Nightmare for Rome

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Hannibal Barca was one of the Roman empires biggest enemies and a nightmare to its people. After the first Punic war his father Hamilcar Barca made him swear to one day defeat the romans and avenge his loss. At the age of nine years old he went to the altar and swore with his father to be friends with Rome. He would never be friend Rome and would eventually lead his army to Rome in start of the second Punic War.
Hannibal spent 16 years of his life in Spain training in military camps. Learning different types of war tactics and learning to become a sharp minded commander so he could eventually run the Carthage military. In 221 BCE the son in law of Hamilcar Barca; Hasdrubal was assassinated. At the age of 26 Hannibal was now the new commander of the Carthage military. Just 5 years before Hannibal had become commander the Ebro Treaty with Rome said that they could not cross Spain’s Ebro River with idea to conquer. There was a city south of the treaty line known as Saguntum who were allies with Rome. In 219 Hannibal decided to conquer Saguntum because they had supposedly been attacking local allied tribes of Carthage. It took Hannibal 8 months to seize the city of Saguntum. This was the start of the second Punic war.
At this time the Romans controlled the Mediterranean Sea with their navy, so the only safe route for Hannibal was to travel by land. If he would have taken the sea route he would have been crushed by the Roman Navy. By taking the land route meant he would have to cross over the Alps the biggest land barrier in Europe. This would not be an easy task for him and his army. The total journey from Spain to Italy while crossing the Alps was around 1,500 miles which would take him 5 months to accomplish. The army of...

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...on would push his troops through the defile, with a thick fog working against him and his troops by covering the hills. The Roman forces eventually would push into the punchbowl and Hannibal would then unleash his trap. The Romans would be taken by surprise. Hannibal’s men would strike fast and hard killing many soldiers before they could even draw their swords. Many Roman soldiers were pushed back into the lake were they would drown because of their heavy armor.
After around 3 hours at battle around 15,000 Roman soldiers laid dead and an equal number were taken as prisoners, their leader Flaminius was also killed. Hannibal’s losses were only 2,500. Hannibal released many of the Italian prisoners telling them that war wasn’t with them but the true enemy was Rome. He did this because he wanted to gain there trust and get them to fight with him against Rome.

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