WAR ELEPHANTS OF THE ROMANS AND CARTHAGINIANS.
The war elephant was a feature of the armies of the Orient many years
before it was known in Italy. We have seen that the huge animal was
especially effective in spreading terror among the opposing hosts, from
its gigantic size and peculiar form: and nations that had never heard
of, nor seen, an elephant, were so demoralized at the sight, that they
often fled without giving battle; their horses and other animals, equally
alarmed, completing the rout and confusion. The Romans were no exception
to this; and, with all their valor and courage, they quailed before the
astonishing array of monsters—for so they considered them—that King
Pyrrhus of Epirus brought upon the field in the reign of Heraclear (280
B.C.). His elephant detachment was a small one, being composed of twenty
animals, which bore upon their backs tall wooden towers filled with armed
bowmen. The Romans soon rallied, however; but their defeat, according
to Floras, was directly due to the terror inspired by the elephants.
When Fabricus went to Epirus to negotiate with Pyrrhus for an exchange
of prisoners, the latter endeavored to bribe him, and then to frighten
him, by producing one of the largest of his elephants. But the old Roman
replied on leaving, “Neither your gold yesterday, nor your beast to-day,
has made any impression upon me.”
Four years later the Romans had become perfectly familiar with elephant
warfare; and Curius Dentalus organized his men especially to demoralize
the elephants, ordering them to attack the animals with burning torches
in one hand, and sharp swords in the other. This plan was successful,
and was aided by an unforeseen accident. An elephant calf accompanied
its mother upon the field of battle; and, becoming wounded early in the
fight, its roars so enraged its mother, and demoralized the others, that
they charged, and threw the troops of Pyrrhus into complete disorder.
They were finally captured by the Romans, and four led in triumph to
Rome,—the first ever taken there.
To show what vague notions of the elephant the Romans had, they called
the great creatures Lucanian oxen; and, according to Pliny, the Roman
writers, in general, gave them this name, probably because they first saw
them in Lucania.
King Pyrrhus was extremely unfortunate in the management of his
elephants. At the siege of Argos, when his men had battered in the gates
of the town, the mahouts lost control of the beasts in the excitement,
and they attempted to rush through the low gates; but the tall towers
struck them, and forced them back in great disorder, and many of
their own soldiers and masters were trampled under foot, and killed.
In describing this event, Plutarch relates that one of the elephants
exhibited remarkable courage and affection for its rider; keeping a large
number of enemies at bay when its master was dismounted, finally taking
him in its trunk, and removing him to a place of safety. The animal
doubtless received some instruction from its master.
The old writers were fond of accrediting to the elephant many more
virtues, courage, generosity, and self-sacrifice, than they seem to
possess to-day; and, undoubtedly, they often gave the animals credit for
spontaneous actions, when they were really obeying a command of their
mahout, or driver. I have referred particularly to this and the opinions
of Sanderson in the chapter devoted to the intelligence of the elephant.
Plutarch and Ælian both record the story of an elephant of Porus that
drew darts from its master’s body. Such may have been the case; but I
think, if true, it was at the direct order of Porus, and not actuated by
compassion, as the old authors would have us believe.
It was fortunate that the Romans had acquired some experience with
Asiatic elephants, as, soon after, they became involved in a series of
wars in which the enemy employed large numbers of African elephants.
Their familiarity with the Asiatic elephants did not always avail them.
In the first Punic war, Regulus, the Roman consul, the Buonaparte of his
time, captured a division of eighteen elephants in the battle of Adis;
but on another occasion, Xantippus, the Lacedemonian, the general of the
Carthaginian troops, used his elephant batteries, as we may call them,
so judiciously, and with such marked skill, that the Romans were utterly
routed. The elephants, under direction of their enraged riders, and
infuriated themselves by their wounds, charged into the fleeing Romans,
trampling them under foot, tossing them high in air, and goring them with
their tusks; committing such frightful carnage, that for a long time the
Romans dreaded to meet them.
The Carthaginians not only fought with elephants on their own soil, but
they carried them into Sicily. At the siege of Panormus (Palermo), they
employed one hundred and forty African elephants in a solid phalanx, a
most impressive sight, and moved upon the city. But the Romans fired at
them with darts from the city-walls, and turned the huge animals upon
their own men. Then taking advantage of the confusion, Metellus, the
Roman consul, who was in command, led his troops upon the Carthaginians,
and utterly routed them, and captured one hundred or more of their finest
war elephants.
Such a victory offered a rare opportunity to Metellus to exhibit his
prowess and the spoils to his countrymen: so he commanded that an immense
raft be built, composed of empty barrels covered with planks, and in
turn packed with earth; and upon this the elephants were floated over
the straits to Rhegium (Reggio). For some time the Romans kept the noble
creatures on exhibition, and treated them with great indignity, driving
them about the circus with blunted spears; all of which was undoubtedly
done to convince the people that the elephant was not the terrible beast
he had been pictured, and to erase from the public mind the terror they
had inspired when Regulus was defeated. Again, it was the custom to
parade captive kings before the populace in chains, and treat them with
great indignity; and the elephants probably came under this head. When
the Roman citizens were surfeited with the display, it occurred to the
state that a herd of animals that could devour seventy-two thousand
pounds of green food in twenty-four hours was a great luxury; and in
a moment of economy, according to Verrius, who is cited by Pliny, the
unfortunate captives were killed.
That the Romans overcame their fear of elephants did not prevent the
Carthaginians from retaining them as an important branch of the service.
Hannibal carried them into Spain; and after the capture of Saguntum (218
B.C.), we hear of him sending to Africa for a new supply.
In the second Punic war, which commenced about this time, Hannibal began
operations on Roman soil with an army of fifteen thousand men, and,
according to Appian and Eutropius, thirty-seven elephants. He crossed the
Pyrenees, and the Rhone at Orange. Livy, Silius Italicus, and Polybius,
all describe some of the events of this campaign; but that of the latter
is the most comprehensive and valuable, giving, evidently, a correct
account of the management of war elephants at this time. The Greek
historian says,—
“Hannibal having posted his cavalry as a reserve on the side towards the
sea, commanded the infantry to begin their march, while himself waited
to receive the elephants, and the men that were left with them on the
other side of the river. The passage of the elephants was performed in
the following manner: When they had made a sufficient number of floats,
they joined two together, and fastened them strongly to the ground, upon
the bank of the river. The breadth of both together was about fifty feet.
To the extremity of these they fixed two more, which were extended over
into the water; and to prevent the whole from being loosened and carried
down the river by the rapidity of the current, they secured the side that
was turned against the stream, by strong cables, fastened to the trees
along the bank. Having in this manner finished a kind of bridge, which
was extended to the length of about two hundred feet, they then added to
it two other floats of a much larger size, which were very firmly joined
together, but were fastened in so slight a manner to the rest, that
they might at any time be separated from them with little difficulty.
A great number of floats were fixed to these last floats, by the help
of which, the boats that were designed to tow them over might hold them
firm against the violence of the stream, and carry them in safety with
the elephants to the other side. They then spread a quantity of earth
over all the floats, that their color and appearance might, as nearly as
was possible, resemble the ground on shore. The elephants were usually
very tractable upon land, and easy to be governed by their conductors,
but were at all times under the greatest apprehensions whenever they
approached the water. Upon this occasion, therefore, they took two
female elephants, and led them first along the floats; the rest readily
followed; but no sooner were they arrived upon the farthest floats, than,
the ropes being cut which bound them to the rest, they were immediately
towed away by the boats towards the other side. The elephants were
seized with extreme dread, and moved from side to side in great fury and
disorder. But when they saw that they were every way surrounded by the
water, their very fears at last constrained them to remain quiet in their
place. In this manner, two other floats being from time to time prepared
and fitted to the rest, the greater part of the elephants were carried
safely over. There were some, indeed, that were so much disordered by
their fears, that they threw themselves into the river in the midst of
their passage. This accident was fatal to the conductors, who perished in
the stream: but the beasts themselves, exerting all their strength, and
raising their large trunks above the surface of the river, were by that
means enabled not only to breathe freely, but to discharge the waters
also, as fast as they received them; and having, by long struggling,
surmounted likewise the rapidity of the stream, they at last all gained
the opposite bank in safety.”
Hannibal’s march along the bank of the Isère, in his approach to the
famous pass of the Little St. Bernard, was attended by many dangers. The
natives mounted the sides of the high passes, and hurled huge rocks and
bowlders down upon the elephants and men. But everywhere the strange
beasts produced the greatest terror; and, as they approached the Alps,
forces that had gathered to oppose them fled at the sight of them. The
march was accomplished in fifteen days, at an enormous loss, the passes
being strewn with men and beasts.
“Great was the tumult there,
Deafening the din, when, in barbaric pomp,
The Carthaginian, on his march to Rome,
Entered their fastnesses. Trampling the snows,
The war-horse reared, and the towered elephant
Upturned his trunk into the murky sky,
Then tumbled headlong, swallowed up and lost,
He and his rider.”
ROGERS’S _Italy_.
Many elephants were lost in the mountain passes, but enough were saved to
make a formidable appearance in the battles of Ticinus and Trebia. How
so many were taken over, considering the nature of the Alpine passes, is
somewhat astonishing; and it is stated by Livy, that in some places the
elephants of Macedon were delayed while special bridges were constructed
for them to cross. Hannibal, on the other hand, pushed through with the
energy that characterized all his movements; and the passage of his army
and elephants through the Alps is one of the most remarkable feats in
military history, ancient or modern.
Ancient history contains interesting accounts of the battles in which
the elephant took part. Livy says that the Gauls, who were the allies
of the Romans, fled before them. According to Appian, the Roman horse
were alarmed at the sight and smell of the strange animals; and Silius
Italicus gives the elephant of Hannibal full credit for all his
victories. The poet of the Punic war thus, in characteristic language,
describes a fight between an elephant and a Roman soldier:—
“For as
The towered elephants attempt to pass,
Into the flood with violence they fell
(As when a rock, torn from its native hill
By tempests, falls into the angry main);
And Trebia, afraid to entertain
Such monstrous bodies, flies before their beast,
Or shrinks beneath them, with their weight oppressed.
But as adversity man’s courage tries,
And fearless valor doth to honor rise
Through danger, stout Fibrenus doth disclaim
A death ignoble, or that wanted fame;
And cries, ‘My fate shall be observed, nor shall
Fortune beneath these waters hide my fall.
I’ll try if earth doth any living bear
Which the Ansonian sword and Tyrrhen spear
Cannot subdue and kill.’ With that, he pressed
His lance into the right eye of the beast,
That, with blind rage, the penetrating blow
Pursued; and tossing up his mangled brow,
Besmeared with reeking blood, with horrid cries
Turns round, and from his fallen master flies;
Then with their darts and frequent arrows all
Invade him, and now dare to hope his fall.
His immense shoulders and his sides appear
One wound entire; his dusky back doth bear
Innumerable shafts, that, like a wood,
Still waving as he moved, upon him stood;
Till, in so long a fight, their weapons all
Consumed, he fell, death hasting through his fall.”
_Silius Italicus_, by THOMAS ROSS.
After the battle of Trebia, the elephants were marched with the army,
over the Apennines; and Livy tells us that seven starved to death;
later, in passing the Arno, which was a raging torrent, numbers of men,
elephants, and horses were swept away, the only elephant left being the
one the great general himself rode.
Previous to this, in crossing the Po, Hannibal had arranged his elephants
in a long line across the shallow river, to break the force of the stream
by a living dam. Perdiccas did the same, in an unfortunate attempt to
cross the Nile near Memphis; but the waters of the Arno were too swift,
and, notwithstanding the fact that elephants are fine swimmers, they were
carried away and drowned. Hannibal was not cast down by his misfortune,
and immediately sent for a new supply of elephants from Carthage. At
the battle of Cannæ (216 B.C.),’the Roman forces attacked the elephants
with torches, and succeeded in firing the towers upon their backs. This
terrible scene is thus described by Silius Italicus:—
“The yet prevailing Roman, to withstand
The fury of these monsters, gives command
That burning torches, wheresoe’er they go,
Should be opposed, and sulph’rous flames to throw
Into their towers. This, with all speed, obeyed,
The elephants they suddenly invade;
Whose smoking backs with flames collected shined,
That, driven on by the tempestuous wind,
Through their high bulwarks fire devouring spread.
As when on Rhodope or Pindus’ head
A shepherd scatters fire, and through the groves
And woods, like an hot plague, it raging moves,
The leafy rocks are fired, and all the hills,
Leaping, now here, now there, bright Vulcan fills.
But when the burning sulphur once begun
To parch their skins, th’ unruly monsters run
Like mad, and drive the cohorts from their stand:
Neither durst any undertake at hand
To fight them; but their darts and javelins throw
At distance burning, they impatient grow,
And, through the heat of their vast bodies, here
And there, the flames increasing bear;
Till, by the smooth adjoining stream, at last
Deceived, themselves into it they headlong cast,
And with them all their flames, that still appear
’Bove the tall banks, till, both together, there
In the deep channel of the flood expire.”
_Silius Italicus_, by THOMAS ROSS.
It would seem that Hannibal was sometimes actuated by motives similar
to those of our Indians of the West, who, in former days, sometimes
offered to release prisoners of war, if they would defeat a number of
warriors in a struggle. After the battle just referred to, he offered
some Roman prisoners their liberty if they could conquer the elephants.
One of the Romans accepted the offer, and actually killed the elephant
single-handed. But Hannibal broke his word, perhaps fearing, that, if
such an instance was circulated among the Roman soldiers, they would lose
their fear of the animals; so he had the courageous Roman murdered.
When the Carthaginians were before Capua, they had a strong force of
elephants, and we read of their obtaining re-enforcements from Carthage
as early as 215 B.C.; so that this city must have been a central depot of
elephant supplies.
The management of war elephants in Spain was mostly conducted by
Asdrubal, who was in command of the Carthaginian forces in the absence
of his brother. According to Livy, he was defeated in the famous fight
between the two Scipios at Tortosa, but managed to save his elephants. In
other battles, large numbers of these animals were killed and left upon
the field.
The effect of a panic among the war elephants was greatly dreaded by the
generals who owned them; and Asdrubal provided his drivers with a knife
and mallet, with instructions, if the elephant became unmanageable,
to drive the knife between the junction of the head and spine. In the
battle of Metaurus, this expedient was also employed. The Romans attacked
them with such ferocity, that the elephants turned, and began trampling
their own troops; and, in obedience to their instructions, the drivers
slaughtered six while in their headlong flight, falling with them to the
ground. This, however, did not prevent the utter rout of the forces; and,
in a frenzy of rage, Asdrubal threw himself single-handed at a battalion
of the enemy, and fell, opposed by thousands.
It is evident that in these days the range of the African elephant
extended farther to the north; and that they were much more abundant,
is shown by some passages in the old works. Thus, when Scipio was about
to invade Africa, the Carthaginians made great preparations to prevent
his advance; and, according to Appian, a large number of elephants were
taken in a short time, and trained for war. This could not have been done
if they had to be sought at a great distance. They may have been found
in Barbary, which would explain the ease with which re-enforcements were
made in all these wars.
When Scipio invaded Africa, Mago, the brother of Hannibal, proceeded
against Italy with a new and magnificent army; and the vast array of
elephants he drew up before the Roman cavalry on the field of Insubria,
is said to have been almost unequalled in the annals of ancient warfare.
Notwithstanding this, the Romans were successful. Scipio was followed
into Africa by Hannibal; and the two warriors, both equally famous, met
on the field of Zama. Hannibal had eighty elephants in line, a formidable
array; but Scipio, aware that his horses were useless, sent them to
the rear, and ordered his archers to direct their arrows at the trunks
of the elephants of the enemy. So vigorous was the assault, that the
elephants, panic-stricken, turned, and in a moment were rushing wildly to
the rear; their trumpeting, and the cries of the dead and dying trampled
under foot, producing an indescribable scene. The entire right wing of
the Carthaginian general was broken, and, utterly routed, he retreated
to Adrumetum; the action of his own elephants bringing to a close the
second Punic war (201 B.C.). A treaty of peace was now arranged; and
with due respect for the elephant, as an engine of war, the Romans bound
the unfortunate Carthaginians to deliver up all their war elephants, and
never tame others for military service. The elephants captured by Scipio
were forwarded to Rome; and in his triumphal procession to the Capitol,
they followed the sacrificial victims.
Curiously enough, for a period of eighty years after the Romans became
familiar with the advantages of the elephant as a valuable adjunct to
the service, they did not employ them. The warriors, however, were
specially drilled in elephant warfare; and many devices were invented
by the skilful generals to discomfit the huge animals. The great object
was to turn the elephants upon their own masters, as we have seen; and
to this end, the men were directed to fire their darts and arrows at the
trunk of the elephant, which was known to be the most sensitive point.
Chariots were constructed to bear men who carried enormously long spears.
The horses were clothed in mail, and trained to charge at the elephants
at full speed; and, as they passed, the spearmen would prod them in the
trunk, and endeavor to demoralize them. This branch of the service was,
necessarily, one of great danger, and the courageous lancers often lost
their lives; horses, chariots, and men, all being crushed to death by the
infuriated animals.
Another corps of elephant-men were armed with a peculiar armor, covered
with long, sharp spikes, so that the elephant would not attempt to seize
them with its trunk. Other soldiers were armed with slings, with which
they threw stones at the driver of the elephant, it being their sole
business to dismount him; while instruments that could propel their own
darts were employed against the body of the elephant. Besides these
offensive movements, the troops were drilled in the manner of receiving
an elephant’s charge. They executed manœuvres in falling back as the
animal came on, and in closing in to surround him. Such were a few of the
methods employed against the elephant, which serve to show its importance
in ancient warfare.
Rome was finally forced to use the elephant herself; and in the first
action of the Macedonian war, they formed no inconspicuous corps of the
Roman army.
In the third year of the war, according to Polybius, Titus Quintius
Flaminius used them with signal advantage against the Macedonian
king. In the second Macedonian war, thirty years later, Q. Martius
Philippus employed them against Perseus, the last king of Macedon. The
latter, unlike his predecessor, who conquered India, had neglected to
provide himself with a corps of elephants; and his horses were utterly
demoralized by the animals possessed by his enemy. Finding that elephants
were necessary to success, he conceived the idea of manufacturing some
bogus ones, after the fashion of Semiramis, quoted in a previous chapter,
and had a number of wooden elephants made, in the interior of which
was concealed a man, who blew upon a trumpet which led into the wooden
throat, when the charge was ordered; hoping in this way to imitate living
elephants. But the ruse did not succeed; and, after a war of four years,
the Macedonians came under the Roman yoke.
In some of these wars, it often happened that the African elephant was
marched against its Asiatic ally. This was the case in the battle of
Magnesia, when the Roman arms were turned against Antiochus, king of
Syria; and, according to the old writers, the African elephants of Scipio
were much inferior in size and strength to the Indian ones of Antiochus.
The reverse, at least regarding size, is true to-day; and the same was
probably true then, African male elephants being at least a foot taller
than their Asiatic cousins.
When Scipio found that his elephants were inferior, he placed them in
his rear as a reserve; but they were routed, only fifteen escaping:
while fifteen thousand men were slain. The Romans utterly defeated them,
and insisted upon the same terms which we have seen the Carthaginians
made,—Antiochus agreeing to deliver all his war elephants to Rome, and to
train no more. If both parties had kept their word, the elephant would
have fallen into disuse as a war-factor.
The Romans exacted a similar bond from Jugurtha (111 B.C.); killing large
numbers, and continuing the war until the Numidian king consented, and
delivered his elephants to Metellus (108 B.C.).
Julius Cæsar probably considered that elephants retarded active
movements, and did not have a large corps of them; though a certain
number were kept, presumably to re-assure the soldiers, in case the enemy
should be supplied with an elephant corps. In his battle with Scipio in
Africa, he was confronted with thirty of these animals, having towers
of archers; but he sent his elephants to the rear, and succeeded in
defeating his enemy.
Some idea of the manner in which elephants fought in battle is given by
Cæsar:—
“A wounded elephant, furious with rage, attacked an unarmed follower of
the troops, and, kneeling upon him, crushed the life out of his body. A
veteran of the fifth legion rushed forward to attack the beast, who was
roaring, and lashing with his proboscis. The elephant immediately forsook
his victim, and, catching up the soldier in his trunk, whirled him in
the air. But the intrepid warrior did not lose his presence of mind: he
wounded the elephant in his sensitive proboscis, till, exhausted with
pain, he dropped the soldier, and fled in terror to his companions.”
The elephant was probably not used to any extent in war by the Romans,
after the establishment of the imperial government. In A.D. 193, we
read that Rome was filled with horses and elephants, ready for use in
the proposed war between Didius Julianus and Septimius Severus. In the
famous battle between Alexander Severus and Artaxerxes (A.D. 230), three
hundred elephants were taken from the Persians, and a number marched to
Rome in solemn state. The introduction of new appliances of war, and the
successful attempts in routing bodies of elephants, probably did much to
render them unpopular, for a time at least, among the Roman conquerors.