by Dexter Hoyos
fighting off Hannibal’s attacks, they did nothing to help. This inactivity was
covered up by later Roman tradition in inventive ways. For instance, as noted
earlier, Valerius’ and Baebius’ mission was redated to 219 and during the
siege. A different excuse is Polybius’ claim that a new Illyrian war launched by
the Romans during 219 prevented them intervening in Spain. This might be
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true up to a point but hardly as a complete excuse, given that the war was
over by late summer and—in any case—some of the Roman forces could
have been released early for tasks elsewhere.
The likeliest reason why nothing was done for Saguntum was that the
Roman Senate was deadlocked over whether to act. Glimpses of inconclusive
debate are given by more than one writer drawing on Roman historical tradi-
tions, not only Livy but also Silius and Appian, all of them firmly placing the
debate in 219. Dio, later than any of these, is not to be believed when he
transfers debate to 218 when Hannibal was on his march to Italy: he may be
following a chronicler who wanted to have the Romans discuss peace or war
with Carthage at a more dramatic moment.
On the other hand Dio may be right that the most forceful speaker for
intervention was L. Cornelius Lentulus, for Silius’ pro-intervention
spokesman is called Lentulus too—probably the Lentulus who had been
consul in 237 when Sardinia was seized. And like Silius again, Dio’s
spokesman for restraint and caution is named Fabius, though probably not
the famous and equally cautious Q. Fabius Maximus who later campaigned
against Hannibal.3
Opponents of intervention in Spain need not have been all that many so
long as they included ex-consuls of high standing and influence, for the
Senate worked by consensus whenever possible—especially on major issues
like peace and war. Arguments against intervening would include how recent
the Romans’ link with Saguntum was and how unclear Hannibal’s intentions
were. Maybe too Fabius the spokesman alleged that relations between New
Carthage and old Carthage were rocky—this was what the historian Fabius
Pictor, a senator at the time, was to claim—and that a restrained reaction
from Rome now could split the two and enable the Romans to tackle Hanni-
bal on his own soon. Events would show that there was no basis for such a
conceit but, just as Pictor held to his view of antagonism at Carthage versus
the Barcids, so too it may well have been held by others in 219 with a hope
that something could be made of it to Rome’s advantage. When it turned out
false, the easy explanation was that Hannibal had dragged the leaders of
Carthage all unwilling into his war.4
Saguntum’s long resistance must have been an unpleasing surprise to the
Punic commander. There had been nothing like it in Barcid Spanish warfare
before. It wore down men, equipment, supplies and money. Nor could he be
sure, at first anyway, that he was safe from a Roman expeditionary force arriv-
ing to help the besieged. Not sending one was a serious missed opportunity
for them, as he could appreciate better than most. They could have caught his
army immobilized around a fiercely resisting stronghold, with little freedom
to manoeuvre, and could have mauled him badly with Saguntine help before
he got free; or could have landed somewhere else in Spain to make mischief
in his absence.
On the other hand, the longer no help arrived the more secure he must
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have felt, especially after learning of both consuls’ departure for Illyria; nor
can he have missed hearing of the Romans’ debate or debates over Sagun-
tum. In the end the town fell when part of its walls collapsed under
battering-ram attack. Many Saguntines, unyielding as ever, destroyed as much
of their possessions as they could and then killed themselves and their fami-
lies. By then it was long past any chance for the Romans to intervene.
II
How these would react to the loss of their supposed protégés neither Hanni-
bal nor his fellow-citizens could be certain, but his measures over the
following winter and spring show he presupposed war.
The booty from Saguntum, large in spite of the destructive efforts of
some Saguntines, was shared out—Hannibal keeping for his treasury the
money garnered from the town and from sales of plunder, rewarding his
officers and men with enslaved townsfolk, and sending further goods and
valuables to Carthage to sharpen support there. The troops were then given a
well-earned winter rest, while he set about preparing for what was likely to
happen in 218.5
First his brother Hasdrubal was appointed, in effect, his deputy and
empowered to take over command in Spain ‘if he himself were to be some-
where else’. Presumably Hannibal had done without a second-in-command
for his first two years as general. Next he arranged some transfers of troops:
some 16,000 Spanish soldiers to Africa including Carthage, and some 15,000
from Africa to Spain, the idea being that this would bind the two lands more
effectively. Carthage too received a garrison of 4,000 other African troops.
These could march there as soon as their muster-rolls were complete, but the
transfers across water very likely waited until it was safe again to sail, in
February or March 218.
Hasdrubal was also assigned 21 elephants, while for his own expedition
Hannibal earmarked 37. This seems all that still existed of their brother-in-
law’s great 200-elephant corps; given its size and the nature of the warfare in
rugged Spain, it looks as though downsizing had taken place. Hasdrubal took
charge too of what passed for the Barcid navy in Spain: 32 quinqueremes and
five triremes, all properly manned, plus 18 quinqueremes (and a couple of
quadriremes) that lacked full crews. At Carthage naval strength was a little
better, since a few months later 55 warships were available for failed missions
to Sicily and Italy. Very likely, orders for fresh shipbuilding went out about
this same time or not long after, for any war with the Romans would need far
more than 100-odd vessels. The Romans, in fact, already had 220 quin-
queremes in commission.6
Hannibal’s third measure points most clearly of all to him expecting a
Roman war. He sent agents into the western Alps and north Italy to sound
out the Gallic peoples there about him passing with an army through their
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territories, and to win their agreement ‘promised everything’ (writes Poly-
bius). This was not a move to be put off until he knew for certain that war
existed, but equally there was no point in it if he was not fairly sure that war
was coming. The general was already well informed about the people and
resources in north Italy and (Polybius expressly adds) about how much the
region’s Gauls loathed the Romans who had made victorious war on them
only four or five years earlier. His agents now reported back that the Gauls
were keen to join him if h
e came.
These soundings must be decisive against the idea that he began 218
aiming only at subduing Spain beyond the Ebro, but changed his plan to
invading Italy when he learned of the Romans declaring war. Yet Hannibal
did nothing after Saguntum to provoke them or bring on hostilities. He sent
his troops into winter-quarters or (the Spanish ones) to their home towns for
rest and relaxation; and reassembled them at New Carthage for a military
review only after hearing from Carthage that a Roman embassy had declared
war. Even then his next move was to dismiss them again—presumably back
to their encampment—with orders to be ready to march on a fixed date.7
All this deliberateness confirms that he had meant the sack of Saguntum as
a challenge to the Romans, which they could choose to take up or ignore. Of
course he expected them to take it up—and, in any case, as a responsible
leader he had to be ready if they did. In other words he had to have a war-
plan.
This in turn was dictated by strategic, logistic and above all political reali-
ties. Standing his ground and fighting in Spain was not a serious
consideration. No doubt he would defeat any Roman invasion, but mean-
while there might also be a Roman invasion of Punic Africa. No amount of
victories in Spain would compensate for Carthage being blockaded and
starved into surrender. And even if the Romans were to concentrate all their
efforts against Spain, defeating them would not end the war: he would still
have to carry it to them to achieve that.
The earlier war had told the world how all but inexhaustible were Roman
resources of manpower and munitions. Although every attack on every
sector of Carthage’s dominions might be beaten back, that would only mean
fresh attacks before long. Even if in the end the Carthaginians won through,
the price could (or must) be exhaustion. No less worrying, such a war—long,
costly and draining—risked undermining the position of the faction that had
brought it on. Barcid control, in other words, might not survive a war of
attrition.
Everything thus pointed to his invading Italy. Pretty certainly Hannibal was
well informed on affairs there: travellers, traders, Carthaginians with Roman
guest-friends, and Silenus the Sicilian his own close friend could all supply
facts. Even though the other Italian states had shown their loyalty to the
hegemonic Roman republic throughout the first war with Carthage and had
stood shoulder to shoulder with it against the great Gallic invasion of 225,
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this alliance system had originally been imposed by Roman military might
and it was still relatively new to some areas. For instance the grandfathers of
the warlike Samnites of the central southern mountain-lands had been at war
with the Romans until 290 while the Greeks in the south had come under
Roman domination only after 280. At least a few members of the ruling élite
of Capua, the wealthy chief city of Campania, felt that Capua rather than
Rome ought to enjoy Italian predominance: something Hannibal may or may
not have known.
Certainly he reckoned that a successful invasion would disrupt the Romans’
alliance system and at the same time enable him to build a Punic one. This was
the policy he followed as soon as he reached Italy. Victories over Roman
forces under the Romans’ and their allies’ own eyes, combined with benign
treatment of allied land and prisoners, must prompt defections, and the
defectors would have no choice but to join his side. His military and political
strength would wax as the Romans’ strength waned, with his brother Has-
drubal joining him with fresh forces at a convenient time and other
reinforcements coming over from Africa. In the end, a definitive peace settle-
ment would not merely reverse the verdict of 241 but establish a new
Punic-dominated alignment of power across the western Mediterranean—
one dominated, in turn, by the Barcids and their friends.8
III
That would be the grand strategy. More immediate were the needs of ordi-
nary strategy: above all, how to reach Italy in fighting trim when seaborne
transport was out of the question. A large army and a high level of resource-
fulness were required (and, fortunately, both were available). But it was just as
important to calculate the enemy’s possible moves. Hannibal had to expect
either simultaneous offensives against North Africa and Spain, or else a con-
centrated assault on Spain with a smaller push against Africa. His planning
probably or certainly depended on finding out which alternative it would be.
This helps account for features of his own movements in 218 that puzzle
historians. Although the Romans declared war at Carthage in March and he
received word of this ‘early in the spring’, probably around 1 April, he did not
march from New Carthage until late May or even early June. In other words
he set out surprisingly late. Then after crossing the Ebro three or four weeks
later, he spent a rather long time in north-east Spain between the Ebro and
Pyrenees—some two months, subduing some fairly obscure peoples who
fought hard but whose military importance was scarcely high. He did not
leave for Italy until late August or early September.
Yet the north-east was hardly of prime strategic value to his expedition,
given that he and his men were abandoning Spain and any supplies from
there to live off the land en route to Italy. If urgency was supposedly the
keynote of their march, it is surprising too that he fought this preliminary
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campaign himself. If the region were strategically or economically important
to his brother’s defence of Punic Spain, the conquest could have been left to
him, or a lieutenant like Hanno whom Hannibal then put in charge of the ter-
ritory with a corps of 11,000 from the grand army. But even a defensive
importance is to be doubted. No move was made against Emporiae on the
coast, the Greek port allied to the Romans, a potential bridgehead into Spain
as any general could foresee—and one duly used a few months later by the
arriving Roman forces of Cn. Scipio.9
Various explanations have been offered for all this: the Spanish rivers
needing to subside from their spring flooding, the army having to wait until
enough food and fodder were available en route, the north-eastern conquests
having to be organized and the army reconsolidated, or a wish to lull the
Romans into a false sense of security. Some of these features may well have
contributed. Rivers may have been in flood that winter (we can recall how
Hamilcar died in winter 229–228) and certainly food and fodder needed to be
available in quantity, since the expedition could not be reliably supplied by
sea. But if those were the chief factors, late August or early September—or
even a month or so earlier, on other calculations of the chronology—is
unconvincingly late for marching from Spain. Rather it looks as though Han-
nibal was deliberately taking his time about leaving.
Early in
the new consular year, in other words after 15 March, the consul
P. Cornelius Scipio, Cn. Scipio’s brother and superior, had been commis-
sioned to take an army and fleet to Spain—only to be delayed by the Gauls in
north Italy rebelling—and his colleague Sempronius to ready an invasion of
Africa from Sicily. The preparation and indeed destinations of these forces
could scarcely be hidden. Probably in June or July the consul Sempronius set
out for Sicily, but Scipio got going only in August or early September. And
Hannibal himself started for the Pyrenees and Italy around the same time,
for two months later he descended into north Italy.10
Marching through southern Gaul he used the coastal route as far as the
Rhône, the same route that Scipio was heading for in the opposite direction.
Nor did he press his troops unduly, if the pace Polybius records for a late
stage of the march across Gaul—800 stadia, or 90 miles, in ten days—applies
more or less to the whole of the march until they reached the Alps, as has
been inferred. Roman imperial armies, fully equipped, averaged up to 15
miles (23 kilometres) daily on good terrain, and southern Gaul was easy
enough going. By the stage Polybius mentions, Hannibal knew that the
Romans under Scipio were no longer pursuing him and so may have allowed
his men a more relaxed pace before they moved into the Alps; but, on the evi-
dence, they had not moved with any urgency even between the Pyrenees and
the Rhône.11
Why these late departures and relatively unhurried movements? The likeli-
est explanation is that Hannibal first waited to learn of the Romans’ general
military dispositions. If both consuls were sent against him and he destroyed
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their armies, preferably in southern Gaul away from his own territories, and
then invaded Italy, the impact on the Romans and their allies would be gi-
gantic. If only one consul came, he could either handle him similarly or let
him reach Spain—where Hasdrubal could deal with the intruder while he
himself still fell on Italy. In either case the shock could prompt the Romans
to abort any plans for attacking North Africa, lower their morale and achieve
a Carthaginian victory more swiftly.
By contrast, if the enemy learned too early that he was moving on Italy,