If this was Space Battles.com or Star Destroyer.net it would have degenerated into an outright flame war by now. Especially with the admins of both boards retiring from day-to-day managing of it turning them into free-for-alls. It is why I left both boards. This place by contrast seems to have Mods awake ready to cool hot threads down before they burst into flames.
Cannae's current terrain is beside the point. So let's get this straight: you say Hannibal is occupying Cannae, as in holding it with troops during the battle (not true, but we can get to that later). The Romans came in from the north, then crossed to the south side of the river. In that case, there's no way Hannibal would have his back to the river. He'd have Cannae, the high ground, and everything to the south behind him. Not exactly pinned. The Romans, meanwhile, would have the river along their entire rear. Not a good place to be in. You just conceded the river was once further north. That gives plenty of room between river and high ground for the armies to deploy. And Hannibal didn't have troops in Cannae itself during the battle. Everything I can find puts the village just behind and off to the side of the Roman line. As for the supposed buildings, I'd point to Polybius: "But when Aemilius observed that the ground was flat and bare for some distance round, he said that they must not engage there with an enemy superior to them in cavalry; but that they must rather try to draw him off, and lead him to ground on which the battle would be more in the hands of the infantry. But Gaius Terentius being, from inexperience, of a contrary opinion, there was a dispute and misunderstanding between the leaders..." Flat and bare. Would anybody describe land riddled with fences and buildings as being bare? The map, which isn't Connolly's but is based on his work, doesn't have a scale. Since Connolly was one of the original historians to propose that the river was further north at the time, it's safe to assume this map is showing a wider plain between the river and high ground than exists today. And the river being further north doesn't mean Hannibal was pinned against it; that logic doesn't even follow. You keep saying the Iberians and Celts had buildings to shelter in and such, but this is unsourced and is contradicted by most historians. Why should anyone believe that claim? Hannibal's crescent center allowed the Roman momentum to be absorbed until the cavalry fight was finished, not buildings that--per Paullus's words--didn't exist. The depot was back by Hannibal's camp and not a factor. My position is the traditional one: Polybius's account, with the river on the Carthaginian right/Roman left, the high ground covering the other flank, neither side "pinned".
Under normal circumstances no. Under exceptional destructive circumstances during static tests under specific conditions, sure depending on what is being tested. In the heat of battle getting into position to slash at your opponent with destructive results is easier said than done as your opponent is swinging back. It is the point. Given Polybius is a very limited source and modern cross-referencing with other sources makes several Historians such as Mark Healy wonder if Paullus, not Varro was actually in command and Varro acquiesce to taking the blame to avoid Paullus Family Name from being tarnished. Given both Livy and Polybius state Paullus led the Cavalry which would fall to the Commander of the Army, it is likely Paullus actually commanded the force. We will say Varro commanded for simplicity, but he likely didn't lead the battle as the fight occurred on the third day at the making of camp and both consuls were on agreement on the battle plan. That said, they were fighting over freshly harvested farmland which is relatively bare from a hilltop view but on the ground, you got fences, furrows, and buildings. This is confirmed by archaeology digs. Hell they even found a few trees that were saplings during that conflict, if only they could talk. Also another thing to remember: The Carthaginian Center was held by light troops! Hah, back to normal tone. These light troops were basically unprotected and would not have lasted more than a few minutes in a pitched fight. The Pila storm would have rendered their shields useless, then they would have been bare to Roman Swords. Had there not been furrows, grain buildings, copses of trees and fencing, they would have crumbled quickly before the cavalry fight ended. No amount of generalship could have had those men last as long as they did without additional cover. As it was, the Romans broke through, but at that point, the Cavalry fight was over and they were trapped against the River with no room to maneuver. Those who could swim, swam for it, the rest were cut down. Hannibal needed to destroy the Roman Army, which meant bringing it to battle, he could not wage a war of attrition. The Romans refused to attack him at Cannae Citadel which he held. So he moved from it to give the Romans a more favorable battlefield much like Alexander did at Gaugamela against Darius. He left a few troops to hold Cannae a valuable strategic spot and ensure he had a safe spot to retreat to if the Romans failed to take the bait. The Romans also wanted a decisive battle to win the war quickly and force terms on Carthage. Both sides wanted a fight, but on their terms. Douglas Moreman and Mark Healy have done quite a bit of modern research on this fight, If we accept that Polybius Account is correct, which is spare on details and written to vilify Varro, then after crossing back to the South Bank after maneuvering and skirmishing with the Romans on August 1 from the high ground, Hannibal has his back to the river and is cut off from his camp on the North Bank and the Smaller Roman Camp is blocking him from Cannae itself. Battle is inevitable. Or Polybius and Livy are writing Alternative Facts and the actual battle took place elsewhere and the little we recovered from the Battlefield survey from the Roman Period is the remains of Skirmishing. As I said before, the Normans also fought in this area in the 11th Century and we find more remains from their period than that of the Roman Period. We can debate this endlessly till the grain harvest. But that said, we'll never agree, unless Trees can talk and tell us what they saw that day.
The Mods don't seem to be needed with you two gentlemen. I will throw in my interpretation, for which I don't recall the source, it was a modern interpretation of the battle, that Hannibal intentionally put his weakest forces in the center, to draw them in, indicated that perhaps the center should engage then conduct as orderly a withdrawal as possible to lure them into the trap formed by the strong forces of infantry and cavalry on their flanks. The Romans could not resist what appeared to be a collapsing center, advancing into a trap with cavalry and African infantry on both flanks.
Except that would make no sense and would have ruptured his front quickly if we except the account it was a flat plain which is nonsense as the light troops would have had no cover from the pila storm. Then there is the issues of modeling the charge. Though this is more for the Principate period. The fundamentals still apply to the Polybian Era. Also the problem with Hannibal's crescent working is visualized here. As they got pushed back from their cover, the crescent breaks and it did break, the Romans broke through to the River. We know the cavalry fight lasted an hour or more. Also cavalry charging infantry has issues as well. As stated before we have the works of Polybius and Livy who weren't there, and relied on the words of a few survivors or word of mouth, wrote their works decades after the fight and with clear political biases. For all we know, they may have even made stuff up. The terrain and the archaeology also places constraints on what is possible. We have a lot of Normans buried here but few Romans or Carthaginian Forces show up which leads to the question of what happened to the bodies? If they were mass cremated we would know of it from soil cores, if they were buried, where is the mass grave? Were the bodies disinterred and buried elsewhere? If 50,000 plus people died here, what happened to the bodies? Just leaving them to rot would be bad form.
Hannibal was commanding the center, which implies his intention to lead an orderly withdrawal before the Romans, which appears to be what happened, rather than a route.
I'd hardly call the Iberians and Celts light troops. Lighter than the principes and triarii, sure. But they'd be a rough match for the hastati. They were medium infantry. Don't forget that the Iberians had their own equivalent of the pila as well. And the pila would've only hit the first few rows of the opposing companies. The idea that the Romans actually penetrated Hannibal's center is ridiculous. Such a thing would've been mentioned by at least one ancient historian (such as Livy, ever the Roman nationalist). But it's not. Once again, there's no evidence Hannibal had troops in Cannae itself. Cannae was by all accounts behind Roman lines; there's no way he could retreat to it. I've read Polybius's account of the battle; there's no mention of Hannibal's back to the river. If we assume it's correct, we assume that the map I previously posted is correct. Otherwise, I'd agree that nobody is going to convince the other. I see no reason to doubt Polybius's version of events, and you see no reason to doubt Healy's. So I'd have no problem dropping it, especially since it's so tangential to the topic anyway. I'm just going to point out that it's not like the Carthaginian heavy cav was charging into the back of the triarii; remember the velites got pulled back behind the center after the screening/skirmishing was done. These are the men the cavalry would've hit: inexperienced adolescents protected only by a small shield and armed with a short sword after having already expended their javelins. Perfect prey for cavalry.
Iberian Caetratii wore a helm usually of copper, carried two soliferum which while similar to the pila, is not the same and carried a buckler for protection. They had the Falcata. These are light troops who can't stand up to a frontal charge. Iberian Scutari which you are thinking about, would be more akin to Hastati but weren't in the center as they were professional troops that Hannibal would need to support the right flank of the Africans. The Dorkei Hatkafa have yet to be formed as well and show up after this battle. Few Celts went into battle with any more protection than a shield which is pretty much fatal in a melee as an overhead cut or thrust will kill you. More professional soldiers able to afford mail and helmets were usually ranked with the Cavalry and would have been involved in the Cavalry clash. Livy and other Roman writers rarely give much details on a fight and in Livy's case he is writing 250 years after the fact. His accounts must be treated with skepticism. That said, the crescent simply could not have worked. As note 35 shows, any backing up opens up gaps and the crescent disintegrates. One interpretation of the battle, has the Africans crouching low in concealment out of sight and waiting for the crescent to break then pinning the Romans once they break through the light troops who simply have inadequate equipment to fight toe to toe with the Romans whose larger shields would have been decisive. We also have to understand the Carthaginian center would be as hindered by the dead as the Romans. Re-enanctors have tried on a small scale to replicate the crescent formation and could never get it to work. We of course for practical reasons can't gather up 130,000+ people and horses, and recreate the battle onsite. So that leaves computer modeling and here the crescent theory holding the Romans just doesn't work. But if you somehow win a billion+ dollars and can convince the Italian Government to let you reform the terrain of Cannae to what it looked like earlier and get the necessary number of people to re-enact the various factors, go ahead. The entire fight started because Hannibal took Cannae and its nearby grain depot. It commanded the high ground and was Hannibal's secure line of retreat. The Romans refused to fight for it and held back. Hannibal wanted a decisive battle, so both sides maneuvered to force battle on their terms. In this the Romans succeeded by getting the smaller camp between him and Cannae and the larger Camp blocking disengagement to the North. Hannibal had no choice but to abandon high ground north of the River to engage the small camp, but the Romans knew that he would and both Varro and Paullus agreed to move once Hannibal moved and trap him against the River. As it was the third day since initial contact, Paullus was most likely in charge as he led the Cavalry. Had Varro actually commanded, he would have led it. Now we get murky details. But this much is clear, Hannibal won. Fair enough. The Velites wouldn't show up till Capua when the Leves, Rorarii and Accensi were disbanded and merged. The correct unit is Rorarii who had a scutum, Hasta Spear, a few javelins, and a helmet. While considered a Polybian Unit, Velites were actually a late edition. The Polybian Reforms, were actually a series of gradual reforms of the middle republican army lasting to the end of the Social War. Also not really. Horses don't like charging into people. They are not Elephants who don't care, they see formed up infantry presenting sharp objects at them, they call it quits regardless of reign signals. Also the Rorarii would have had picked up pila and spare darts left in the staging area where they would have been picked up by returning units rotated out of the fray. As trained, the Rorarii would aggressively engage the Cavalry and buy time for the rest. So the cavalry delivering the coup de grace doesn't really fly unless they dismounted which is possible. The more one really gets into the nitty gritty details, the less and less likely the details we do have make sense. The crescent simply would not have worked and would have shattered at first contact. 8,000 Cathaginian Cavalry simply could not have delivered a coup de grace. Which is why newcomers to the field are questioning large tracts of the battle.
The entire body of Iberians is described in the manner of Scutari. But Livy does paint a picture of a Roman army totally enveloped by Carthaginians, not trapped against a natural landform. And he would not have done that if he could point to such a major success as piercing the Carthaginian center. He was too much a nationalist for that. Far crazier things in ancient warfare worked. Philip II pulled a sort of feigned retreat with half his army at Charonaea, leaving Alexander's flank open, but it worked. The crescent's inversion would've been very tightly controlled by Hannibal and his commanders. It only has to hold just long enough for the African phalanx to engage the Romans from the side and corners of the rear, which would take pressure off, and then a little longer for the heavy cavalry. Don't forget that ancient warfare was too exhausting to keep fighting for hours continuous; there were times during battle where both sides would pull back a bit to catch their breath. This would've helped Hannibal pull his crescent stunt. As for the dead, the crescent would've been pushed back onto fresh ground, so they wouldn't have been too hindered until the later phases of the battle. Taking the village doesn't mean he had to keep troops in it, though. And the depot itself was more in the region of Hannibal's camp. His secure line of retreat would've been from his camp on the north side of the river, which is also the side the Romans would've arrived on. The Roman camps were designed to mess with his foraging on both sides of the river, and Camp 2 covered the route the ford that would let them bring the whole army to the south side, their preferred field of battle. It was the third day since initial contact, but Varro had been in command on the very first day. Paullus made his observations of the field and recommended baiting Hannibal elsewhere, but Varro disagreed and moved up. Hannibal sent out skirmishers to hinder them but these were repulsed. Varro sets up Camp 1. Paullus is in charge the next day, but with the men heartened by the successful skirmish he doesn't want to withdraw. He doesn't want to fight here either. Hannibal then sends out his Numidians, who go right up to Paullus's camp and stop the Romans from gathering water. This gets both Varro and the regular men good and angry, and Varro gives battle the next day. The precise formation of the velites is murky. There's mention of Fabius Maximus designing a new marching order shortly after Trasimene that included velites. It's possible this is an error and leves were meant, but the point about Cannae itself stands. The skirmishers would've been pulled back after the initial phase of battle. And there were a lot; at least 20,000 between the Romans and their allies. They would've been organized loosely enough the horses wouldn't have balked at a charge. Interestingly--and I didn't know this until checking on the date of the Rorarii's disbandment--there's a large body of historians that think they were actually a slightly heavier body of skirmishers rather than light spearmen. The ancient histories are pretty scant, though, so I doubt we'll know for sure. Either way, there were a large number of light troops between the cavalry and any spearmen (rorarii or triarii, though it's possible the triarii were the 10,000 men left at Camp 1 who attacked Hannibal's camp and got taken prisoner later). And yeah, it's certainly possible the cavalry dismounted, like they'd done on the left flank. I'll just point out that Hannibal had more than eight thousand cav. Those were just the Libyans/Carthaginians. He also had around 3,000 Iberians and 4,000 Celts. Combined with the pikes grinding into the flanks and rear corners, I think those 15,000 (minus casualties) hitting the rear would've finally broken the maniples' cohesion.
Except they weren't. Livy wasn't there and never served in combat and never did any military service. Nor did he visit Cannae itself. We don't know his sources and his account must be treated with wide skepticism and grains of salt. As shown, the Crescent simply would not have work, and the Roman Cuneus Formation was designed to produce such crescents in their enemies and rupture their front. This is basic military science here. Polyaenus's account has numerous falsehoods in it and Diodorus's account gives few details. Chaeronea itself is a problem, it is not terrain suitable for Cavalry. More than likely, the battle was a straight up Infantry Clash and the Macedonians with better gear prevailed. This is nonsense. The troops of that era were in far better shape than modern soldiers and had better distribution of weight. Fighting for several hours was possible for them and often done in major pitched battles. In addition, the less armored and equipped Light Infantry in the center simply would not have stood up to a determined charge and the crescent formation would have screwed up unit cohesion and shattered quickly as it caved in as the Romans had more troops to press the openings. So the crescent formation is an absurdity. Yes he would have left a garrison as the Citadel was a commanding spot over several trails. It would have been reckless not to garrison it. The Depot was south of the river close to the grain fields. Hannibal had already harvested the grain, this is what set off the campaign. Camp 2 was placed to block Hannibal from retreating to Cannae while Camp 1 was set to block Hannibal going North. Paullus was in command, as he commanded the Cavalry. If Varro was leading, he would have commanded the Cavalry and not the Infantry. That was the custom and law. No the Rorarii would not have been in loose order and Leves and Accesensi if present would still have attacked aggressively, it was what they were trained to do and 8,000 horsemen charging Infantry aggressively engaging with missile fire ends in one way: The Horsemen dying in droves as the Skirmishers target their horses. Antesignani would continue this tradition and proved super effective against Parthian Cataphracts when led by someone who wasn't an idiot with more money than sense. The African Cavalry pursued the Roman Cavalry, if we take the reports at face value, so that leaves the Iberians and Celts to charge the Roman Rear. Of these only the Iberian Lancearii had armored horses and even then they would not have lasted long if they charged into the Light Infantry who would have swarmed them and gone for the Horse's legs. Brihentin lacked barding for their horses.
