Books Should Be Free Loyal Books Free Public Domain Audiobooks & eBook Downloads |
|
The History of Rome, Books 27 to 36 By: Livy |
---|
![]()
HISTORY OF ROME. TITUS LIVIUS.
BOOKS TWENTY SEVEN TO THIRTY SIX. LITERALLY TRANSLATED, WITH NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS, BY CYRUS EDMONDS. MDCCCL. THE HISTORY OF ROME.
BOOK XXVII. Cneius Fulvius, proconsul, defeated by Hannibal and slain;
the consul, Claudius Marcellus, engages him with better
success. Hannibal, raising his camp, retires; Marcellus
pursues, and forces him to an engagement. They fight twice; in
the first battle, Hannibal gains the advantage; in the second,
Marcellus. Tarentum betrayed to Fabius Maximus, the consul.
Scipio engages with Hasdrubal, the son of Hamilcar, at
Baetula, in Spain, and defeats him. Among other prisoners, a
youth of royal race and exquisite beauty is taken; Scipio sets
him free, and sends him, enriched with magnificent presents,
to his uncle Masinissa. Marcellus and Quintus Crispinus,
consuls, drawn into an ambuscade by Hannibal; Marcellus is
slain, Crispinus escapes. Operations by Publius Sulpicius,
praetor, against Philip and the Achaeans. A census held;
the number of citizens found to amount to one hundred and
thirty seven thousand one hundred and eight: from which it
appears how great a loss they had sustained by the number
of unsuccessful battles they had of late been engaged in.
Hasdrubal, who had crossed the Alps with a reinforcement for
Hannibal, defeated by the consuls, Marcus Livius and Claudius
Nero, and slain; with him fell fifty six thousand men .
1. Such was the state of affairs in Spain. In Italy, the consul
Marcellus, after regaining Salapia, which was betrayed into his hands,
took Maronea and Meles from the Samnites by force. As many as three
thousand of the soldiers of Hannibal, which were left as a garrison,
were here surprised and overpowered. The booty, and there was a
considerable quantity of it, was given up to the troops. Also, two
hundred and forty thousand pecks of wheat, with a hundred and ten
thousand pecks of barley, were found here. The joy, however, thus
occasioned, was by no means so great as a disaster sustained a few
days afterwards, not far from the town Herdonea. Cneius Fulvius, the
consul, was lying encamped there, in the hope of regaining Herdonea,
which had revolted from the Romans after the defeat at Cannae, his
position being neither sufficiently secure from the nature of the
place, nor strengthened by guards. The natural negligence of the
general was now increased by the hope that their attachment to the
Carthaginians was shaken when they had heard that Hannibal, after the
loss of Salapia, had retired from that neighbourhood into Bruttium.
Intelligence of all these circumstances being conveyed to Hannibal by
secret messengers from Herdonea, at once excited an anxious desire to
retain possession of a city in alliance with him, and inspired a hope
of attacking the enemy when unprepared. With a lightly equipped force
he hastened to Herdonea by forced marches, so as almost to anticipate
the report of his approach and in order to strike greater terror into
the enemy, came up with his troops in battle array. The Roman, equal
to him in courage, but inferior in strength, hastily drawing out his
troops, engaged him. The fifth legion and the left wing of the allied
infantry commenced the battle with spirit. But Hannibal ordered his
cavalry, on a signal given, to ride round as soon as the foot forces
had their eyes and thoughts occupied with the contest before them, and
one half of them to attack the camp of the enemy, the other half to
fall upon their rear, while busily engaged in fighting. He himself,
sarcastically alluding to the similarity of the name Fulvius, as he
had defeated Cneius Fulvius, the praetor, two years ago, in the same
country, expressed his confidence that the issue of the battle would
be similar. Nor was this expectation vain; for after many of the
Romans had fallen in the close contest, and in the engagement with the
infantry, notwithstanding which they still preserved their ranks and
stood their ground; the alarm occasioned by the cavalry on their rear,
and the enemy shout, which was heard at the same time from their camp,
first put to flight the sixth legion, which being posted in the second
line, was first thrown into confusion by the Numidians; and then
the fifth legion, and those who were posted in the van... Continue reading book >>
|
This book is in genre |
---|
History |
eBook links |
---|
Wikipedia – Livy |
Wikipedia – The History of Rome, Books 27 to 36 |
eBook Downloads | |
---|---|
ePUB eBook • iBooks for iPhone and iPad • Nook • Sony Reader |
Kindle eBook • Mobi file format for Kindle |
Read eBook • Load eBook in browser |
Text File eBook • Computers • Windows • Mac |
Review this book |
---|