Battle of the Metaurus
Channel: all the knowledge of the universe PRINCIPIA
Date: 2022-01-11

Battle of the Metaurus, by Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=1006880 / CC BY SA 3.0

#207_BC
#200s_BC_conflicts
#Battles_in_Marche
#Battles_of_the_Second_Punic_War
The Battle of the Metaurus was a pivotal battle in the Second Punic War between Rome and Carthage, fought in 207 BC near the Metauro River in Italy.
The Carthaginians were led by Hasdrubal Barca, brother of Hannibal, who was to have brought siege equipment and reinforcements for Hannibal.
The Roman armies were led by the consuls Marcus Livius, who was later nicknamed the Salinator, and Gaius Claudius Nero.
Claudius Nero had just fought Hannibal in Grumentum, some hundreds of kilometres south of the Metaurus river, and reached Marcus Livius by a forced march that went unnoticed by both Hannibal and Hasdrubal,
so that the Carthaginians suddenly found themselves outnumbered.
In the battle, the Romans used their numerical superiority to outflank the Carthaginian army and rout them, the Carthaginians losing 15,400 men killed or captured, including Hasdrubal.
The battle confirmed Roman supremacy over Italy.
Without Hasdrubal's army to support him, Hannibal was compelled to evacuate pro-Carthaginian towns in much of southern Italy in the face of Roman pressure and withdraw to Bruttium, where he would remain for the next four years.
Hasdrubal's invasion of Italy Hasdrubal's campaign to come to his brother's aid in Italy had gone remarkably well up to that point.
After adeptly escaping Publius Scipio in Baecula, recruiting mercenary contingents in Celtiberia and making his way into Gaul in the winter of 208, Hasdrubal waited until the spring of 207 to make his way through the Alps and into Northern Italy.
Hasdrubal made much faster progress than his brother had during his crossing, partly due to the constructions left behind by Hannibal's army a decade earlier,
but also due to the removal of the Gallic threat that had plagued Hannibal during that expedition.
The Gauls now feared and respected the Carth...