The Punic Wars

Originally posted by Earl Aster Yes- i recall that many of his men fell down the chasms in the alps and all of his elephants died!   Also, what were Mago and Hamilcar's military abilities good? Were they as good as Hannibal? Mago seemed to make some assaults against Hanibals' abilities- "Hannibal got victories but did not know how to use them"

[EDIT] MOST of his elephants!

So far as I know, the actual route of Hannibal over the Alps has not yet been determined with certainty, we are still only specualting. And he met ALOT of resistance from Gauls in the Alps, his losses there were enormous.

Massilia was a Greek city state allied to Rome. It did not possess a large army and the intelligent thing to do was to alert Rome of Hannibal's entry into the area. This they did, but Hannibal moved very quickly towards the Alps and no major battle took place. There was a cavalry skirmish between the Roman and Hannibal's cavalry.

The Romans did not engage Hannibal in a proper battle until he reached northern Italy because the Romans expected him to travel much slower and by one of the more predictable routes.

What i do not understand (This is partially because i have not read Livy- the wars with Hannibal Book2 yet) is how Hannibal was finally defeated at Zama in Africa by Cornellius Scipio in AFRICA. He was marching down to Rome after Cannae and the Senate had agreed to the countryside being ravaged to stop his advance. How can he have just gone to  North Africa that soon after? I thought that Scipio would have defeated him in Italy.

 I believe the slave legions performed rather well, instead of being used in the times when Rome felt confrontation with Hannibal was a good idea, the slave legions were around when Rome was attempting to contain Hannibal so not suicidally giving battle. Lucky them.

 Indeed desperate times I believe the age for service in the legions was reduced to 16 or 17 as so many men had been killed in battle and many territories were at the point of exhaustion.

 It must have been demoralising to the Carthaginians that they had killed so many Romans yet they still had the resources in manpower to replace them whereas the Carthaginians had barely any capacity to replenish their troops or atleast replace the fallen with comparable quality.

hey I read in one of my books that in the second punic war that there were two legions of slaves?

Originally posted by Maju Originally posted by Infidel What I remember from my latin classes about the Punic Wars is the Delenda est Carthago (Carthage must be destroyed) slogan by Cato (or was it Scipio?). Cato's slogan was Delenda Carthago (let's destroy Carthage!). Delenda est Carthago means (I think) Carthage is destroyed, something they would say surely later, paraphrasing Cato.

Cato�s slogan was ;"Praeterea censo Carthaginem esse Delendam".

I�m also of the opinion of that Carthage must be destroyed

 

 

Isn't it "Carthaginian"? I forget. =\

Aside from that, it's really good.

are you learning modern latin or ancient.

pretty Dux, I look forward to the rest

 

alright i haven't read any of it yet but it looks like you've given it s substantial treatment and I certainly will get around to checking it out.