Historical sources on the battles of Ticinus River and Trebia River

Extract A

"First I shall indicate the causes of the above war between Rome and Carthage, known as the Hannibalic war, and tell how the Carthaginians invaded Italy, broke up the dominion [power and control] of Rome, and cast the Romans into great fear for their safety and even for their native soil, while great was their own hope, such as they had never dared to entertain, of capturing Rome itself." 

Extract B

"To return to the war between Rome and Carthage, from which this digression [side discussion] has carried us away, we must regard its first cause as being the indignation [deep anger] of Hamilcar surnamed Barcas, the actual father of Hannibal. Unvanquished in spirit by the war for Sicily, since he felt that he had kept the army of Eryx under his command combative and resolute until the end, and had only agreed to peace yielding to circumstances after the defeat of the Carthaginians in the naval battle, he maintained his resolve and waited for an opportunity to strike." 

Extract C

"The Carthaginians could ill bear their defeat in the war for Sicily, and, as I said above, they were additionally exasperated [angered] by the matter of Sardinia and the exorbitancy [extreme excess] of the sum they had been last obliged to agree to pay. Therefore, when they had subjugated [conquered] the greater part of Iberia [Spain], they were quite ready to adopt any measures against Rome which suggested themselves." 

Extract D

"He then set large parties of his men to work, and, with infinite toil, began constructing a road on the face of the precipice. One day's work sufficed to make a path practicable for beasts of burden and horses; and he accordingly took them across at once, and having pitched his camp at a spot below the snow line, he let them go in search of pasture; while he told off the Numidians [North African light cavalry soldiers] in detachments to proceed with the making of the road; and after three days' difficult and painful labour he got his elephants across, though in a miserable condition from hunger. For the tops of the Alps, and the parts immediately below them, are completely treeless and bare of vegetation [plant life], because the snow lies there summer and winter; but about half-way down the slopes on both sides they produce trees and shrubs, and are, in fact, fit for human habitation." 

Extract E

"As soon as Tiberius [Sempronius Longus, the Roman commander at the Battle of Trebia] saw the Numidian horse [light cavalry] approaching, he immediately sent out his cavalry by itself with orders to engage the enemy, and keep them in play, while he despatched after them six thousand foot armed with javelins [throwing spears], and got the rest of the army in motion, with the idea that their appearance would decide the affair: for his superiority in numbers, and his success in the cavalry skirmish of the day before, had filled him with confidence. But it was now mid-winter and the day was snowy and excessively cold, and men and horses were marching out almost entirely without having tasted food; and accordingly, though the troops were at first in high spirits, yet when they had crossed the Trebia, swollen by the floods which the rain of the previous night had brought down from the high ground above the camp, wading breast deep through the stream, they were in a wretched state from the cold and want of food as the day wore on. While the Carthaginians on the contrary had eaten and drunk in their tents, and got their horses ready, and were all anointing [rubbing oil on] and arming themselves round the fires." 

Extract F

"The place was admirably adapted for putting them off their guard; because the Romans were always suspicious of woods, from the fact of the Celts [Gauls] invariably choosing such places for their ambuscades [ambushes], but felt no fear at all of places that were level and without trees: not knowing that for the concealment and safety of an ambush [the tactic Hannibal used to trap the Romans at the Trebia] such places are much better than woods; because the men can command from them a distant view of all that is going on: while nearly all places have sufficient cover to make concealment possible, — a stream with an overhanging bank, reeds, or ferns, or some sort of bramble-bushes, — which are good enough to hide not infantry only, but sometimes even cavalry, if the simple precaution is taken of laying conspicuous arms flat upon the ground and hiding helmets under shields. Hannibal had confided his idea to his brother Mago and to his council, who had all approved of the plan." 

Contextual information:

Polybius was a Greek historian born around 200 BC who lived in Rome for many years and knew leading Roman figures personally. He wrote his Histories to explain how Rome came to control the known world, and he is the most important surviving eyewitness-informed source on the Second Punic War. His account of the causes of the war and the battles of Ticinus and Trebia in Book III is the earliest and most detailed primary source available. 

Bibliographical reference:

Polybius. Histories (W. R. Paton, Trans., 1922; Vol. II, Book III, pp. 3, 25, 33, 55, 71–72). William Heinemann. (Original work written ca. 150s BC).  

Copyright: Public domain. 

Extract A

"IN this book is described the beginning of the Second Punic War, and how Hannibal, the general of the Phoenicians [the people of Carthage, a city on the North African coast], crossed the river Ebro in violation [breaking] of the treaty. Besieging Saguntum, a city belonging to allies of the Roman People, he captured it in the eighth month. [Hannibal's motive was to defeat Roman power and ultimately capture Rome, building on the deep Carthaginian resentment of Rome that followed the loss of Sicily at the end of the First Punic War in 241 BC.] After a troublesome passage of these mountains, in the course of which he also defeated in several battles the Gallic mountaineers, when they blocked his way, he descended into Italy and routed [defeated and scattered] the Romans in a cavalry battle near the river Ticinus. In this battle Publius Cornelius Scipio [the Roman consul commanding the army at Ticinus] was wounded and was saved by his son, who later received the name of Africanus. Again a Roman army was routed near the river Trebia. After this Hannibal crossed the Apennines [mountains in central Italy], with great distress to his soldiers, because of violent storms." 

Extract B

"The driving sleet and the intolerable cold caused the death of many men and baggage animals, and nearly all the elephants perished. The Carthaginians stopped their pursuit at the banks of the Trebia and returned to their camp so benumbed with cold that they hardly felt any joy in their victory. In the night the men who had guarded the camp, and the rest of the soldiers, mostly wounded, crossed the Trebia on rafts without any interference from the Carthaginians, either because the roaring of the storm prevented them from hearing or because they were unable to move through weariness and wounds and pretended that they heard nothing. Whilst the Carthaginians were keeping quiet, Scipio led his army to Placentia and thence across the Po to Cremona, in order that one colony might not be burdened with providing winter quarters for the two armies." 

Contextual information:

Titus Livius, known as Livy, was a Roman historian who wrote his massive History of Rome around 27 BC to 14 AD, covering Roman history from its foundation. This extract comes from the summary of Book XXI, which covered the opening campaign of the Second Punic War in 218 BC. Livy wrote roughly 200 years after these events and relied heavily on earlier sources, including Polybius, whose account he frequently followed. His history is one of the two most important surviving ancient accounts of the Punic Wars, alongside Polybius. 

Bibliographical reference:

Adapted from Livy. History of Rome (Rev. Canon Roberts, Trans., 1912; Book XXI, Summary, Book XXI, ch. 56). E. P. Dutton and Co. (Original work written ca. 27 BC–14 AD).  

Copyright: Public domain.