Read Online The Middle Sea: A History of the Mediterranean by John Julius Norwich - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: John Julius Norwich
Ads: Link
fighting on both sides; the eventual result was a Roman presence in the peninsula which lasted over six centuries. After the death of the two Scipios in 211 BC they were replaced by a kinsman, also called Publius, who took Cartagena after a short siege. With the capture of their capital the Carthaginians swiftly lost heart, and by 206 BC the last of them had left the peninsula.
While there had been a hope of victory over the Romans in Spain, Hasdrubal had had no chance of organising a relief expedition to help his brother. Not until 206 BC , when he knew he was beaten, could he begin to consider such an enterprise, and when in 205 he in turn led his men across southern France and across the Alps, he was marching to disaster: on the Metaurus river, just outside Ancona, he encountered a Roman army and his force was cut to pieces. Hannibal learned the news only when his brother’s severed head was delivered to his Capuan camp. He remained in Italy for another four years, but he would have been wiser to return; elsewhere in the Mediterranean, young Publius Cornelius Scipio had by now taken the offensive.
In 204 BC Publius and his army landed on the North African coast at Utica, less than twenty miles west of Carthage, where they routed 20,000 local troops and established a position on the Bay of Tunis threatening the city itself. In the spring of 203 Hannibal, now seriously alarmed, hurried back to Carthage and in the following year led an army of 37,000 men and eighty elephants against the Roman invaders. The two sides eventually met near the village of Zama where, after a long and hard-fought battle, Hannibal suffered the only major defeat of his extraordinary career. It was at Zama, we are told, that the Romans finally discovered how to deal with the Carthaginians’ favourite tactical weapon, their elephants. First a sudden blast of trumpets would terrify them, to the point where their riders lost control; the Romans would then open their ranks, and the panic-stricken animals would charge between them, out of what they thought to be harm’s way. The Roman victory was complete. The Second Punic War was over. Rome’s prize for her victory was Spain. All the carefully built-up Carthaginian military and civil administration had already been dismantled–the Scipios had seen to that–and now it remained only for Carthage formally to cede the peninsula to her conquerors. Hannibal himself–who had narrowly escaped death at Zama–lived on until 183 BC , when he took poison to avoid being captured by the enemy he so hated. As for the victorious Scipio, he was rewarded with the title of ‘Africanus’, which he richly deserved. He, more than any other of his compatriots, had ensured that it was Rome, not Carthage, which would be mistress of the Mediterranean in the centuries that followed.
But the Punic Wars had had a traumatic effect. They had brought the Roman Republic several times to the brink of disaster and had in all claimed the lives of perhaps two or three hundred thousand of her men. And yet there, across the narrow sea, the city of Carthage still stood–its population of some 750,000 unharmed, industrious and enterprising, recovering from its recent defeat with almost frightening speed: to every patriotic Roman a reminder, a reproach and a continuing threat. Clearly, its survival could not be tolerated.
‘Delenda est Carthago’
(‘Carthage is to be deleted’): these words were spoken by the elder Cato at the end of every speech he made in the Senate until they eventually became a watchword; the only question was how the job was to be done. At last, in 151 BC , an excuse was found when the Carthaginians presumed to defend their city from the depredations of a local chieftain. Rome treated this very natural reaction as a
casus belli
, and in 149 BC once again sent out an invading army. This time the Carthaginians surrendered unconditionally–until they heard the Roman peace terms, which were that their city
While there had been a hope of victory over the Romans in Spain, Hasdrubal had had no chance of organising a relief expedition to help his brother. Not until 206 BC , when he knew he was beaten, could he begin to consider such an enterprise, and when in 205 he in turn led his men across southern France and across the Alps, he was marching to disaster: on the Metaurus river, just outside Ancona, he encountered a Roman army and his force was cut to pieces. Hannibal learned the news only when his brother’s severed head was delivered to his Capuan camp. He remained in Italy for another four years, but he would have been wiser to return; elsewhere in the Mediterranean, young Publius Cornelius Scipio had by now taken the offensive.
In 204 BC Publius and his army landed on the North African coast at Utica, less than twenty miles west of Carthage, where they routed 20,000 local troops and established a position on the Bay of Tunis threatening the city itself. In the spring of 203 Hannibal, now seriously alarmed, hurried back to Carthage and in the following year led an army of 37,000 men and eighty elephants against the Roman invaders. The two sides eventually met near the village of Zama where, after a long and hard-fought battle, Hannibal suffered the only major defeat of his extraordinary career. It was at Zama, we are told, that the Romans finally discovered how to deal with the Carthaginians’ favourite tactical weapon, their elephants. First a sudden blast of trumpets would terrify them, to the point where their riders lost control; the Romans would then open their ranks, and the panic-stricken animals would charge between them, out of what they thought to be harm’s way. The Roman victory was complete. The Second Punic War was over. Rome’s prize for her victory was Spain. All the carefully built-up Carthaginian military and civil administration had already been dismantled–the Scipios had seen to that–and now it remained only for Carthage formally to cede the peninsula to her conquerors. Hannibal himself–who had narrowly escaped death at Zama–lived on until 183 BC , when he took poison to avoid being captured by the enemy he so hated. As for the victorious Scipio, he was rewarded with the title of ‘Africanus’, which he richly deserved. He, more than any other of his compatriots, had ensured that it was Rome, not Carthage, which would be mistress of the Mediterranean in the centuries that followed.
But the Punic Wars had had a traumatic effect. They had brought the Roman Republic several times to the brink of disaster and had in all claimed the lives of perhaps two or three hundred thousand of her men. And yet there, across the narrow sea, the city of Carthage still stood–its population of some 750,000 unharmed, industrious and enterprising, recovering from its recent defeat with almost frightening speed: to every patriotic Roman a reminder, a reproach and a continuing threat. Clearly, its survival could not be tolerated.
‘Delenda est Carthago’
(‘Carthage is to be deleted’): these words were spoken by the elder Cato at the end of every speech he made in the Senate until they eventually became a watchword; the only question was how the job was to be done. At last, in 151 BC , an excuse was found when the Carthaginians presumed to defend their city from the depredations of a local chieftain. Rome treated this very natural reaction as a
casus belli
, and in 149 BC once again sent out an invading army. This time the Carthaginians surrendered unconditionally–until they heard the Roman peace terms, which were that their city
Similar Books
