SLC Thesis Template - ResearchSpace@Auckland - The University ...

community to resist Hannibal who eventually withdraws from outside their city. In
reality of course the two situations were quite different.
Livy‟s placement of the item about the Capuans voting to contact Hannibal after
Hannibal has already turned toward Capua from Neapolis allows for the possibility that
they surrendered out of fear. 334 Livy also separates further information that would
otherwise add to the sense of the physical and psychological threat facing the Capuans.
The reference to Hannibal‟s camp 335 on Mt Tifata which overlooks the town is not
mentioned until 36 chapters after the story of the Capuan surrender (Livy, 23.36.1; see
Figure 6). This separation also removes a distinct parallel between the Capuan surrender
to Hannibal and their original surrender to Rome, recorded in Livy‟s first decad which
took place when the Samnites were threatening and attacking the city from their camp
on Mt Tifata (Livy, 7.29). 336 Similarly the intention to separate the two events may also
explain Livy‟s decision to use se tradidisse in relation to Hannibal, not se dedere as in
the earlier Capuan deditio to Rome (7.30.1).
The pro-Roman voices of dissent at Capua are represented by Magius Decius, a
senator, and the young son of the leading senator, Pacuvius Calavius (Livy, 23.6.1-6;
23.7.1-2). 337 Livy develops a sense of pathos around these two figures, discussed below,
as the son reluctantly obeys his father and Magius Decius will be punished by Hannibal.
The moral degeneracy of the Capuans is illustrated by their method of showing support
for Hannibal as he approaches the town. The Roman prefect 338 and other Roman citizens
are seized and murdered through suffocation in the baths:
nam praefectos socium civisque Romanos alios partim aliquo militiae
munere occupatos partim privatis negotiis inplicitos plebs repente
omnis conprehenos velut custodiae causa balneis includi iussit ubi
fervore atque aestu anima interclusa foedum in modum exspirarent.
Livy, 23.7.3
334 Zonaras writes that the people wanted to defect from Rome but not the nobility; the two groups
became reconciled with one another and made peace with Hannibal (Zonaras, 9, 2). Diodorus writes that
the Capuans reached a unanimous decision out of fear of Hannibal (Diodorus, 36.10.1).
335 There is an interesting correlation between Livy and an area labelled on the medieval Peutinga map as
Hannibal‟s camp, Aniba castra, on Mt Tifata. Zonaras 9.2 describes Hannibal seizing a Samnite fortress
on entering Campania after Cannae; its location is unspecified. Cf. Livy, 7.29.
336 The Capuans sought amicitiam in perpetuum with Rome because their army, weakened by excessive
luxury and effeminacy, could not defend the town against the Samnites (Livy, 7.30.1). Capua‟s reputation
as an unhealthy place for military discipline is reinforced soon after when a Roman garrison installed
there turned to luxury and becomes mutinous (Livy, 7.32-7).
337 Lancel, 1998, 114 describes Pacuvius as a „political genius.‟ In my view, Livy presents Pacuvius as a
man of dubious, manipulative characteristics (Livy, 23.3).
338 Whether there was a Roman military presence at Capua or whether this person was there to levy troops
is not known.
141