Hannibal

The folk-tale esque geographic components of Hannibal’s military campaigns have intrigued me for awhile, especially as I have been more actively reading history from his general temporal period. Hunt is an excellent biographer (especially as an introductory text on Hannibal, which this was for me), in part because he has physically traveled to each of the key locations of the campaigns, through Spain, France and the Alps, and can speak with authority on where the inconsistencies compounded through history are most present.

Hannibal’s mindset — to hate Rome as a guiding principle — was drilled into him since birth, just due to the historical context he found himself in, and the placement of his family as a military family in wartime, coming off a humiliating treaty. It is fascinating to see how it shaped every aspect of his decision making throughout his life — his relative stoicism compared to other contemporaries, his Odyssesian willingness to use deception at a time where it was less in vogue, and his embrace of religious omens and animal sacrifice as a military and physiological strategy even while he most likely non-religious.

I am sensing that I am beginning to develop a bit of a niche historical interest, from reading about Hannibal, Mithridates and others, in learning about those who most successfully challenged Rome at periods of its greatest strength. There is much to learn from those who have had success against much better financed and more powerful forces. I think I’ll take on a few other books in different subjects next, but I hope to return to this general period of history soon with some reading on Roman generals like Scipio Africanus to better juxtapose.