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enemy and warmonger because Hannibal was said to have left Africa immediately after
the battle at Zama, sailing east to join King Antiochus:
Sunt qui Hannibalem ex acie ad mare pervenisse inde praeparata nave
ad regem Antiochum extemplo profectum tradant, postulantique ante
omnia Scipioni ut Hannibal sibi traderetur responsum esse
Hannibalem in Africa non esse.
Livy, 30.37.13
There are some who relate that Hannibal, on leaving the battle made
his way to the sea and sailed at once on a ship prepared for him to
King Antiochus, so when Scipio demanded above all things that
Hannibal be surrendered to him, the reply was that Hannibal was not
in Africa.
Adapted from Moore, 1955, 509.
It may almost be regarded as a passing remark but it foreshadows Hannibal‟s future in
Livy‟s next decad. Livy leaves the development of the Roman desire to capture
Hannibal until the following decad.
Appian and Cornelius Nepos paint somewhat different pictures of Hannibal in the
aftermath of Zama to the portraits found in Polybius and Livy. They agree insofar as
Hannibal escaped from the battlefield and reached Hadrumentum (Appian says that
Hannibal stopped at Thon (an unidentified location), but left under cover of darkness
because he was afraid that the Bruttians he encountered there would surrender him to
Scipio: Appian, Pun. 8.47). In these texts Hannibal does not consider his defeat as final
and takes no part in the immediate peace negotiations; it is others who negotiate peace
with Scipio. Instead Hannibal rallies the survivors, recruits additional men and makes
preparations to continue the war (Appian, Pun. 8.47; Cornelius Nepos, Hannibal, 6.4).
Appian, Pun. 8.55, puts the number mustered at 6,000 whereas Nepos writes only that
Hannibal rallied as a large number within a few days.
Appian returns his readers to the unrest at Carthage; some people were angry at those
who sent provisions to the Romans in a time of great food shortage and threaten to burn
their houses in retaliation. Hannibal was summoned and, apparently surprised them by
urging them to accept the peace terms (Appian, Pun. 8.55). As Appian presents it, not
everyone at Carthage looked forward to the prospect of Roman domination with
enthusiasm.
The mixed feelings at Carthage may underlie Nepos‟ representation of Hannibal
continuing to rally men while others negotiate the peace terms. In Nepos‟ biography, the
Carthaginians, despite making peace, neither stop Hannibal‟s activities nor recall him:
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