[227-219 B.C.]
The city of Cartagena, which Hasdrubal founded on the modern gulf of that name, and which he furnished with an admirable harbour, was the most glorious monument of his administration. The success of his arms, the nature of his designs, roused the fears both of the Greek colonies on the coast of Catalonia and Valencia, and of several independent nations in the interior. They resolved to call in a third power, which had long regarded with jealousy the growing prosperity of Carthage. Rome eagerly embraced the cause of the discontented states (227 B.C.), probably, indeed, she had secretly fomented that discontent. She sent a deputation to Carthage, which obtained from the senate two important concessions: that the Carthaginians should not push their conquests beyond the Ebro; that they should not disturb the Saguntines and other Greek colonies. Though Hasdrubal promised to observe them, he silently collected troops, resolved to make a final effort for the entire subjugation of Spain before Rome could succour the confederates. In three years, his formidable preparations being completed, he threw off the mask, and marched against Saguntum. On his way, however, he was assassinated by the slave of a man whose master, a native prince, he had put to death.[2] The attachment of this slave to his master’s memory could be equalled only by the unshaken firmness with which he supported the incredible torments inflicted on him by the fierce Hannibal.
This famous Carthaginian was in his twenty-fifth year. He was more to be dreaded than all his predecessors united. To military talents and personal valour, perhaps unexampled in any age, he joined astonishing coolness of judgment and inflexibility of purpose. While Hasdrubal was actuated only by selfish considerations, Hannibal recognised, as the great principle of his actions, revenge—revenge against the bitter enemy of his country, and still more against the destroyers of his kindred. There is a moral grandeur in this all-engrossing purpose of Hannibal, which, notwithstanding its fell malignity, unaccountably rivets our admiration.
The young hero lost no time in extending his conquests, and amassing resources for the grand approaching struggle with the Romans. Having subdued some warlike tribes of modern Castile and Leon, and brought into full activity some rich silver mines at the foot of the Pyrenees, he marched at the head of 150,000 men against Saguntum, which he invested in due form. In vain did the Roman deputies whom the senate despatched for the purpose intimate to him that an attack on the ally of the republic would be regarded, as a declaration of war against the republic herself. He had vowed the destruction of the city. Yet, though he pressed the siege with the utmost vigour, such was the valour of the defenders that neither his mighty genius for war nor his formidable forces could reduce the place in less than nine months: it would not even then have fallen, had not famine proved a deadlier enemy than the sword. The citizens resolved that the last act of this fearful tragedy should be a suitable consummation of the preceding horrors. Having amassed all their valuable effects, and everything combustible, into one pile, and placed their wives and children around it, they issued from the gates, and plunged into the midst of the surprised enemy. The slaughter was prodigious on both sides; but, in the end, numbers and strength prevailed against weakness and desperation; the Saguntines were cut off almost to a man. No sooner was their fate known in the city than their wives, who were in expectation of the result, set fire to the pile, and cast both themselves and children into the devouring element. The city in flames soon discovered the catastrophe to the Carthaginians, who immediately entered, and put what few stragglers they could find—chiefly the aged of both sexes—to the sword.[3] Some, however, had previously secured their safety by flight. Thus perished one of the most flourishing cities of Spain, and one which will be forever memorable in the annals of mankind (219 B.C.). Its destruction hastened, if it did not occasion, the Second Punic War, as described in the history of Rome.
Hannibal mustered his forces for the invasion of Italy. The exploits of the Carthaginian hero beyond the bounds of the peninsula have been treated of in the history of Rome. While he is spreading destruction around him, and the towers of “the eternal city” themselves are tottering, our task must be to cast a hurried glance at the transactions which, after the invasion of Scipio, happened in the country he had left behind. The Carthaginian yoke is allowed on all hands to have been intolerable. The avidity with which the local governors sought pretexts for seizing on the substance of the natives; the rigour with which some of the captive tribes were made to labour in the mines; the exactions of a mercenary and haughty soldiery; the insolence of success on the one hand, and the smart of wrongs endured on the other—prepared the way to the commotions which shook all Spain to its centre, and ultimately ended in the destruction of its oppressors.[g]
THE ROMANS IN SPAIN
[219-206 B.C.]
The Romans, either alarmed by the progress of Hannibal, or becoming aware of the value of such allies as the Spaniards, now sent larger armies to their assistance, headed by their ablest generals. Spain was the theatre of the first exploits of Publius Cornelius Scipio, afterwards surnamed Africanus from his victories over the Carthaginians in Africa. In Spain, Scipio gained the hearts of the natives by his great and good qualities, not the least of these being his self-command—one instance of which has ever since been a favourite theme with painters, poets, and moralists. The charms of a beautiful captive had touched his young heart, and the laws of the age made her in every respect his slave. He respected her undefended loveliness, and restored her, in unsullied purity, to her betrothed bridegroom. In cordial co-operation with the Spaniards, Scipio finally expelled the Carthaginians from Spain in 206 B.C.
[206-45 B.C.]
The object of the Romans, in assisting the Spaniards against Carthaginian oppression, had not been the emancipation of their gallant allies. They immediately proceeded to reduce the peninsula to the condition of a Roman province, governed by their prætors. This was not easily or speedily accomplished. The natives resisted their new, as they had done their former invaders. Numantia, besieged by a second Scipio, emulated the heroism of Saguntum.[b] In vain did the inhabitants send deputations to the consul; he coolly replied that he was content to await the inevitable effects of famine. But their impatience could not await the slow effects of such a death; some took poison; some fell on their swords; some set fire to their houses and perished in the devouring flames. Thus perished all; not a living creature survived (133 B.C.).[g] The Cantabrians, who inhabited the northwestern part of the peninsula, were not even nominally subdued during the continuance of the Roman Republic. The other portions, Celtiberia in the north, Bætica in the south, and Lusitania in the west, were conquered after a long struggle, and constituted the Roman province, but remained the scenes of constantly recurring warfare. The natives revolted against the extortion and tyranny usually practised by the Roman governors of subject states; and the leaders of republican factions, when defeated everywhere else, often found in Spain abundant means of making head against the masters of the world.