly a false one. The Numidians closed with the javelineers so quickly the latter had no time to act offensively, retreating through the gaps of the Roman horsemen. Both were quickly crushed in a cavalry pincer. It worked well for Hannibal circumstantially, but his vastly superior cavalry and his ability to precisely utilize them needed to be concealed as long as possible.

Sorry to be antagonistic, hellheaven1987 and everyone, but - from my view (by no means exempt from bias and arbitrariness) these Hannibal detractors just so often bite the dust with their false sense of 'conviction'. They just keep at it. I guess the 'non-Roman', 'non-Greek' Hannibal is always going to be reviled by a few who think they are not blinded by what they deem as our 'hero-worship'. To each his own...

HannibalB is advancing profoundly with his balanced research and formulated analyses on these subjects , and the likes of pannonian, Keyser, Manuel I Komnenos, and Xanthippus of Sparta (etc., to those erudites with whom I am not yet familiar) are here to add to that. Great stuff.

Thanks, James

[Timoleon of Korinthos]

Let me start by saying that I also find Hannibal to be overrated and I also happen to believe that Scipio Africanus was better –a case of the pupil becoming greater than the master-, but even so I think that it does great injustice to the man to deny that he was a great general, among the best of antiquity, let alone imply that he was D grade.

I just watched the show "Ancients: Behaving badly" and from what ive saw, it seems like Hannibal was nothing more than a D grade general.

1)His elephants. They chulked up alot of provisions, and slowed his army, and on the battlefield werent doing as good as thier cost. For people who never saw elephants, theyre scary as hell, but after that(when they get to know them) you can just move out of thier way(like scipios army did in zuma).

However, the experience required to remain calm in the face of an elephant charge and to be able to evade or neutralise it was acquired by lessons in blood. How many casualties did the Romans suffer, how many times were they thrown into confusion and panic, until a charismatic leader like Scipio, who alone, aided of course by the reality of continuous campaigning, had brought his army into great shape and a high level of tactical flexibility, managed to outmaneuver them?

2)The alps. He lost 25,000 men there, and most of his elephants. WTF? I mean, wouldnt it had been better for hannibal to go for sardinia, and then sicily, and then raid the southern countryside of rome? Carthage anyways had a superior navy.

After the 1st Punic war Carthage learned the hard way that despite the superior seamanship of their crews, it was the Roman fleets and methods of naval warfare that enjoyed mastery of the seas. Hannibal did not have the option of naval or amphibious expeditions at his disposal. Nevertheless, I agree with the assertion that his crossing of the Alps was disastrous and it constitutes, in my opinion, one of the three focal points of criticism one can lay down against Hannibal. Either he made a mistake in attempting a crossing under hostile weather and diplomatic conditions with the mountainous Celtic tribes or he was wrong to expect that the war in Italy would be concluded with a few swift stunning victories and thus several thousands of lives -qualitatively hard to replace- were expendable in the effort of gaining the element of surprise. Still, without the hindsight his strategy was a gamble, whose outcome nobody could have predicted with certainty before it was made clear in the event, so one might say that his miscalculated crossing is, if not in a sense forgivable, at least understandable.

He may had crushing victories over the romans, but lets look at the romans. From what ive seen, at that time the roman army was managed by two consouls, and they had 24 hour shifts on the general office. Some day one general tried to dig in, while the other went on the offensive. We also know that the roman generals were motivated by oppertunities of glory and politics, rather than co working together for strict military goals.

Yes, such divisions and individualistic behaviors undoubtedly existed, but on the day it is hard to see how they had much influence. There is a reason why Roman armies of the era more often than not beat the crap out of everyone, Greeks, Carthaginians, Iberians, Celts etc, their military system was simply much more effective and their army overall better regardless of the quality of leadership. Not to say that they were invincible, but they enjoyed several inherent advantages (large numbers, good equipment, great morale, flexible formation, a class of experienced and battle-hardened officers of low and middle rank as well as a well articulated structure of command etc), which the other side had to somehow overcome in order to achieve victory. And Hannibal would crush massive, united armies as well as destroy small parties and isolated detachments, so even though he was adept at exploiting antagonism and discord in the enemy chains of command, this feature was far from the key characteristic in his success on the battlefield. His true strength lied in his ability to punish the simplistic Roman ways of warfare, especially their rudimentary and predictable tactics out of which they ironically evolved largely thanks to him, but for the reasons mentioned above this was by no means an easy accomplishment, as evidenced by the rarity of generals that had done this in the past -or would do so in the future- and their comperatively smaller extent of efficiency.

4)Why didnt he just go for rome when he could? Instead he tried to make failing alliances of Italian cities, letting the much manpower superior romans regroup and rebuild thier army. He just wandered in Italy untill he had to be called back to africa to defend carthage, where he was crushed.

How would he be able to besiege and take Rome with less than 40,000 men? He had ridiculously few men to blockade her given the lenght of the circuit-wall and push her to starvation, he couldn’t hope for a betrayal or negotiations, the defences were formidable and the Romans could muster large numbers of defenders without even recalling the legions operating in Illyria, Sicily and Iberia, so a direct assault would have probably been easily repulsed. And if he stayed there for long he would be trapped by the returning armies.

[HannibalB]

Let me start by saying that I also find Hannibal to be overrated and I also happen to believe that Scipio Africanus was better –a case of the pupil becoming greater than the master-, but even so I think that it does great injustice to the man to deny that he was a great general, among the best of antiquity, let alone imply that he was D grade.

I don't agree that Scipio was better, but who knows! Scipio's Spanish and African campaigns were excellent, no doubt, but he also faced different circumstances than Hannibal did in Italy. Scipio had a decent supply line, lots of allies north of the Ebro and many easily susceptible to rebellion south of it, and faced commanders that weren't operating strategically well together (a point Scipio makes in his reported letter to Philip V of Macedon on his capture of New Carthage). Carthaginian armies lost to Roman commanders all the time, not just Scipio... and they had a number of decent commanders in Italy that were winning the war with a great strategy before Scipio even reached Spain!

[Kitsunegari]

Scipio certainly excelled more in the diplomatic area, showing finesse that was rare among Roman generals to say the least, although it could be said that this owed much to the strength of the Roman system vis-a-vis the Carthaginian.

[MathiasOfAthens]

Scipio excelled in diplomacy and strategic war planning in that his campaigns far exceeded Hannibals successes. However, Hannibal was a brilliant tactical commander. Anyone Capable of pulling off Cannae after 3 other successes deserves the title Great.

Zama which he lost was a different battle. Hannibal didnt really use any ambush or traps as he had in the past. This was a fixed battle which Scipio not only excelled at but used Hannibals own tricks against him. One of Scipios strongest traits was his ability to learn from Hannibal... and counter his "moves".

[HannibalB]

Scipio excelled in diplomacy and strategic war planning in that his campaigns far exceeded Hannibals successes. However, Hannibal was a brilliant tactical commander. Anyone Capable of pulling off Cannae after 3 other successes deserves the title Great.

Hannibal was also a brilliant strategist. Scipio was in a better position to affect rebellion against Carthage than Hannibal was on the peninsular, that doesn't mean to say Hannibal wasn't as good a diplomat, just that they clearly faced very different challenges, of which, I believe Scipio faced the easier task. Had Hannibal been facing a diplomatic situation like Scipio had, he'd have won. The Romans and their allies largely had a different mentality and system of alliances, where Hannibal's many field victories and capture of the second and third largest cities on the peninsular at that time (along with many other towns and cities) wasn't enough, whilst just a few victories and capture of one real strategic target (that was left poorly defended with a garrison of less than 1000 soldiers) allowed Scipio to succeed (half of their Iberian possessions had only recently, since 221 BC, fallen under their sway under Hannibal's initial Spanish campaigns.) Hannibal was in a far tougher position where many had spent generations under Roman hegemony so were not so easy to break, and faced a military response that really tested Hannibal's strategy, and was unlike anything Scipio faced.

Scipio had the bonus of kick starting his campaigns in Spain with the benfits of his father and uncles diplomatic work, then Nero's, whilst his first year in Africa achieved very little, and spent most of his time hunkered down trying to capture the city of Utica (indeed, he even failed to take advantage of a Numidian rebellion which Syphax managed to crush and gave his opponents time to build up an army) Even in Africa he didn't face Hannibal's problems, but got a small taste of it with his problems of besieging Utica in the face of an army on land forcing him to retreat. Scipio could hope for supplies from Sicily whenever he needed thanks to the navy he could make use of. He was also very lucky his fleet wasn't destroyed by the Carthaginians who, instead of taking advantage of speed, holed up and allowed Scipio time to return and save his siege-equipment laden ships from destruction (by admittedly coming up with a great solution). Had the Carthaginian fleet simply continued on instead of stopping, they could have left Scipio stranded. Luck saved him. Strategic war planning, he was great, but again, I don't see him above Hannibal. His invasion of Africa was sanctioned by the senate and was a reversion to the original war plan of 218 BC. Hannibal's strategic plan was bold and workable, but he had to rely on generals elsewhere to win to back him up on the peninsular, and take the islands of Sicily and Sardinia, and he couldn't be everywhere at once. Unfortunately, they were all beaten either by the Romans or disease (such as on Sicily).Hannibal's strategy really was the only one viable to beat Rome and he may have come perilously close to succeeding... That Scipio won does not necessarily mean he was a better strategist...

[Admiral Piett]

Zama which he lost was a different battle. Hannibal didnt really use any ambush or traps as he had in the past. This was a fixed battle which Scipio not only excelled at but used Hannibals own tricks against him. One of Scipios strongest traits was his ability to learn from Hannibal... and counter his "moves".

Actually, Hannibal had a carefully crafted plan at Zama that was working quite well in repelling the superior Roman infantry. It was the failure of the Carthaginian right flank cavalry that led to their encirclement and destruction.

Hannibal had deployed his infantry in three lines, not that dissimilar from the Roman infantry formation actually. He had his Gallic, Liberian, and Balearic men in the front rank. His Carthaginians and Libyan citizens in the second rank. His actual veterans from his Italian campaign were in the rear, to play a crucial role later in the battle - but this never came to be.

He knew that Scipio had taken the cavalry advantage by his skillful tongue courting the Numidian leader over to his side. So he instructed his right cavalry wing to engage but retreat and lead the heavy Roman cavalry away from the battlefield to be ambushed far away from the battle.

When the battle began, the first thing he did was advance his skirmishers and elephants to disorganize the Roman hastati. Scipio unleashed his brilliant plan to lead the elephants through gaps in their lines. But he also instructed his cavalry to blast really loud trumpets, drums, and horns simultaneously. It failed to work on most, but succeeded in frightening the elephants on the Carthaginian left. The elephants ran straight into the Carthaginian left and completely disorganized its formation. The Roman right, with the Numidian cavalry, siezed the opportunity and charged. The Numidians on Hannibal's left routed, but failed to comply with Hannibal's orders. However, the cavalry engagement on the Carthaginian right went to plan. The cavalry lured the Romans from the battlefield and negated Scipio's cavalry advantage. This left Hannibal to execute the center and the overall infantry engagement feeling his flanks secure. (However, this would be the demise) Hannibal's feigning cavalry tactics were later imitated by the Romans at Magnesia against the Seleucid heavy cavalry.

Hannibal was very familiar with Scipio's tendency to envelop the center and instructed his 2nd lines to not allow the 1st line through when they pulled back. He coerced his men to progressively pull back and fall in either flank, thus gradually lengthening Hannibal's lines and drawing the Romans in. Hannibal defeated the Roman hastati through this maneuver. Scipio reinforced the hastati with his principes, playing into Hannibal's intentions. The battle quickly fell into a stalemate when the 2nd Carthaginian line fell back and Hannibal's veterans were preparing to enter the battle. Scipio pulled back and reorganized his line into a similar formation to Hannibal's. Hastati in the center, principes on the inner wings, triarii on the outer wings.

However, unknown to Hannibal, the Carthaginian cavalry failed to turn back the Roman cavalry. They were supposed to lure the Romans off the battlefield to a specific geographic location where the Roman cavalry would be defeated, but in the chaos and lack of cohesion far from the field, this failed and instead, the Carthaginians were defeated by the Roman cavalry and fled. The Romans then turned around moved quickly back to the battlefield. The final climatic infantry charge occurred. The fighting was at its most intense when the Roman cavalry then surprised and encircles Hannibal's flanks and his army, except for him and his Italian veterans, were totally trapped. The Romans butchered the first two lines and the battle was decisively over.

Due to this, we'll never know what Hannibal was going to do in the last phase of the battle with his veterans.

[boofhead]

Read the primary sources about Hannibal, and maybe you'll get a true idea of the worth of the man. Some crappy Z-grade documentary will tell you very little.

[HannibalB]

However, unknown to Hannibal, the Carthaginian cavalry failed to turn back the Roman cavalry. They were supposed to lure the Romans off the battlefield to a specific geographic location where the Roman cavalry would be defeated, but in the chaos and lack of cohesion far from the field, this failed and instead, the Carthaginians were defeated by the Roman cavalry and fled. The Romans then turned around moved quickly back to the battlefield. The final climatic infantry charge occurred. The fighting was at its most intense when the Roman cavalry then surprised and encircles Hannibal's flanks and his army, except for him and his Italian veterans, were totally trapped. The Romans butchered the first two lines and the battle was decisively over.

Due to this, we'll never know what Hannibal was going to do in the last phase of the battle with his veterans.

The last few phases of Zama appears a little confused in your account. The first two lines had already been broken, and those that didn't run away were reformed on the flanks of Hannibal's veteran line. The last phase of the infantry battle before the cavalry return was between two lines, one Roman and one Carthaginian - Hannibal's veterans stopped Scipio's in their tracks and put up a stiff fight before the cavalry returned on their flanks and rear, destroying the veterans and forcing Hannibal to flee. Had Hannibal had a cavalry advantage, he would have probably won.

Two thirds of Hannibal's infantry force were unreliable, a third completely freshly levied, only the third line made up of his veterans of Italy were an instrument of Hannibal's will. The rest were made up of disparate armies that had yet to gel. Scipio's infantry were a homogenous force and very experienced, made up of veterans who had seen constant service since at least 216 BC (made up of the remnants of Cannae, and the two battles of Herdonia, who continued to fight and campaign in Sicily and then in Africa) - Scipio's infantry had the advantage overall - not in numbers (which weren't that much of a difference really!), but in organization and overall experience.

Hannibal is also thought to have devised a plan to level the playing field in regards to the cavalry. Both H.H Scullard and Richard Gabriel believe Hannibal gave them the order to give ground and drive the opposition off the field, which could explain the ease of the Roman victory here (though against this they may well have just perused too far, and Lazenby believes that it would have been very risky to expose his flanks like this, but something had to be done to try and negate the Roman cavalry advantage). With the cavalry off the field, Hannibal's only chance of victory would be to break the Roman centre, thus he threw all his weight against the numerically inferior Romans, starting with the elephants, then three waves of infantry. The strategy almost worked, as we can see the hastati were exhausted after their struggles against the first two lines. It is also thought that Hannibal set up the third line to prevent Scipio's infantry flanking his first two lines,.

Scipio's own tactics were the set up of his maniples and the use of the lanes to funnel the elephants (which are generally regarded to have been made up of young and and ill-trained elephants), and the extension of his line to engage Hannibal's veterans. Scipio's tactics relied on turning the phalanx into echelon, which he did by discarding the usual quincunx formation by placing the triarii and principes back from the front line making the last two lines capable of independent manoeuvre, which Hannibal nullified completely with the use of his third line, thus Scipio engaged in the normal Roman frontal slog rather than use his manoeuvres from earlier battles. Gabriel believes out of the two plans, Hannibal's was the most sophisticated (Gabriel, Hannibal, p.199)

Strategically before the battle, both were considering the same objective, to reach their allies from the west (mainly for cavalry support); Scipio was searching for Massinissa, Hannibal for Vermina and both generals moved their armies towards them. It was a risk on both their parts as they had no control over it, but perhaps Scipio had more reliable information where Massinissa was. Massinissa arrived first at any rate. Vermina arrived just a few days too late to help Hannibal, and was bringing a large force to compliment the Carthaginian which Livy puts at 16,200 men. Livy's date that the battle against Vermina happened three months after Zama makes no sense as Vermina would not sally forth to Zama to fight Scipio's army unless he was there to support Hannibal.

The story of Hannibal being too far from water also appears suspicious. According to Gabriel (p.191):

Why Hannibal would have made such a basic mistake in not providing water for his army and animals in the obviously hot and dry climate is not explained...

It's interesting to wonder what just may have happened had Hannibal linked up with Vermina's force in time...

[Xanthippus of Sparta]

HannibalB's account is closer to the ones I have read over the years.

I have an article ("Clash of the Titans at Zama") that states the Triarii were actually forced into to the battle and that Hannibal's veterans were possibly getting the better of the Roman force when the Roman cavalry returned.

They were supposed to lure the Romans off the battlefield to a specific geographic location where the Roman cavalry would be defeated, but in the chaos and lack of cohesion far from the field, this failed and instead, the Carthaginians were defeated by the Roman cavalry and fled.

I have actually never heard this.

From what I've read, Syphax's Numidians and the Carthaginian citizen cavalry put up a token resistance, and fled the battle, probably on Hannibal's orders.

What I've been led to believe over the years was this was simply to draw them away from the battle so the infantry could fight it out (Hannibal outnumbered Scipio) similar to what happened at Raphia.

[MathiasOfAthens]

Interesting FF...

Either his cavalry fled to ambush the romans or to lead the roman cavalry away idk but if its the former then we can almost predict that Hannibal would of used his cavalry to encircle the romans right?


I do remember reading that Scipio copied Hannibals cavalry tactics and employed them in Hispania.

[Admiral Piett]

Hmm, that's odd. The article I had read about Zama seems to not have the correct position of the Italian veterans then. I thought that they weren't participating in the battle until the final infantry engagement when they were engaged in the center. Perhaps where the confusion might be is exactly where the Roman cavalry charged their rear and how Hannibal escaped with some of his men. About the cavalry retreat, you may be right as that is supposition as we'll never know if the cavalry feign was meant to draw the Roman cav into a trap or simply lure them away. But we do know that at a certain point, the Carthaginian cavalry turned around to fight them and were eventually defeated. I do concur with the statements though that Hannibal may well have been steadily gaining the upper hand before his encirclement by the Roman cavalry.

About the water situation, I actually think that the issue here is that the popular location for the battle is not where it actually occurred. I went on this historical battles pin-marking on Google Earth project and when I was looking for the battle of Zama, there are conflicting theories. The location I actually went with was from a professor who looked around the landscape and came to a spot - further north from the traditional location. This relatively flat plain with an elevated position on opposite sides where the armies camped more closely resembles the description by contemporaries. It is a field just southeast of modern Al Karib, only 6 miles from the Medjerda River. Its also a more direct route 70 miles west-southwest from Carthage. I have it pinned on Google Earth at 36°17'59.37"N , 9°11'0.79"E

[Hanny]

It is a field just southeast of modern Al Karib, only 6 miles from the Medjerda River. Its also a more direct route 70 miles west-southwest from Carthage. I have it pinned on Google Earth at 36°17'59.37"N , 9°11'0.79"E

You might find this of use:http://pleiades.stoa.org/places/315267


http://openlibrary.org/works/OL83277...tory_on_CD-ROM)

[Admiral Piett]

Thanks, man!

[Lord Oda Nobunaga]

Scipio wasn't even at Metaurus, the real turning point of the war.
I could also suspect that the legions in Spain received much more experience before Scipio Africanus took command in comparison to the Punic troops in Spain which were probably not as good as those that went to Italy. Without Scipio Sr. and Uncle Scipio's battles as well as Metaurus then Scipio Africanus would have been lost. Also had Africanus fought Hannibal in Italy, then I doubt he would fare much better than anyone else in Italy. In the end Scipio's victory at Zama was due to his experienced army and Hannibal's previous short comings dealt by others, that allowed Scipio to beat Hannibal. This is very similar to the Napoleon vs Wellington debate or the Grant vs Lee or even the Manstein vs Zhukov debates.

[HannibalB]

Scipio wasn't even at Metaurus, the real turning point of the war.

The real turning point of the war happened long before the Metaurus - by 207 BC, any real chance of victory had slipped away - Hasdrubal's force wasn't large enough to really help Hannibal - and the size of it would have caused him even more problems if he couldn't break out from Bruttium, he was struggling to supply his own army, which was, by this point, lacking in the quality troops he had at Cannae. By 207 BC, Hannibal had lost so much ground and politically wasn't appealing to the allies at all - he couldn't defend them, losing Capua and Tarentum really sealed the fate of Hannibal's Italian campaign and the only real means of beating them was by stripping Rome of its resources - Hasdrubal's force was a little too late in my opinion - yet perhaps he could have recovered the situation with more supplies and manpower had Hasdrubal arrived sometime in 211 BC had he attempted the land journey after the Scipio brothers had split their forces and were killed, yet they couldn't break past a paltry force of Roman survivors (and may well have had more uprisings to deal with in Spain), and even then its likely he'd have been brought to battle and destroyed before meeting up with Hannibal by other Roman commanders defending northern Italy, but would have stood a much better chance than 207 BC as Hannibal still had enough land to supply his army for longer marches and more men to work with and the initiative could have been won by the Carthaginians again, particularly if Mago arrived in southern Italy. I believe the real turning point in the war, and the most decisive battle was at the mouth of the Ebro river in 215 BC when the Scipios beat Hasdrubal Barca's army which was coming to support Hannibal - it diverted another army Mago was planning to invade Italy with from North Africa back to defend Spain - at that point, after Cannae and Capua joining Hannibal's force - two more armies may well have provided the means to persuade more allies to break from Rome, not just in the south, but perhaps in the north and central Italy - such as Etruria - too. But who knows, perhaps Hannibal could have done something had he met with his brother, yet the real turning point had happened long before. Hasdrubal's march was quite desperate, and stood very little chance from the outset. The Romans had the routes blocked into southern Italy, still massively outnumbered them on the peninsular and would have trapped him long before he met with Hannibal.

[Tiberius Tosi]

I just watched the show "Ancients: Behaving badly" and from what ive saw, it seems like Hannibal was nothing more than a D grade general.

1)His elephants. They chulked up alot of provisions, and slowed his army, and on the battlefield werent doing as good as thier cost. For people who never saw elephants, theyre scary as hell, but after that(when they get to know them) you can just move out of thier way(like scipios army did in zuma). Furthermore, just the fact of having elephants increased the time hannibal needed to spend in the alps to two weeks, when it should have been only one week travel.

You have to look at the psychological factors both tactically and strategically. Tactically, yes, elephants are scary as hell and make soldiers run just from the mere sight of them many times. Additionally, I think you underestimate the difficulty of moving while is such tight and crammed formations that war was fought in during this period, in which war was more like a shoving match than anything else. Scipio's army was spared because Scipio deliberately set them up before the battle to allow for avenues for the elephants to run through, to try to create such avenues during a battle would be nearly impossible, and instead would just result in a rout of all nearby formations.

Strategically, if you are the Romans and Hannibal managed to not only use elephants against you, but to use them against you in Italy, that has a huge impact on your perception of the Carthaginian fighting capability. To have the logistical means to transport elephants all the way into Italy is frightening, and leaves the question of what other feats the Carthaginians may be able to also accomplish against the Romans.

2)The alps. He lost 25,000 men there, and most of his elephants. WTF? I mean, wouldnt it had been better for hannibal to go for sardinia, and then sicily, and then raid the southern countryside of rome? Carthage anyways had a superior navy.

Hannibal did not have the option to invade Italy by sea, since the Carthaginian navy was all but nonexistent after the First Punic War. To invade Sicily or Sardinia would be to completely miss the aim of the war, Hannibal did not and could not have a protracted, long, and drawn out war in Sicily like the First Punic War, Carthage simply could not support it financially or in manpower. Hannibal needed to remain mobile, living off the land.

Also the fact that Rome did not come to peace with Hannibal is nothing short of a miracle, had Hannibal done such a feat against any other State, they would have been in peace talks immediately. Rome was a rare exception, which no one else could have known just how radically militant Rome was to keep fighting on when they did. The idea for Hannibal was not to conquer Rome, or to make her completely powerless, but to achieve a quick and decisive victory so as to check her power in the future and allow Carthage breathing room to recuperate and gain power in the Mediterranean back.

Additionally, Hannibal had to literally fight his way through the Alps against hostile tribes and in the dead of winter. Accomplishing this feat while keeping the army together is nothing short of amazing, regardless of how many men he lost doing it.

3)He may had crushing victories over the romans, but lets look at the romans. From what ive seen, at that time the roman army was managed by two consouls, and they had 24 hour shifts on the general office. Some day one general tried to dig in, while the other went on the offensive. We also know that the roman generals were motivated by oppertunities of glory and politics, rather than co working together for strict military goals.

Roman politicians all had military experience, there was no distinction between a political career and a military career as there is today. Consuls were typically very knowledgeable in leading armies. The use of two Consuls leading the army for one day at a time was only in the period leading up to Cannae, it was not the norm by any means.

Roman generals were eager to fight in order to gain political glory, and Hannibal knew this and used it to his advantage, yet another aspect of his genius. It was only against the Fabian Strategy (that of avoiding direct pitched battles against Hannibal and instead attacking his supply, foragers, etc) that Hannibal ran in to problems, and once the Romans fully adopted this strategy it became Hannibal's downfall (also the fact that no Socii state besides Capua would capitulate to Hannibal's side without being directly besieged and conquered, which again owes to the radical and strange nature of Rome).

4)Why didnt he just go for rome when he could? Instead he tried to make failing alliances of Italian cities, letting the much manpower superior romans regroup and rebuild thier army. He just wandered in Italy untill he had to be called back to africa to defend carthage, where he was crushed.

He simply did not have the means to take Rome. A siege of Rome could and probably would have potentially lasted years, during which Roman armies would be formed outside the city and constantly be fighting Hannibal in order to break the siege (which meant that Hannibal would not be fighting on his terms anymore, as he was so good at doing). Hannibal simply lacked the logistical supply to besiege Rome and take it, the only possible way he could have maybe done it was if he had complete control of the seas and knew that Roman armies could not return from Spain and Sicily, and he could be supplied with fresh troops and supplies from Carthage (as foraging further and further from Rome would eventually allow the Romans to slowly chip of men from his army and further weaken him).

Also, sacking Rome was not his goal strategically. Carthage did not have the means to literally conquer Rome, just as Rome did not have the means at this point to conquer Carthage after they utterly defeated them on Carthaginian turf.

And as we know, history in older times was influenced much from politics. Roman historians maybe wanted scipio to look like a great general. Had he just won over a loser that wouldnt have been as glorious as defeating the "greatest general of them all". That just makes scipio a much better general.

Scipio was actually an absolute outcast after the war, as his young age during the war in such a high position broke political convention (maybe even legality if I recall correctly). Hannibal was remembered not by Roman historians primarily, but the main source for him is Polybius, a Greek. It seems still though that the Romans respected Hannibal, as almost everyone in that time respected an enemy who fought well and against all odds, just as we still do today (Lee, Rommel, etc.)

[HannibalB]

Great post Tiberius!

Additionally, Hannibal had to literally fight his way through the Alps against hostile tribes and in the dead of winter. Accomplishing this feat while keeping the army together is nothing short of amazing, regardless of how many men he lost doing it.

The numbers are highly suspicious anyhow, I don't believe he left New Carthage with more than 40,000 men (Richard Gabriel provides an excellent analysis of the logistics in his book Hannibal). Essentially, Hannibal needed to get to Italy quickly. Dragging 90,000 soldiers (half of which would have been poorly trained and of little use on a long march, let alone battle), and tens of thousands of pack animals would have slowed him down a lot, and would have also presented a possible large danger to those whose country he was traveling through... Another point to consider, if Hannibal's army was so large, why did the Romans think they could deal with it with the reduced legions they sent to Spain under the consul P. Scipio? There were obviously anti-Carthaginians on the Iberian peninsular who could have informed the Romans of the size of Hannibal's force, when it was laying siege to Saguntum. Indeed, even the Roman envoys perchance saw his army. Were the Romans that dismissive of Carthaginian military power?

It was only against the Fabian Strategy (that of avoiding direct pitched battles against Hannibal and instead attacking his supply, foragers, etc) that Hannibal ran in to problems, and once the Romans fully adopted this strategy it became Hannibal's downfall

Rome's military response on the peninsular was really very good, yet to suggest that they avoided direct pitched battles isn't exactly correct - the Romans actually engaged Hannibal in direct pitched battle more times after Cannae than before. Hannibal fought perhaps more than twenty pitched battles involving large numbers of men on both sides on the peninsular, not including smaller engagements in Umbria (217), Lucania (212), Caulonia (209) and Petelia (208). Many of these large engagements occurred after Cannae, which reveals Roman generals were willing to engage Hannibal in pitched battle, particularly Marcellus. (A Companion to the Punic Wars, ed. Hoyos, L, Rawlings, The War in Italy, 218-203, pp.299-319)