merely Roman history. However, I think that the Celts, passing over the Pyrenees at some former time, mingled with the natives, and that the name Celtiberia originated in that way. I think also that from an early time the Phoenicians frequented Spain for purposes of trade, and occupied certain places there. In like manner the Greeks visited Tartessus and its king Arganthonius,' and some of them settled in Spain; for the kingdom of Arganthonius was in Spain. It is my opinion that Tartessus was then the city on the seashore which is now called Carpessus. I think also that the Phoenicians built the temple of Hercules which stands at the straits. The religious rites performed there are still of Phoenician type, and the god is considered by the worshippers the Tyrian, not the Theban, Hercules. But I will leave these matters to the antiquaries. 3. This fruitful land, abounding in all good things, the Carthaginians began to exploit before the Romans. A part of it they occupied and another part they plundered, until the Romans expelled them from the part they held, and immediately occupied it themselves. The remainder the Romans acquired with much toil, extending over a long period of time, and in spite of frequent revolts they eventually subdued it and divided it into three parts and appointed a prætor over each. How they subdued each one, and how they contended with the Carthaginians for the possession of them, and afterwards with the Iberians and Celtiberians, this book will show, the first part containing matters relating to the Carthaginians, since it was necessary for me to introduce their relations with Spain in my Spanish history. For the same reason the doings of the Romans and Carthaginians in respect to Sicily from the beginning of the Roman invasion and rule of that island are embraced in the Sicilian history. 1 Herodotus (i. 163) mentions the visit of the Phocæans (who were driven from their own country by Harpagus, the Persian general) to Tartessus and its king Arganthonius. Strabo (iii. 2, 11-14) mentions both, and quotes from Anacreon concerning the king, who is said to have "reigned over Tartessus 150 years." Herodotus says that he reigned 80 years and lived to be 120. Several other ancient authors mention Arganthonius, but all seem to rely upon Herodotus and Anacreon. VOL. I-E Y.R. B.C. 4. The first external war waged by the Romans against the Carthaginians in reference to Sicily was waged in Sicily itself. In like manner the first one concerning Spain was waged in Spain, although in the course of it the combatants sent large forces into, and devastated, both Italy and Africa. 536 This war began about the 140th Olympiad by the infraction 218 of a treaty which had been made at the end of the Sicilian war. The infraction came about in this way. Hamilcar, surnamed Barca, while commanding the Carthaginian forces. in Sicily, had promised large rewards to his Celtic mercenaries and African allies, which they demanded after he returned to Africa; and thereupon the African war was kindled. In this war the Carthaginians suffered severely at the hands of the Africans, and they ceded Sardinia to the Romans as compensation for injuries they had inflicted upon Roman merchants during this war. When Hamilcar was brought to trial for these things by his enemies, who held him to blame for such serious calamities to the country, he secured the favor of the chief men in the state (of whom the most popular was Hasdrubal, who had married Barca's daughter), by which means he escaped punishment; and as a disturbance with the Numidians broke out about this time, he secured the command of the Carthaginian forces in conjunction with Hanno the Great, although he had not yet rendered an account of his former generalship. 516 5. At the end of this war, Hanno was recalled to answer 238 certain charges against him in Carthage, and Hamilcar was left in sole command of the army. He associated his sonin-law Hasdrubal with him, crossed the straits to Gades and began to plunder the territory of the Spaniards, although they had done him no wrong. Thus he made for himself an occasion for being away from home, and also for performing exploits and acquiring popularity. For whatever property he took he divided, giving one part to the soldiers, to stimulate their zeal for future plundering with him. Another part he sent to the treasury of Carthage, and a third he distributed to the chiefs of his own faction there. This 525 continued until certain Spanish kings and other chieftains 229 gradually united and put him to death in the following manner. They loaded a lot of wagons with wood and drove them in advance with oxen, they following behind Y.R. BC. 525 prepared for battle. When the Africans saw this they fell 229 to laughing, not perceiving the stratagem. When they came to close quarters the Spaniards set fire to the wagons and drove the oxen against the enemy. The fire, being carried in every direction by the fleeing oxen, threw the Africans into confusion. Their ranks being thus broken the Spaniards dashed among them and killed Hamilcar himself and a great many others who came to his aid. CHAPTER II Hasdrubal succeeds Hamilcar - Rise of Hannibal- He attacks 6. The Carthaginians, enjoying the gains they had received from Spain, sent another army thither and appointed Hasdrubal, the son-in-law of Hamilcar, who was still in Spain, commander of all their forces there. He had with him in Spain Hannibal, the son of Hamilcar and brother of his own wife, a young man zealous in war, beloved by the army, and who soon after became famous for his military exploits. Him he appointed lieutenant-general. Hasdrubal brought many Spanish tribes to his support by persuasion, for he was attractive in personal intercourse, and where force was needed he made use of the young man. In this way he pushed forward from the Western ocean to the interior as far as the river Iberus (Ebro), which divides Spain about in the centre, and at a distance of about five days' journey from the Pyrenees flows down to the Northern ocean.1 7. The Saguntines, a colony of the island of Zacynthus, who lived about midway between the Pyrenees and the river Iberus, and other Greeks who dwelt in the neighborhood of Emporia and other Spanish towns, having apprehensions for their safety, sent ambassadors to Rome. The Senate, who were unwilling to see the Carthaginian power augmented, sent an embassy to Carthage. It was agreed 1 Another blunder in geography. The Ebro empties into the Medi terranean. 2 Another mistake. Saguntum was situated a long distance southwest of the Ebro. Y.R. 525 534 B.C. between them that the limit of the Carthaginian power in 229 Spain should be the river Iberus; that beyond that river the Romans should not carry war against the subjects of Carthage, nor should the Carthaginians cross it for a similar purpose; and that the Saguntines and the other Greeks in Spain should remain free and autonomous. So these agreements were added to the treaties between Rome and Carthage. 8. Some time later, while Hasdrubal was governing that 220 part of Spain belonging to Carthage, a slave whose master he had cruelly put to death killed him secretly in a hunting expedition. Hannibal convicted him of this crime and put him to death with dreadful tortures. Now the army proclaimed Hannibal, although still very young, yet greatly beloved by the soldiers, their general, and the Carthaginian Senate confirmed the appointment. Those of the opposite faction, who had feared the power of Hamilcar and Hasdrubal, when they learned of their death, despised Hannibal on account of his youth and prosecuted their friends and partisans with the old charges. The people took sides with the accusers, bearing a grudge against those now prosecuted, because they remembered the old severities of the times of Hamilcar and Hasdrubal, and ordered them to turn into the public treasury the large gifts that Hamilcar and Hasdrubal had bestowed upon them, as being enemy's spoils. The prosecuted parties sent messengers to Hannibal asking him to assist them, and admonished him that, if he should neglect those who were able to assist him at home, he would be thoroughly despised by his father's enemies. 9. He had foreseen all this and he knew that the persecution of his friends was the beginning of a plot against himself. He determined that he would not endure this enmity as a perpetual menace, as his father and brother-in-law had done, nor put up forever with the fickleness of the Carthaginians, who usually repaid benefits with ingratitude. It was said also that when he was a boy he had taken an oath upon the altar, at his father's instance, that when he should arrive at man's estate he would be the implacable enemy of Rome. For these reasons he thought that, if he could involve his country in arduous and protracted undertakings and plunge it into doubts and fears, he would place his own Y.R. B.C 534 affairs and those of his friends in a secure position. He 220 beheld Africa, however, and the subject parts of Spain in peace. But if he could stir up a war with Rome, which he strongly desired, he thought that the Carthaginians would have enough to think about and to be afraid of, and that if he should be successful, he would reap immortal glory by gaining for his country the government of the habitable world (for when the Romans were conquered there would be no other rivals), and if he should fail, the attempt itself would bring him great renown. 535 10. Conceiving that if he should cross the Iberus that would constitute a brilliant beginning, he suborned the Turbuletes, neighbors of the Saguntines, that they should complain to him that the latter were overrunning their country and doing them many other wrongs. They made this complaint. Then Hannibal sent their ambassadors to Carthage, and wrote private letters saying that the Romans were inciting Carthaginian Spain to revolt, and that the Saguntines were coöperating with the Romans for this purpose. Nor did he desist from this deception, but kept sending messages of this kind until the Carthaginian Senate authorized him to deal with the Saguntines as he saw fit. Since he had a pretext, he arranged that the Turbuletes should come again to make complaints against the Saguntines, and that the latter should send legates also. When Hannibal commanded them to explain their differences to him, they replied that they should refer the matter to Rome. Hannibal thereupon ordered them out of his camp, and the next night crossed the Iberus with his whole army, laid waste the Saguntine territory, and planted engines against their city. Not being able to take it, he surrounded it with a wall and ditch, stationed plenty of guards, and pushed the siege at intervals. 11. The Saguntines, oppressed by this sudden and unheralded attack, sent an embassy to Rome. The Senate commissioned its own ambassadors to go with them. They were instructed first to remind Hannibal of the agreement, and if he should not obey to proceed to Carthage and complain against him. When they arrived in Spain and were approaching his camp from the sea, Hannibal forbade their coming. Accordingly they sailed for Carthage with the Saguntine ambassadors, and reminded the Carthaginians of 219 |