Cannae 216 BC: Hannibal's Crescent and the Double Envelopment of Rome

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After defeats at the Trebia and Lake Trasimene, Rome tried Fabius Maximus's strategy of avoiding battle, then rejected it. In 216 BC the Senate raised eight legions, about 86,000 men with allies, under two consuls, Varro and Paulus, who alternated supreme command daily. Hannibal seized the Roman supply depot at Cannae on an open plain by the Aufidus River, harassed Roman water carriers the day Paulus held command, and fought on Varro's day. The main surviving account comes from Polybius, a friend of Paulus's grandson Scipio Aemilianus, which may explain why Varro takes most of the blame.

Hannibal placed his Gauls and Iberians in a forward-bulging crescent at the center, stood with them himself, and kept his veteran African infantry on the wings, with the Romans facing the morning sun and a dust-laden wind. The deep Roman column pushed the center back into a pocket and crushed itself, Hasdrubal's cavalry swept around to hit its rear, and the Africans turned inward. Up to 80,000 Romans and allies died, cut down at a rate of roughly 600 men a minute. Capua and Tarentum defected and Philip V of Macedon pledged support, but Rome refused to make peace and fought on for 14 years.

• When an officer named Gisco remarked on the Roman numbers, Hannibal replied that not one of them was called Gisco, and the ranks laughed.
• Livy wrote of trapped Romans found the next morning with their faces buried in pits they had dug themselves.
• The dead included Paulus, two quaestors, 29 military tribunes and 80 senators or men eligible for the Senate.
• Hannibal's brother poured a pile of gold signet rings taken from dead Roman aristocrats onto the floor of the Carthaginian Senate.
• His cavalry commander Maharbal told him he knew how to win a victory but not how to use it, after Hannibal declined to march on Rome.