David Durham - Pride of Carthage

Varro raged yet again, but still Fabius stood upon the hills staring out, firm in his resolve, ears attuned to the youth speaking softly beside him. It was Publius who casually mentioned that Hannibal's forces were now within a natural boundary, and that that could be used against them. Fabius pulled in his blurred gaze and focused on the soldier standing beside him, almost as if seeing him for the first time, though they had now been inseparable for weeks. He asked Publius to explain this notion. And the young soldier did, much to the older one's interest.

The situation became clear to Hannibal well before the body of his joyous army paused to consider it. They were afoot and unbeaten on Italian soil, enjoying the bounty of Campania, elated by their victories, fat from fine food, and sated from conquerors' sex. Most of the army had slaves they called their own in the train behind them, and these were laden with all they could carry and more: weapons and jewels; coins and tools and sacred items. Behind them followed hundreds of cattle, some newly slaughtered each evening, the scent of their roasting adding a pleasant air to camp. While they were constantly aware of the army following their every move, the Roman cowards did not dare engage with them. Hannibal several times set the army on a field perfect for battle and invited Fabius to engage, but the Roman sat on his hands and did nothing. None of the army of Carthage had ever imagined their lot could be this good. Campania had been a blessing to them; this Fabius had been less a foe than an escort. But Hannibal saw a problem stalking them, as gradual and inevitable as the change of seasons.

He called a meeting of his generals and opened it by asking them to study the charts of their current position, paying close attention to his notes detailing the best information he had on the Roman positions. They had entered the plain through the narrow pass of Callicula. Fabius took this pass shortly after, leaving a detachment of four thousand men sitting tight within it. The dictator then sent his master of horse to the defile of Terracina, where the mountains came down to the sea and the Via Appia could be easily held. He strengthened the garrison at Casilinum and lined the hills hemming in the plain with troops awaiting any weakness, easily called to arms, with a daylight view of all the Carthaginians might undertake.

“In short,” Hannibal said, “we are trapped. This plain is a joy for summer raiding, but it will not sustain us through a winter. Nor would it be wise to stay here with nearby cities like Capua and Nola still hostile to us. Fabius knows it. That is partly why he watched us and did not engage, so that we might confine ourselves to winter in a depleted land. What thoughts have you each?”

As was their custom each general spoke in turn, each espousing a different course of action, if not from conviction then from custom, for Hannibal always asked to hear all reasonable alternatives before settling on the best. Bomilcar argued in favor of fighting through the pass; Maharbal suggested a dash toward the Via Appia, double time, to beat the season and reach someplace more favorable; Bostar suggested, though doubtfully, that they might ford the Volturnus; Monomachus was adamant that they could easily survive the winter, for they carried with them more than just cattle to eat.

Hannibal was silent. If he disagreed with any proposal he did not say so at once; nor did he have to, for Mago found the faults of each. The Romans held all the positions of advantage. The toll the Carthaginians would suffer in dead if they tried to fight up through the pass would leave them fatally weak. They would be no wiser than the Persians at Thermopylae, and unlike the Persians, they did not have thousands of lives to waste. They could run for the south, but this would spread them dangerously thin. The men would have to abandon their booty; this would damage morale, cost them much of what they had gained thus far, and betray a measure of fear that would give the Romans heart. The river itself posed a formidable barrier, hard to cross at any time and certainly no favorable route with an army ready to pounce on them.

Mago tossed the dagger he had been using as a pointer down upon the table. “Trapped! Fabius has all of Latium and Samnium and Beneventum to call upon for supplies. They will get fat while we starve. This plain of bounty will be the death of us.”

Hannibal spoke lightheartedly, looking at Mago with a crooked grin on his lips. “My brother has a soldier's fire in his soul,” he said. “And yet there's still some of the poet in him. It is my joy to see him grow this way.”

Mago snapped his head up and stared at his brother, searching for sarcasm. Instead he saw a wry humor written on his face, like one who has thought of a joke and is about to share it. Mago had seen this look before. He smiled and shook his head at his own outburst. “Tell us, then,” he said.

On that prompting, Hannibal explained how they were to proceed.

In the days that followed, the sprawling army marched back toward the ridge of mountains barring entry into Apulia. The plain they crossed stretched right up to the base of the mountains, and the peaks rose in one thrust. They could make out the dispositions of Fabius' army, clinging to the heights, waiting, watching. The glow of their fires stood out in the night, showing by their size the various routes through the mountains. The widest pass had the largest contingent of soldiers, but Fabius left no possible route unguarded. Small units held the smaller openings against spies or messengers or any who might seek solitary escape. Though many among the army groaned at their situation, Hannibal saw only the conditions he had anticipated.

The men ate quickly that evening. They made tight bundles of their weapons and supplies. They secured what supplies they could to the backs of horses and donkeys and even cattle. Men rushed out under the dying light of day and gathered all the wood they could find: fallen branches and decaying trees and twigs of all sizes right down to finger thin. These they piled near the edge of camp. Beside it they collected a hundred select steers in one mass of uneasy bovine life. For this task, Hannibal wanted only the largest from the herd they had gathered over the summer, the ones with wide horns and the strength to endure the ordeal he planned for them.

Mindful of the gods and of his men's morale, Hannibal asked Mandarbal to sanctify the proceedings. The robed priest went to his task with a surly belligerence, uttering the sacred words that were his province. He explained little to the nervous eyes watching them, but moved among the beasts cutting nicks in their shoulders and necks. He grasped at invisible objects, snatching them down and pressing them into his heart and rubbing them along the shaft of his dagger. he slapped away the hands of any who were touching the steers so that none fouled them during his ritual. By the time he concluded, all believed the method of their hoped-for escape had somehow been married to a great offering: a religious sacrifice and their own deliverance, at once.

Once Mandarbal retired, Hannibal himself oversaw the next phase of preparations. With his own hands, he tugged one of the animals away from the rest and toward the woodpile. He picked pieces of wood and placed them between the creature's horns, balancing them carefully. He called for twine to secure them. Soon the creature wore a headdress of sticks and branches woven through and tied to its horns and smeared with the pitch used to fuel torches. Hannibal stepped back and studied the wary, dejected creature, head heavy beneath its load.

Standing beside his brother, Mago said, “This is a singularly strange undertaking.”

Hannibal did not disagree. He ordered that all the steers be similarly dressed.