04-26-2010, 01:59 AM
The Second Punic War is sometimes called "the Hannibalic War" or the "War Against Hannibal," and Polybius frames the entire conflict as a sort of personal vendetta by the Barca family against Rome:
"The first cause, we must recognize, was the anger of Hamilcar, surnamed Barca, the father of Hannibal." (Histories, 3.9.8)
But let's say, hypothetically, that Hamilcar Barca died in a random accident before his sons were born. Would some other Carthaginian general have invaded Italy with a large army?
Were Carthage's people and Rome's people so bitter toward each other that a final conflict was inevitable? Were the Barcas merely riding the crest of a historical wave, so to speak, or did they really start a war that could have been avoided?
I always wondered how the Barca family could rouse, e.g., a bunch of Numidian and Iberian tribesmen who seemingly had little reason to hate Rome, and use them to form the core of an army that campaigned in Italy for over a decade. Maybe these peoples actually had some reason to hate or fear Rome, and just by chance Hamilcar and his sons happened to be the ones who came along and tapped this latent energy?
For a long time I thought that maybe the Barcas were just excellent motivators. But I've been reading Tolstoy's War & Peace, and this passage got me thinking about this:
One could argue, for example, that "the sum of human volitions" produced Alexander's conquest of Persia, as the conflict was framed as a campaign of revenge for the Greco-Persian wars. A lot of Greeks at the time were amenable to the idea of conquering Persia, and Alexander was able to harness that energy.
But during the Second Punic War, it seems like the Carthaginian government's support for Hannibal was only lukewarm. Maybe he really was just a renegade who managed to rouse a large group of loyal supporters, while the general sentiment in North Africa and Iberia wasn't overwhelmingly anti-Roman?
Then again, we don't have any Carthaginian historians to help us gauge the prevailing sentiment of the time from their perspective, so maybe these questions can't be answered.
"The first cause, we must recognize, was the anger of Hamilcar, surnamed Barca, the father of Hannibal." (Histories, 3.9.8)
But let's say, hypothetically, that Hamilcar Barca died in a random accident before his sons were born. Would some other Carthaginian general have invaded Italy with a large army?
Were Carthage's people and Rome's people so bitter toward each other that a final conflict was inevitable? Were the Barcas merely riding the crest of a historical wave, so to speak, or did they really start a war that could have been avoided?
I always wondered how the Barca family could rouse, e.g., a bunch of Numidian and Iberian tribesmen who seemingly had little reason to hate Rome, and use them to form the core of an army that campaigned in Italy for over a decade. Maybe these peoples actually had some reason to hate or fear Rome, and just by chance Hamilcar and his sons happened to be the ones who came along and tapped this latent energy?
For a long time I thought that maybe the Barcas were just excellent motivators. But I've been reading Tolstoy's War & Peace, and this passage got me thinking about this:
Quote:History studies the deeds of a single man, a tsar, a colonel, as representing the sum of men's volitions, when in reality the sum of men's volitions is never expressed in the activities of any one historical personage.
... The first fifteen years of the nineteenth century in Europe exhibit an extraordinary movement of millions of men. Men abandon their ordinary vocations, rush from one end of Europe to the other, rob, slaughter one another; they are filled with triumph and with despair, and the whole course of their lives is for a number of years changed, and undergoes a powerful movement, which at first goes on increasing and then slackens.
"What is the cause of this movement, or by what laws did it take place?" asks the human mind.
The historians, replying to this question, bring to our notice certain acts and speeches of certain dozens of men, in one of the buildings of the city of Paris, and call these acts and speeches "the Revolution"; then they give a circumstantial account of Napoleon, and of certain sympathizers and enemies of his, tell about the influence which certain of these individuals had upon the others, and they say :
" This was the cause of this movement, and here are its laws."
But the human mind not only refuses to put credence in this explanation, but declares, up and down, that this manner of explanation is fallacious, for the reason that, according to it, a feeble phenomenon is taken as the cause of a mighty one. The sum of human volitions produced both the Revolution and Napoleon, and only the sum of these volitions sustained them and destroyed them.
One could argue, for example, that "the sum of human volitions" produced Alexander's conquest of Persia, as the conflict was framed as a campaign of revenge for the Greco-Persian wars. A lot of Greeks at the time were amenable to the idea of conquering Persia, and Alexander was able to harness that energy.
But during the Second Punic War, it seems like the Carthaginian government's support for Hannibal was only lukewarm. Maybe he really was just a renegade who managed to rouse a large group of loyal supporters, while the general sentiment in North Africa and Iberia wasn't overwhelmingly anti-Roman?
Then again, we don't have any Carthaginian historians to help us gauge the prevailing sentiment of the time from their perspective, so maybe these questions can't be answered.