They eventually found Hannibal on the left bank of the Aufidus River, and encamped six miles ( 10 km ) away.

After great tension within the city government, culminating in the assassination of the supporters of Carthage, Hannibal laid siege to the city of Saguntum in 219 BC.

Nevertheless, it might be stated that its recorded history started in 409 BC when its more ancient neighbor, Himera ( now completely within the comune's borders ), was completely destroyed by the Carthaginian army under Hannibal Mago.

* Former Beddington and Wallington Borough Council: Argent a Fess embattled between three roses Gules each surmounted by a Rose Argent barbed and seeded proper the Fess surmounted by an Escutcheon Azure charged with a representation of an Hannibal Aircraft volant Argent and in base a rising Sun Or all within a Bordure compony Or and Azure.

Hannibal camped his army within sight of this gate when he considered besieging Rome in 211 BC.

Since the " Assyrian genocide " took place within the context of the much more widespread Armenian genocide, scholarship treating it as a separate event is scarce, with the exceptions of the works of David Gaunt and Hannibal Travis.

Livy claims that immediately after the victory, Maharbal urged Hannibal to push on at once with his cavalry upon Rome itself, promising him that if he did so, within five days he should sup in the Capitol.

The Soviet soldiers allow Hannibal and Mischa to stay within the lodge, where it is warmer.

According to Strabo and Plutarch, Artashes also founded the Armenian capital Artashat ( Artaxata ) with the aid of the Carthaginian general Hannibal who was being sheltered from the Romans within Artashesians ' court.

In 1842, he began a striking series of designs dealing with the Crossing of the Alps by Hannibal, in which the weird power which animates his later art becomes first apparent.

However, Rome, fearing the growing strength of Hannibal in Iberia, made an alliance with the city of Saguntum, which lay a considerable distance south of the River Ebro and claimed the city as its protectorate.

In addition, the night before the battle commenced, Hannibal ordered his men to light campfires on the hills of Tuoro, at a considerable distance, so as to convince the Romans that his forces were further away than they actually were.

Hannibal camped at a distance in the plain below, enthusiastically supplied by the Gallic population.

Hannibal may have crossed the Alps with a herd of elephants, and the Romans had settlements in the region.

Although he was aware that the Bastarnae were hardly likely to achieve the same success as Hannibal some 40 years earlier, and would most likely end up cut to pieces by the Romans, Philip hoped that the Romans would be distracted long enough to allow him to reoccupy his former possessions in Greece.

With Consular armies destroyed in two major battles, and Hannibal approaching Rome's gates, the Romans feared the imminent destruction of their city.

When Carthaginian commander Hannibal Barca fought the Romans, he recruited several Gaulish mercenaries who fought on his side at Cannae.

Thus, Hannibal took the Romans by surprise a scant two years later in 218 BC by merely reviving and adapting the original Gaulish-Carthaginian invasion plan of his brother-in-law.

Publius Cornelius Scipio, the consul who commanded the Roman force sent to intercept Hannibal, and Scipio Africanus ' father, had not expected Hannibal to make an attempt to cross the Alps, since the Romans were prepared to fight the war in Iberia.

Here, Hannibal forced the Romans, by virtue of his superior cavalry, to evacuate the plain of Lombardy.

To avoid this, Hannibal deceived the Romans into thinking that the Carthaginian army was going to escape through the woods.

By capturing Cannae, Hannibal had placed himself between the Romans and their crucial sources of supply.

The Romans and allied legions, resolving to confront Hannibal, marched southward to Apulia.

After Cannae, the Romans were very hesitant to confront Hannibal in pitched battle, preferring instead to weaken him by attrition, relying on their advantages of interior lines, supply, and manpower.

The Romans utilized the attritional strategy Fabius had taught them, and which, they finally realized, were the only feasible means of defeating Hannibal.

The Romans deprived Hannibal of a large-scale battle and instead, assaulted his weakening army with multiple smaller armies in an attempt to both weary him and create unrest in his troops.

* 217 BC – The Romans, led by Gaius Flaminius, are ambushed and defeated by Hannibal at the Battle of Lake Trasimene.

Thus, Hannibal took the Romans by surprise a mere two years later ( 218 BC ) by merely reviving and adapting the original Gaulo-Carthaginian invasion plan of his brother-in-law Hasdrubal.

According to Roman tradition, Hannibal had been made to swear by his father never to be a friend of Rome, and he certainly did not take a conciliatory attitude when the Romans berated him for crossing the river Iberus ( Ebro ) which Carthage was bound by treaty not to cross.

There were three military theaters in this war: Italy, where Hannibal defeated the Roman legions repeatedly ; Hispania, where Hasdrubal, a younger brother of Hannibal, defended the Carthaginian colonial cities with mixed success until eventually retreating into Italy ; and Sicily, where the Romans held military supremacy.

After assaulting Saguntum, Hannibal surprised the Romans in 218 BC by leading the Iberians and three dozen elephants through the Alps.

Although Hannibal surprised the Romans and thoroughly beat them on the battlefields of Italy, he lost his only siege engines and most of his elephants to the cold temperatures and icy mountain paths.

The Second Punic War, also referred to as The Hannibalic War, ( by the Romans ) The War Against Hannibal, or " The Carthaginian War ", lasted from 218 to 201 BC and involved combatants in the western and eastern Mediterranean.

During the Second Punic War ( 218 – 202 BC ), the Veneti even sent a contingent of soldiers to fight alongside the Romans against Hannibal and the invading Carthaginians and Venetians were among those slaughtered at the Battle of Cannae ( 216 BC ).

: When, after the action had thus occurred, his own men returned to each general, Scipio could adopt no fixed plan of proceeding, except that he should form his measures from the plans and undertakings of the enemy: and Hannibal, uncertain whether he should pursue the march he had commenced into Italy, or fight with the Roman army which had first presented itself, the arrival of ambassadors from the Boii, and of a petty prince called Magalus, diverted from an immediate engagement ; who, declaring that they would be the guides of his journey and the companions of his dangers, gave it as their opinion, that Italy ought to be attacked with the entire force of the war, his strength having been nowhere previously impaired.

In 184 BC, Hannibal of Carthage had clay pots filled with venomous snakes and instructed his soldiers to throw the pots onto the decks of Pergamene ships.

* Livy The War with Hannibal translated by Aubrey de Selincourt 1974, Penguin Books, London, England.

They were defeated there by the Carthaginians under Hamilcar ( a popular Carthaginian name, not to be confused with Hannibal Barca's father, with the same name ) in 260 BC.

Often regarded as one of the greatest military strategists in European history, Hannibal would later be considered one of the greatest generals of antiquity, together with Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Scipio, and Pyrrhus of Epirus.

According to Livy, Hannibal much later said that when he came upon his father and begged to go with him, Hamilcar agreed and demanded that he swear that as long as he lived he would never be a friend of Rome.

When his father drowned in battle, Hannibal's brother-in-law Hasdrubal succeeded to his command of the army with Hannibal serving as an officer under him.

Hannibal perceived this as a breach of the treaty signed with Hasdrubal and so he laid siege to the city, which fell after eight months.

Hannibal reportedly entered Gaul with 40, 000 foot soldiers and 12, 000 horsemen.

These Hannibal surmounted with ingenuity, such as when he used vinegar and fire to break through a rockfall.

There, in December of the same year, Hannibal had an opportunity to show his masterful military skill at Trebia ; where after wearing down the superior Roman infantry he then cut it to pieces with a surprise attack and ambush from the flanks.

Hannibal quartered his troops for the winter with the Gauls, whose support for him had abated.

Hannibal drew up his least reliable infantry in a semicircle in the center with the wings composed of the Gallic and Numidian horse.

Due to these brilliant tactics, Hannibal, with much inferior numbers, managed to surround and destroy all but a small remnant of his enemy.

Hannibal also secured an alliance with newly appointed Hieronymus of Syracuse.

It is often argued that if Hannibal had received proper material reinforcements from Carthage, he might have succeeded with a direct attack upon Rome.

Instead, he had to content himself with subduing the fortresses that still held out against him, and the only other notable event of 216 BC was the defection of certain Italian territories, including Capua, the second largest city of Italy, which Hannibal made his new base.

Hannibal ’ s troops lost in combat were replaced with less well-trained and motivated mercenaries from Italy or Gaul.

In 203 BC, after nearly fifteen years of fighting in Italy, and with the military fortunes of Carthage rapidly declining, Hannibal was recalled to Carthage to direct the defense of his native country against a Roman invasion under Scipio Africanus.