206 BC
The pursuit, and Iberia lost
That night, as his Iberian allies desert, Hasdrubal slips out of the camp and makes for the ocean. Scipio pursues with the cavalry in front and the legions behind and catches the column on the march. Hasdrubal reaches a hilltop without water with 6,000 men. He and Mago escape to Gades, and the men left on the hill surrender soon after.
Santiponce near Seville, the site of Italica, with the monastery of San Isidoro del Campo, engraving from Impressions of Spain in 1866Wikimedia Commons, Internet Archive Book Images, No restrictions (Impressions of Spain in 1866 (1867) (14743237326).jpg)
Hasdrubal Gisco sails to Africa, to the court of Syphax, and Mago to the Balearic Islands, from where he later lands in Liguria. Gades goes over to Rome, and Masinissa, who led Carthage’s Numidian cavalry in Iberia, changes sides. Scipio settles his wounded at Italica near Ilipa, returns to Rome and is elected consul for 205 BC.
Sources
- Polybius, Histories, book 11, 24.
- Livy, History of Rome, book 28, 15 to 16.
- Appian, The Wars in Spain, 38.
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