dhampyresa

Following the 101 primer,I will now answer some follow-up questions.


Does anybody know why Hannibal didn't march on Rome when he could? And also exactly under what circumstances did Hannibal and Scipio die the same year, were they in completely different places fighting other people or..?

The answer to both these questions, by the way, is WE JUST DON'T KNOW.

Like, Hannibal not marching on Rome is legit one of the greatest mysteries in History. The most commonly held views are, iirc, that the Romans were supposed to surrender, because they'd lost the war according to the way war was waged at the times and/or that Hannibal simply didn't have enough men to lay siege to Rome (hence waiting for reinforcements from carthage, to no avail).

Hannibal and Scipio both died in exile the same year (...maybe), but beyond that, we don't know. Nobody seems to agree what year Hannibal died in and even though the cause of his death is rapported as being him poisoning himself so that he wouldn't be taken alive by the Romans, the fact that there's no real date for it makes it sound more like a story than a history, if that makes sense. Scipio's death we know slightly more about, in that we have a precise year and that's pretty much it. We don't know what he died from (fever? suicide?) or where he's buried, given that no contemporary records of either death or burial are known. So it's likely that the tomb in Linternum that says "Ungrateful country, you will not even have my bones", although it does sound like something late-life Scipio would think (let's just say that after the war, Hannibal and Scipio's relationships to their respective cities goes sour and bitter) is probably not where he's buried.

So, mysterious deaths + same year = eloping together. (Yeah, yeah, I know Hannibal was in Bithynia and Scipio in Campania. Whatever.)


Why did Scipio's relationship with Rome get sour?

Why did Scipio's relationship with Rome turn sour, you ask? Why, because Cato was a dick, of course! (Cato is pretty much always a dick. Doesn't matter which one it is, all the Catones are terrible.)

Essentially, the people of Rome loved Scipio. Loved him. Like, he's the guy who finally beat Hannibal, right? The man who won the war. They loved him with the kind of fervor the people of Rome sometimes get, the kind of fervor that might have ended the Republic, had Scipio let it. They would have named him dictator, and Consul for life.

That's how much they loved the man that was starting to become known as Africanus.

They'd have ended the Republic for him, but Scipio really, genuinely likes the Republic. He believes in it like he believes in nothing else and so he refuses the honours. His war is over.

Except that given that the Roman people like him, obviously the Roman Senate hate his guts. Maybe they're afraid he'll change his mind and end the Republic, after all. Maybe they don't like that he didn't destroy Carthage (because there was no point. His war is over). Maybe they don't like that he made them look bad by surviving Cannae and then taking the war to Spain when all of them thought he was going to die there. Maybe they're the Roman Senate and they're contractually obligated to be opposed to the will of the people of Rome. Maybe they're the Roman Seante and as such are a great big bag of dicks. WHO KNOWS.

This is all happening while Cato goes around ending every speech with "Carthage Must Be Destroyed!", because Cato Cato wanted Cartahge to be destroyed after the war, because Cato is a dick, as we've established.

Hannibal becoming leader of Carthage during this time period also can't have helped.

But however much Scipio might love the Republic, he's not a politician. He was never in it for power. He was in it for Rome and that's not the same thing at all.

So now it's time for him to pull a Cincinnatus and retire to the country?

Well, sort of. Scipio does his best to leave politics behind, but politics and the war still won't leave him alone. When the Romans ask Carthage to surrender Hannibal to them, Scipio explicitly opposes the notion, which the Seante (especially Cato) DOES NOT LIKE.

But what the fuck are they gonna do, huh? He's Scipio Africanus, he's still a Roman hero right down to the bone. They can't touch him, not without a widespread revolt on their hands.

What they can do, though, is declare war to the Seleucid Empire (BADASS DUDES, just thought I'd put that out there) and send his brother to command the army there.

Except, in a shocking twist of fate, Hannibal is, through sheer coincidence, you understand, currently spending his exile in the Seleucid Empire. WHODA THUNK

So, Scipio jumps on this occasion and says "yeah dudes and dudettes, Imma go help out my brother in this here war, yeah? yeah" and so Scipio and Hannibal find themselves at war with each oter once again. The war is soon over, however and Hannibal and Scipio do not face each in battle again.

While Scipio and his brother are away, howevere, Cato continues to pour poison into the Senate's collective ear and when they return the Seante pretty much accuses them of having been bribed by the Seleucid Emperor, which Scipio doesn't take kindly to, to put it mildly.

He takes so unkindly to it that he pulls a powerplay on the Senate (Scipio! who has never been a man of politics) by pointing out it's the anniversary of his victory at Zama, which causes the people of Rome to rise up in his favour.

Turns out the Senate really can't touch him, not unless they want to take the risk of him ending the Republic. Sure, maybe that's not much of a risk, because Scipio Africanus, end the Republic? No.

But someone might have ended it on his behalf if they'd kept it up and that's a risk the Seante just can't take.

Scipio's wars are over and he is done with politics, done with Rome, done with all of it. He retires to the country, up until he "dies" there (but he never stops trying to get Rome to stop hounding Hannibal).


How come Scipio and Hannibal didn't cross paths in that last war of theirs?

I'm not entirely sure why, because the Roman-Seleucid war isn't my area of expertise (for a given value of expertise). It's possible they do meet, but I doubt it. Well, they do meet at Ephesus, but that's before the war which kind of makes the whole thing even more tragic.

Part of why they didn't meet is that Scipio's not in charge, his brother is, so any battle is far more likely to be generaled by him and part of it is that the seleucid Emperor never trusted Hannibal and so Hannibal never truted him back, so when the Seleucid Empire starts losing the war it starts looking a lot like the emperor is going to hand Hannibal over to the Romans as war tribute and Hannibal is very not okay with that and goes into exile (yes. Again).



The obvious answer is HANNIBAL'S BLOOD OATH AGAINST ROME.

Which I realise needs some context, so let me provide said context (and then some, because I don't know when to shut up).

When Hannibal is born in 247 (all dates from here on out are in BCE, btw), the First Punic War is still ongoing. It's been going since 264 and will keep going until 241. The First Punic War has been called 'the First World War of the Ancient World' and while it only happened in and around the Mediterranean, for sheer scope and number of people involved, it's a description that's more accurate than you'd think. Combining forces from both sides, over a million men were involved in the conflict. IT WAS FUCKING MASSIVE.

And the really weird thing about the First Punic war is that the Romans won. Now, I know that pop culture has lead everyone to just assume that the Romans will win pretty much everything (you can thank Octavian and the Empire for that, btw), but at this point in time it's really really not a given.

Imagine Rome, upstart city-state that doesn't even control the whole of Italy and has never even looked beyond Italy or had a navy.

Now imagine Carthage, a city of merchants at the head of a vast trading empire. Carthage controls the entire western Mediterranean, if not in fact (north Africa, Corsica, Sardinia, part of Spain, Sicily) then through a tangled web of alliances.

Because of Roman politics (the same politics that eventually led to the Gracchi being murdered over land reforms, even) there's been tension between Rome and Carthage for a while. Rome's expansionist, almost imperialistic, tendencies don't sit well with the elders of Carthage. (The elders of Carthage, the Hundred and Four, are much like the Roman Senate, both in how they work and in being A GREAT BIG BAG OF DICKS.)

Anyway, war happens because a bunch of pirates helpfully provide everyone with a good reason and Rome and Carthage proceed to try and beat each other to a pulp for over twenty years. FUN TIMES.

This is a war that mostly happens at sea. The Romans, by the way, are so completely clueless abot seafaring that they have to copy a wrecked Carthaginian ship before they can actually do anything.

Romans. Tenacious little fuckers, the lot of them.

I'm going to skip over, like, everything about the war until 247, because it's basically Rome and Carthage playing tug-of-war with Sicily.

In 247, two things happen: Hannibal is born and his father, Hamilcar Barca, gets sent to Sicily to push back the Romans. Which he does! That's very probably how he earns his family the last name of "Barca" (Thunderbolt). Hell, he very nearly bankrupts the Republic in the process.

Remember what I said above about the Hundred and Four being A GREAT BIG BAG OF DICKS? This is when it becomes relevant. They're worried that Hamilcar is gaining too much power, because they're listening to Hanno the Great AND WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT WHY so they refuse to support Hamilcar (stop me if this sounds familiar) and so he ends up having to negotiate a peace treaty with the Romans.

Then because Hamilcar has in fact grown too powerful, Carthage sends him off to Spain to, like, conquer some land? Idk, bro, we just want you of the city.

Hamilcar then starts conquering Spain like it ain't no thang, founding several cities along the way, such as Carthago Nova (nowadays Carthagena) and Barcino (currently Barcelona).

Anyway, back to the blood oath. Whe Hannibal is eight, so about two years after the end of the war, Hamilcar takes Hannibal to the temple of Baal and then makes him swear A FUCKING BLOOD OATH (I swear I'm not making this up) to never be a friend to Rome. This happens, by the way, because wee Hannibal wants to go to war with his father, which kind of tells you everything you need to about what Hannibal's childhood was like and how lacking in shenanigans it was.

We have very little sources about Hannibal's early life, btw. I'm going to blame this on a) the burning of the Library of Alexandria which held the last recorded copy of the biography of Hannibal that was written by one of his contemporaries and b) FUCKING AEMILIANUS THAT ASSHOLE why'd you go and burn Carthage bro THIS IS WHY YOU'RE MY LEAST FAVOURITE OF THE SCIPIONES

We know even less about Scipio's childhood, which is saying something and a crying shame I'm blaming entirely on Polybius not doing his job properly.

He was a literal knight in shining armour at one point when he was seventeen and saved his father's life at Ticinnus, but I think seventeen is stretching the boundaries of 'childhood' a little. Feel free to imagine all sorts of childhood shenanigans for wee Scipio, his younger brother Lucius and his BFF Gaius laelius, though.


Could you tell us more about Hannibal's family? Like, his father got a kingdom in Spain?

Hannibal's immediate family consists of his father, Hamilcar Barca, his brothers, Hasdrubal and Mago, his mother and his sisters. As far as I can tell, we don't know the names of any of his female relatives. You may occasionally encounter a reference to a sister of his named Salambo or Salambaal, but unless Gustave Flaubert had access to sources we do not, she's fictional.

It's probably likely, however, that one of Hannibal's sisters did become priestess of Tanith, because that seems to have been an office that wielded some amount of power. At least of Hannibal's sister is older than he is (unless I am reading my timelines wrong). I tend to think there were three sisters, just like there were three brothers, because I like the symmetry of it, but that's based on nothing.

Hannibal also may or may not have been married to an Iberian princess -- certainly her father and his father contracted an alliance and that was usually how those thing went -- and he may or may not have had a son by her. I tend to think both are true and that even though it seems unlikely they loved each other (on account of the marriage being political) that they were friends. I like to pretend Hannibal's son ran away from Carthage, possibly with his mother, because the option of him staying in Carthage leads to nothing good.


As for Hannibal's father getting a kingdom in Spain: What happened after the Mercenary War is that the elders of Carthage, especially Hanno the Great (who you might remember from such hits as "let's no support Hamilcar in his war against Rome" and "let's not support Hannibal in his war against Rome"), were fucking humiliated by Hamilcar's victory and sent him off to Spain, probably hoping he would die.

Basically the Mercenary War consisted of the mercenaries Carthage had employed in the First Punic War, most of whom had been Hamilcar's troops, going "Dude, where's my money?" and Carthage refusing to pay, which lead to the mercenaries besieging Carthage. The general defending the city was Hanno the Great who didn't do great. In fact, he did so poorly that the Hundred and Four (more or less the Carthaginian Senate) asked Hamilcar to end the war.

Before that, however, the mercenaries had, while fighting Hanno, fucking INVITED ROME TO TAKE OVER SARDINIA, which of course Rome did. I mean, why wouldn't they? They'd been asked so nicely *smile* *smile* *smile*

Unfortunately, there was only so much Hamilcar could do. Sure, he did win the war and shut down the mercenary revolt, but when he prepared to try to retake Sardinia, Rome argued that was an act of war against them, so declared war on Carthage. The Hundred and Four give up on Sardinia, leaving it in Roman control. That also adds some more war reparations for Carthage to pay Rome and without Sardinia, Carthage's trade empire is in trouble.

So they sent Hamilcar away to Spain, in the hopes that he will find some source of money. Which he does, in the form of spanish silver. One interesting thing is that the army Carthage gives Hamilcar to conquer Spain is made up from what remains of the people who fought for him in the First Punic War, ie THE MERCENARIES HE JUST DEFEATED. Smart money's on Carthage expecting (and hoping) for Hamilcar to get killed.

I mean, almost winning the First Punic War was bad enough, but saving Carthage? Hamilcar had just become a political heavy weight and Hanno the Great was having none of that. (I... am not Hanno the Great's biggest fan.)

So here's Hamilcar, sent off to Spain at the head of an army that, at least in part, doesn't like him and wants to kill him. I'm not sure how Hamilcar does it, but in the time between that moment and his death, he manages to conquer between a third and half of the Iberian peninsula and win himself and his successors the loyalty of his troops.

Also, at one point Rome went "dude wtf are doing conquering all those cities are you preparing to attack us" and Hamilcar's reply was essentially "i'm just getting the cash we owe you nbd" to which Roma went "sounds legit carry on".

Then Hamilcar died in somewhat nebulous circumstances, in that we know he was killed, but aren't sure if the mercenary who killed him was hired by Rome or Carthage. there's even a version of the story that has him sacrificing himself to save wee!Hannibal and another of his sons.

Speaking of wee!Hannibal, he's actually in Spain while all this is happening, because he begged his father to take him along at the beginning of the conquest of Spain. When he was eight. I can't remember if I have sources for this or not, but I link the BLOOD OATH AGAINST ROME (in all caps because that is FUCKING METAL) to this: Hamilcar had Hannibal swear it before taking him along. The rest of Hamilcar's sons (and at least one daughter) follow later.

The person who takes over Hamilcar's kingdom in Spain after his death is not Hannibal, but Hasdrubal the Fair (not to be confused with Hasdrubal Barca, son of Hamilcar). Hasdrubal the Fair was Hamilcar's son-in-law and on those grounds alone a reasonably logical choice for a regent until Hannibal comes of age. That said, the fact that he and Hamilcar were lovers probably didn't hurt.

Hasdrubal the Fair is the one who negotiate the Ebro River Treaty with the Romans. This is important because the breaking of that treaty is one of the causes of the Second Punic War.


Also, what do you think the powers that be in Carthage think was going to happen with Rome? In not helping Hannibal there, they passed up on an opportunity to storm Rome and possibly crush their enemy. Were they that certain of their ultimate victory in the conflict? Was it just unthinkable to them that Rome would win?

I think the problem here is that the Hundred and Four just didn't get Rome. Carthage is a merchant city. Shit, it was literally founded as a Phoenician trade colony. I mean, yeah, there's the entire legend about Dido and Eneas, but is 100% A++ propaganda. Dido probably did kill herself, but as a powerplay. Anyway, In 539BCE, Cyrus the Great (he's Persian) conquers Phoenicia, leaving Carthage to salvage what it can of the Phoenician trade empire. Now, I am not saying that Carthage becoming a sovereign city was something that completely destabilised it, but they weren't used to ruling themselves. They'd never had to make war in their own name. All they knew how to do was trade and boy, were they amazing at it.

Rome, on the other hand, is a military society. It's built on conquest. Without the constant acquisition of new territory, all of it will collapse on itself. You can see this most flagrantly in the Empire era, but it was in fact already there in the Republican era, it's just that the growth of the Roman controlled territory and so their reliance on new territory was exponential. (It's actually really interesting to see the ways in which the Second Punic War eventually lead to the downfall of the Republic.)

I don't think Carthage understood that, so when they drew up treaties with rome, they expected Rome to keep to those treaties -- because that was the best way of making business.

It's not like Rome didn't have its blindspot regarding Carthage, either: Rome didn't believe Carthage would keep its treaties, because they wouldn't have, because how else were they going to expand?

So Rome and Carthage didn't understand each other on a fundamental level. They were always going to go to war. As they say, "this town Mediterranean ain't big enough for the both of us".

I think Hannibal did understand that there was an ever-hungry conquest beast at the heart of Rome, something that would eventually turn to Carthage as its next prey, and so hannibal had to stop it before that happened. And the only way to do that was to bring the war to Roman soil, hence the crossing of the Alps, hence the sapping of the Roman/Gaulish alliances (you can't tell me Hannibal setting up the Gauls that Flaminius had brutally repressed a handful of years earlier against Faminius at Trasimene was a complete coincidence).

Carthage didn't get that, so what Hannibal was doing looked to them to be a mad bid for power. They didn't support him, because then if he was ever defeated they could claim truthfully that they hadn't and work out advantageous treaties with Rome (with the expectations that Rome would keep to them). They didn't ask him to stop, though, because if he did win it would be good for them (and they wouldn't be seen to have been disobeyed when he didn't stop).

So what Carthage expected was for the Romans to sue for peace once Hannibal was defeated. And on some level, it wasn't personal for Carthage the way it was for Rome or Hannibal.


What did they look like? How do you picture them for shipping purposes?

This is kind of hard question to answer. I tend to think of Hannibal as looking like Alexander Siddig (because he played him in that one BBC movie) and after discussion with another nonny, we came to the conclusion that Scipio looked like SIMON WOODS (and because I am secretly five ALL CAPS SIMON WOODS is forever hilarious to me).

Here they are, looking intently to their left:


Are there other members of Hannibal's army named besides Maharbal and his brothers Hasdrubal & Mago?

I can answer this! First, you have to know that Hasdrubal didn't follow Hannibal to Italy and stayed in Spain until 207BCE. There was however another Hasdrubal among Hannibal's officers (not to be confused with Hasdrubal Gisgo). Hasdrubal Gisgo was an officer in the Second Punic War, but on the Iberian side of things. He is not to be confused with the Gisgo that was in Hannibal's arly at Cannae. ARE YOU CONFUSED YET? It gets worse.

There was also another Hannibal in the army, Hannibal monomachus, who is the one my mind goes to with "Hannibal the cannibal", on account of how he suggested/predicted they resort to cannibalism in the Alps. Everyone reacted to that with "dude wtf".

There were at least two Hannos, Hanno son of Bomilcar (who lead part of the cavalry at Cannae) and Hanno the Elder, but there might have been as much as five of them. None of them are Hanno, son of Hannibal, because he was a commander in the First Punic War and so NOT the son of Hannibal Barca and if I see that mistake one more time I will scream. (None of these are Hanno the Great, either.)

There's also Carthalo and as far as I Know there was only one of him. He lead the delegation to Rome after Cannae.

Basically there were about five names to go around among the male Carthaginians so assume everyone is named either Hannibal or Hasdrubal or Hanno or Mago or Hamilcar. (The Barcids had very original names, you may notice.) Bomilkar and Gisgo were also popular.

Someone compiled a list of Cartaginian names here.


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