Scipio Africanus by B.h. Liddell Hart

Author:B.h. Liddell Hart
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Da Capo Press
Published: 2011-05-08T16:00:00+00:00

Following up Syphax, Lælius and Masinissa arrived in Massylia (Masinissa’s hereditary kingdom from which he had been driven) after a fifteen days’ march, and there expelled the garrisons left by Syphax. The latter had fallen back farther east to his own dominions, Massæsylia—modern Algeria,—and there, spurred on by his wife, raised a fresh force from the abundant resources of his kingdom. He proceeded to organise them on the Roman model, imagining, like so many military copyists in history, that imitation of externals gave him the secret of the Roman success. His force was large enough—as large, in fact, as his original strength,—but it was utterly raw and undisciplined. With this he advanced to meet Lælius and Masinissa. At the first encounter between the opposing cavalry, numerical superiority told, but the advantage was lost when the Roman infantry reinforced the intervals of their cavalry, and before long the raw troops broke and fled. The victory was essentially one due to superior training and discipline, and not to any subtle manoeuvre such as appears in all Scipio’s battles. This is worth note in view of the fact that some historians lose no opportunity of hinting that Scipio’s success was due more to his able lieutenants than to himself.

Syphax, seeing his force crumbling, sought to shame his men into resistance by riding forward and exposing himself to danger. In this gallant attempt he was unhorsed, made prisoner, and dragged into the presence of Lælius. As Livy remarks, this was“ a spectacle calculated to afford peculiar satisfaction to Masinissa.” The latter showed fine military spirit as well as judgment after the battle, when he declared to Lælius that, much as he would like to visit his regained kingdom, “it was not proper in prosperity any more than in adversity to lose time.” He therefore asked permission to push on with the cavalry to Cirta, Syphax’s capital, while Lælius followed with the infantry. Having won Lælius’s assent, Masinissa advanced, taking Syphax with him. On arrival in front of Cirta, he summoned the principal inhabitants to appear, but they refused until he showed them Syphax in chains, whereupon the faint-hearted threw open the gates. Masinissa, posting guards, galloped off to seize the palace, and was met by Sophonisba. This woman, almost as famous as Helen or Cleopatra for her beauty and for her disastrous influence, made such a clever appeal to his pride, his pity, and his passion, that she not only won his pledge not to hand her over to the Romans, but“ as the Numidians are an excessively amorous race, he became the slave of his captive.” When she had withdrawn, and he had to face the problem of how to reconcile his duty with his pledge, his passion suggested to him a loophole—to marry her himself that very day. When Lælius came up he was so annoyed that at first he was on the point of having her dragged from the marriage-bed and sent with the other captives to the Utica camp, but afterwards relented, agreeing to leave the decision to Scipio.

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