Cannae, Rome. 216 BC.Hannibal annihilates Rome's last remaining army. 80,000 Roman soldiers along with Consul Lucius Aemilius Paullus, and a third of the Governing Senate body are killed in a single day.Twenty Percent of Rome's men were killed over the course of two years leading up to Cannae in a series of devastating defeats.Hannibal is on the doorstep of Rome, and there's nobody left to oppose him. By all objective metrics, he has won.Hannibal sends terms to Rome, hoping to avoid further bloodshed in a negotiated surrender.Rome refused. Through manly determination, thoughtful reform, and pure grit, Rome pushed on. The idea of surrender was banned, talk of peace was made illegal, mourning was limited by law to only 30 days, traditions are strictly adhered to, new legions are raised, depleted ones are replenished, and tactical changes are made to make the remaining army more efficient. Over the course of Fourteen Years of pure hell, and entire provinces of Southern Italy siding with the invaders, Rome fought a desperate war of attrition against Hannibal and Carthage. In the end, they were victorious.Never black pill. It's not over until it's over.CARTHAGO DELENDA EST!IVDEA DELENDA EST!
>>539975383
>last remaining armyThey got 8 new legions every year
>It's not over until it's over.protip: it's never overtime doesn't stop
>>539975383Cato the elder sends his regards to all the jewish bitches
>>539975466Buy the ticketTake the ride
>>539975383>In the end, they were victoriousYou left out the part where Hannibal did not press on and wipe them out when he could have. Either he didn't know how bad it was there or he wanted a surrender, but his inaction is why they survived. Caesar had a similar opportunity with Pompey not finishing him off.
>>539975383Carthagians, Phoenicians (Canaanites), Sea peoples, Jews. It's always the same people causing problems.
>>539975383i dont buy that shit about him crossing the alps on elephants. seems like made up bullshit.
Equality.Freedom.Peace.WHO IS IT THAT USES THESE WORDS BUT GREEKS AND JEWS AND SLAVES?
>Twenty Percent of Rome's men were killed over the course of two years leading up to Cannae in a series of devastating defeats.the 20% figure includes Cannae, in fact some historians say that it was 20% at Cannae alone. for reference Germans lost about 30-35% in ww2Hot take but i dont think Cannae was a triumph of Hannibals genius as much as it was a major blunder of the Consuls who were in charge of the roman army. One of the core fundamentals of formation warfare is that a formation organizes your fighters so that they have enough space to allow themselves to fight. Typically you would want an entire arms length between you and the person in front of you so that they have enough room to pull back their arm for a stab or to take a step backwards for a dodge, and to be spaced out enough for extra roo mto fight and only just close enough to be able to lock shields. One of the deadliest and most horrifying things that could happen in ancient warfare was a break down of formation in a way in which your fighters no longer had enough room to fight and would start tripping over each other and develop into what is known as a "crowd crush". This is what happened at Cannae. The Consules in charge threw traditional formation strategy aside and told the romans to get into as tight a formation as possible in the centre, the result being that when things became hectic, there was no room to give and soldiers could not fight back efficiently.
>>539975643its a little different than Caesar and Pompey because the situation with Pompey was that he won the siege battle and didnt chase Caesar. Where as Hannibal didnt bother Sieging Rome because he didnt think he would need to and he focused on harassing the Roman country side where all the food was grown and trade routes ran through.Also Pompey was actually really smart and a good strategist and he didnt need to chase Caesar to win, he was playing it safe and smart and his biggest mistake was to accept a fight in order to get it over with because he thought he had already won as he had drained Caesars logistics and outmanoeuvred his army to the point he was starving them out anyways. Ironically this is sort of what the Romans started doing to hannibal, they started to refuse to fight him and just shadowed him and harassed his logistics and threated to attack them in the back if they sieges a city, they effectivelky neutered the effectiveness of their army by refusing to fight it in a straight up battle.
>>539975383that's still the most lethal 24 hour period of combat/war fatalities in human history. Nothing in ww1 or ww2 out did it. And it was melee combat....
