“1
[3]
who, unable to do so by any other means, has ruined our family by the downfall of Carthage.”
[4]
Already foreboding this very thing he had previously put his ships in readiness.
[5]
Accordingly, after distributing the mass of useless troops, nominally as garrisons, among the few Bruttian towns that were being held rather
[6??]
by fear than by loyalty, he transported the flower of
[7??]
his army to Africa. Many men of Italic race
[8??]
refusing to follow him to Africa had retired to the shrine of Juno Lacinia,2 never desecrated until that
[9??]
day, and had been cruelly slain actually within the temple enclosure.3 They say that rarely has any other man leaving his country
[10??]
to go into exile departed so sorrowfully as Hannibal on withdrawing from the enemy's land;
[11]
that he repeatedly looked back upon the shores of Italy and, accusing gods and men, called down a curse [p. 443]upon himself also and his own head because he
[12??]
had4 not led his soldiers blood-stained from the victory of Cannae to Rome.5
1 21. iii. 2 ff.; x. 2 —xi. 1; XXIII. xii. 6 —xiii. 6 (216 B.C.). Still prominent according to Appian Pun. 34. At xliv. [2] 5, if not at xlii. 12, another Hasdrubal (Haedus) has taken his place.
2 Cf. p. 441, n. 3.
3 The temple itself would have room for no more than a small number fleeing for refuge. Diodorus Sic. XXVII. 9 makes the number 20,000. Cf. Appian Hann. 59 (no mention of the temple). The whole story seems to be fictitious.
4 B.C. 203
5 Cf.
Livy. Books XXVIII-XXX With An English Translation. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1949: no copyright notice.
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