This was a concise and quite interesting summary of a man who conquered a half of the world. A good attempt was made to examine Genghis Kahn the man, and not get caught up in technical and mechanical details. However, it would've been even nicer if the book contained more maps and relevant illustrations to enliven its content. E.g., a map showing the routes that he and his generals took from Gobi to Persia would be have been a fascinating illustration, a map showing who conquered which territory would've been good, too.

Hannibal

Years and years ago, when I was in elementary school I was fascinated by the saga of Hannibal Barca. (Yes they actually taught history then, geography too!) His was a story of which legends are born. Several years later I read a book on Hannibal by Harold Lamb simply titled Hannibal.

Harold Lamb - now deceased - was a historical writer. He wrote numerous books about intriguing subjects like The Crusades, Genghis Khan, Kublai Khan, Tamerlane, Alexander, Charlemagne, Fredrick the Great, Cyrus the Great and on and on, most of which I read. While I did receive a rudimentary background on all these characters and events in school, it was Harold Lamb that really brought these historical icons to life and of all of these larger than life legends, nobody did more with less than Hannibal Barca.

I'm sure many of you readers are probably familiar with the popular football parlance "The Best Defense Is a Good Offense". Well Hannibal was no football player but he sure utilized that theory. Hell, he invented it when, as a defensive maneuver, the great Carthaginian General crossed the Alps with a diverse army of forty thousand men and forty Elephants in the winter of 218 BC to confront Carthage's bitter enemy, fast rising power Rome. Most of his Elephants and many of his men perished on this trip.

Rome was a bully, an implacable foe and saw Carthage the only power on the horizon as a threat. Carthage was a prosperous city state of peaceful sea faring traders located directly south of Sicily, across the Mediterranean Sea, on the African coast (near present day Tunis). Carthage had fought two wars with Rome, fought mostly to a stalemate but in its most recent humiliating treaty with Rome they were restricted from applying their trade in the Mediterranean except in Spain and not above the Ebro River.

This virtually ceded the Mediterranean to Rome and forced Carthage to venture beyond the Pillars of Hercules to the Atlantic shores of Spain (actually today's Portugal). Hamilcar, Hannibal's father, a successful warrior general in his own right, colonized this area and built, among others, the village of New Carthage with thrived and grew into a powerful city. Hamilcar's brother, Hasdrubal, who took over after his brother's death, began consolidating power on the Iberian Peninsula including building villages on the Mediterranean coast. Hannibal, now a grown man and head of the army laid siege, albeit unsuccessfully to Saguntum. Eventually, Saguntum, a Greek city and Roman ally on the Spanish coast, complained to Rome about the Carthaginians.

This matter was put before the Senate where it was decided to issue an ultimatum, turn over Hannibal to Rome or face war. To the Roman emissaries' surprise, Carthage would not back down. War was mutually decided, hence Hannibal was notified and Hannibal and forty thousand men and forty elephants began their odyssey into history.

Hannibal's Coming

I'm sure you've heard someone tell their children "the Boogey Man is going to get you". Maybe you said it yourself, I know I have. The Roman "Boogey Man" was Hannibal. "Hannibal's coming. He's going to get you". Well Hannibal did more than scare little children. He scared the bejesus out of the whole country. Hannibal was a master tactician and General. He defeated one Roman army after another and spent twelve long years terrorizing the public in the Roman countryside. Hannibal was the man behind Rome's greatest defeat the famous Battle of Cannae in which not one but two great Roman armies faced the inscrutable, Carthaginian nemesis Hannibal. The Roman annihilation was crushing. Not only were fifty thousand warriors including ninety percent of their Tribunes killed but eighty members of the Senate who came to watch the slaughter were in turn slaughtered.

Rome was in a panic. No army stood between Hannibal and the capital and they prepared for a siege. Some of Hannibal's trusted officers urged him to advance on Rome but Hannibal blinked and in the end, many years later, it was his and Carthage's downfall.

Hannibal was a great tactician but he had little experience and no previous success (ref: Saguntum) in laying siege to a fortified position so he was unable to consolidate his victories. In the twelve years he received little in the way of supplies or re-enforcement from Carthage, mostly living off the land and gaining recruits from subjugated people within. One time when his younger brother attempted to replicate Hannibal's trek across the Alps a messenger was intercepted leading to the destruction of the force and his brother's decapitated head being thrown into Hannibal's camp.

Eventually, as the fortunes started to change Hannibal's army started to melt away through deserters and attrition. In the end the great General met his end defending Carthage from overwhelming superiority.

CONCLUSION

Harold Lamb was a master at telling historical yarns. Where there were voids in the accepted historical record, Lamb sometimes interpolated events to fill in the gaps. His books are fun to read and I think he makes the subject, so many find boring, eminently compelling. His writing, though written by a scholar is not highbrow and is very easy to follow. It is written for the masses not for the few.

The book I read was only two hundred and eighty pages but the writing is small and probably equates to a present day book about a hundred pages longer.

(Book Description)

(Book Description)

(Book Description) 1930. With numerous illustrations. In this volume is told the story of the first crusaders. It begins with their setting out, and it ends with the death of the last survivor. Eight hundred and thirty-five years have passed since then, and the lines of these men are known to us only by the chronicles of their days. Several of these chronicles were written by men who marched with the crusaders, by two chaplains and an unknown soldier. Two other narratives were finished in Beyond the Sea after the march, and we have accounts of others who saw the crusaders pass, a princess of Byzantium, an Armenian patriarch. There is also the testimony of Arab travelers and historians of the period, and the notes of Genoese sea traders, and the saga of a Norse king. Upon these original chronicles the story in this book is based. It does not deal with the legends that grew up after the crusades. It is not history rewritten. It is the story of a dozen men, most of them leaders, who started out on that long journey-what they saw on the road, and what they did, and what befell them at the Sepulcher of Christ.

(Book Description)

(Book Description)