First battle of Beneventum
Coordinates: 41 ° 7 ′ 52 ″ N , 14 ° 46 ′ 41 ″ E
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Location of Beneventum on an old map
| date | 214 BC Chr. |
|---|---|
| place | Beneventum, today Benevento |
| output | decisive Roman victory |
| Parties to the conflict | |
|---|---|
| Commander | |
| Troop strength | |
| approx. 18,000 soldiers, including approx. 8,000 Volones | approx.17,000 infantrymen, 1,200 horsemen |
| losses | |
|
4,000 dead |
more than 16,000 dead |
Saguntum - Lilybaeum II - Rhone - Ticinus - Trebia - Cissa - Lake Trasimeno - Ager Falernus - Geronium - Cannae - Nola I - Nola II - Ibera - Cornus - Nola III - Beneventum I - Syracuse - Tarentum I - Capua I - Beneventum II - Silarus - Herdonia I - Upper Baetis - Capua II - Herdonia II - Numistro - Asculum - Tarentum II - New Carthage - Baecula - Grumentum - Metaurus - Ilipa - Crotona - Large fields - Cirta - Zama
The Battle of Beneventum was in the Second Punic War , a 214 v. Chr. Material discharged battle between an army of slaves under Tiberius Gracchus on the Roman side and Hanno on Carthaginian side.
prehistory
While Hannibal 214 BC BC besieged the city of Nola in Campania , he waited for Hanno to bring reinforcements to him. Hanno marched with allegedly 17,000 infantrymen and 1,200 African cavalrymen, mainly from Bruttium , against Beneventum , which, however, could be occupied by the consul of the previous year, Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus. So Hanno set up camp on the Caloris River three miles from Beneventum. Thereupon Gracchus went against the Carthaginians and established his base about a mile from the camp of Hannos. The Roman army was largely made up of slaves. Gracchus promised freedom to anyone who brought the head of a Carthaginian enemy from the battlefield.
The battle
The Roman historian Titus Livius depicts the battle between the Romans and the Carthaginians in great detail and in great detail. After that, the battle developed very slowly and was initially undecided. The slaves who served as volunteers ( volones ) in the Roman army would have fought less than they would have occupied themselves with cutting off the heads of killed enemies in order to gain their freedom. Gracchus then issued the slogan that they had already shown enough courage to be released and that they should now concentrate exclusively on attacking their opponents. The fight was then fiercer, but there was still a stalemate. After all, Gracchus announced that none of his men would gain freedom if they did not defeat the enemy. These words are said to have inspired the slaves so much that they fought more resolutely, broke enemy resistance and finally stormed the Carthaginian camp. Only 2000 enemies, mainly horsemen, escaped together with their commander Hanno. In any case, the fact is that the Romans achieved a clear victory and the victorious slaves were granted the freedom promised to them.
reception
In modern research, the course of the battle, dramatically described by Livy, is seen as a rhetorically exaggerated embellishment of the actual events. In particular, the condition for a release, namely the showing of a severed head, which the general presented to the unfree soldiers, is assumed to be improbable or even absurd. It is also assumed that the 8,000 slaves were a partial contingent and not the majority of the troops involved in the fight.
annotation
- ↑ Karl-Wilhelm Welwei : Unfree in ancient military service . Steiner et al., Wiesbaden et al. 1974–1988 (also: Bochum, University, habilitation thesis, 1970/1971); Volume 3: Rome (= research on ancient slavery. Vol. 21). 1988, ISBN 3-515-05206-2 , The so-called volones , pp. 5-18.
See also
swell
- Titus Livius , Ab urbe condita 24, 14, 1 - 16, 9
- Zonaras 9, 4