Hannibal met three Roman armies in succession, first at the Ticinus, next on the banks of the Trebia, and last near Lake Trasimenus in Etruria.  He routed all of them.  As he advanced, his army increased in number; the warriors of Cisalpine Gaul (northern Italy) joined him against the Romans.  He took up position beyond Rome in Apulia, and it was here that the Roman army came to attack him.  Hannibal had an army only half as large as theirs, but he had African cavalrymen mounted on swift horses; he formed his lines in the plain of Cannae so that the Romans had the sun in their face and the dust driven by the wind against them; the Roman army was surrounded and almost annihilated (216).  It was thought that Hannibal would march on Rome, but he did not consider himself strong enough to do it.  The Carthaginian senate sent him no reenforcements.  Hannibal endeavored to take Naples and to have Rome attacked by the king of Macedon; he succeeded only in gaining some towns which Rome besieged and destroyed.  Hannibal remained nine years in south Italy; at last his brother Hasdrubal started with the army of Spain to assist him, and made his way almost to central Italy.  The two Carthaginian armies marched to unite their forces, each opposed by a Roman army under the command of a consul.  Nero, facing Hannibal, had the audacity to traverse central Italy and to unite with his colleague who was intrenched against Hasdrubal.  One morning Hasdrubal heard the trumpets sounding twice in the camp of the Romans, a sign that there were two consuls in the camp.  He believed his brother was conquered and so retreated; the Romans pursued him, he was killed and his entire army massacred.  Then Nero rejoined the army which he had left before Hannibal and threw the head of Hasdrubal into the Carthaginian camp (207).  Hannibal, reduced to his own troops, remained in Calabria for five years longer.  The descent of a Roman army on Africa compelled him to leave Italy; he massacred the Italian soldiers who refused to accompany him and embarked for Carthage (203).  The battle of Zama (202) terminated the war.  Hannibal had counted as usual on drawing the Romans within his lines and surrounding them; but Scipio, the Roman general, kept his troops in order and on a second attack threw the enemy’s army into rout.  Carthage was obliged to treat for peace; she relinquished everything she possessed outside of Africa, ceding Spain to the Romans.  She bound herself further to surrender her navy and the elephants, to pay over $10,000,000 and to agree not to make war without the permission of Rome.

Hannibal reorganized Carthage for a new war.  The Romans, disturbed at this, demanded that the Carthaginians put him to death.  Hannibal fled to Antiochus, king of Syria, and proposed to him to incite a revolt in Italy against Rome; but Antiochus, following the counsel of his courtiers, distrusted Hannibal and invaded Greece, where his army was captured.  Hannibal withdrew to the king of Bithynia.  The Romans sent Flamininus thither to take him, but Hannibal, seeing his house surrounded, took the poison which he always had by him (183).