218 – 215 BC
The Scipios in Iberia
In autumn 218 BC, while Hannibal marches on Italy, Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio sails from Massalia and lands at Emporion with two Roman and two allied legions, about 25,000 men. Hanno, the Carthaginian commander north of the Ebro, attacks him at Cissa without waiting for Hasdrubal and is defeated. Tarraco becomes the Roman base.
The Roman walls of Tarraco, modern Tarragona, the Roman base in Iberia from 218 BCWikimedia Commons, Vmenkov, CC BY-SA 3.0 (E5327-Tarragona-Roman-wall.jpg)
In spring 217 BC Hasdrubal Barca advances north by land and sea together. At the mouth of the Ebro 55 Roman and Massaliot ships defeat his fleet of 40 quinqueremes and take or sink 29 of them. Later that year Publius Scipio joins his brother with 8,000 men.
Naval battle between Romans and Carthaginians in the waters of the Ebro, engraving in Las Glorias Nacionales, 1852Wikimedia Commons, Fondo Antiguo de la Biblioteca de la Universidad de Sevilla, CC BY 2.0 (Las Glorias Nacionales, 1852 "Combate naval entre romanos y cartagineses en las aguas del Ebro". (4013948726).jpg)
Carthage orders Hasdrubal to take his army to Italy. In spring 215 BC he marches north from New Carthage, while the Scipios cross the Ebro and besiege Ibera, a town allied to Carthage on its south bank. When Hasdrubal besieges a town allied to Rome, the brothers lift their siege and march to meet him.
Sources
- Polybius, Histories, book 3, 76 and 95 to 96.
- Livy, History of Rome, books 21 to 23.
- Dexter Hoyos, Mastering the West (2015).
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