by Rob Edmunds
The lack of coordination between Mago, Hasdrubal and Hasdrubal Gisco, and the fact that Mago, as the commander of the city, was complacently three days’ march away when it was attacked made the capture and occupation of the city much more straightforward than it ought to have been. Its defenders comprised merely around 1,000 Carthaginians, bolstered by a local militia of about 2,000 men charged with defending the city’s gates. Scipio initially blockaded the town from the sea, with the aid of a powerful expeditionary force of the Roman fleet commanded by Gaius Laelius, and then attacked across the isthmus. Whilst rebuffed initially, he attacked again, this time with a contingent striking unexpectedly across the sparsely defended northern side across the lagoon. A fierce gale aided his advance from this direction considerably, as it drained much of the lagoon temporarily, facilitating a quite rapid crossing for his men, who scaled the northern wall barely opposed, and attacked the Carthaginian forces from the rear.
Once the naval forces broke the resistance in the south, and stormed past the bastions, the Carthaginians were condemned to a grizzly fate. Scipio, according to well-established Roman practice, gave orders to spare none of the defenders, which was an order received with much gusto by those of his army who had survived the battles of the Upper Baetis. Chroniclers of the massacre that ensued took care to note that the looting of the town was postponed for some time whilst its men, women, children and beasts were butchered. It was an act of revenge, but also a cold-blooded and deliberate act intended to sow terror in the enemy and doubt in their allies. This doubt was further cajoled by the liberation of the captive allies of Mago and Hasdrubal Gisco, the wives and daughters of the Celtiberian nobility.
It was an astute manoeuvre on Scipio’s part, and it quickly reaped a partial dividend. Many of the local warlords and chieftains abandoned Carthage and switched their allegiance to Scipio, including Indibilis and Mandonius, who – on the return of their daughters and spouses, and a promise of a much more lenient suzerain – concluded it was very clearly in their vested interests to switch patrons. With their choice made, a ripple effect drew most of the locally administered tribal territories into the Roman cause, with only the major cities of the south remaining under Carthaginian control; the main base of operations moved to the Phoenician stronghold of Gades. The happy coastline of the east was lost, and with it the preferred venue for the alfresco feasts Masinissa had begun to look forward to. In any case, the guest list would have been unrecognisable, and it was certain he would no longer be on it, regardless of the bonhomie and personal affinity between him and the local warlords.
Worse for the Carthaginian cause, if not specifically for Masinissa himself, was Scipio’s subsequent strategic thrust, which fully utilised his new local auxiliaries. Once his position was consolidated and the very lucrative silver mines of the region firmly under his control, Scipio launched a further campaign against the Carthaginians, who had learnt no lessons from Carthago Novo and were just as refractory in their own stubborn interests at the cost of the common cause as they were before that calamity. He marched west towards the army of Hasdrubal Barca, which was wintering at Baecula on the upper reaches of the Baetis River. Hasdrubal’s scouts caught sight of the advancing Romans quite early, and, in response, his army was able to adopt a very strong defensive position on a plateau south of the town, with their flanks shielded by ravines and a meandering river to the front and rear, respectively. It took Scipio two days to devise a strategy, which, for the most part, was a pincer movement, with Gaius Laelius leading an attack to the left of the enemy and Scipio himself attacking the right.
Whilst surprised that the attack was more than a mere skirmish, Hasdrubal evaded being enveloped, and was able to retreat with the bulk of his forces and his elephants. The Romans, fortuitously for Hasdrubal, chose to loot the Carthaginian camp once their victory seemed assured and allowed the Carthaginian army to escape with nothing more than a desultory chase pursuing them.
Whether it was motivated by the defeat itself or the attendant humiliation that may have beset him as a consequence of it, Hasdrubal’s next move was to march over the Pyrenees. This was ostensibly to join up with Hannibal, who was campaigning in Lucania, but perhaps also to try to lure a more earnest pursuit by Scipio, which may have led, in turn, to his ruin, with the other two Carthaginian armies ready to follow them both north. If it was a ruse, Scipio didn’t take the bait, but instead moved the bulk of his forces to Tarraco where he continued his beguiling of the local tribes.
For Masinissa, it was the first hint of things to come. Of course, he had regarded the Romans as a formidable force, but one that could be as tactically inept as some of the Carthaginians generals. When news reached him of Hasdrubal’s defeat and the defections of the Iberian tribes to Scipio, Masinissa felt the change in the air like a gale rather than a zephyr. Mago and Gisco would charge him, as the most capable and strongest mobile force at their disposal, to wage a guerrilla campaign in the mountains, whilst they busied themselves with recruitment in North Africa and Lusitania.
It was with resignation rather than any vigour that he accepted this mission, wondering often whether he might find Indibilis and the others over the next ridge, and what he might do at such an encounter. He wasn’t used to trusted friends becoming his enemies. The paradoxes of the war were never starker than when he thought of the prospect of drawing swords with former allies and trying to kill men whom he regarded as friends, even brothers, by then. Do you pause at the absurdity of it at the decisive moment? he wondered. Will I think of their smiles and their affection? Do I have the time even for that moment of tension or hesitation? Could I turn a friend into an object, merely the muscles and sinews wielding the sword? It was a test he wasn’t sure of, nor was he even sure what action would be regarding as passing it, and he hoped it was an examination of his morality and humanity that would never come. The balance of probabilities suggested it would.
Even worse for Masinissa, amongst the captured or slain at Baecula was Massiva, who had ignored his uncle’s orders defiantly and had ridden with the more impetuous elements of the Numidian cavalry that had rushed to the aid of Hasdrubal.
The Art of Persuasion
The defeat at Baecula was a shocking reversal for the Carthaginian forces, but one that perhaps Masinissa could have forecast given the ebbing of their fortunes on the peninsula since the advent of Publius Cornelius Scipio and his astute manoeuvring, both on the battlefield, and within the local tribes and communities that he was wooing relentlessly.
The involvement of the bulk of the Numidian forces had been slight, as a small contingent attached to the armies of Mago and Gisco, but their reprieve from the disaster was tempered by the loss of at least two of Masinissa’s closest comrades. Micipsa, who had ridden with Massiva as a surrogate guardian at the insistence of Masinissa, had been declared killed at the battle by the few survivors who had returned to the southern and eastern armies. His loss tore at Masinissa, but the uncertain fate of Massiva bit much deeper chunks of guilt into his being. With Massiva it was different; it was a blood bond, and Masinissa would rather have swapped places with him and be strung up in whatever fetid, horrific dungeon he was in, rather than imagine his nephew enduring such a torment. In his imagination, he constructed the worst scenarios and humiliations, and upbraided himself for his failure to save him. It was a long way down from a nobleman’s horse to the wetter corners of an overcrowded cell, and Masinissa punished himself relentlessly by speculating how far and in what fashion Massiva was being dragged down.
All that spared him the agonies of his thoughts were the imperatives of the moment and the pragmatic evaluation of their circumstances. It was grim to say the least, but it was better to distract yourself with that than dwell on the hideousness of your ward’s captivity.
Concluding that the Carthaginian war effort lay in ruins was a premature and largely inaccurate assessment, but, at the very least, it was a catastrophe. They had taken a poundin
g that would take some time to recover from. How many more men could they recruit from amongst the Numidians? They had bled long for the cause already. Could the Mauretanians and Lusitanians be entreated to ally themselves in greater numbers? Could the musterers go deep into the southern mountains and deserts, and bring more Libyans, Gaetuli and other nomads up to pad the ranks? Masinissa was sceptical. Those tribes were scornful of the institutions and laws of civilisation and the “sea people”, as they were often derided. They would not find common cause unless they were promised plenty of booty or were roped into service.
He doubted that either coercion or exaggerated tall tales of riches would be adequate to persuade many of the simpler folk. If you were happy in your tents and huts, why risk that for shiny baubles? Taking men from those tribes by force was also fraught with dangers. You had a long way to go and a few nights in the open before you reached the safety of your boats, and the prospect of plenty of able trackers eager to cut your throat, or worse, in the darkness.
Perhaps even more damaging than the loss on the battlefield was the perception of vulnerability it instilled, or – more accurately – reaffirmed, after a string of Roman victories over the recent period. The loyalties of the allied tribal forces had vacillated, but the loss at Baecula would likely be decisive in terms of any wavering local support. The local population was going to be pragmatic in the end, and their paramount considerations were how likely they were to live and what quality of life would be granted to them after that survival. With Scipio ascendant, and apparently indulgent towards the local tribes, that loyalty was unlikely to swerve back towards the Carthaginians.
The scales looked to be tipping in the Romans’ favour. Even worse, amongst the Numidians, morale was low and questions were being raised, sometimes in the corners of the campfires or tavernas after a few cups, sometimes only in the recesses of their own minds, but often in more careless, open ways, as if the doubter knew their view was shared by everyone else in earshot, and there would be no reprisals or discipline for the loose, or occasionally even seditious, talk.
Certainly, Masinissa took care not to articulate his own doubts too freely, but they were there, and they were sawing deeper into him every time he paused to speculate on Massiva’s whereabouts and condition. In a cock fight, you’d be a fool to back the bird carrying a limp, and he was coming around slowly to the realisation that this metaphoric status applied to the present predicament of the Punic forces. He dwelt on his losses too, be they intimate, casual or even just numerical. In previous triumphs, he was part of the army that had retained control of the fought-over ground, the arena into which men poured, and only the victorious would have a proper idea who had made it through. Even in those triumphs, the accounting of lives was far from neat. Identifying pulpy remains was heartbreaking, and there were times when soldiers were not even sure that the soaked corpse they presumed was their best friend or brother was actually them. Many times, it was the clothes or the ornaments that gave decisive confirmation of identity.
Fleeing the battlefield and abandoning comrades to their fate – to the savageries, sport and slavery that their enemies would inflict upon them inevitably – was a materially different experience. It was certain that their enemy’s ranks would have as many sadistic psychotics like Nosejob as their own army did, and it was only chance and luck whether they would fall into the custody of those who retained some regard for honour and mercy. You had no way of knowing what type of man your soldiers had surrendered to or been captured by.
“Tanit watch over him, I beg you,” Masinissa had murmured to himself reflexively every time he thought of his nephew.
His knowledge of the degradations of the war – the wisdom of battlefield survival, so to speak – nourished a different kind of grief and mourning, one that was fed by his memories of Carthaginian victories at the Upper Baetis and elsewhere, as much as his rampant and fearful imagination. Sometimes, his visions were vivid, and it was hard for him to not put Massiva’s face on the victim of his nightmare. One of the flashes of half-recall, half-invention that often assailed him was of a man, often with familiar features, falling with a spear to his side. Masinissa would find himself made impotent by being dragged away from his fallen comrade’s aid, and his mind would snap its vision and he would be left to wonder horribly about the man’s prospects. Would this nebulous victim bleed out and go as mercifully as they could have prayed for, as no doubt many of the soldiers had at Baecula, or would they be used as an enfeebled target practice or dragged off in chains to some dreadful subjugation? His imaginary brother’s fate was piteous, but the pity Masinissa felt in his heart for him and all the others on the real battlefield at Baecula was impotent. He was left without any consolation, clinging to childish hopes that had little chance of coming true, and feebly praying that the calamity could be swept away by wishful thinking or sorcerous rescue by one of the powerful, concerned gods, who would come to Masinissa’s aid if he only prayed hard enough, or offered other pacts or promises to the deity.
Of course, the futility of his supplications and promises had been revealed to him many times in the past. You can’t bring back the dead, heal the devastated or liberate the enslaved, but, even in that certainty, you had to continue to believe in it. There was no other way to smother the loss. In the past, over time, some of those tugs of guilt and concern had faded, but those that related to his closest relationships, and blood ties especially, would cling on like a stain that couldn’t be erased however hard you rubbed away at it. It was only a short time since the defeat at Baecula, and the emotions were high and fresh, but it seemed to Masinissa that his grief and guilt would never fade. In fact, the opposite might happen, and it would only deepen and become more painful. The stain of the loss spread more over his being each day and burnt into every part of him. It lit up questions for which he had no answers, but only more questions. He thought that if it had been anyone else, even Ari or Capuca, he might have been able to reconcile himself to the loss, and the questions might release their grip on him slowly. However, Massiva was his dependant, and regarded Masinissa as a hero, a brother and a role model, and it was a combination of his devotion and Masinissa’s sense of his own errant responsibility to him that fused into a relentless scraping at Masinissa’s heart.
There were at least wiser heads to offer advice, if not anything that could be regarded as a salve. Both Pun and Tigerman urged him back into the fight to numb himself that way, although the war seemed to be in a momentary respite as everyone licked their wounds, consolidating their gains or planning their counters. Having yielded territory in the loss at Baecula and having mostly detached from the main armies to resume skirmishing, news was hard to come by, and Masinissa dwelt miserably for weeks on the probable wretchedness of his nephew.
This miserable spell was broken suddenly when an emissary of Scipio, bearing his seal, arrived at Masinissa’s camp. The emissary declared very tentatively and hesitantly that Massiva was alive and in good health, and – even more remarkably – that Scipio, as a gesture of goodwill between honourable and esteemed foes, wished to repatriate Massiva without any compensation, assurance or commitment from Masinissa in return.
Masinissa, regularly having witnessed and heard of the torments of captivity, regarded the envoy with astonishment and, at first, as if it were some kind of trick. Following a detailed interrogation, however, the envoy’s story seemed more and more plausible, to the point where the matter that most made Masinissa uneasy was how he had found Masinissa’s troop in the first place. On this issue, the Roman was coy, but it was plain that he wasn’t the only party bearing this message, and there were a few others roaming the hills looking to find Masinissa and present him with the news.
Despite his conviction that the man was to be trusted, Masinissa was still conscious that he was perhaps being lured into a trap with Massiva as the juicy, hooked bait. As such, he arranged a rendezvous for two days’ time in the middle of a wide, cultivat
ed valley that was free of any woodland and a short ride away. There were vineyards close by, so that, in the event that there was cause for celebration, there would be libations nearby. The Roman assented and left without any escort.
*
For the next two days, Masinissa’s mood swung between pillars of doubt and euphoria. It was almost as if the messenger had resuscitated someone and brought them back from the dead. It was barely credible, and the longer he thought about it, the more preposterous a notion it sounded to him.
Nevertheless, he rode out two days later with a large detachment of about thirty riders, including Cap, Ari and Juba Tunic, which he figured ought to provide sufficient muscle to match any Roman unit or evade any Roman platoon if things took a turn for the worse. As they crested the hill overlooking the valley and the bushy, orderly clusters of grapevines that were strung out in long lines along much of it, he could see the Roman party waiting for him. As they rode closer, he could start to discern more of Massiva’s features, whom it certainly was, amongst the Roman cavalry escort who waited for them, relatively impassively, aside from the snorts of their horses. Incongruously, his nephew had never looked better. There was a composure in him and a sanguine bearing that was out of step with the situation in which he found himself. Masinissa even felt a flush of pride at the nobility of the scene. It was clear that the Romans had treated Massiva well. He was certainly not in the least cowed or subdued in their presence. He hadn’t taken any fists to the face or knives to his flanks, that was for sure.
As Masinissa drew up to the waiting enemy cavalry, his vigilance still on high alert, he nevertheless went through the protocols he presumed were appropriate for such a rendezvous. He was uncertain whether there was some expectation from him as far as the exchange was concerned, and, on the presumption that there was an element of barter to the matter, he signalled for his men to release five Roman prisoners whom he had brought with them as their side of their bargain. None were high-ranking centurions, although that might have been a deliberate misrepresentation of their true ranks. They were, according to their own statements, a pair of optios, another pair of standard bearers and a tesserarius, whom Masinissa had found quite reminiscent of Pun in his bearing and manner. For that alone, he was quite pleased with the fact of their release. He hoped all five would be given some kind of extended leave, although the probability that they would be engaged in hostile actions almost immediately was far more likely. In any event, one of the optios at least managed a smile and a wave as they rode back into their own troopers, where they were received heartily.