Hannibal's Odyssey 1593339518, 9781593339517

Citation preview

Hannibal’s Odyssey

Gorgias Studies in Classical and Late Antiquity

11

Gorgias Studies in Classical and Late Antiquity contains monographs and edited volumes on the Greco-Roman world and its transition into Late Antiquity, encompassing political and social structures, knowledge and educational ideals, art, architecture and literature.

Hannibal’s Odyssey

The Environmental Background to the Alpine Invasion of Italia

William Mahaney

9

34 2013

Gorgias Press LLC, 954 River Road, Piscataway, NJ, 08854, USA www.gorgiaspress.com Copyright © 2013 by Gorgias Press LLC

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise without the prior written permission of Gorgias Press LLC.

2013

9

‫ܚ‬

ISBN 978-1-59333-951-7 Second Printing

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A Cataloging-In-Publication Record is Available from the Library of Congress Printed in the United States of America

Front Cover: View is from the upper Guil Valley in France looking south-eastward towards the Monte Viso Massif. In the background, seated in Italy, Monte Viso rises above its impressive steep western slope. The massif has two summits: to the left is Monte Viso (3841 m) and to the right the Viso di Vallante (3781 m). In fall, 218 BC, the Punic Army under Hannibal marched along the Guil River in one of the most ambitious and unorthodox mountain military operations of all time. Hannibal altered the center of gravity in the looming Roman/Carthaginian conflict by opening a second front in northern Italia. The environment proved as much an enemy to Hannibal as marauding Gallic tribes, ever present and always looming imminent danger during the mountain crossing. The actual route Hannibal followed has been the subject of controversy almost from the beginning with different groups arguing for one route over the others. This study matches the environmental background of the various routes against the ancient literature to demarcate the invasion route and pinpoint sites where geoarchaeological investigations might yield important results. Once out of the mountains the Punic Army prepared to meet the legions of Publius Cornelius Scipio deployed near present-day Pavia. Over the next two years Hannibal would defeat one Roman Field Army after another, first on the Ticinus then on the Trebbia and later at Lake Trasimene (217). A fourth victory, a battle of near total annihilation, destroyed eight legions at Cannae (216) and virtually brought Rome close to bankruptcy.

Also by W.C. (Bill) Mahaney Ice on the Equator, 1990, Wm. Caxton Ltd., Ellison Bay, Wisconsin, 386 p. ISBN 0-940473-19-4 Atlas of Sand Grain Surface Textures and Applications Oxford University Press Oxford, U.K. ISBN 0-19-513812-0 The Warmaker IUniverse, Bloomington, Indiana, 2008, 302 p. ISBN 978-0-595-71611-1 Visit his website at www.billmahaney.com

TABLE OF CONTENTS Table of Contents ....................................................................................................................vii Foreword .................................................................................................................................. ix Prologue.................................................................................................................................... xi Acknowledgments ................................................................................................................... xv 1 Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 1 2 Overview of the Punic Invasion ...................................................................................... 11 3 Onset of the Second Punic War ....................................................................................... 23 4 Campaign Strategy .......................................................................................................... 29 5 Col du Perthus—The First Test ....................................................................................... 45 6 Volcae—First Roadblock ................................................................................................ 53 7 The “Island”—Necessary Alliance.................................................................................. 59 8 Col de Grîmone: Second Test .......................................................................................... 69 9 Test of Approach Routes and Col Possibilities ............................................................... 83 10 Combe de Queyras......................................................................................................... 107 11 Chateau-Queyras—Upper Guil River............................................................................ 121 12 Col de la Traversette—Ultimate Test ............................................................................ 137 13 Upper Po River .............................................................................................................. 161 14 Geological Considerations............................................................................................. 169 15 Military Considerations ................................................................................................. 175 16 Conclusions ................................................................................................................... 183 Glossary................................................................................................................................. 191 Major Players in the Second Punic War and its aftermath .................................................... 201 References Cited.................................................................................................................... 205 Web Sites....................................................................................................................... 217 Fiction............................................................................................................................ 217 Biography ...................................................................................................................... 218 Index...................................................................................................................................... 219

vii

To Silenus—cartographer and historian—commissioned by Hannibal to log the invasion of Italia in 218 BC. His log, presumably a major source used by Polybius and Livy when they wrote their histories of Rome and Hannibal, was destroyed in the great fire of the library in Alexandria (300 AD). ‘All warfare is based on deception’…Sun Tzu ‘Hannibal’s Pass’—The highest in the Alps…Servius ‘Matters of war, more than any others, are subject to continual change’….Miguel de Cervantes

FOREWORD More than two thousand years after his famous exploits, historians and military leaders consider Hannibal as one of the greatest military commanders of all time. Military schools and aspiring Army officers continue to study the generalship of the Carthaginian commander who achieved decisive victories over the Roman legions at Trebbia (218 BC), Lake Trasimene (217 BC), and Cannae (216 BC), and who nearly brought about the premature end of the Roman military and political systems. For all of Hannibal’s accomplishments on the battlefield, his epic journey across the Alps and into Italia during the Second Punic War is probably one of the most remarkable feats ever accomplished by a military commander. Yet far more attention has been devoted to the battles that occurred within the context of Hannibal’s offensive campaign against the Romans. While some military historians have attempted to chronicle the events of the epic journey, none have examined this monumental feat as holistically or in as much detail as Dr. Bill Mahaney. Other scholars have restricted their research to reviewing the literature and searching through archival works, but Mahaney has actually investigated each of the possible invasion routes with tremendous precision, employing a multidisciplinary approach, conducting extensive fieldwork, using the latest technology, and performing various scales of analysis in the process. In so doing, Bill Mahaney has shed new light on the complexity of the task and the unparalleled challenges confronted by Hannibal and his Army as they journeyed more than 1,000 miles through Gaul and over the Alps into northern Italia. Hannibal’s invasion route has long perplexed military historians. The elevation, nature of the relief, soil conditions that hindered mobility and trafficability, climate, adverse weather conditions, and the scarcity of forage along segments of the route, would have collectively introduced insurmountable obstacles to any Army of the time. Moreover, when one considers that tools such as aerial photography, satellite imagery, global positioning systems, and a variety of maps at various scales (all routinely available for today’s military commanders) were unavailable to Hannibal, then one must conclude that the journey across the Alps with more than 50,000 soldiers and an estimated 37 elephants was nothing less than amazing, if believable. Mahaney’s effort to correlate aspects of current and past environments with the ancient literature to determine Hannibal’s actual route represents a major breakthrough in our understanding of the most remarkable alpine, military maneuver in history. The author’s multidisciplinary approach draws from geology, geomorphology and ecology to examine the challenges imposed by the natural environment throughout the course of Hannibal’s invasion route. In the end, Mahaney’s work provides a comprehensive explanation to a most perplexing two-part question: Did Hannibal and his army of 50,000 actuix

x

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

ally journey more than 1,000 miles from New Carthage, through Gaul and over the Alps into northern Italia? And, if so, what route did they take? The author’s findings will be invaluable to historians, military geographers, environmentalists, and military personnel who have struggled for more than two thousand years to find answers to these same questions with hopes of better understanding Hannibal’s epic journey. Colonel Eugene J. Palka, Ph.D. Professor and Head, Department of Geography & Environmental Engineering U.S. Military Academy West Point, N.Y.

PROLOGUE In 218 BC when Hannibal, the young commander of the Punic Army in Iberia, opened hostilities against Rome by marching from New Carthage across the Pyrénées to the Rhône and through the Dauphiné and Hautes-Alpes, he set in motion one of the great mountain military operations of all time. At least seven works of the invasion were written in his lifetime: two by Greeks who accompanied him on the long trek and two by his Roman adversaries (Proctor, 1971). His major chronicler, Silenus, produced an important eyewitness account of the invasion, a work of inestimable value, the last known copy being lost in the great fire that destroyed the library at Alexandria in 300 AD. Polybius (trans., Scott-Kilvert, 1979), writing his great history some 70 years after the event, found major fault with nearly all that had been previously written about the invasion. Curiously, Polybius says little about Silenus, although he undoubtedly had read and likely carried a copy of Silenus’ work with him when he followed Hannibal’s footsteps fifty years after the end of the Second Punic War. At an indeterminate time in the mid-Second Century, Polybius wrote a book on tactics which survived for at least two centuries, subsequently to disappear into the void of works copied by hand prior to the incunabula, books printed before 1500 AD. Given Polybius’ fascination with the Hannibalic Wars, his inspiration rising to the point where he actually followed the invasion route on horseback, one might only wonder what insight might be gained from his analysis of Hannibal’s clever ‘twists and turns.’ Would he have given ‘high marks’ to Hannibal after studying the narrow defile he wandered into somewhere deep in the Hautes-Alpes, his rearguard and flanks suffering heavy losses at the hands of a well-orchestrated Gallic enfilade attack (Mahaney and Tricart, 2008). How would he have assessed the choice of the col Hannibal selected to pass over into Italia? Presumably Polybius’ assessment of tactics would have included analysis of Persian, Greek, Gallic, Roman and Carthaginian battles rather than a description of events that transpired during the Hannibalic Invasion as it appears in The Histories. When Livy (trans., de Sélincourt, 1965) wrote his history about 120 years later the question of which route Hannibal followed when he invaded Italia had already developed into a major literary battle amongst historians claiming to have discovered ‘The Col,’ the high pass over which the Punic Army marched. Since then and for over 2000 years arguments have been advanced in favor of one route over all others by the virtual legion of historians and military professionals who have studied the invasion, the volumes they produced filling dozens of library shelves in several languages (see, for example, Boser, 2007). I certainly had no book in mind when, after wading through several works on the Hannibalic Wars starting in 1995, I set out to correlate descriptions of the invasion route xi

xii

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

provided by Polybius and Livy with present-day environmental data available for all possible col routes. This correlation soon led to a kind of forensic exercise where bits and pieces of geologic, geomorphologic and ecologic information could be assessed and analyzed for the first time to identify the invasion route and to open the possibility for future geoarchaeological investigations. My first reconnaissance in 2002 led to the identification of the Col de la Traversette as the likely pass, the long sought after route used by Hannibal in the southern Cottian Alps (see Freshfield, 1917 for a discussion of the great passes in the Cottian Alps). In 2004, a second more detailed expedition led to the discovery of fired-rock outcrops below the Col du Clapier, which opened up the possibility of a northern route (Mahaney et al., 2008a; Sodhi et al., 2006). Further examination of the geology and topography of the approaches and comparison of rockfall along the two most likely col routes swung the pendulum again to the south and reinforced the Traversette, originally championed by de Beer (1969), as the only pass Hannibal could have crossed. This pronouncement, bold and presumptuous as it may seem, especially considering some of the great names—Napoléon, Hart, and Gibbon—who have labored over the approach route and ultimate col of passage into Italia, is based principally upon the analysis of environmental data—satellite imagery, air photography, topographic mapping and sample collection in the field—correlated with the ancient literature. Identification of the actual invasion route may make it possible to recover artifacts left behind by the squadrons of Punic soldiers who marched with Hannibal over two millennia ago. Hannibal’s march, the subject of literally hundreds, if not thousands of enquiries and assessments, continues to mystify most researchers who study it. Indeed, JourdainAnnequin (1999) argued that most divergent opinions on the invasion route have been generated by workers who have never visited the approach routes and cols, thus leading to a certain myth about Hannibal. Various writers have focused on one or more aspects of the invasion, almost all commonly rooted in the military campaign, its chronology and time/motion analysis with scant attention paid to assessing the environment or landscape across which the great march was undertaken. Close scrutiny of the ancient literature provides criteria against which it is possible to reconstruct the only possible route Hannibal could have taken. This book is the result of the forensic exercise begun in 1995; one that followed a labyrinthine course through ancient to modern literary sources and later field examination of the various pathways Hannibal might have followed. Silenus (cf. Silenos), Greek historian of Kaleakte, Sicily, was commissioned by Hannibal to write the log of the invasion, an enterprise that turned into a major history of the Hannibalic Wars, a work now lost but most probably a major source to both Polybius and Livy (see Lazenby, 1998). Although Polybius does not mention Silenus it is hard to imagine that he followed Hannibal’s invasion route without a copy of Silenus to hand. Cornelius Nepos (trans. Rolfe, 1929) documents that Silenus accompanied Hannibal and wrote the log of the invasion. Perhaps the reason Polybius failed to mention Silenus comes from his admonition that the best sources are derived from oral questioning of survivors not from written sources. Nevertheless the loss of Silenus’ log in the great fire that consumed the library in Alexandria (300 AD) removed the one primary source that would have provided a solid footing for all further conjecture over the last two millennia. We know almost nothing about Silenus himself although in Greek mythology Silenus (Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th Edition) is described as the eldest of the satyrs—part

PROLOGUE

xiii

beast and part man—resident of mountains and forests, son of Hermes or Pan and tutor of Dionysus. According to Greek myth sileni were often known to imbibe in drink but given the discipline of the Carthaginian Corps1 and Hannibal’s own disinclination to excessive drinking it is unlikely Silenus was anything but the most astute observer of day-to-day operations of the Punic Army as it labored onwards across the Pyrénées and the Alps into Italia. As it is, the next best source originates with Polybius, written seventy years after the invasion. The result is just as Polybius framed it over two millennia ago, Hannibal—for reasons we will never know exactly and can only surmise—took the highest pass in the Alps in one of the greatest mountain military operations of all time, one that opened a second front in the war, ultimately shifting the center of gravity temporarily in favor of Carthage. As the two superpowers—Carthage and Rome—struggled for domination of the western Mediterranean (Throckmorton, 1971), Hannibal roamed up and down the peninsula for fifteen years, inflicting one crushing defeat after another on the Romans, albeit without taking Rome itself. Hannibal never crossed to Sicily although he had allies in Syracuse and he sent agents to rouse the local population (see Lazenby, 1998, p. 102). As in many other Mediterranean conflicts before and after, Carthage had the instrument that would lead to victory; it lacked only the will to provide the resources to allow Hannibal to carry his grand strategy (see Hoyos, 1983 and Billau and Graczyk, 2003) through to a final conclusion. The environment in all its totality—the sum of the geology, topography and ecology—would prove to be a greater obstacle to Hannibal than his Roman/Gallic adversaries. Geology provided a lithologic framework with which the Gauls nearly defeated Hannibal’s Army along the approach route to the Alps whereas geomorphic processes emplaced surficial deposits on the lee side of the Alps blocking his advance into Italia. Topography, controlled by glacial and fluvial erosion as well as tectonics provided only a finite number of approach routes and cols of passage from which Hannibal had to choose the invasion route. Ecology, especially the ability of the land to provide forage, dictated various degrees of difficulty Hannibal would encounter in trying to pass from the lower basins to the high col. As pointed out by Proctor (1971) Hannibal would have, perforce, timed his movements to coincide with time of harvest in northern Iberia and southern Gaul and many a Gallic farmer would have suffered loss of crops/animals at the hands of the Carthaginian invaders. In the end as Hannibal progressed higher into the Alps the scarcity of forage and food, the ecologic matrix as it were, produced a near-intolerable situation that nearly terminated the invasion. The sketchy information available to Hannibal as he planned the invasion, based on fast-paced reconnaissance of the approach route and passable cols, made the entire enterprise rest on something like rolling dice. After leaving the Pyrénées, he entered southern Gaul. Here, fragile Gallic alliances, and tribes with mercurial dispositions, presented many problems for him. But following his passage the mountain tribes who opposed him 1 The nucleus of Hannibal’s army consisting of Libyans (cf. Polybius); also Africans (cf. Livy, ancestors of present-day Berbers and Numidians from the Carthaginian territory (see Lazenby, 1998, p. 9).

xiv

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

with such determination soon discovered it was to their ultimate advantage to let foreign armies invade Italia if only to keep the Romans out of the northern frontier. Hence, in 207 Hannibal’s brother, Hasdrubal, led a relief army across the Alps without incident until he was destroyed by Roman legions at the Metaurus River on the peninsula. As in all matters of human history, military operations are subject to “continual change” (see de Cervantes, 2003).

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Many people assisted with the preparation of this volume. I owe a debt of gratitude to my wife, Linda Mahaney, who encouraged me to put pen to paper as it were to complete this project after so many hours wrestling with the reconstruction of Hannibal’s trek along the Rhône, through the piedmont and Hautes-Alpes to the Po River Plains. Using the geological information I uncovered helped immensely to narrow down the prospects for the correct route, eventually ending up with the Col de la Traversette, the most unlikely prospect of all, originally attributed to Varro and lately traced out by Sir Gavin de Beer over 40 years ago. Professor Pierre Tricart (UJF-Grenoble) provided invaluable counsel on the geology of the Queyras and adjoining regions. I am especially grateful to him for advice on many aspects of the geology of the Queyras and for a critical review of the volume. I am also greatly indebted to Col Eugene Palka, (Professor and Head of the Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering at the U.S. Military Academy, West Point, N.Y.), for critically reviewing a near-final draft of the manuscript and for writing the foreword to the volume. Lastly, I thank Professor Emeritus John Lazenby (University of Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK, for reviewing and criticizing my historical interpretations and saving me from considerable mistinterpretations of Polybius and Livy. Professor Peter Birkeland (University of Colorado) reviewed a late draft of the book and provided critical and helpful comments. Dr. Andrew Stewart critically reviewed chapters 9 and 12. Any failings or misinterpretations in the manuscript belong entirely to me. Professors Randy Dirszowsky (Laurentian U.) and Volli Kalm (Tartu U.) accompanied me on the great trek in 2004 when we followed the main routes Hannibal could have taken from the Rhône to the Isère—Drôme—Durance to the main cols of the Agnel/Traversette/de la Croix, Genèvre, Clapier and Mt. Cenis, assessing each in turn with regard to elevation, latitude and longitude, lithology and most importantly the presence/absence of weathered or fired rock. Robert Siegenthaler (formerly of the U.S. Marine Corps), Fred Ermuth and Volli Kalm joined me on the second great trek from the Ebro River in Spain to the plains of the Po River and Dora Riparia in 2006. After revisiting all the great cols, and numerous discussions about the logistics of taking a large army across the Alps during the late fall and the environmental constraints facing Hannibal, we centered on the Col de la Traversette as the most probable transit route. Volli Kalm (Tartu University), Pierre Tricart (Grenoble), René W. Barendregt (Lethbridge University) and Barbara Kapran (York University) accompanied me on the third great trek assessing the major cols of passage into Italia in 2008. Fred Ermuth translated volumes of material from German and French to English, which added immensely to the corpus of literature available to me as I wrestled with the many interpretations of Hannibal’s route. xv

xvi

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

Helmar Drost (York University) provided various translations from German to English, all of which greatly helped in assessing some of the important work of Professor Jacob Seibert who actually took students into the Alps to assess first-hand the attributes of the proposed routes Hannibal might have followed. James Dohm (University of Arizona, Tucson), remote sensing specialist, field geologist and planetary scientist provided Landsat imagery used in the analysis, some of which is partially reprinted in this volume. I owe John Dawson a debt of gratitude for preparing most of the illustrations both photographically and with Adobe Photoshop. Roelf Beukens, Isotrace Radiocarbon Laboratory, University of Toronto, attempted to date the fired rock outcrops below the Col du Clapier and also translated documents from the original Latin into English. Barbara Kapran (York University) translated several Latin and French manuscripts into English and assisted with the field and laboratory work on the Col du Clapier and Traversette samples. She also did the final photoshop tune-up of images used in the book. Andrew Stewart drafted several maps: of the Pyrénées, Col de Grîmone and Chateau-Queyras showing topographic details of several important engagements Hannibal fought against the Gauls. Michael W. Milner, Adjunct Professor, York University, Toronto and consulting geologist advised on mining activities in the Alps in ancient times. Philip Deline of Savoie University, France, assisted with information on the Alps, which proved invaluable in my analytical work. He also uncovered little known works in French, particularly the volume by General Guillaume, one of the few works on Hannibal written by a military officer. Trent Hare (U.S.G.S., Flagstaff, Arizona) provided information on GIS and imagery of the invasion route. Rana Sodhi (Department of Chemical Engineering and Surface Interface Ontario, University of Toronto) used the ToF-SIMS to study the composition of the burnt rock in the Col du Clapier. Sal Boccia (Materials Science and Engineering, University of Toronto) assisted with SEM imagery acquisition for the Clapier samples. I owe an enormous debt to my family and to all colleagues and associates who assisted in this project to bring environmental aspects to the forefront of discussions pertaining to the reconstruction of Hannibal’s invasion route into Italia. However, any omissions or misinterpretations are my sole responsibility.

1 INTRODUCTION Despite the many studies of Hannibal and the Second Punic War (Wilkinson, 1911; Walbank, 1956; Guillaume, 1967; Mayer, 1974; Caven, 1980; Bradford, 1981), few researchers have focused on the environmental constraints (de Beer, 1967, 1969; Mahaney, 2004, 2008a; Mahaney et al., 2008a,b,c; Hunt, 2006, website) facing Hannibal and the way in which he used his intuition and knowledge of nature to overcome obstacles, both logistical and otherwise, in his trek over the Alps in 218 BC. Only de Beer (1969) sought to bring natural history into play to look at the environmental side of Hannibal’s crossing. All other investigators have studied the topography of the various routes to weigh in with one route at the exclusion of all others and in most cases the actual route identified was based on incomplete assessments of all the topographic variables (see Mommsen, 2006, for example). It was de Beer (1969) who added certain aspects of natural history to his reconstruction but fell short of analyzing the geology and geomorphology of the various invasion routes. Piecing together the actual route followed using only fragmentary descriptions in the ancient literature is difficult at best. However, combining these ancient environmental descriptions, fragmentary as they are, with existing knowledge of the environmental variables—geology, geomorphology, topography, climate, ecology—offers the possibility of first, excluding routes based on the presence/absence of discrete criteria, and second, focusing on the most probable route to be explored with the expectation of locating important historical archaeological evidence. Hannibal’s vision of military affairs, derived partly from the teaching of his Greek tutors and experience gained alongside his father, stretched over most of the Mediterranean World of his time (Fig. 1.1; color frame in the Appendix). Indeed, the breadth of his vision gave rise to his grand strategy of conquering Rome by opening a northern front and subduing allied city-states on the peninsula rather than by attacking Rome directly. Historical events, which led to the defeat of Carthage during the First Punic War when his father commanded the Carthaginian Army, led Hannibal to plan the invasion of Italia by land across the Alps. The task was daunting to say the least. It involved the mobilization of between 60,000 and 100,000 troops (see Proctor, 1971) and the training of a warelephant corps, all of which had to be provisioned along the way. This is the story of the alpine invasion of Italia, a military operation that would shake the Mediterranean World of 218 BC (Figure 1.1: see Appendix) with repercussions for more than two decades. It was a world war in the sense that it involved about threequarters of the population of the entire Punic-Greco-Roman world and few people living in the Mediterranean were able to escape it. Virtually every family in Rome lost a member or members in the swath of destruction brought down on them by Hannibal and his

1

2

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

Carthaginian Corps (Mommsen, 2006; comprising his Libyans, Numidians and Iberians); eventually nearly every Roman male between 16 and 50 would be killed or wounded.

Fig.1.1. Satellite panorama of Hannibal’s theater of operations in the western Mediterranean during the Hannibalic Wars. The invasion route stretching from New Carthage to Torino is approximately 1600 km. Credit Dr. William A. Bowen, California Geographical Survey. See the color print in the Appendix cd.

This book is an attempt to provide readers with the environmental background to Hannibal’s odyssey—his invasion of Italia in 218 BC. The historical interpretations are derived from ancient historical sources listed in the references cited at the end of the book and for critical reviews of this material the reader should consult these texts. Nearly all historians have judged Hannibal of Carthage to be a military genius but curiously most chroniclers of his invasion route and several battles have never deeply explored the environmental setting through which he and his army marched and fought. Hannibal’s success in reaching northern Italia is due in part to his ability, with one exception in the Combe de Queyras (Mahaney and Tricart, 2008), to read the environment and use the ground to his advantage. Even though primary historical sources on Hannibal are largely nonexistent, the environmental record of his passage and correlations between the geology/topography of the invasion route (as outlined in ancient sources) remain very much intact on the ground. It is this environmental evidence of the invasion route that is explored in this book. While the route itself is a subject of some controversy it is with painstaking analysis of the environmental data that it is possible to piece together, from the varied interpretations of the ancient literature, the most likely path followed by the Punic Army in 218. The aim here is to establish the invasion route from the available documentation, however slim it might be, from environmental constraints and from the geological record which together dictate the only possible path Hannibal could have followed on his trek into Italia. The invasion, studied in detail by military officers and military historians for 2200 years, still, even today renders the actual route Hannibal followed a mystery. Few have paid any attention to the natural landscape and none have closely examined the geo-

INTRODUCTION

3

logical/environmental setting to establish an area—one of the three main approaches or six cols—that could be investigated to recover proof of passage of the Punic Army. Pinpointing the route by correlating descriptions in the ancient literature with the existing environmental evidence will provide a discrete area upon which to focus future geoarchaeological investigations. An invasion route would have had to be decided upon at an early stage (Proctor, 1971) and this would have required sending scouts ahead to map the Pyrénées, the Rhône Valley, the foothills and the ultimate col (pass) over which the army could move onto the northern frontier of the Roman Republic, an exercise documented by Polybius. Despite this necessity, not all authorities are agreed on the extent to which Hannibal informed himself regarding the character of the land and people he would encounter on the great invasion (Machiavelli, trans Wood, 1965). It is most implausible to consider a commander as astute as Hannibal wandering around the labyrinthine foothills of the Alps with +50,000 troops trying to find a route across (Polybius, III, 48). He was far too skilled a commander for any happenstance operation like this, yet many (Hart, 1967; Connolly, 1981, amongst others) think this is exactly what he did. However, if you analyze Hannibal’s political alliances, logistical jumping off spots, local drainage patterns, topography and what it offered for cavalry operations (the backbone of his tactical units), water and forage possibilities and quite possibly Gallic mining operations, it is hard to imagine this was anything but a well planned military venture. And, as a master of deception, some workers, Latimer (2001) among them, argue Hannibal chose the high pass because the Romans and most probably the Gauls would never imagine he might take the most difficult route. Such a hypothesis is plausible but not likely given the logistical problems Hannibal faced. As will be discussed later a more likely hypothesis is that Hannibal intended to take the direct route to northern Italia across the Col de Genèvre, the entry previously used by Gallic Armies into the Po River Country, but for reasons unknown he deviated through one of the most challenging of routes—The Queyras. Emissaries attempted to forge alliances with Gallic tribes who agreed to join the Carthaginians; some had treaties with Rome which prohibited alliance with Carthage and others, especially the mountain Gauls, simply refused to allow either Carthaginians or Romans free passage through the Alps. The mountain tribes, including the Allobroges, were not keen on allowing free passage to Hannibal, whether because of the ecological devastation he would bring in his wake or from a long standing desire to profit from pillaging his baggage train. In many ways the mountain Gauls were a somewhat disorganized version of the Carthaginians, who along with their mercenaries, fought primarily for spoil (Goldsworthy, 2002; Barceló, 2004) although there is evidence mercenary armies were paid in gold coin (see Wells, 1999) at least up to the end of the Second Century. As a semi-nomadic hill people who lived from hunting and fishing they occasionally profited from raiding other clans as well as the Romans who periodically attempted to subjugate them. For the Latins at this time northern Italia stopped at the Rubicon (Proctor, 1971). The territory beyond in the Po River area was being annexed for Roman colonization. But while the Gauls had often repulsed Roman legions, contact with the Carthaginians provided a whole new lesson in warfare, one they would profit from in their continual conflict. The Carthaginians

4

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

had a war-elephant corps—virtually an armored unit if you will—one that struck terror into the minds of the Gauls who opposed it, producing fear unlike anything they had experienced before. The Romans were terrorized by the elephants to a degree but eventually found ways and developed tactical formations to deal with attack by the great beasts, a counter formation brilliantly organized by Scipio Africanus at Zama nearly two decades after Hannibal’s trek across the Alps (Mosig & Belhassen, 2007). Hannibal would have been briefed by his agents and reconnaissance officers as to the “lay of the land,” including information on rivers, crossings, stream depths, cols, nature of roads and paths and vegetation. Hannibal couldn’t possibly have planned an invasion of this magnitude without information on the major physical attributes of the invasion route, the details of which are laid out in Chapter Three. Hannibal and his staff probably viewed the invasion as a contest of time and motion relative to the supply of food as much as a contest of military skill against his opponents. Hannibal was certainly well aware of the Gallic predilection for uncoordinated military action and the Roman tendency toward linear battle formation. And he likely considered he was more than a match for any hostile Gallic commander and any Roman consul who might be pitted against him. Hannibal’s knowledge of the invasion route was probably rudimentary and secondhand, but as Polybius (III, 48) makes clear, he most certainly would have had to know about the distribution of vegetation, especially variations of forest through which he planned to march. Indeed, Polybius clearly states that Hannibal anxiously awaited the return of his couriers sent to contact the Insubres and Boii chieftains near present-day Milan and Bologne, for without their cooperation he could not possibly hope to successfully invade the Roman Republic from the north. The character of the mixed deciduous forest of the Mediterranean Belt, then as now, with its stands of oak, alder and Neapolitan maple in lowland areas grades upwards into forests of beech and mixed forests of beech, silver fir, pine, and Norway spruce. The highest bioclimatic zone of Norway spruce, larch, birch and cembran pine (Pinus cembra L.) changes into moorlands with Rhododendron and Vaccinium vegetation or glacial fellfields (Italian Aeroallergen Network, http). Knowledge of the broad character of the vegetation and its distribution would be important in everything from cooking fuel to boat building and weapon construction not to mention forage for draft animals. The controversy over which route Hannibal selected to cross the Pyrénées and the Alps has fueled speculation by many authors over the last two millennia. As previously stated, with the exception of de Beer (1967, 1969), little or no attention has been paid to the role of the natural environment as it influenced Hannibal in his logistical choices despite the problems of moving ponderous columns of infantry, cavalry, elephants, horse and baggage train through rugged mountain country. And the natural environment, including geologic/topographic obstacles, rivers, vegetation, snowpack, firnpack, glaciers and geomorphic features (mass wasted deposits and burnt rock crusts), must be factored into any attempted reconstruction that one might correlate with factual data in the ancient literature. As we shall see, there are tantalizing bits and pieces of evidence for all six of the major passes. All we can do is analyze the physical evidence as it exists today and tie the pieces of the puzzle together to get the best fit, rather like fitting the continents together to prove continental drift as Wegener (1966) did nearly a century ago. As outlined

INTRODUCTION

5

below and expanded (Proctor, 1971) throughout the text the pieces make quite the puzzle indeed and the environmental sciences have much to offer ancient historians in their various pursuits. Climatic conditions at the time of Hannibal’s crossing are important as they would have controlled everything from stream flow, glacial advance/recession and snowpack/firnpack extent, to timberline elevation and the state of forests. As Neumann (1992) pointed out, Hannibal crossed the Alps at a time when climate was similar to today, but without the severe warming trend that is now affecting snowbank/firnpack distribution and terminal positions of glaciers, almost on an annual basis. However, the warmer climatic interval following an earlier glacial advance lasted until ~1500 AD, after which climate deteoriated again with the onset of the Little Ice Age (see Mahaney, 1990, for details on this episode of late Neoglacial time after ~1500 AD and Finsinger & Tinner, 2006, for vegetation changes). Had Hannibal crossed a thousand years earlier or 1700 years later he would have encountered a most inhospitable environment complete with more snow, enlarged firnpack and expanded glaciers. The glaciers would not have presented much of an additional problem but increased snow and firn would have made the trek more difficult. Of all the mountain passes Hannibal might have chosen to cross, and there were many, the highest and most forbidding was the Col de la Traversette located just north of Mon Viso and one of the most prominent landmarks on what is now the Italian/French frontier. Close examination of the works of Livy and Polybius show there is ample evidence that Hannibal did indeed use the Guil River approach and most probably the Col de la Traversette, and this, along with examination of the geological settings of the Rhône, Drôme, Buëch, Durance, Guil and Po river basins supports this view, especially in light of the time/distance figures quoted by Polybius. On the other hand, close corollaries with regard to time/distance may be obtained if Hannibal used the Col du Agnel or the Col de la Croix, both adjacent to the Col de laTraversette. Compared with the other mountain passes, the Traversette is the only col with appreciable patches of permanent snow (firnpack) rising to just under the 3000-meter contour. The Col du Agnel and the Col de la Croix, adjacent to Traversette, are at lower elevations, offer somewhat shorter routes into Italy but lack firnpack, a prime prerequisite to identify the correct col. As well, none of the other major cols—Clapier, Genèvre, Cenis— have permanent snow and firnpack, which is why de Beer (1969) and other researchers have favored the Traversette as the route Hannibal used to enter Italia. Moreover, Polybius, who followed Hannibal some sixty years later, stated he crossed a high pass, one complete with steep slopes, abundant snow cover and dense snow (firnpack) underneath. Even if elevations were imprecisely known, Polybius’ statement strongly suggests the Traversette as the entry point into the peninsula, an inference supported by Varro’s mention (De Re Rustica in Proctor, 1971) of the passes in geographic order from north to south—“Hannibal’s Pass” lying south of the Col de Genèvre. Moreover, reference to Varro’s mention of the five cols is quoted in Servius’ commentaries on Virgil (Savage, 1934). In the original Latin from Servius (personal communication, 2007, trans. by R. Beukens, IsoTrace Lab, University of Toronto): “…Alpes quinque viis Varro dicit transiri posse: una quae est juxta mare per Ligures; altera qua Hannibal transit; tertia qua Pompeius ad Hispaniense bellum profectus est;

6

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY quarta quae Hasdrubal de Gallia in Italiam venit; quanta quae quondam a Graecis possessa est, quae exinde Alpes Graiae appellantur.”

Varro, more or less narrows the pass down to one of the high transit points south of the Col de Genèvre and north of the Col de Larch, of which the Col de la Traversette is favored. Polybius is also on record using the phrase—tas hyperbolas tas anǀtatǀ tǀn Alpeǀn—the highest pass of the Alps (personal communication, J. Lazenby, 2007). But as we shall see, there are other factors: a two-tier landslide described by Polybius (III, 54) which is found only on the lee side of the Traversette, and burnt rock crust described by Livy (XXI, 37), the latter pointing to one other possible route over the Col du Clapier. Another research group, led by Serge Lancel (1999), Dion (1962), and Huss (1985), favors the Col du Clapier over the Traversette. They point out similarities with nearby cols of approximately the same elevation, thickness of scree, presence of snow and meadows in lower valleys where Hannibal was able to regroup as compelling evidence that Hannibal took the northern route into Italia. However, whilst fired rock, complete with carbonised and hematite coatings, exists on a 30-meter long ledge below the Col du Clapier there is no certainty that Hannibal fired the local vegetation. Also, there is no long-distance view into Italia, as described by many authors (Lancel, 1999), but there is ‘a wonderful view of the plains of Italy from a spur below the summit’ as described by Lazenby (1998, p. 46). But most importantly, the lower drainage from the Clapier does not lead to the Po River as Polybius mentioned, but to the Dora Riparia west of Torino. As well, although a minor amount of blocking rockslide exists below the Clapier, there is no firnpack present and precious little snow cover, all of which are major considerations to identifying the correct route into Italia. Why Hannibal would have chosen the Guil River leading to the Col de la Traversette may have had more to do with existing trade routes, political alliances, avoidance of Allobroges opposition, logistics, topography and drainage than avoiding direct contact with the Roman legions when the Punic Army issued out of the mountains. Hannibal had made contact with the Gauls of northern Italia well before leaving New Carthage (Cartagena) and he certainly knew the Roman Army was not well established in the Po River area of northern Italia. He may also have chosen the Guil to Traversette route by mistake, as a result of treachery on the part of his Gallic guides and even through miscommunication. Hannibal was, after all, with his rearguard and out of touch with his vanguard (see Polybius, III, 53) when his army turned from the Durance Valley into the Guil Catchment. An alternative hypothesis is that Hannibal may originally have intended to take the Durance Valley to the Col de Genèvre, but with mounting pressure from the Allobroges tribe decided at the last minute to move his columns through the Combe de Queyras in the Guil Valley leading to the Col de la Traversette (Mahaney and Tricart, 2008). If the Allobroges were massing forces in the area of Briançon in the upper Durance Basin Hannibal would have certainly wished to avoid contact, a conclusion supported by statements from Polybius (III, 49). Of all approaches to the high cols only the Guil Catchment matches the setting described by Polybius, a narrow defile with steep cliffs. Here, the Gauls nearly exterminated the Punic Army by a simultaneous attack against Hannibal’s rearguard and flanks, a combined operation that had the desired effect of cutting his forces in two. The analysis of relative weathering scars on outcrops of dolomite, quartzite

INTRODUCTION

7

and schist on the cliffs in the Combe, and deposits of rockfall debris on the valley floor, attest to localities along the 19-km stretch of the gorge where the Gauls attacked the Punic Army (Mahaney and Tricart, 2008). Having been tutored by Greek historians and cartographers, Hannibal was certainly acquainted with mountains and probably had direct or indirect knowledge of the Atlas Mountains of North Africa. It is reasonable to assume that he expected to encounter snow and that he was acquainted with Aristotle’s Meteorologica,2 a major treatise on natural history that laid out the climatic map of the Earth and attempted to explain the nature of climate. Moreover, for at least three centuries, Phoenician traders had sailed as far as England and quite possibly beyond. Conventional wisdom would recognize that putting increasing latitude together with increasing altitude one eventually encounters ice, either on land or at sea. If Hannibal had read Aristotle, as his Greek tutors would have required him to do, he must certainly have known about frost and snow (Aristotle, XI)3: …For rain is the result of the cooling of a large body of vapour, which owes quantity to the length of time during which and the size of space in which it collects. Dew, on the other hand, is produced by small quantities of vapour, which collects for a day only and over a small area, as is shown by the rapidity with which it forms and its scanty quantity. The same is true of hoar frost and snow: when cloud freezes snow is produced when vapour, hoar frost. So snow is a sign of a cold season or a cold country.

Whether Hannibal actually knew he would encounter snow and ice in the Alps we shall probably never know, but it is likely he expected at least snow and surely his scouts would have mentioned it after exploring and mapping the invasion route in winter (Proctor, 1971). Documentation from Polybius (III, 54) and Livy (XXI, 35), about his encounter with snow and firn (dense old and permanent snow) and movement within sight of mountain glaciers narrows the pass down to the Col de la Traversette, the highest, most forbidding and least likely avenue into Italia. Two adjacent lower passes that could be approached from the Guil River lack the firnpack required for the invasion col. However, to exclude the Col du Agnel and Col de la Croix, adjacent to the Col de la Traversette, from the more northern cols it is necessary to examine all environmental evidence including the distribution and character of surface geological/geomorphological features. I have used kilometers instead of stadia throughout this study, as this is more recognizable today as a measure of distance traveled. I assume 5.633 stadia to 1 km., the same measurement de Beer (1969) used to calculate distances traveled. Where possible, I have rounded off the distances as they are approximate only, the exact location of places such as the “Island” being very inexact. What is most exact are the mountain passes, and while their elevations were not known with precision in Hannibal’s time, their relative heights were probably worked out along the lines of a nominal scale of “highest, high and lower,” such as Tozer (1971) described in his research on ancient geography. Certainly, the Col de Genèvre was known as a main through-fare from Transalpine to Cisalpine Gaul, and 2 3

First major treatise on meteorology and climate written in the 4th Century BC. Translated by H.D.P. Lee, 1962, Harvard University Press, 433 pp.

8

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

Hannibal’s Gallic envoys would have known from first-hand experience about the path/trail and snow conditions. The Col de la Traversette might have been less well known in Hannibal’s time but it is likely his Gallic envoys traversed it just prior to meeting him in the lower Rhône Valley, probably in August 218. Without doubt it had been a trade route across the Alps prior to the Second Punic War and the mountain Gauls had a copper mine and armory in place at St. Véran, almost in Hannibal’s line of march and well before the Third Century. A small museum at St. Véran contains exhibits of archaeological excavations attesting to mining activity at the site prior to Hannibal’s invasion of the Hautes-Alpes.4 We have no idea how Carthaginians measured elevation but they may have used a measurement similar to the Roman foot (pes), possibly the shod foot about 12 in. (296 mm) in length (Hornblower and Spawforth, 1999). One stadium (cf. stadion) equals 600 pes or 178 meters. A Roman mile, therefore, is equivalent to about 1618.5 yards or 4855.5 feet. Thus, the Roman foot was subdivided into 12 unciae and equals 29.69 cm, which is coincidentally the length of the long axis of a sheet of A4 paper in use in Europe today. Also, the foot was sometimes divided into sixteen digiti but whether this measurement was used in Hannibal’s time is unknown. A pace (passus) was measured at five feet (pedes), the average of two steps taken by males smaller in stature than today. One hundred and twenty-five paces are the equivalent of one stadium; 1000 paces equal one Roman mile. It is possible the Romans measured height following the Greek system of mensuration in which six feet equals one fathom, a nautical measure of ocean depth still in use today. If the fathom, as a measurement of depth (length measured with a string or rope between two outstretched arms), was in use at the time and the unit used to measure elevation above sea level then the height of the Col de la Traversette would equate to 1660 fathoms. Surely Hannibal was given some idea of relative col elevations from his agents who traveled to Italia in 219/218 and he may have reckoned distance according to either Roman or Greek standards. To simplify height herein, meters are used throughout, as this is recognizable to the modern reader. Elevations are given in meters relative to sea level; hence, a.s.l. means above sea level. All dates given are in years BC unless otherwise stipulated. All major players in the invasion, Roman, Gallic and Carthaginian, so far as known are characterized in an appendix. Also as an appendix, a glossary provides explanations of all technical Earthscience terms used in the text. Hannibal marched through some of the most complex alpine topography in the World—the Hautes-Alpes3—an area formed by thrust belts, which lifted former sea beds to great heights, the crown of Mount Viso the pinnacle of the range a prime example. Many workers have attempted to paint portraits of various generals attempting to rank them as great to greatest. Indeed, legend has it, supported by Polybius (XV, 6,7) that 4

The term ‘Hautes-Alpes’ has a purely administrative origin as it is the name of a French ‘Departement’ created by Napoléon. In geological terms it is useful to use the term to refer to the mountains east of the Pelvoux Massif, corresponding approximately to the upper catchment of the Durance River (area of Briançon).

INTRODUCTION

9

Scipio Africanus and Hannibal met at the end of what has been called the Hannibalic Wars, before the battle of Zama in 202, outside Carthage. Aside from other military and political matters, Scipio and Hannibal sized one another up (Livy, XXX, 30) probably in relation to Alexander who, in his twelve years as ruler of much of the Mediterranean World and Asia, was a barometer against which all generals were compared up to this time. Indeed, Hannibal and Scipio were two of the great captains of their time and more or less equals of a kind. Hannibal pointed out that battles often favor younger men, apparently an attempt to flatter his younger adversary but without success. And with his cavalry much reduced in numbers, Hannibal lost the battle at Zama in part due to Scipio’s use of realigned maniple formations designed to allow the passage of elephants through his lines. In essence Hannibal was right in assuming younger generals are often victorious; in this case by Scipio adopting the flexible tactics of Hannibal, his main opponent. After discussing the background to the Second Punic War, Hannibal’s campaign strategy and approach to the Hautes-Alpes, the discussion moves to the crucial test required to identify the actual invasion route. This is an exercise that correlates environmental descriptions in ancient texts with existing field and laboratory evidence gleaned from other sources and from expeditions in 2002, 2004 and 2006. As will be shown, this exercise requires an evaluation of the geologic, geomorphologic, topographic, climatic and ecologic evidence available for each possible col route weighed against what Polybius, Livy and others have documented. Close attention to surficial environmental characteristics provides a corpus of new information supporting de Beer’s (1969) contention that the actual invasion route was through the Guil Catchment and over the Traversette— ‘Hannibal’s Pass,’ as named by Varro and recounted by Servius two thousand years ago. As we shall see the only major complication to “sealing the actual route” comes from the presence of a fired bedrock outcrop on the exit route below the Col du Clapier (Mahaney et al., 2008a; Sodhi, Mahaney and Milner, 2006), as mentioned by Livy and supporting the northern route previously advanced by Lancel (1999) and others. But aside from the fired rock evidence below the Col du Clapier not mentioned by previous investigators, there is little to support the Clapier as Hannibal’s invasion route. Like theories of climatic change, hypotheses of the various routes Hannibal could have taken across the Alps are themselves cyclical in nature. What is different about the present study is that two millennia and one-hundred and fifty years after Polybius traced and described Hannibal’s route (see Tozer, 1971), I set out to investigate the various approach routes and cols of passage Hannibal might have taken. After examining the field settings, and weighing all surficial environmental, geological and biological elements against what is known and documented in ancient sources, I utilized the ‘forensic’ advantages of environmental data obtained from different sources to solve an ancient mystery. Most importantly, I relied on first-hand field reconnaissance of the invasion route, including all possible cols of passage, from Spain to Italia.

2 OVERVIEW OF THE PUNIC INVASION The onset of the Second Punic War (218-202) led to the planning of one of the most daring military campaigns of history. The plan for the alpine invasion of Italia was put in motion when Hannibal assumed command of the army upon the death of his brother-inlaw, Hasdrubal. As the newly elected commander of all Carthaginian forces in 221, Hannibal revitalized his father’s plan to attack Italia by land and he wasted little time preparing for the long march to the Alps. The relative political/economic spheres of influence in 218 of both Carthage and Rome are shown in the Collins Atlas of Military History (Sommerville, 2006), the Punic sphere greatly reduced after the First Punic War. The intent in this chapter is to provide a general overview of the environmental variables facing Hannibal and how they may be used to reconstruct the actual route taken by the Carthaginian Army. Fearing a repeat of the disastrous attempt by Carthage to invade Sicily by sea in the First War (264-241; Lazenby, 1996), Hannibal implemented plans to transit the Alps and ravage Rome from where it would least expect attack—the North. To implement his strategy, Hannibal had first to bring Italia to war and he did this by laying siege to Saguntum in 219, a Greek City on the Iberian Coast south of the Ebro River, a center with trading and political ties to Rome (Scullard, 1970; Fox, 2006). With the siege ongoing, Hannibal quietly extended his control north to the Ebro River laying the groundwork for moving a large army to the north. While the exact route is open to some discussion the main army is thought to have passed through the Col du Perthus and on into the Rhône Valley where his scouts (Polybius, III, 34) had established contact with lowland Gauls inhabiting an area known as the “Island.” The approach route to the Pyrénées took on a special significance for Hannibal since his army would rapidly use up food and forage as it moved north of the Ebro River. Aside from the warlike nature of many tribes south of the Pyrénées, Hannibal no doubt counted on confiscating the grain harvest starting in July, probably late in the month. The great grain producing area lay inland in the area of the Ilergetes, one of the main tribes Polybius (III, 35) mentions as opposing the Punic Army. If, as most authorities propose, Hannibal marched inland from the Iberian Coast on a straight line approach to the Col du Perthus, he would have had to dispatch a sizable column to subdue the Ilergetes and this body of troops would have needed transport to move grain and reunite with Hannibal later on. Whereas we do not know the final details as to how the army was deployed, we can only assume from what Polybius tells us that a sizable force of both infantry and cavalry would have had to be sent inland some 200 kilometers or more from the coast to carry out this mission. More to the point, if Polybius is correct in his mention of conflict with the Aerenosii and the Andosini in and about the area of Andorra, Hannibal would have had to dispatch a separate corps of troops charged with subduing the inland tribes and moving grain closer to the coast (see Lancel, 1999, for a discussion of inland cols Hannibal’s troops might have crossed over). 11

12

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

While the siege of Saguntum in 219 took longer than expected (Hoyos, 1998), the Romans dithered over what reaction—political or military rebuttal—to take, a paralyzing procrastination that afforded Hannibal time to forge an army of mercenaries around the central nucleus of one of the most professional armies ever to take the field—the Carthaginian Corps (Goldsworthy, 2002). Composed of Celtiberian and African infantry and Numidian Light Horse, Hannibal’s troopers reconnoitered the area north of the Ebro River while emissaries traveled north and northeast to lay the groundwork for the approach to the Alps. While opinion varies on just how much prior knowledge (Connolly, 1981; Hart, 1967) Hannibal had of the topography and geology of the Alps, it is quite implausible that one of the greatest tactical commanders of all time, might attempt to take several army corps into Gaul without a sound strategic plan. Hoyos (1998) argues Hannibal split his army into two army corps which took two different routes into the HautesAlpes, terra incognita.To invade a land of largely unknown adversaries and worst of all unknown natural forces which could unleash greater destruction than opposing armies requires detailed reconnaissance providing intelligence to be factored into the war plan. One must step back a pace and consider the planning that went into taking an army, estimated at between 50,000 and 100,000 infantry and cavalry and 37 war-elephants, into foreign lands inhabited by tribes, some tacitly friendly and others mostly hostile, for a period of several months. Moreover, Hannibal surely knew of the labyrinthine approaches to the Alps from the Gallic side and his scouts and intelligence network would have advised him to decide on an approach route (Fig. 2.1) that would allow entrance to Italia, but not necessarily the route the Romans and Gauls might expect him to take. Hannibal would have anticipated a Gallic reaction to his selection of any alpine corridor and he would have weighed Gallic opposition as the most important variable since unfriendly tribes controlled the heights. Six main approaches/passes—Mt. Cenis, Col du Clapier, Col de Mt. Genèvre, and the Guil River leading to the Col de la Traversette, Col du Agnel and Col de la Croix— offered the main routes into largely Gallic-held territory and the northern frontier of the Roman Republic. Which one did he take? No other question in ancient history has led to such diverse opinions with different “camps” espousing one invasion route over another for various reasons (Mahaney, 2008a). Many historians favor the view that Hannibal left Iberia with no clear invasion route in mind intending, it seems, to wander around to the west of the Alps with a large army and forge a route across the range when it suited him to do so. True, Hannibal often acted on impulse as he did on several occasions, but it is inconceivable to imagine him leading an invasion army with no precise route of advance. Had he advanced with no prearranged route, the ecological destruction alone resulting from his passage would have sealed his fate and eventually turned the whole of Gaul against him, with disastrous consequences. The simple fact that Hannibal planned to meet members of the Boii, a Gallic Clan from northern Italia, in the Rhône Valley (Polybius, III, 44) just after the defeat of the Volcae (about September, 218) indicates he had a far-flung intelligence network and was well aware of various approaches to the Cisalpine region of Italia. However, it was the Boii envoys who apparently argued against seeking battle with Scipio in southern Gaul as a defeat at this stage might make it impossible to cross the Alps (Seibert, 1987,

OVERVIEW OF THE PUNIC INVASION

13

1993). It seems Hannibal agreed, despite the flat topography of the upper Rhône Delta offering the ideal landscape for the tactical deployment of light cavalry, his principal arm. Just how well Hannibal understood the geography of the Mediterranean can be gleaned from Strabo (Strabo, trans. Jones, 1999) whose map (Fig. 2.2) of the entire basin probably dates from late in the first century BC or early in the 1st Century after Christ. Strabo was an experienced traveler with a keen eye for detail. He visited most of Italia and near eastern regions including the Black Sea, Egypt and much of Asia Minor. His geography, written in seventeen books, deals with specified regions and much of his analysis apparently comes from Eratosthenes. The Geography, planned as a sequel to his historical work which was lost, was intended for civil servants rather than professional geographers; nevertheless his map of the Mediterranean gives an idea of how little was known of the geography of the Mediterranean Basin nearly two-hundred years after Hannibal. Certainly, the contour of the Mediterranean coastline, positions of major topographical features and outline of major islands indicates serious flaws in the knowledge of position and distance not to mention areal distances. For example, Italia and the Adriatic Sea are viewed as elongated east to west when they should appear oriented northwest to southeast (see Cornell and Matthews, 1995, Atlas of the Roman World, for ancient cartography). The Strait of Messina between Sicily and the Italian Peninsula is shown 500 stadia wide, some 90 km, when in fact it is half that distance. Likewise Sardinia and Corsica are shown oriented northwest-southeast when in fact both islands are oriented nearly north-south. The Pyrénées are oriented north-south instead of northwest-southeast. Britannia appears much larger on this map stretching nearly to the Pyrénées.

Fig. 2.1 Map of Iberia, southern Gaul, the Alps and Po River Plains as Hannibal and his staff might have viewed major topographical/drainage features along the invasion route. Possible variations in northern and southern routes through the Alps are shown.

14

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

With such cartographic imprecision it is no wonder navigation at sea often resulted in sailors missing landfall as several authors have mentioned, principally de Beer, (1969) and Proctor (1971). Considering Strabo’s lack of knowledge of the Rhône Valley and the Hautes-Alpes two centuries or more after Hannibal’s invasion we may assume Hannibal would have needed to refine the area beyond the Pyrénées prior to launching his invasion of Italia. As clearly shown on Strabo’s map, the area north of Massilia is devoid of any detail even two hundred years after the Hannibalic Wars. Presumably, Hannibal’s couriers sketched out the various routes during their reconnaissance of 219-218, and further, that Silenus mapped the area along the Iberian Coast, through southern Gaul and across the HautesAlpes to the Po River country. Because Hannibal’s cartography was probably available to Polybius and Livy we can only assume it was not seen by Strabo who was a contemporary of Livy.

Figure 2.2. Strabo’s map of the Mediterranean Basin (after Strabo, trans. Jones, 1999). Published two centuries after the Second Punic War this map provides some idea as to how the ancients viewed the Mediterranean Basin. Reprinted by permission of the publishers from STRABO: GEOGRAPHY – VOLUME II, translated by Horace Leonard Jones, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, Copyright 1923 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. The Loeb Classical Library ® is a registered trademark of the President and Fellows of Harvard College.

From Polybius, one gets a sense of Hannibal’s insight into the country and the environment he would encounter along the invasion route. Certainly some of the Celts in his army must have had experience in the Alps, and if one were to take Polybius (III, 34) at his word, Hannibal had sent out a reconnaissance force well before he launched the invasion. Indeed, Proctor (1971) argues that given the time required for Hannibal’s reconnaissance force to cross the Alps, reconnoiter with the Boii and Insubres and return, the departure time for the invasion from New Carthage must, perforce, be late May to early or

OVERVIEW OF THE PUNIC INVASION

15

mid-June. Perhaps the details of Celtic settlements, streams and mountain cols were partially filled in by Hannibal’s reconnaissance team as they recorded intelligence details after contacting tribes in Cisalpine Gaul. Not to get too far ahead of the story, and as previously mentioned one can only assume that Hannibal was well aware of snow, possibly from first-hand experience or from reports at least in the Atlas Mountains of North Africa. He certainly must have known about snow and ice in the Alps, if only that his Gallic contacts would have told him what to expect and his agents and couriers had transited the Alps prior to the invasion. And how would he have dealt with snow and ice? Hannibal must have put great importance on contacts with lowland Gauls who could supply him with provisions, clothes, boots5 and horses and for this reason he placed attention on placating the Gallic inhabitants of the “Island,” the central and last supply link before entering the foothills of the Alps and the main range itself. All of this is reasonably well documented by Polybius, his chronicler of the invasion, and the only person to follow and write about the direct route Hannibal took over the Alps, albeit some seventy years later. In fictional form the importance of the “Island” is described by Mahaney (2008b). By the time he reached the “Island,” Hannibal had marched some 1000-km fighting several actions, some very intense, against tribes south of the Pyrénées as well as the Volcae at the Rhône crossing. The attrition of equipment, supplies and livestock would have become acute by this time making it necessary to reequip his forces, a necessity that required friendly contact with tribes in the Rhône Valley. After leaving the “Island,” opinion varies as to what route Hannibal took into and through the Hautes-Alpes with different factions (Hart, 1967; de Beer, 1969; Proctor, 1971; Lazenby, 1998, amongst others) favoring one route over another. Although Polybius did not give us an invasion roadmap of any kind he did lay out some of the hurdles Hannibal faced, not the least of which was the effect of newly fallen snow on what most certainly was firnpack (see the glossary), old dense snow existing year round. Polybius relates how soldiers stepped through the snow and slipped on the dense old snow (firn) beneath, thus sliding off into the abyss below. Livy who never visited the invasion route speaks of glaciers, but there is no permanent ice across the Col de la Traversette, although there are glaciers on the heights above and there is the possibility that newly fallen snow might have melted and froze creating ice that would make walking treacherous in the extreme. This is one of the keys to establishing the Col de la Traversette, as the invasion route since no other pass into the Alps—not even the Genèvre favored by the Romans as the main entrance into Gaul—contains permanent snow (firn), let alone glaciers. Other evidence in support of the Col de la Traversette comes from Polybius’ (III, 53) description of the approach route, a long narrow defile with two steepwalled gorges (the lowermost gorge is where Polybius describes the brunt of the attack against his rearguard) as entrance and exit. Of all the main passes that various authorities

5 Little is known of Carthaginian garments and footwear but recent excavations at Teutoberg Forest in northern Germany, the site of the Germanic conquest of a Roman field army, legionaires were outfitted with hobnailed boots (Wells, 2003).

16

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

have argued Hannibal used to cross the Alps, only the lower Guil River and the Combe de Queyras match the topography described by Polybius. As previously noted, Polybius also had access to the report written by Silenus, a Greek cartographer commissioned by Hannibal to document the invasion, presumably a day-by-day log of the trek across southern Gaul through the Alps and into Italia. Alas, unfortunately the last documented copy of Silenus’ report was destroyed by the great fire that ravaged the library in Alexandria in 300 AD. Nevertheless, Polybius gives some idea of the topography, rough scree-strewn slopes, canyons and raging rivers, and most importantly the presence of a two-tier rockfall or landslide that blocked Hannibal’s exit from the summit onto the terraces of the upper Po River. As we shall see, the presence/absence of a blocking landslide, rockslide/rockfall, a mass of rock rubble, is one of the key topographical/geomorphological obstacles to the invading Punic Army, so much so that its presence should have generated a search of all passes centuries ago, its location providing compelling evidence of the actual invasion route. Severe ecological damage must have been inflicted on the valley in which Hannibal camped or rested for two days following intense fighting with Gallic defenders who rolled and hurled huge boulders down upon the Carthaginians. One can only imagine the rock-strewn lower slopes littered with debris rolled and thrown from the heights by Gauls who slid large boulders and trees from the southeast and northwest escarpments of the Combe de Queyras, dropping them en masse in a well coordinated attack (Mahaney and Tricart, 2008). The Gauls themselves, master gold workers as they were in those days, also had a keen knowledge of geology as higher up in the Queyras they slid boulders of schist and sent them cascading down on Hannibal as his forces passed through to the high col (Mahaney, 2004). Later on the Italian side of the range they rolled gneiss and serpentine boulders on beds of ophiolite, a greasy mineral substance somewhat similar to mica, which reduced friction and made it easy to ready large stones for eventual release. And to the south of the Guil River invasion route the Gauls mined copper at a place now known as St. Véran. It is likely Hannibal did know of the copper mine and in all probability his cavalry sacked it on the way through the Guil, although Polybius and Livy, his two chief chroniclers, have not documented this action. Certainly the prospect of capturing copper stocks along with any quantity of tin, as sources of metal for the construction of weapons/implements,6 would have loomed large in Hannibal’s mind. Whether or not he attacked St. Véran is speculation, given his problems in the main Guil Valley with Gallic invaders attacking his column, but the prospect is enticing to consider and the horsemen—his Numidian cavalry—available to carry it out. Crossing the Alps at ~3000 m a.s.l. elevation runs a risk of mountain sickness that affects people in different ways. Pulmonary and cerebral oedema and milder forms of mountain sickness may well have affected Hannibal’s troops who were used to the atmospheric pressure and lower hemoglobin count at sea level. Despite a long march of several hundred kilometers rising to elevations of 1500 meters, the high Traversette would likely have posed problems for some of his troops. In 1976, on Mt. Kenya in East 6

Hannibal’s troops used weapons made mainly of iron (J. Lazenby, personal communication, 2007).

OVERVIEW OF THE PUNIC INVASION

17

Africa, I was present in the field when 1600 British paratroopers carried out maneuvers flying directly in from sea level to elevations of +3-4000 meters. Out of 1600 men, some 60 had to be flown out by helicopter to hospital in nearby Nanyuki, their operational base, many with extreme cases of pulmonary oedema. While no documentation of pulmonary oedema occurring during Hannibal’s invasion of Italia exists, there is the prospect of mountain sickness affecting his troops (Mahaney, 2004). Even Hannibal’s most uncharacteristic reaction of indecision when mountain Gauls attacked his forces in the Combe de Queyras could well be taken as an indication of mountain sickness. In addition to nausea, the mind is numbed by cold and reduced air pressure often resulting in aberrant behavior that might explain Hannibal’s indecisiveness, which lasted for a few hours while the onslaught continued. The entrance to the Guil Valley passes through a narrow defile, the Combe de Queyras (Mahaney, 2004; Mahaney and Tricart, 2008) down river from the Chateau-Queyras, itself a monolithic buttress of dolomitic bedrock, a formidable defensive position and notable landmark described by Polybius and the legion of historians engaged in discovering the actual route over the last few centuries. No other river basins approaching the main cols to the north have topographic features similar to the long gorge system of the Combe de Queyras. Admittedly the Chateau-Queyras, at the upper end of the gorge, is a close corollary of Polybius’ “certain bare rock” and it is easy to see why many researchers have focused on it as the actual site where Hannibal regrouped his forces after the onslaught in the Combe. The entrance to the gorge lies just up-river from Guillestre where numerous steep-walled sections match descriptions of the setting where the Gauls ambushed Hannibal’s Army as it made its way through into the upper drainage. While the gorge referred to by Polybius matches closely the topography of the lower Guil, the geomorphic record in the Combe provides supporting evidence, as discussed later in the text, that this was the approach route. If this is the route, most certainly the column of Punic soldiers— reduced to some 40,000-50,000 in all—must have stretched through the entire Combe de Queyras along its full 19-km length cut in Triassic and Jurassic-age rock. After a geological reconnaissance in 2002, and full-scale expeditions in 2004, 2006 and 2008 the conclusion reached is that the Chateau-Queyras, possibly the “certain bare rock” described by Polybius, is not the only identifiable landmark where Hannibal could have regrouped his forces after the terrible onslaught by the Gauls in the Combe de Queyras. Because the rock buttress upon which the Chateau-Queyras was constructed is one of the obvious topographic features in the valley, both de Beer (1969) and Prevas (1998) argued the ‘certain bare rock” of Polybius must be the prominent landmark. But, as we shall see later, a close reading of Polybius leads to the conclusion that the ChateauQueyras is too far up the Guil River to qualify as the important landmark and it is probable the famous rock exposure is closer to the point at which the Carthaginians entered the Combe. Alternatively, it is likely that the “certain bare rock” is within the Combe de Queyras, presumably between the entrance and La Maison du Roy (3 km from the entrance; Mahaney and Tricart, 2008). The one main drawback to the Guil passage is the statement by Polybius that Hannibal rested his army on the summit for a period of two days. The summit of the Col de la Traversette is itself a near knife-edge ridge upon which it would be impossible to rest an infantry company let alone an army of some 30,000 survivors of the carnage in the lower

18

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

valley. A more likely alternative is that Hannibal rested his army on the slopes below the Col, out of the wind and snow that had likely begun to fall, the time being late October or early November based on documentation (Polybius, III, 54) mentioning the setting of the Pleiades. The Pleiades, as mentioned by Polybius (III, 54), means the time at which snow begins to appear in the mountains. If taken literally it means the early part of November although it is entirely possible that Hannibal was near the pass in late September or early October. In any case it is a phrase used in ancient times to indicate the beginning of bad weather; hence, leading to winter. Just below the Col, at the east end of the valley, a large apron of bedrock and assorted glacial and periglacial deposits is visible on air imagery, a topography not altogether gentle but wide enough to bivouac at least part of the 27,000 to 30,000 men and animals that survived the carnage in the lower valley. A wide trail winds up to the broad bedrock apron from the valley below, opening out into tundra, a treeless expanse offering minor shelter from the wind and sufficient visibility making it difficult for the Gauls to conceal themselves prior to attack. The rock apron below the Col would have provided a defensive location sufficient to allow the Carthaginians to see their Gallic adversaries as the timberline, now as then, is well below and the encampment far enough away from the valley walls so there was no danger of rockfall. It is logical to imagine the wide path across this bedrock apron, as discussed in Chapter 12, was made by Carthaginian engineers at the end of the bloody battle in the lower Guil Valley. If Hannibal bivouacked in the upper Guil Valley below the Col de la Traversette he would have left many hearths behind. Twenty-six to thirty thousand men, camped in a place for two days, would leave behind hearths, an abundance of artifacts and charcoal that could be radiocarbon dated. While no artifacts have been found there are numerous hearths well placed in depressions in the blanket of ground moraine that covers much of the valley floor up to 2400 m a.s.l.. No doubt some hearths have been camping places for centuries and without doubt were probably used by the Carthaginians when they camped there in fall, 218. Surface examination by ground penetrating radar and excavations in promising locations would likely yield a wealth of new information pertaining to the invasion. Many authors have stressed the nature of the summit area, with descriptions of Hannibal pointing off to the east in the direction of Italia urging his troops to greater effort and indicating ‘the prize’ was close at hand. No doubt by this time Hannibal’s troops were starving and his elephants, subsisting on what little forage was available, had become cantankerous in the extreme. By all accounts, as Hannibal’s army regrouped with stragglers catching up and transiting the summit area, he had lost nearly 20,000 men mostly in the Combe de Queyras debacle. All his war-elephants and the core of his Carthaginian Corps had escaped the carnage inflicted upon them in the lower valley by Gallic defenders. To what extent Hannibal posted sentries on the heights above to drive off Gallic guerrillas is unknown and undocumented, although very likely since the Gauls continued to sporadically attack his column from the first gorge in the lower Guil Catchment to the high col. If the Carthaginians ventured high along the slopes of Mt. Viso it is possible we may eventually find the mummified remains of a Punic soldier encased in ice. Just as in

OVERVIEW OF THE PUNIC INVASION

19

the Tyrol, a copper-age (5000 yr BP) mountain man who lived in the Neolithic was recovered in fortuitous circumstances where he died, preserved at the base of a small alpine glacier (Natl. Geographic Society Staff, 1999). Such a find, were it to occur on the flanks of Mt. Viso, would provide a wealth of information on skeletal health, DNA, and the normal attributes of a Carthaginian foot soldier, about which we know very little. On the Italian side of the Alps the Carthaginians were stopped by a large rockfall or landslide (Bagnall, 1999; de Beer, 1969). To the northwest lay the slopes of high summits and to the southeast a drop into the Po Valley, a virtual abyss. Presumably the large boulders created shadows which spooked the elephants and horses making it difficult to get them to go near, no doubt partly the result of near starvation on the part of the animals. The engineers attempted to wedge the boulders out of the way to clear a path through but without success, either because they lacked metal tools or the pine was not strong enough to lift large rocks. Hannibal was summoned from the rear of the column and all eyes must have been well focused on him as he surveyed the situation. Livy (XXI, 37) states Hannibal ordered trees felled, the wood laced around the boulders and set alight on his orders. Every historian who has recounted this story, has added flourishes here and there, and assumed the cut wood was fresh despite the difficult task of firing fresh wood (Bagnall, 1999). If the conflagration occurred it is just as easy to assume the Carthaginians cut dead wood from fallen trees and used it to create a pyre that, when set afire, would create enough heat to crack or spall the large stones. Practicing a human-induced form of physical weathering, and assuming the event actually happened, Hannibal anticipated Blackwelder (1927). He no doubt knew from experience or from his tutors that Greek farmers routinely fired boulders to remove them from fields. Curiously, though Polybius documents the landslide, he is silent on fire as a means of fracturing rock into smaller pieces mentioning only that Hannibal set the Numidians to work restructuring the road down off the mountain. Perhaps, as noted by Lancel (1999), while the landslide or rockfall was real enough, the firing episode might be a bit of hubris concocted by Silenus to build Hannibal’s reputation. This question will be discussed later in Chapter Nine. The story of the boulder roadblock, originally recounted by Polybius and reiterated by Livy, has been told and retold by many historians. But only Livy described the final act as the pyre burned for a time ultimately spalling many large stones into smaller, more manageable pieces that could be levered out of the way. Later Livy described how Hannibal ordered casks of sour wine decanted on the fire, instantly cooling the rocks and fracturing them, a form of rock spalling similar to what happens when lightning strikes rock or in the aftermath of a forest fire. What rock could not be cracked with fire, after creating a strong thermal gradient from the outside to the inside of the boulders, would certainly fragment with near instant cooling. Apparently no water was available and if the land surface was dry (doubtful given the reference to fresh snow) it is a wonder Hannibal did not burn his army right on the spot. Up-valley (anabatic) winds in daytime, and gravity (katabatic) winds off the heights at night might have shifted the fire posing a threat to the army. If Hannibal did use wine, even sour wine, he would have expended a valuable emollient, one hardly fit to drink perhaps but useful to rid horses of mange. Other historians, Cottrell (1992) among them, relate that Hannibal was stopped by a large boulder blocking his path, an obstacle he attacked with vinegar apparently believing

20

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

the acid would dissolve the rock. In any case, vinegar would have little effect on silicate rock outcrops that exist on each of the major cols. It is not so much the application of acid to rock that is unbelievable, but that no exceedingly large boulders exist on any of the major ledge routes into Italia, except the Traversette. It took three days for Hannibal’s engineers to construct a path through the rockfall/landslide debris which must mean it was a fairly sizable mass of debris, perhaps two or three hundred meters in width. A few mass wastage candidates exist below the Col de la Traversette in the Upper Po Valley, above the timberline (which might not have been in the same position in Hannibal’s time) and the town of Crissolo, although all of them have been modified by road/trail construction in recent time. Indeed, mass wasted obstacles exist below the Col du Agnel, Col du Clapier and Col de Mt. Cenis; however, the only two-tier mass wasted deposit (described in Chapter 12) referred to by Polybius (III, 54), as a “previous” and “recent” slide, is located on ledges just below and within the 2600-meter contour on the upper Po River below the Col de la Traversette. Once the mass wasted debris had been cleared, Hannibal led his starving army through the forest and out onto the Po River terraces. In the mountains with his cavalry screen inoperative Hannibal had only to rely on fragmented reports coming in from infantry and dismounted cavalry, a situation unlike he had never encountered before. Now he had the expansive Po River Plains before him, level ground for his “eyes and ears,” the Numidian horseman to gather intelligence. The nearest enclave of Gauls—the Taurini— with sufficient food to supply his army were unwilling to join his war against Rome, even when he had done something no Roman Army had yet done—transit the Alps. The Taurini would pay an exacting price for refusing to join Hannibal, an object lesson for other Gallic tribes, and perhaps most importantly, for the Romans. Within three weeks after coming down out of the Alps, most likely in late November 218, Hannibal had revitalized his army, invested and taken ancient Turin and located the vanguard of a field army led by the Consul, Cornelius Publius Scipio. Hannibal must have been surprised that Scipio could have retreated from southern Gaul (see Fig. 1.1), warned Rome, regrouped his forces and marched to the northern frontier with his army in record time. Scipio, on the other hand, failed to find Hannibal at first, quite possibly because he did not believe his adversary could traverse the high alpine passes. The defeat of the Taurini, on the other hand, must have put Scipio’s nerves on edge as the Romans had not been able to subdue them despite several punitive expeditions in the north. The two armies closed on one another during the early days of December, first clashing at a crossing on the Ticinus River which drains the Alps, and shortly thereafter at the Trebbia, a major drainage with a source in the Apennines. It is at the Trebbia that Hannibal showed his understanding of the value of topography and natural forces in tactical operations, while at the same time violating one of the foremost military dictums of never subdividing a force in the face of the enemy. He used the topographic setting to lead the Romans across a freezing stream, all the time retreating to let nature in the form of freezing weather wear out his adversaries before engaging them. Once engaged, a handpicked force of infantry and cavalry, led by his brother Mago, stormed the Roman rear routing nearly all of its main contingents (Polybius, III, 71.6). It was also at the Trebbia that Hannibal began to release non-Romans conquered in battle as a demonstration of his friendship to city-states on the peninsula, a magnanimous act showing that

OVERVIEW OF THE PUNIC INVASION

21

he had nothing to fear from city-states allied with Rome. This anticipates al-Malik’s Discussion of the Strategems of War written during the Crusades that “kindness toward noncombatants” is a means of demonstrating power, which might assist in demoralizing the enemy (from, Read, 1999). While there are many studies of Hannibal from the military, historical, political and economic perspectives few have considered any aspect of natural history as a limiting effect on the invasion. At best, all previous studies, including the masterful work of de Beer (1967, 1969) have included topography in their individual analyses, and then only on a superficial basis without including factors such as geology, soils and climate. This seems strange since Hannibal was the first Great Captain (Dodge, 1889) to understand and use nature and natural features to achieve a military objective. Combining all available historical, geological, pedological, geomorphological and ecological information, including satellite and air imagery of the invasion routes, it is possible to assess and exclude certain cols, primarily because they do not fit the necessary topographic and geologic criteria. This book attempts to look at all four possible routes— Traversette/Agnel/de la Croix, Genèvre, Cenis and Clapier—advocated as the prime route by one researcher or another from ancient times to the present-day, analyze the pros and cons of each one and recount the history as it conforms to environmental constraints. Before Hannibal, even Alexander the Great backed off from massive operations in the mountains of Afghanistan, but then Alexander lacked the Hannibalic fervor to destroy his opponents at any cost. After Hannibal, there are few mountain military operations to rival his (Winters et al., 1998), and none with the great logistical problems of moving ~50,000 men through high mountain valleys. Pompey led his legions across the Col de Genèvre but not on the same scale as Hannibal’s crossing of the high col. During the summer of 773 AD, Charlemagne undertook his crossing of the Alps from Geneva in the direction of Susa in the Dora Riparia (Barbero, 2006), a passage equated to that of Hannibal. Napoléon fought after crossing the Alps but then he had a road network, although in its formative stages, along which he could move men and supplies. Simon Bolivar led his troops through the Andes of northwestern Venezuela in the early 19th Century during the war of liberation against Spain (O’Leary, 1970). Crossing mountain passes as high as 4000 meters, Bolivar’s exploits rival those of Hannibal, both in elevation and in distance, if not in numbers, his methods achieving a positive result when Spain capitualted. During World War II, the German Alpen Korps in the Carpathian Mountains and the Italian Alps carried out rapid maneuvers designed to catch opponents off guard but these coordinated operations of battalion and regimental strength (Young, 1965) fall far short of the numbers involved in the Second Punic War. In World War II, only the operations of the Tenth Mountain Division of the U.S. Army (Govan, 1946) compares somewhat distantly with Hannibal, and never close to the numbers he had to contend with, feed and motivate. Present day operations of U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan (Berkowitz, 2003; Coll, 2004) and Indian and Pakistani troops in Kashmir (Winters et al., 1998) underscore how little the situation of mountain warfare has changed since the time of Hannibal. As with his Gallic adversaries, replaced by Bin Laden’s guerillas in the present day, engagements are close in and often hand-to-hand in a similar fashion to what Hannibal experienced. Despite firepower and logistical equipment being different in the modern context, the commander who can use the elements—geology, topography, ecology,

22

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

weather—and outguess his opponents is the likely winner (see Rose & Nathanail, 2000, for examples of geology in command decisions). Hannibal made misjudgments in the Alps, which resulted in what today would be considered astounding losses, but on the whole he managed to solve his logistical and tactical problems with speed and ingenuity, two factors that come with inspired leadership. Many authors have discussed how commanders have achieved success over the enemy, the common practice among them being time of movement. As pointed out in a biography of Col. John Boyd (Coram, 2002), one of the great strategists of the 20th Century and a man like Hannibal who left no documentation, the key is time or speed on the battlefield. The military that operates at a higher speed than opposing forces will likely create unexpected events and engender confusion and disorientation amongst the enemy. Other factors may intervene such as inexperienced commanders, lack of familiarity with terrain, lack of training etc. to offset speed of movement. But as we shall see with Hannibal, his Carthaginian Corps was superbly trained and experienced, so much so that he could rely on speed of movement to create the unexpected and produce confusion amongst the Romans. Considering the diverse nature of his army, troops that spoke some 30 dialects/languages, his cohesive army and speed of movement generally but not always worked in his favor. That Hannibal was a leader par excellence is inescapable, as he kept his army largely of mercenaries—on the move, motivating them with personal leadership and promises of rich rewards once they ravaged the cities of Italia and sacked Rome. He probably deluded many with promises he could not keep, but one is left with the feeling that when he cleared the boulder blockade in the Upper Po River Basin, this one act, whether achieved with or without firing the rock, created an illusion of sorts in the minds of all present. To his men he must have seemed larger than life, a commander capable of anything and certainly not one to be stopped by any natural force. Like any good athletic coach, Hannibal had the motivated team, the instrument that would carry him far and wide in Italia, creating havoc and pandemonium on a scale seldom seen in history. He would very nearly bankrupt and collapse the Roman Republic his great enemy, fulfilling an oath he had taken in the presence of his father, “to never be a friend of Rome” (Polybius, III, 11; Nepos, XXIII, III; and Lazenby, 1998; Fox, 2006). Carthage had the instrument—Hannibal—to restore its predominance in the Mediterranean, one that would return it to its former elevated economic position both in the east and west. What Carthage failed to have was faith in itself and its military enterprise overseas in Italia, which otherwise would have provided the wherewithal to win. The Roman Senate had the greater will to survive and win but lacked the instrument to carry it through to a successful conclusion, the lack of leadership nearly sinking the Republic. As witnessed so many times in the history of the world, the Romans won by sacrificing a whole generation of youth led by incompetent consuls far inferior to the “infidel” from the south.

3 ONSET OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR The Second Punic War was essentially an outgrowth of the First War and a trade dispute between Carthage and Rome, the two superpowers of the Mediterranean (Markoe, 2002). Carthage had occupied a strategic position on the Tunisian Coast for almost the same time that Rome held sway over parts of the Italian peninsula, nearly 600 years. Moreover, Carthage was built in the ideal place to become the capital of a seaboard civilization with an excellent harbor and wide but narrow strip of fertile agricultural land along the North African Coast (Fernández-Armesto, 2000). Prior to the First Punic War, Carthage had extended its control over almost the whole of the western Mediterranean, including Sardinia, Corsica and much of the Iberian Coast, gaining hegemony over the Greek city states with the establishment of trading centers along the coast and inland (Matthews, 2003; Fig. 2.1). By the Sixth Century BC, Carthage had allied itself with the Etruscans, driven the Greeks out of Corsica and established control over Sardinia, Sicily and along most of the Iberian Coast as far west as Gades. By 264, Carthage was the pre-eminent power in the western Mediterranean and the stage was set for conflict with Rome (Hoyos, 1998), for when the spheres of influence of two military-minded powers overlap hostilities often ensue. The degree to which Carthage had developed its agriculture and commerce was summed up before the Roman Senate when Cato dropped a few ripe figs on the table, an illustration of just how successful the Carthaginians were at agricultural production, commerce and communication (Fernádez-Armesto, 2000). This bit of theatrical politics was followed by Cato’s famous exclamation, Delenda est Carthago (Carthage must be destroyed). At the end of the Third Punic War, in 146, Carthage was completely destroyed by the Romans, a physical destruction of the city and ethnic cleansing, in effect, which destroyed a culture and dispersed the population into the hinterland. A hundred years after the fall of Carthage, Julius Caesar, who appreciated strategic locations, had the port rebuilt and garrisoned with Roman veterans (Prevas, 1998). The city would later become the capital of Rome in Africa during Imperial times (Danziger & Purcell, 2005). The fire in Carthage burned for days at the end of the Punic Wars, rubble of the city full of human remains that lay scattered, representing the final remnants of a civilization described as the “jewel of the Mediterranean.” Such was their hatred of things Carthaginian that even in defeat the Romans salted the earth so that nothing would grow there ever again (de Beer, 1969; Prevas, 1998). Over 110 years earlier, the First Punic War broke out in 264 and lasted for 23 years, ending in 241 with Rome the dominant player in the western Mediterranean. Rome forced a huge indemnity on Carthage. In flagrant violation of the treaty, Rome seized control of the islands of Corsica and Sardinia in the Mediterranean. Celtiberian tribes in Iberia had revolted against Carthage during the war establishing tacit political control over parts of the peninsula, a situation that threatened to wrest control of all of Iberia from Carthage. Even though the Carthaginian Suffete—two elected supreme magistrates 23

24

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

elected annually—attempting to keep the Romans at bay after the close of hostilities, dispatched Hamilcar Barca in command of an army to Iberia to put down the local tribes and re-establish Carthaginan control, the future of Carthage did not look all that promising. Hamilcar had fought in the First War against the Romans and had been a chief negotiator when Carthage sued for peace in 241. He systematically defeated the Celtiberian tribes and reestablished Carthaginian hegemony over much of the southern part of the peninsula from Gades to New Carthage. During the siege of Helice in 229, a Greek colony on the eastern Iberian coast, Hamilcar drowned. This set the stage for the election of Hamilcar’s son-in-law, Hasdrubal (otherwise known as Hasdrubal the Handsome), to commander-in-chief of Carthaginian forces in Iberia. Hasdrubal successfully expanded farming and mining in Spain to the extent that coins minted in Spain had the highest silver content; both farming and mining helped to fund the growth of a large and efficient army. In 226, a Roman embassy coerced Hasdrubal into signing a treaty that specified Carthage would not advance beyond the Ebro River (Richardson, 1979; Goldsworthy, 2001), and while Punic control was still well to the south of the river, this agreement indicated the Romans believed they could impose restrictions on Hasdrubal and presumably on Carthage whenever they chose (Bagnall, 1999). According to Polybius (III, 29; Fox, 2006), the treaty Hasdrubal signed with Rome contained, amongst other things, assurance that either side would not attack each other’s allies and that Carthage would not cross the Ebro “in arms.” That Hasdrubal could sign such a document without the apparent knowledge of the Suffete, as was later claimed (Peddie, 1997), suggests that Hasdrubal acted more like a Barcid prince than a Carthaginian administrator. Hannibal, upon his election to command of the Carthaginian Army, would act very much in a similar fashion by opening up a number of campaigns designed to bring all of Iberia and Celtiberia under his control. With Hasdrubal in command, the three sons of Hamilcar—Hannibal, Hasdrubal and Mago—carried out military operations that led to the subjugation of the area to the south of the Ebro River. It is possible Hamilcar had a fourth son as documented by de Beer (1967, 1969), Lazenby (1998, p. 286) and Prevas (1998) but others doubt this. Lancel (1999), mentions Hanno as a son of Bomilcar and grandson of Hamilcar, which may explain the lineage. While Rome watched from afar, Hasdrubal tightened his control over the area, carrying out a series of well-planned campaigns against local tribes and solidifying political domination over the southern half of the peninsula. It was at the end of these campaigns in 221 BC that a captured Celt managed to assassinate Hasdrubal, thus opening the top position in the army. Shortly after, soldiers of the Punic Army elected Hannibal, a general at 26 years of age, Commander-in-Chief. An important difference between the Roman and Carthaginian armies was the method of electing/appointing commanders. In Rome initial comitia/centuriata (the assembly in centuries) appointed consuls usually for a single year and from opposing political parties. Often the Senate appointed co-consuls with each consul sharing command on alternate days, a system that led to weighty changes in command structure from day-to-

ONSET OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR

25

day depending on the nature of the person in charge. The system of co-consul command7 often led to variations in tactical deployment from day-to-day creating a certain volatility that did little to instill confidence in the troops and often led to disastrous results.

The Carthaginians on the other hand elected army commanders from among the troops with confirmation from the Suffete. What image of Hannibal presented itself to the average Carthaginian soldier? To quote from Livy (XXI, 4): ...The old soldiers felt as if the young Hamilcar had been restored to them; in this young man they saw the same vigorous expression, the same fire in his eyes, the same air, the same features. Very soon Hannibal’s own qualities, rather than his father’s memory, claimed their love and obedience. Never had one nature more perfectly combined the most opposite forms of behaviour, power to command and willingness to obey. Hasdrubal preferred him above all other officers for courage and vigour in action, and there was no leader with whom the soldiers showed more confidence or boldness. No one was more daring in confronting dangers, or had more sangfroid in the midst of those dangers themselves. He was indefatigable in both body and spirit; he could endure extremes of heat and cold with equanimity; he ate and drank according to his needs, not his pleasure; waking and sleeping, he made no distinction between day and night; what his duties left him he gave to sleep, nor did he seek it on a soft bed or in silence: he was often to be seen, wrapped in an army cloak, asleep on the ground amid common soldiers on sentry or picket duties. His clothing in no way distinguished him from other young men of his age; but his accoutrements and horses were conspicuous. On horseback or on foot he far outshone all other fighting men; he was the first to go into battle, and once it was engaged he was the last to leave the field. These great virtues were matched by his vices: inhuman cruelty, a more than Punic perfidy, no heed for the truth, a total disrespect for honour, no fear of the gods, no respect for the sanctity of an oath, no religious scruples. Such was the complex character, compounded of these virtues and vices, of the man who served three years under Hasdrubal’s command, overlooking nothing that he needed to do or see in order to become a great leader one day.

This quote from Livy, as interpreted by Lancel (1999), is an example of Livy’s literary quality even if it is an English translation, but more than that, it evokes an image of a young commander, one with certain features that Livy may have discovered from writings of eyewitnesses, perhaps Silenos (cf. Silenus). Moreover, Livy recounted a warning that Rome had to fight a leader of genius, who feared neither god nor man, a clever commander with a seemingly endless repertoire of tactical surprises. The question of Hannibal’s likeness to his father, given our ignorance of Hamilcar’s features, we are at a loss to verify. Although one might assume Livy was quoting some reasonable authority, perhaps Polybius or Silenus, when he described Hannibal. Hannibal’s countenance, the subject again of some uncertainty allows, in the words of Lancel 7

After 500 BC the Romans, unhappy with the kings who had ruled since the time of Romulus and Remus, established a system in which the power of the king was divided between two aristocrats, co-consuls elected for one-year terms. The co-consuls it was thought would stop each other from assuming too much power (see Danziger and Purcell, 2005 for a discussion of political organization in the early Republic).

26

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

(1999), “our imagination full play.” The images reported to be that of Hannibal might arguably compare more closely with deities of one kind or another, Hercules perhaps. In earlier times, Melqart, a Carthaginian god, figured prominently on silver and gold coinage mass-produced in Carthage, beginning about 410. And certainly, by 264, Carthaginian silver and gold coin was used to finance conflict with Rome. Curiously, an official army unit ‘Melqart’s Head’ may have had authority to mint coins (see Mildenberg, 1989). A fine bronze effigy presently housed in the museum at Rabat, Morocco, has been ascribed to be a likeness of Hannibal, amongst other leaders of history. It bears a distant resemblance to silver shekels of Barcid coinage claimed to be a likeness of Hannibal (Robinson, 1956), the latter similar to images seen gracing the covers of books on Hannibal (see for example Bagnall, 1999). The Ashmolean Museum at Oxford (personal correspondence, Ms. Roz Britton-Strong, Heberden Coin Room, 2003) has housed in its coin collection images arguably of Hannibal with a royal or deified look, and undeniably showing a man with a large face, thick neck, long nose and steady gaze similar to what is shown by Peddie (1997). The most common likeness of Hannibal in mid-life has appeared in several publications: the front cover of Baker (1999), frontispiece in Peddie (1997) and as a backdrop to chapter 1, p. 18 in Goldsworthy (2001). The face of Hannibal, notwithstanding, this was the man who subdued the Iberian tribes in 221-220 forcing them under the yoke of Carthage in record time. As a rather “disorganized and demoralized” people according to Bagnall (1999) the tribes could not stand up to the professional army Hannibal commanded. The whole of Iberia and Celtiberia as far north as the Ebro found itself under Carthaginian dominance in the space of two years, a feat which must have presented an ominous threat to the tribes of the north, if not to the Romans themselves. More to the point, a decade of continual fighting, first under Hasdrubal and later under Hannibal, left the Carthaginian Corps in excellent fighting trim, well honed to carry on against the Romans, and poised to move north of the Ebro. Political squabbles in Saguntum (Greek city on the Iberian Coast south of the Ebro) in 220-219 between pro-Roman and pro-Carthaginian factions produced friction within the city, and at some point before Hannibal returned to Cartagena in the late fall of 220, a number of pro-Carthaginian supporters were executed. The Roman Senate had dispatched an embassy to Saguntum in an unsuccessful attempt to quell the dispute. It is possible that a short time later this same embassy traveled to Cartagena to meet with Hannibal and attempt to dissuade him from interfering in the affairs of the city (Healy, 1999). The description of events that now followed differs between Polybius and Livy, but since Polybius is preferred here as a prime authority, it is wise to follow him. Hannibal marched to New Carthage where the Roman embassy waited to warn him about interfering with Saguntum and to further demand he live up to the terms of the treaty agreed to by Hasdrubal (Hoyos, 1998), not to advance beyond the Ebro. After hearing their concerns, Hannibal apparently chastised the Romans for executing some of the Saguntine magistrates and allowing the Saguntine Council to cower behind their alliance with Rome and attack neighboring tribes, mainly the Turdenti. He further asserted that his Spanish allies had been attacked and killed giving him the moral right to intervene. In any event the Roman embassy returned to Rome convinced Hannibal intended war, but as Bagnall (1999) recounts, they had no idea Hannibal intended to wage it in Italia. In a clever move Hannibal left open his response and referred the matter to the Council (Synedrion) in Car-

ONSET OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR

27

thage (Polybius, III, 20) who advised him to “act as he saw fit” (Healy, 1999). In April 219, Hannibal attacked Saguntum. The siege, which lasted eight months, proved a costly enterprise, and quite possibly convinced him to avoid laying siege to cities in the future. Investing cities and towns wasted both time and money, not to mention the loss of manpower. Assuming war would follow Hannibal formulated his plan for the invasion of Italia. Saguntum was more than a political opportunity to engage Rome in war, it was a pro-Roman military strongpoint on the Iberian coast (Fig. 2.1), a military bridgehead as it were (Healy, 1999), one that could not be left in Hannibal’s rear as he marched on the Rhône. Hannibal may have initiated the attack on Saguntum as a feint, a deliberate attempt to convince the Romans he intended to fight on Iberian soil when, in fact, he intended a full scale invasion of the Roman heartland. In any case the Roman Senate dithered over the matter intending to bluff Carthage out of continuing the assault. The report of the fall of the city did not reach Rome until February 218, at which time the Senate realized that intimidation and bluff did not go over well with Hannibal. Still the Senate procrastinated, lively debate ensued as various factions strove to change the political center of gravity; in the meantime, Hannibal executed his plan for the invasion of the Roman homeland. Various political factions in the Roman Senate carried on vigorous debate over the logical course of action to counter Hannibal’s attack on Saguntum, a precursor to political inaction—a kind of positive entropy—that would occur in Rome throughout the Hannibalic Wars. Much has been written about the declaration of war in 218 (Fox, 2006). After much procrastination, the Roman Senate voted to send an embassy to Carthage carrying a declaration of war, although with an escape clause. The Suffete was to be told they could avoid war by giving up Hannibal and his staff thereby saving face by admitting Hannibal had attacked Saguntum on his own without the approval of Carthage. The alternative to this was that a state of war would exist between Carthage and Rome. Livy (XXI, 21) describes with great fanfare the events that followed, when in middle May, 218, the Suffete met with the Roman delegation to hear the terms of their conditions for peace. After considerable banter about Carthaginian refusals to honor the treaty made by Hasdrubal and Roman demands that Saguntum was protected by it, Fabius, one of the Roman delegates ‘laid his hand on the fold of his toga, where he had gathered it at the breast,’ said, “Here, we bring you peace and war. Take which you will.” Scarcely had he spoken, when members of the Suffete resoundingly answered, “Whichever you please—we do not care.” Fabius let the gathered folds fall and cried: “We give you war.” The Carthaginian senators replied, as one man: “We accept it; and in the same spirit we will fight it to the end.”

As indicated by Polybius (III, 30) the crisis at Saguntum provided only one instance of the rising enmity between Rome and Carthage and the fall of the city was not the only casus belli. The causes of the Second War were summed up by Polybius:

28

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY “…Accordingly, if we regard the destruction of Saguntum as the cause of the Hannibalic War, the Carthaginians must be judged to have been in the wrong in starting the conflict, both from the point of view of the treaty of Lutatius, which provided that the allies of each power should be secure from attack by the other, and from that of the agreement with Hasdrubal, whereby the Carthaginians engaged not to cross the Ebro in arms. If, on the other hand, we identify the cause of the war with the Roman annexation of Sardinia and with the added indemnity which they extorted from the Carthaginians, then we must certainly agree that the latter had good reason to embark on the war. Just as they had yielded to circumstances earlier, so they now took advantage of circumstances to retaliate against those who had wronged them.”

The general picture of growing discord and perceived wrongs between Rome and Carthage, as described by Polybius (III, 32, 33), led Hannibal to focus on two issues of concern: the security of Africa and Iberia and the report of agents he had dispatched to northern Italia. It seems he precipitated the war after considering his army could protect the heartland of Carthage but before he had formalized alliances with tribes at the foot of the Alps. And while Polybius attributes the war to Hannibal’s initiatives (Schepens, 1989) it must be remembered that the historical evidence related to the war is controversial mainly because it comes almost entirely from Roman sources. When Carthage perished in 146 she left no historian to write or relate the Punic version of events as they unfolded. Accordingly the victorious party, in this case the Romans, was inclined to build its own version of “historical truth.” Only the scantiest fragments of information survive from historiographers, numismatic authorities, epigraphic experts and archaeologists favoring Punic interests. Had the Romans lost the resulting war it would have been called the Roman War (Mosig and Belhassen, 2006). Thus, the stage was set for conflict, with Hannibal moving apace to implement his planned invasion of the Roman Republic. For sixteen years the two major powers of the time would clash in a bitter conflict over the whole of the West-Mediterranean area. Fighting mainly on land, in Spain, southern France, Italia and North Africa the war would come to an end in 202 with Roman legions under Scipio victorious over Hannibal’s army. Later, in 146, Roman legions would completely destroy Carthage but part of her culture and language would persist until the 5th Century AD (van Houtte, 1989).

4 CAMPAIGN STRATEGY Hannibal’s thinking regarding conflict with Rome is unknown since he did not leave memoirs or written records of any kind (Lazenby, 1998). What we know is what is recorded by his enemies and what has come down to us from Polybius (Scott-Kilvert, 1979, trans. of Polybius), chronicler of the Second Punic War who, some 50 years after the war ended, actually followed Hannibal’s path from New Carthage to the Alps. One can only assume that a number of options lay open to Hannibal. He might stand fast after Saguntum and wait to repel a Roman attack either upon North Africa or Iberia which would give him time to station his crack troops, those destined to cross the Alps with him, in strategic places and catch the Roman Army unawares. Given his intelligence network in the north of Italia (Lancel, 1999) this would suit the defensive side of his character but it might produce a level of boredom amongst his troops with which he would not wish to cope. If he went over to a defensive posture, he would have to subdivide his forces, a tactical situation he was extremely skilled at doing but it would mean he might have to fight on several fronts at one time. Second, Roman supremacy in sea power must have conjured up images of defeat similar to those facing Hitler and Napolơon in later times. In Hannibal’s mind the defeat of Carthage at sea in the First War was an event he did not wish to repeat. Hannibal decidedly had the better army, as did Hitler and Napolơon, but could he expect to move them with his inferior navy? If he moved at sea could he avoid the losses he might expect to sustain in the mountains? These questions must have weighed heavily on his thinking as he put his strategy together. The logistics would have conclusively indicated to Hannibal that with 150 quinqueremes he would find it difficult to move an army of 25,00050,000 handpicked troops and cavalry to Italia by sea, even if he could count on avoiding the numerically superior Roman fleet. Third, Hannibal knew from the start that he could count on political instability and a tenuous hold on the Po River country by Rome to bring allies flocking to his standard. By 220, the Romans had moved closer to the Alps (Lazenby, 1998), their newly installed bases at Placentia and Cremona ripe to create resentment amongst the Gauls. Certainly, as already pointed out, Hannibal’s agents had slipped into Cisalpine Gaul and were sending back intelligence reports indicating an unsettled political situation, one that offered the prospect of numerous allies (Polybius, III, 34). The Gauls had made their first appearance in Italia in the 5th Century BC, spreading southwards into Etruria as documented by Silius Italicus (trans, 1934). In 390 BC they sacked and burned Rome. Hannibal undoubtedly intended to repeat the Gallic destruction of Rome a second time, but to achieve it he needed Gallic allies.

29

30

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

Fourth, and perhaps most importantly, finances must have been widely discussed amongst Hannibal’s staff and at the Suffete in Carthage. And whilst we know little to almost nothing about the cost of the invasion and the funds that were available to purchase supplies, procure transport, pay bribes and the normal foot-soldier we can only assume it was a hefty budget that was required not only to prepare for invasion but to actually pull it off. Hamilcar had previously set in motion an aggressive mining operation in Iberia to help pay off reparations from the First War. Hasdrubal the Handsome had increased the output of Iberian mines and opened new ones, a process that was accelerated under Hannibal. Even though this is a topic skirted by most historians, it must certainly have been underlined by Hannibal as he would have needed enormous reserves of coin, not to mention gold and silver talents—ancient equivalent of bullion---to pay his troops and bribe his way through tribes more interested in assurances of no return and payment over contest on the battlefield. The weight of precious metal, uncoined and used in monetary equivalents, is described by Xenophon (trans. Warner, 1972) who mentions the finances required to support military operations two centuries before Hannibal. Outside mention of bribes paid to some Gallic tribes, Polybius (III, 41) is nearly mute on the subject of finances, but these must have loomed large in discussions prior to the invasion, and certainly Hannibal’s staff would have had to come up with budget numbers of one kind or another. Gold talents weighed out as gold dust (i.e. from gold placer mining; Herodotus, trans. 2003) were used as payment of tribute from vassal states to imperial monarchies and republics from at least the Sixth Century BC. Three centuries before the Hannibalic Wars gold by weight was fourteen times more valuable than silver (Cartledge, 2006). What we know of Hannibal’s actions and his troop dispositions indicate sound strategic thinking based on adequate planning given the reality of his situation. As previously pointed out he must certainly have been briefed on the nature of the alpine environment, as one cannot imagine planning an enterprise of this nature without adequate intelligence. Environmental information would certainly affect logistics, what in modern military parlance is called G4. Certainly Hannibal was well aware of the alpine drainage network, at least in rudimentary form, since his agents had penetrated as far as Cisalpine Gaul and presumably had produced a map (Figure 2.1) showing the route of this reconnaissance. He knew of the “Island” Gauls and could count on their assistance, a valuable focal as well as hinge point on the invasion map unfolded by his staff in Cartagena. After traveling nearly 1000 km from Cartagena to the lower reaches of the Rhône River, battling unfriendly tribes along the way, Hannibal would have needed to refit his army and re-supply with foodstuffs and materiel. The “Island” would be the “hinge” upon which he would wheel his army ninety degrees and proceed into the piedmont and cross the Hautes-Alpes. Whereas we know relatively little about the structure of the Carthaginian Army, it is reasonable to assume that it was organized somewhat along the lines of the Roman and Greek armies. The main tactical unit of the Roman Army was the legion with a 600-year history all the way back to the origin of Rome. The legion refers to selection as the men in the legion were “selected” (Bath, 1981). When a legion was levied by the Senate every able bodied male citizen between 17 and 46 assembled on the Capitoline Hill to the south of the Palatine Hill, the birthplace of Rome itself. Here they were assigned positions determined by age and height, the legionary tribunes selecting the quotas they required to fill the ranks. The Roman Army was a citizen army and males enrolled for a period of

CAMPAIGN STRATEGY

31

one year, after which they dispersed to their farms. During the first centuries of the Republic two legions, comprising infantry and a small contingent of cavalry, were raised every year but as Rome expanded into the Mediterranean and northwards to the mountains, crises erupted at various times necessitating the raising of additional legions. The legion was divided into three main units: heavy infantry, light infantry and cavalry. The hierarchy of the legion was such that the cavalry occupied the highest status, the ranks filled by men with money to purchase mounts and equestrian equipment. In descending order the heavy infantry was occupied by men who could afford armor and the necessary weaponry. And the light infantry was brought up to strength by men coming from the lower ranks of society, comprised of individuals lacking the necessary affluence to buy armor and weapons required of the other ranks (Wells, 2003). The Roman Army went through a number of stages from its inception in the Fifth Century, to the sacking of Rome in 390, when the Romans responded by building a stronger army to defend the frontier. Pillaging of Rome by Gauls led to a climate of fear of the northern frontier, which loomed large in Roman minds over the coming centuries. By the Fourth Century, Rome regularly levied more troops, and demanded they be prepared to remain in the field for months at a time. It was the legions of the Fourth and Third centuries that made important territorial gains for Rome and it was these legions that acted on orders from the Senate to occupy territories left under Carthaginian control at the end of the First Punic War. Because Hannibal was well tutored in Greek history, and presumably Greek military history, one may presume his army bore a resemblance to Greek armies of classical times. Carrying this a bit further and considering the fighting effectiveness of the Carthaginian Army it is logical to assume the Punic Army may have been modeled upon the Spartan Army (Cartledge, 2003) whose soldiers were deployed into files (enomotia), each file or unit commanded by an enomotarch, an officer of junior rank akin to a lieutenant. Presumably the enomotia had the strength of a modern platoon (40-60 men), theoretically formed up in five files of eight men (Lazenby, 1985). Files were interlinked into a group of ‘fifties’ (pentekostyles) under the command of a senior officer, presumably a captain or possibly a major. As discussed by Bradford (1993), quoting Xenophon, when marching in formation the Spartan Army moved in column with each section of ‘fifties’ linked up into larger units, possibly the size of a modern battalion. Since the Spartan Army at no time exceeded a total strength of ~10-12,000 men it is likely the entire army was composed of some 10 to 12 battalions. The one great difference between the Hannibalic Army and the Spartan Army was Hannibal’s reliance on his light cavalry, his principal arm. The Spartan Army depended on the strength of the hoplite, a heavily armored infantryman armed with a long spear and double-edged large iron-slashing sword. In contrast, the Carthaginian Army comprised the Carthaginian Corps, a professional nucleus of heavy and light infantry closely allied with a large contingent of Numidian horse plus allied mercenary formations of variable size along with auxiliary formations of cavalry. We have no way of knowing precisely how these forces were structured. It may be that the Carthaginian Corps was organized along the lines of a legionary structure but given the thirty-odd languages spoken by mercenary allies, it is likely each group was placed in battle formation under officers who could communicate with the lower ranks. We do know, however, that Hannibal often placed his mercenary and other auxiliary

32

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

troops in the center and up front, hemmed in by Carthagianian infantry on the flanks (i.e. as at Cannae in 216). We know also that he took up position often with the sun and prevailing wind to his back (Machiavelli, trans Wood, 1965). The Roman legion was organized in lines, the first of these called the Hastati comprised of the younger citizens, some poorer with standard issue equipment of a bronze chest protector and tunic. Richer citizens often appeared clad in mail. All, however, wore the Attic helmet with three feathers and carried an oval shield for defense. The main weapon was the cut and thrust sword and two heavy javelins or pila designed for close-in fighting. Next in formation were the Principes drawn from older recruits but armed similarly to the Hastati, although with a long thrusting spear and the pila. The third line was comprised of the veteran Triarii, the elder group of soldiers who had served in previous campaigns. Armed with the long thrusting spear the Triarii brought up the rear of the legion. As skirmishers, each legion employed light infantry called Velites drawn from the poorer citizenry and armed with light javelins, short swords and a round shield for defense. These troops took up station on the flanks discharging their weapons early on in any engagement and then moving rearward into the ranks. The Carthaginian counterparts to the Roman legionary structure are unknown but presumably the Carthaginian Corps was organized in a similar fashion with men arranged by height, although station in society had little to do with position in the ranks. Within the Carthaginian Corps all troopers were the equivalent of the Triarii, veterans who had served year after year. As skirmishers Hannibal often employed Balearic slingers in lieu of troops armed with javelins, a kind of shock unit against which the Romans had no defense. Roman unit structure within the legion was simple, the basic unit called a century commanded by a centurion. Two centuries comprised a maniple. In theory a century comprised about a hundred men, but often the actual strength was well below a hundred (Bath, 1981). The Hastati and Principes numbered 120 men in a maniple, the Triarii numbering 60. The Hastati and Principes formations were deployed six deep, Triarii three deep in each maniple. Each file of men within a maniple had a frontage of about two meters to give each man room in which to wield his weapons, the maniple itself had a frontage of about forty meters and the legion was spread out over three/quarters of a kilometer. The maniples were deployed as chips on a checkerboard, an array that allowed maniples of the second line to cover gaps in the first. While we do not know the precise structure of the Carthaginian Army we do know that individual units formed into squares (Goldsworthy, 2001), perhaps a smaller version of the battle square favored by Napoléon and other 19th Century armies. In some cases Hannibal deployed infantry formed up in rectangular units of unknown strength. And certainly, as at Cannae in 216, Hannibal was not bound by linear thinking with regard to the shape of his battle line, the Carthaginian line formed into a parabola pointing out as a convexity at the Romans. Cavalry in the Roman legion was formed in units called Turmae, each consisting of thirty horsemen. Ten Turmae were attached to a legion. Each legion of approximately 4500 men was under the command of a Legate who would equate to a brigadier or colonel in modern-day parlance. Each Legate had under him a number of Tribunes, men of noble birth who served in the army to gain experience that might open a door to a politi-

CAMPAIGN STRATEGY

33

cal career. Essentially, the cavalry was employed as mounted infantry rather than the highly flexible and mobile contingent that existed in Hannibal’s Army. In the Carthaginian Army the cavalry operated as a separate force, coordinated with but not tied to each infantry unit. In the Roman Army the Senate decided where the two consuls who commanded the Army of the Republic would serve. During wartime each commanded a consular army of two legions. If war spread over a large region as it did during Hannibalic times, additional legions were levied and consuls of previous years were pressed into service (Bath, 1981). To become a consul a Roman citizen had to first serve as Tribune, and usually as Legate, to insure some measure of competence. The Roman command system had several drawbacks, as it limited time of service to one year, so that continuity of command did not exist. This led to the unusual system of co-commanders, that is, command of an army alternating between consuls on a daily basis. In contrast, the Carthaginian Army elected its commander, the elected officer ratified by the Carthaginian Assemby. The Carthaginian system provided for continuity of command from year to year and insured less political meddling in the army. In the Carthaginian military infrastructure, failure on the battlefield almost certainly insured crucifixion whereas in the Roman system failed consuls were retired to their country estates to write their memoirs. Although Hannibal lost to Scipio at Zama in 202, his name wielded such immense power within the Carthaginian establishment he was spared execution. The Carthaginian Suffete worn down in military strength probably feared the remnant of Hannibal’s Army as much as their Roman adversaries. When Hannibal was elected commander of the Carthaginian Army, at age 26, he was a generation younger than consuls in the Roman Army who opposed him. His brothers, Hasdrubal and Mago, had to be at 23 and 20, respectively, the youngest generals, aside from Alexander the Great, ever commissioned/appointed in any army. As a commander, Hannibal would bring to the military chessboard new thinking and a kind of disciplined dexterity that was missing in the mindset of his adversaries. He employed deception, termed Punic perfidy by his enemies, and speed of movement that created illusion on a grand scale, tipping the balance of power in his favor, often with devastating results for the Romans. The power of illusion in the mindset of his adversaries was so well entrenched that, when for all intents and purposes Hannibal was beaten near the end of his peninsular campaign in 204, four Roman field armies surrounded him in southern Italia outnumbering him at least 5 to 1, but fearing to attack him lest he “pull off” some Punic treachery and defeat them. Such was the power of the illusions he created and much of this came from his unorthodox use of cavalry to gain information, bona fide intelligence about his enemy. Intelligence in the classical world came in bits and pieces, not en masse as it does today. In the words of John Keegan (2003) …intelligence of all sorts abounds but its volume threatens to overwhelm the power of the human mind to evaluate its worth. Its theme is that intelligence in war, however good, does not point out unerringly the path to victory. Victory is an elusive prize, bought with blood rather than brains. Intelligence is the handmaiden not the mistress of the warrior.

34

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

Hannibal would spill much blood, but victory would come from his clever >twists and turns,= at just the right moment (Dupuy, 1969; Bagnall, 1999; Baker, 1999), showing that intelligence correctly interpreted, is truly the servant of the warrior. Those who favor Hannibal wandering around labyrinthine valleys and canyons in the Alps with an army of ~50,000 men searching for the right pass must never have ventured into alpine valleys themselves. Polybius’ (III, 48) assessment of this hypothesis, apparently a proposition advanced by others in his day, as to Hannibal’s war plans and knowledge of the route, is particularly revealing: “… In the first place, could anyone imagine a more improvident general or a more incompetent leader than Hannibal would have been if, finding himself in command of such a large army on which all his hopes for the success of the expedition were placed, he had not familiarized himself with the roads or the lie of the country, as these writers suggest, and had no idea of where he was marching or against what enemy, or indeed of whether the whole expedition was practicable at all? In other words, what these authors are suggesting is that Hannibal, who had experienced no setback to mar his high hopes of success, would have committed himself to a plan which not even a general who had suffered a total defeat and was at his wits’ end for a solution would have adopted, that is, to take his army into completely unknown territory. In the same way, their description of the desolation of the country and the extreme steepness and inaccessibility of the route is glaringly inaccurate. They have failed to bring to light the fact that the Celts, who live near the Rhône, have not once nor twice before Hannibal’s arrival, but on many occasions, and those not in the distant past but quite recently, marched large armies across the Alps and fought side-by-side with the Celts of the Po valley against the Romans, as I related in an earlier book. They have not even discovered that there is a considerable population which inhabits the Alps themselves, but in ignorance of all these facts, they report that some hero appeared and showed Hannibal the road…Of course Hannibal did not act as these writers imply, but pursued his plans with sound common sense. He had taken pains to inform himself of the natural wealth of the district into which he planned to descend and of the resentment which its people felt against the Romans, and to overcome the difficulties of the route he engaged as his guides and scouts natives of the country who were about to take part in his campaign. Of these matters I can speak with some confidence, as I have questioned men who were actually present on these occasions about the circumstances, have personally explored the country, and have crossed the Alps myself to obtain first-hand information and evidence.”

Polybius, the only major authority of the Hannibalic route to Italia, is quite specific about Hannibal’s knowledge of the route and his planning efforts prior to the invasion. Furthermore, Hannibal’s knowledge of the invasion route must have been related to his men through interpreters, as it would seem even common soldiers knew about it. This must have been reinforced in the minds of his men when the Boii envoys from Cisalpine Gaul met with Hannibal at the Rhône crossing. As Polybius (III, 44) relates, “…He paraded the army, presented to them Magilus and the other Celtic chieftains who had come to him from the plains of the Po, and with the help of an interpreter explained to the troops what had been the decision of the Celtic tribes, as their leaders had reported it. What most encouraged his men was first of all the actual appearance of the envoys who were inviting them to come and promising to join them in the war against Rome, and secondly, the confidence they could feel in the promises of the Gauls to

CAMPAIGN STRATEGY

35

guide them by a route on which they would be abundantly supplied with necessities and which would lead them rapidly and safely to Italy. Besides this, the envoys had much to say of the size and the wealth of the country where they were going, and of the eager spirit of the men who would fight by their side in their battles against the Romans.”

These statements of Polybius are quite explicit insofar as they relate to Hannibal’s knowledge of the geography of the alpine invasion route, and while the Punic leader was seeing the country for the first time, he had been “briefed” up front by his agents who had been in contact with the Cisalpine Gauls. The very fact that Gallic chieftains had transited the Alps to meet with Hannibal in the Rhône Valley must have been inspiring to the Carthaginians, instilling encouragement and confidence in their leader and reassuring them the Alps could be crossed. Hannibal had worked out the invasion route well in advance. The fact that Hannibal rendezvoused in the Rhône Valley with Celts from the Cisalpine region raises the question as to why they did not remain to guide the Punic Army across the mountains. Surely, it was to Hannibal’s tactical advantage to retain as guides the Gauls recruited from among the Cisalpine tribes, men who were familiar with the high cols. That this was not the case and that Hannibal recruited local guides is attested to by Polybius (III, 52). If Hannibal left “The Island,” traveling north along the Rhône to its junction with the Isère, he would have had considerable difficulty with the hilly terrain making cavalry operations more difficult and posing problems for his engineers (Mahaney, 2004). Still other problems would likely ensue with uncertain relations among the population of Gauls, the Allobroges inhabiting the area around Valence at the confluence of the Rhône and Isère rivers. A reconnaissance of the confluence of the Rhône and the Drôme rivers carried out in 2002 showed that only two options were open to Hannibal: proceed north into the hill country toward the Allobroges and present-day Valence, or follow the Drôme east to the Col de Grîmone or the Col de Cabre. Hannibal undoubtedly appreciated the wide expanse of floodplain and low terraces of the Drôme, a prime asset for his cavalry and the shortest route to the Col de Genèvre, the lowest pass and most likely his intended route into Italia. After re-supplying his army at the “Island,” the Drôme Basin provided the shortest route to the Durance, with his army exiting into the Buëch Valley near present day Gap (see Chapter Seven). Hannibal’s method of transport is unknown but most probably included a baggage train of draft animals and possibly carts/wagons (Lancel, 1999), although it is incredible to think of wheeled vehicles traversing the high passes of the Alps. To be sure his troops had established a series of food dumps as far north as the Ebro River some 460 km north of Cartagena, but beyond to the Pyrénées and into southern Gaul he would have had to forage, that is, live off the land with all the resentment this would bring from local populations. And this meant contact with tribes holding passes in the Pyrénées, some of whom were loyal to Rome. Whomever he came into contact with would have to provide provisions, or pay the ultimate price of death or slavery. Presumably he sometimes paid in precious metal or simply confiscated what he needed as the situation demanded. In any case he must have anticipated he would leave a wide trail of ecological and human destruction in his wake and he was undoubtedly aware of the enmity this would arouse amongst the Gallic populations with whom he would come into contact.

36

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

Once into Italia there would be no possibility of return across the Alps. Hannibal had only one army to lose. The Romans, on the other hand, had comparatively enormous manpower, a reserve of nearly a million able-bodied men who could be conscripted to fight. The size of Hannibal’s Army has been estimated at between 50,000 and possibly 100,000 (Polybius, III, 35; Lamb, 1958; Proctor, 1971; Bradford, 1981; Ellis, 1990; Seibert, 1993; Peddie, 1997), but a likely figure is something in the range of ~60,000 men, approximately 50,000 foot and +10,000 horse plus an unknown quantity of baggage animals and handlers. Hannibal recruited various levies from the Iberians, Celtiberians, and together with his African contingent and 37 war-trained elephants (Mayor, 2003), he put his plan in motion to invade Italia by land. To what degree he outlined his plans to his men is unknown but it is likely they did not know the final destination until after he had crossed the Pyrénées into the lower Rhône country. The invasion route his agents had mapped covered very nearly 1500 km from Cartagena (New Carthage) to the plains of the Po River, crossing two major mountain chains, the Pyrénées and the Alps. The Pyrénées presented a major logistical problem for Hannibal, but the Alps were a whole order of magnitude greater, for they comprised not one range but two: the Dauphiné Alpes, comprising the foothills, and the Alps (Hautes-Alpes) proper. The war-elephant corps in Hannibal’s Army must have presented some problems in the way of logistical planning. The Carthaginians were not the first to use elephants in warfare, that ingenious strategy having been developed by Alexander who ran up against them in the Tigris Valley at the battle of Gaugamela in 331 (Rogers, 2004). Later, Pyrrhus of Epirus used elephants—Elephas indicus—at Heraclea in 280, an innovation in the west that created a certain amount of consternation amongst his adversaries. The beasts carried on their backs a howdah containing two archers who, as the Carthaginians found out, were capable of inflicting much damage to troops on the ground. Hamilcar used elephants in the First War, and war elephants thereafter became an integral part of the Punic Army, forming an “armored corps.” Their countenance appearing on Carthaginian coinage makes, in the words of Lancel (1999), “the elephant the Barcid totemic animal.” However, Carthaginian coins show war-elephants with a single rider. It is the form of these elephants, as seen on ceramics and coins, which allows identification to species and a means of distinguishing between African and Asian varieties. Long rounded ears, stark concavity in the mid back, head uplifted and a ribbed trunk all serve to distinguish the Punic elephants as a variety of Loxodonta, which had been known in North Africa since the 5th Century BC (see Hanno, Periplus of the Erythraean Sea; Hornblower and Spawforth, 1999). Even Aristotle in the late 4th Century mentioned the existence of Loxodonta in the Moroccan Atlas, their eventual disappearance the result of hunting/poaching and capture for the Roman games. As discussed later in Chapter 12, Hannibal would undoubtedly encounter difficulties with his war-elephant corps, but only insofar as food supplies are concerned. Negotiating the steep slopes of the Alps would not be a problem and no doubt Hannibal was aware his war-elephant corps would perform well. His main concern would have been forage, relatively ample on the way into the Alps, but thinning out at higher elevations. Many authors of the Hannibalic wars, Lancel (1999) among them, profess amazement that the Punic General would take elephants with him on his alpine adventure. Indeed, Edwards (2001) argues that Hannibal’s “perilous journey across the Alps” capti-

CAMPAIGN STRATEGY

37

vated the public mostly because he took an elephant corps with him. Most who have studied the Second Punic War are even more amazed that Hannibal could successfully take the great pachyderms across the high mountains, all thirty-seven of them issuing out onto the Po River Plains. Yet elephants are known to work well in the high mountains of Nepal without complaint provided sufficient forage is available and elephants are documented as skilled negotiators of the high cliffs of Mt. Kenya, a 5112 m a.s.l. volcano, in East Africa (Mahaney, 1990). Moreover, if only to prove they do not always make it over the nearly high ~4800 m interfluves on Mt. Kenya, Ross (1911) documented the carcass of a bush elephant recovered from the Kolbe Snowfield, a permanent mass of firnpack now completely melted out on the northeast flank of the mountain. This evidence shows that Loxodonta africana, at least, is an animal quite at home not only at high elevations but also on old snow. It is not so amazing that elephants transited the Alps with little difficulty but rather that Hannibal was skillful enough to motivate his troops and move his whole army across the high spine of Europe. Many strategic options offered themselves to Hannibal. As discussed previously, he could move by sea but what loomed in his mind at the time was the ignominious defeat of the Carthaginian Navy in the First War and that the Romans had mastered the sea and built a superior navy within the last decade. Roman sea power had risen in strength and by 218 Rome had commissioned 220 quinqueremes (Lazenby, 1998), the 3rd Century BC “battleship.” Sixty quinqueremes were with P. Cornelius Scipio in Pisa and the remaining 160 were based in Sicily under Ti. Sempronius Longus. While the Carthaginian naval strength is uncertain, about 50 quinqueremes were based in Iberia, although Polybius (III, 33) states 18 were unmanned. As tallied up from the numbers cited by Livy, Lazenby (1998) mentions 35 ships sent to western Sicily and 20 more to carry out raids along the Italian Coast. Further, in 217, Carthage could still send 70 quinqueremes to Sicily. As a result, the Carthaginian Navy probably numbered around 150 ships compared to the 220 commissioned by Rome, the latter being the largest naval force yet raised by Rome between the first two Punic Wars. Both navies pale when compared with the 1207 triremes commissioned by Xerxes in 480. But this is not to say that the navy did not fit into Hannibal’s war plans. In 217 the Punic Navy landed on Sardinia, and at Pisa, and Admiral Bomilcar slipped into Locri in 215 (Livy, XXI, 23). However, in planning the invasion Hannibal’s main concern was only that a naval expedition to Italia might well be intercepted by a superior Roman fleet and destroyed (Lazenby, 1998). The Carthaginian Navy did not occupy center space in Hannibal’s strategy of invading Rome but rather filled an ancillary position, primarily useful in raiding coastal areas and to re-supply his land force. Later in the war, Hannibal took various measures to secure a port in southern Italia, but at the outset of the war he was well aware the Roman fleet could outperform his navy. As Hannibal finalized his plans and ironed out his strategy he, like Alexander before him, must have thought deeply about the gods and Homeric descriptions of the land of the Muses (Rogers, 2004). Like Alexander, he might have carried Homer with him and been tempted to think of himself as Menelaus of Sparta, induced to ally himself with Agamemnon of Achaea (Greece) to attack King Priam of Troy and regain Menelaus’ wife who had run off with his son Paris. As the story goes (Homer, XXIV, trans. E.V. Rieu, 1950), while the Achaean forces besieged Troy for nine years camped next to their ships

38

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

on the shore near the great city, they found it difficult to bring the war to an end. We shall never know if Hannibal imitated Alexander, but he no doubt revered Homer and had every intention of following in the footsteps of Achilles; for him Rome was Troy but he had no intention of laying siege to Rome as the Achaeans did to Troy. Saguntum had taught Hannibal a lesson about time, space and attrition. It takes too long to take a small space and the attrition of men and materiel in siege operations is extremely costly. Hannibal could move into southern Gaul and seek battle with the Gauls allied with the Romans at Massilia (Marseilles), which if successful, would clear the way for an invasion along the Mediterranean Coast toward Pisa, a much more negotiable route taking elevation into account than the northern, lofty one he planned to use. He had planted agents among the Ligures and the Ligurian Coast offered a quick entrance into Italia. The only obstacle to a coastal invasion route lay with the Volcae Gauls in the lower reaches of the Rhône River. His agents no doubt attempted to placate the Volcae but with little result, so to cross the Rhône, Hannibal would have to fight. We may never know why Hannibal chose the high mountain route over the lower cols, but we do know that once he laid out his strategy, he was loath to change it (Hart, 1967). As discussed in Chapter 7 the mountain route has three possibilities: two variations to the north along the Rhône to the Isère River and thence over the northernmost passes and a third to the south, east along the Drôme River to the Buëch Valley, through Gap to the Durance, and thence, either over the Col de Genèvre or through the Combe de Queyras to one of three high passes north and south of Mount Viso. As we shall see later, the southern route would go, and it would cross the highest and most forbidding pass into Italia as indicated by Polybius (Lazenby, 1998). But, as the Gauls before him, it may well be that Hannibal planned to pass over the Col de Genèvre at 1830 meters elevation, but for the untimely arrival of the mountain Gauls. Most probably, the Allobroges, who shadowed his army all the way from the Col de Grîmone along the Durance River to the gorges of the Combe de Queyras (Mahaney and Tricart, 2008), had summoned their breatheren from the Isère Valley to reinforce their infantry. Analysis of the map (Fig. 2.1) shows that Hannibal would have to march 1000 km. from New Carthage to his first real supply depot at the “Island.” Along the way he could expect to lose men, animals and supplies, possibly in large numbers. Hannibal may have reasoned that to insure success he would have to follow his strategical plan which included a re-supply of food stocks and animals. If so, the alliance he had forged with the lowland Gauls at the “Island” would have become a main focal point in his invasion plans. What lay ahead could only have been described by his couriers and agents who had traveled to northern Italia to assess the political situation and presumably establish the invasion route. The broad outline of the geography of the invasion route—from Iberia to the Pyrénées, through southern Gaul, and the Alps, to the Po River country—was not as well known to the Romans as to the Carthaginians (see Figure 2.1). Certainly, the Gauls knew the Alps better than the Romans despite Roman attempts to move into the alpine valleys of the Cisalpine region. The Carthaginians probably possessed knowledge of the Alps more or less equal to the Gauls and no doubt they had worked out the actual invasion route well in advance of leaving Cartagena. The problem for Hannibal was to weigh the various routes and decide the merit of choosing one pass over another. Given the time of

CAMPAIGN STRATEGY

39

year it was not the rivers that were much of a problem, but the mountains, where decisions had to be made about elevation, snowpack, access, vegetation, forage capability and defensive positions of the enemy. Elevation was only one part of the equation as the choice of a pass through the Pyrénées, the foothill ranges and the main range of the Alps had to involve the nature of the people the Carthaginians would encounter and what would ensue after the Carthaginians had passed through. Leaving a warlike tribe behind, especially in Iberia, might pose a problem for Hasdrubal, especially if they were to rise up against extended Carthaginian rule. In southern Gaul, part of the Volcae Federation and further north the Allobroges, posed major problems, as they were likely to oppose Hannibal’s forces. We shall never know the precise amount of topographic/geomorphic detail available to Hannibal and his staff prior to the invasion but judging from what Polybius and Livy describe, one might assume Hannibal had a broad outline of drainage lines and summits he would have to cross. The sketch map in Figure 2.1 is probably similar to the level of detail available to Carthaginian staff officers involved in planning the invasion. It is certainly lacking in detail but does give the broad features that would have dominated their thinking, especially insofar as the topography, catchments and local vegetation would be expected to influence logistical considerations. What must have taken precedence in their minds was the 1000-kilometer trek to the “Island” and the need to re-supply, with everything from clothes to horses and mules, the exact quantity of which would have dominated their thinking. The “Island” was the most important focal point en route and advance knowledge of what to expect there must have been known to Hannibal and his officers. The wider map view of the Mediterranean in the Third Century BC can only be guessed at but if Strabo’s map of the entire Mediterranean Basin (Figure 2.2) is any indication of what was known of the area at the turn of the millennium—end of the 1st Century BC/ beginning of the 1st Century AD—one may only guess how accurately the topography was known 200 years before. Certainly the area north of Massilia along the Rhône and across the Hautes-Alpes was known to the Gauls but largely terra incognita to the Romans; in any case the Roman mind tended to focus less on the heights and more on the cols as major transit ways from one area to another (Proctor, 1971). In the 3rd Century the Great Captain might likely have known more about the Alps than the Romans principally as a result of his agents having made the long trek across the invasion route in advance of his army. Certainly the term ‘Hannibal’s Pass,’ initially used by Varro in the First Century BC and recorded by Servius about AD 400 (see Proctor, 1971), has been placed at various locations along the present French-Italian border by a great number of authorities who decided beforehand where Hannibal crossed into Italia and then strove to prove it. With the exception of de Beer (1969), Lazenby (1998) and Prevas (1998), most historians have tended to fit the pass to their preconceived notions of where it should be rather than to study all the possible passes, eliminating those approach routes and transit points that fail to match descriptions in the ancient literature. Virtually every pass, from the Great St. Bernard Pass near Mount Blanc to the Ligurian Pass in the Maritime Alps next to the Mediterranean Sea, has been proposed as ‘Hannibal’s Pass.’ Yet, Varro listed the passes in geographical order from south to north leaving ‘Hannibal’s Pass’ lying south of the Col de Genèvre; admittedly this could be the Traversette, de la

40

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

Croix or Agnel, although as we shall see the Traversette is the only pass meeting the bulk of the criteria described by ancient authorities. Other major impediments to rapid progress along the invasion route would have been the Pyrénées, the Rhône River, the Col de Grîmone—entrance to the Hautes-Alpes itself—the Combe de Queyras, and the Col de la Traversette. Certainly Hannibal would have been apprised by his staff, and by officers carrying out advance reconnaissance of the invasion route, of the nature of the land through which his army would pass. The route along the Iberian Coast was well known to his troops but once across the Pyrénées Hannibal faced difficult choices and on terrain, presumably known only from rapid-paced reconnaissance and from descriptions provided by Gallic allies. With an army of ~60,000 men Hannibal would not have wanted to face any surprises and a close reading of Polybius indicates this is precisely what he had in mind: avoid the Allobroges Tribe as it would not be possible to form alliances with them. In terms of elevation alone Hannibal had to choose from several routes, all with passes at different heights. Each col in the Pyrénées would bring him into contact with tribes that would oppose his passing and more importantly tribes he could not leave in his rear. In the Alps he had several choices once he transported his army across the Rhône. He could swing east and then north along the Durance River, a route that would take him eventually to the Guil River and the Col de la Traversette (2947 m a.s.l.), as well as adjacent and somewhat lower passes, or continue on north along the Durance to the Col de Mt. Genèvre (1860 m a.s.l.). The latter route would later become the major Roman entry point into southern Gaul in imperial times, certainly the lowest entry point into Italia and a direct path toward Torino. Certainly Hannibal knew of both routes and it is likely his agents used them when entering and leaving the Po River Country. In 207, his brother, Hasdrubal, is thought by Lancel (1999) to have used the Genèvre route to enter Italia with a relief column. This interpretation, however, is disputed by other authorities, namely Lazenby (1998). Hasdrubal’s Army was eventually routed and destroyed by Roman legions on the Metaurus (now Metauro) River (Machiavelli, trans. Wood, 1965). Continuing north along the Rhône from the crossing would take the Carthaginians to the “Island,” an area of plentiful crop production and friendly lowland Gauls. The paramount chieftain, Brancus, was friendly to Punic overtures and Hannibal needed to resupply his army at this juncture. The “Island” could only be viewed as a supply depot for Hannibal, a place where he could refit his army and continue on into the Alps. Marching north along the Rhône, Hannibal undoubtedly knew he could turn into the foothills of the Alps, pass by the Col de Cabre (44o 32' 58”N; 05o 35' 54”E; 1193 m a.s.l.) or the Col de Grîmone (44o 41' 29”N; 05o 38' 14”E; 1318 m a.s.l.), major gateways to the Buëch Valley and reach the Durance Basin. Alternatively, he could continue north along the Rhône toward Valence and the Isère River and then choose one of the northern cols—Mt. Cenis or Col du Clapier as a main passage into Italia. He might even have ventured along a circuitous route from the Isère to the Col de Genèvre, as Connolly (1981) believes he did. More northerly routes offered still other possibilities to Hannibal, but as Polybius (III, 49) points out he was well aware of the warlike nature of the Allobroges and the northern route would bring him into their normal territory where they had considerable forces at their disposal. The northern route along the Rhône to the Isère, thence to the area of modern-day Grenoble offered several valleys and passes, adding another ~40 km

CAMPAIGN STRATEGY

41

distance over very rough terrain, which would make cavalry operations extremely difficult, if not impossible. Considering the pass elevations, the two most prominent, Col du Clapier (45o 10' 06”N; 06o 55' 24”; 2482 m a.s.l.) and Col du Mt. Cenis (2084 m a.s.l.), offered easier passage when compared with the Col de la Traversette. In contrast with Mt. Genèvre the northern passes are slightly higher. Certainly Hannibal knew of the relative differences in elevation of various passes, at least between Col de la Traversette and Col de Mt. Genèvre and most probably the elevations and physical character of passes to the south of Mt. Viso (3841 m a.s.l.). It was up to Hannibal to choose the route from among reports brought to him by his various agents in Cisalpine Gaul. It must have seemed a daunting task, even to Hannibal and his officers, to attempt a trek of this magnitude and with only, at best, a year of planning. Political situations, even today, are fluid and subject to change on short notice and in 218 the time must have seemed right to link up with the Celtic tribes of the Po River Valley. Hannibal’s agents had reported that, while conquered, the Celts were anything but complacent having developed a turbulent and volatile relationship with Roman colonists (Ellis, 1990, 2004). Polybius relates that Hannibal was well aware of discontent among the Celts of northern Italia and most importantly that Rome had barely a foothold in the north with garrisons at Placentia and Cremona. The Celts of the Po Valley, decisively defeated at Telamon in 225 and summarily defeated at Clastidium in 222, were now facing a colonization policy as Roman farmers moved into the north (Lancel, 1999). To the Gauls, in 218, it must have seemed only a matter of time before the legions extended Roman control—Pax Romana—all the way to the Alps, across the whole of the Po River country. To Hannibal, it was the right time to set his plan in motion. A delay might bring change in Cisalpine Gaul, and the Romans could strengthen their hold on the north, increasing the number of colonies while moving closer to the Alps. Whether or not Hannibal knew the Taurini (tribe occupying the area around present-day Torino) would not support his bid to fight Rome is unknown, but perhaps he thought he could convince them to join in an alliance once he marched down out of the Alps, an accomplishment the Romans had so far failed to achieve. His main contacts appear to have been with tribes farther to the east, the Insubres and Boii clans, both unfriendly with the Taurini. Hannibal might have used the enmity that existed between the Insubres and the Taurini to his advantage, for if he quickly defeated the Taurini, the Insubres, a more populous tribe, would likely rush to his standard. One aspect of this must have seemed a certainty to him. The Gauls had fought as mercenaries with the Carthaginians in the First War, and while a notoriously volatile people, they were fierce fighters and would form important auxiliary troops allied with his army. As we shall see, Hannibal was not loath to expend them in battle to preserve the nucleus of his army, the Carthaginian Corps, comprising his vaunted African and Spanish contingents. As many previous workers have mentioned, he was well aware he had only one army to lose while the Romans could form several armies from the large male population on the peninsula. The manpower part of the invasion equation must have weighed heavily on Hannibal for one misstep on the battlefield would mean he would have to raise new troops. Unlike the Romans he could not simply levy new forces by decree and the Suffete was slow to respond to his request for funds and supplies. What might they do if he lost a significant part of the Carthaginian Corps?

42

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

Hannibal instructed his brother, Hasdrubal, as to how he expected him to pursue government objectives in his absence and prepare for the defense of Iberia. He also made plans to insure the security of Africa and invoked a clever strategy of posting African troops to Iberia and Iberians to Africa, apparently to cement loyalty amongst the tribes and dampen any thought of mutiny. He then handed over command of the Carthaginian Army in Iberia to his brother leaving him with 25,000 men, including infantry, elephants, cavalry and naval forces to secure the coast and hinterland. Polybius (III, 33) summarizes the strength of these forces, introduces the Balearic slingers and names some of the tribes: “…4,000 infantry were sent from the cities of Metagonium to Carthage to serve both as reinforcements for the defence of the Capital and also as hostages. For a naval force he (Hannibal) left with his brother, Hasdrubal fifty quinqueremes8 two quadriremes and five triremes, thirty-two of the quinqueremes and the triremes being fully manned. He also provided him with a contingent of cavalry consisting of 450 Libyans and LibyoPhoenicians, 300 Ilergetes, and 1,800 Numidians drawn from the tribes of the Massyli, Masaesyli, Maccaei and Maurusii who inhabit the coastal districts of Africa. His infantry strength consisted of 11,850 Libyans, 300 Ligurians and 500 Balearians, together with twenty-one elephants.”

The Balearians, from the Balearic Isles off the Iberian Coast (Fig. 5.1), formed battalions of slingers capable of long-range attack with their weapons. While they were employed later on in the war against Rome, Polybius mentions they were posted in 218 to North Africa giving the impression no units marched with Hannibal when he departed New Carthage. However, Polybius (III, 72.7) documents that Balearic slingers fought with Hannibal at the Trebbia and at Trasimene (Lancel, 1999). The invasion began sometime between late-April to mid-June, 218. There has been much discussion about the jumping off time with some authors thinking Hannibal left Cartagena in early April and others moving his departure up to middle May or even mid June (see Proctor, 1971 for a discussion of the timetable). As will be discussed later an April starting date is not easily reconciled with an arrival in the Po Valley in late October or early November (i.e. the controversy over the setting of the Pleiades as specified by both Polybius and Livy). Both ancient authors clearly state that Hannibal was on the frontier, the high divide of the Alps, at the setting of the Pleiades with approximately one week to go before the army issued out onto the Po terraces. One date is certain and that is the opening of shipping routes in the western Mediterranean—March 11 (Proctor, 1971). Hannibal would have needed two months to reposition his troops between Africa and Iberia, which more or less suggests he left Cartagena, at the earliest, toward mid May. One must remember also that Hannibal waited for news from his couriers as to the situation in the north of Italia, and given that they were dispatched to Italia in December, the earliest one could expect them to return to Cartagena would be sometime in May. Factoring in at least two weeks for preparations the jumping 8

Triremes are galleys with three banks of oars on each side. We do not know how oarages were arranged in quadriremes and quinqueremes but neither probably had more than three banks of oars, the main difference from triremes being that more than one may have pulled the oars in each bank (John Lazenby, personal communication, 2007).

CAMPAIGN STRATEGY

43

off time would likely be late May to early June. Moreover, Polybius categorically states that Hannibal’s time frame for the invasion—Cartagena to the Po River Valley—took approximately five months. Leaving the first week in June, give or take some days, would put Hannibal on the Col de la Traversette just at the setting of the Pleiades which is exactly what was documented by Polybius (III, 54). Aside from repositioning of troops (see Proctor, 1971 for details on stationing troops in North Africa and Iberia including transport problems) and waiting for couriers to return from the Cisalpine regions, Hannibal must have had a major problem attempting to plan for the provisioning of his troops. He could rely on recouping stores left over from the previous year but mostly he would have had to plan on moving north along with the harvest, which as Proctor (1971) has pointed out, starts in Iberia at the end of May; in Languedoc and Lower Provence around the beginning of June; and in the Alps later on into summer. Presumably the sequence of harvest dates was not lost on Hannibal as he planned his invasion of Italia. Hannibal ordered one of his generals, one named Hanno, to secure and guard the passes in the Pyrénées with 10,000 infantry and 1,000 horse (Ellis, 1990). Subtracting these figures from the maximum levies raised it would seem Hannibal probably commanded an invasion force of some ~60,000 men; however, as previously noted many authors believe he commanded a much larger force of close to 100,000 men. With his strategy firmly worked out Hannibal must have counted on the utmost secrecy and rapid movement into the north of Iberia. He surely knew a Roman field army was ready to embark at Pisa destined for Massilia and now he had subdivided his massive army, which would be stretched out in a thin line from Cartagena to the Rhône Delta. His march to Italia would leave a long line of communication stretching across southern Gaul to the Pyrénées and south to Cartagena. Did Hannibal expect to keep his lines of communication open or did he intend to sever them once he crossed the Alps? This question, hotly debated by historians for years (see Meiklejohn, 1938; Lancel, 1999), it seems is logically answered by looking at the number of troops under his command. He lacked the personnel to garrison his rear. With his strategy in place all that Hannibal needed was firm commitment from the Gauls and reports from agents sent to establish contact with the major tribes in the north of Italia. Polybius (III, 34) describes this stage in the planning process: “…After Hannibal had put in hand all the necessary measures for the security of Africa and Spain, he still waited anxiously for the messengers he was expecting from the Celts. He had thoroughly informed himself concerning the fertility of the regions at the foot of the Alps and near the river Po, the density of the population, the bravery of its men in war, and above all their hatred of Rome, which had persisted ever since the earlier war, which I described in my last book in order to enable my readers to follow what I am now about to relate. Hannibal therefore harboured great hopes of these tribes, and had been at pains to send envoys who bore lavish promises to the Celtic chieftains, both those living south of the Alps and those who inhabited the mountains themselves. He was convinced that he could only carry the war against the Romans into Italy if, after having overcome the difficulties of the route, he could reach the territory of the Celts and engage them as allies and partners in his campaign.”

44

HANNIBAL’S ODYSSEY

In early 218, his envoys returned to New Carthage with information from northern Italia. Polybius (III, 34) related: “…At last his messengers returned with the news that the Celts were ready to cooperate and eagerly awaited his arrival; they also reported that the passage to the Alps was arduous and difficult but by no means impossible, and so at the approach of spring he assembled his troops from their winter quarters. At the same time he received the news of the reception of the Roman embassy in Carthage, which served to raise his spirits, and so, trusting that he would be supported by popular feeling at home, he openly appealed to his men to join him in the war against Rome. He impressed upon them how the Romans had demanded that he and all the senior officers of his army should be handed over to them, and at the same time he told them of the wealth of the country they were about to invade and of the friendly feelings and active support of the Gauls. When he saw that the soldiers were as eager as himself to start, he praised their spirit, ordered them to be ready on the day fixed for their departure, and dismissed the assembly.”

In summary, the six passes available to Hannibal as major entry points into Italia all had pros and cons when one considers the topography, time/distance constraints, approaching winter weather and presence/absence of the Allobroges, the one tribe Polybius relates (III, 49) Hannibal wished to avoid contact with at all cost. To Hannibal, the strategic considerations of each pass were probably of paramount importance, given his tendency to strictly adhere to his large-scale plan of invasion. However, two of the passes— Cenis and Clapier—involved a slightly longer trek north, and hence, greater distance through country inhabited largely by the Allobroges, a tribe unfriendly to his cause and in terrain not ideally suited to his cavalry. Moreover, the northern route would take him through ancient Valence and the area of present-day Grenoble (see Freshfield, 1886, 1899, 1924), a Gallic stronghold he did not have the time or the equipment to subdue. The additional marching time (see Proctor, 1971, for a discussion of marching time in various terrain) through hilly terrain would have required an extra week, precious time he did not have given the advance of the seasons and onset of winter. The Col de Genèvre, lower than the Traversette, offered easier passage with an absence of snow and firnpack but it was also the usual path into Cisalpine Gaul and the one route Scipio might expect the Carthaginians to take into Italia. It is possible both the Traversette and the Genèvre were alternate routes, the main through-fare to be decided upon at the last moment given Gallic troop dispositions. However, with Gallic troops harrowing and shadowing his army as he approached the Durance (Polybius, III, 53), it could be that Hannibal chose the Guil approach and the Traversette at the very last moment (Mahaney and Tricart, 2008), or that his vanguard commander, presumably Maharbal, made the fateful decision to detour into the Guil River drainage.

5 COL DU PERTHUS—THE FIRST TEST The first phase of the invasion led from Cartagena to the Pyrénées across marine beds of the Jurassic similar to the geology described later for the French and Italian Alps. Skirting the Hercynian Massif (Iberian Meseta, similar in age to the Massif Central of France), Hannibal marched across shaly or calcareous sediments, the surficial expression of which amounted to coastal plains and hilly topography inland. These massifs, remnants of Paleozoic mountains, are completely surrounded by younger Mesozoic rocks. The landscape in Hannibal’s time, as today, was such as to provide little in the way of difficulty to the movement of his cavalry and infantry. The Celtiberian tribes who opposed Hannibal found only minor defensive comfort in the local topography, a situation that would change once the Carthaginians marched into the Alps. . The Pyrénées, remnants of an ancient Hercynian mountain range, underwent orogeny (mountain building) from the Late Devonian to about the end of the Carboniferous (~280 Ma; see Glossary of technical terms in the appendix and Birkeland and Larson, 1989 for geological time lines). Shallow seas inundated the area during the Jurassic and Early Cretaceous, its elevation high enough so that the resulting marine rocks are thin. After Early Cretaceous time (