If you google “who is the greatest military general ever?” the overwhelming majority of results will list the same 3 men somewhere in the top 4 positions. Napoleon Bonaparte, Alexander the Great, and Hannibal Barca. Hannibal is known for his genius military tactics, his ability to lead and inspire a massively diverse and talented army, and for his herd of trained, armored, and exceptionally dangerous war elephants.
Hannibal lived from 247 – 183 BC, in the age of the Roman Empire, though he would hate that connection as it was his life’s mission to attack and lay siege to Rome. He was from an area in Northern Africa (important later) that history recognizes as Carthage. Today, it is Tunisia, situated across the Mediterranean Sea from Italy and the Global Power of the era, Rome.
As famous as Hannibal became for his military tactics along his conquest across Northern Africa, up into Spain and across Europe, he was equally as famous for his army. An army made up of elite local mercenary groups that Hannibal contracted with, earned the support of, and made deals with during his conquest. He recruited formally-trained Libyan troops, Iberian heavy infantry armed with javelins, mountain-dwelling mercenary groups known as Balearic Slingers who expertly used leather slingshots, 3 different types of cavalry (soldiers on horseback) including the famously dangerous Numidian horsemen, ruthless and agile soldiers who rode extremely fast horses without the use of saddles or bridles, the Celtic Gauls who used their own native equipment such as longswords, and a herd of 37 armored war elephants. Needless to say, without one of the greatest military minds to ever live at the helm, this army was still one of, if not THE, pound for pound most dangerous and dominant military force ever recruited, which is also testament to Hannibal’s military prowess. Add Hannibal the general back to the picture and you are left with the Roman folklore and mythology that has stuck around in our histories to today.
3/4 of the way across Europe, Hannibal encountered his greatest challenge yet, (by the way just skipped over 3 of the most famous and cited military battles of all time, Trebbia, Lake Trasamine, and Cannae— all won by Hannibal, one of them still holding the record for the largest successful military ambush ever) the Alps. To approach Rome, Hannibal would have needed to take Italy by sea or by bypassing the alps. Attempting siege by sea would have been devastating, as Rome had a strong trained Navy, and great relationships with all other sea-faring and trade-involved communities in the area who would have notified the Romans of the activity well ahead of time. Attempting siege by bypassing the alps would have been devestating as well, as the passages that avoided going up and over the mountain range were narrow and winding, making any attempt at maintaining effective formations in combat impossible. They would have been slaughtered. Rome know this too. At at the time, no one had ever successfully crossed the alps with a military force. Much less one the size of Hannibals, made up of different groups, untrained for alpine conquest, in winter, with elephants. This was a task that had never been done before 3 or 4 layers of complexity ago. Hannibal is quoted as saying in response to doubts it was remotely possible, “I will find a way or I will make one.” You can guess what happened.
Hannibal led the army over the alps, albeit with massive losses, but nonetheless he completed the impossible. A full-scale army, cavalry, and elephants. His forces now approached Rome from the North, a side that had never been threatened via approach in the history of man. It was at this moment that Hannibal, the man whom his opponents literally likened to a god and feared like one, made maybe the only recordable mistake of his military career and he chose not to lay siege to Rome, electing instead to rest his troops and wait out better weather while he replenished energy and resources. At this point in the war, Rome has their own general of note, and he can be found alongside Napoleon, Alexander and Hannibal as the 4th person on any History’s Greatest Generals list, Scipio Africanus.
Scipio hatches a plan of reclusion, and Rome’s war against Hannibal (note this is the roman EMPIRE vs a single general and his forces) known as the 2nd punic war becomes one of attrition as Scipio locks the city down and cuts off all resupply routes for Hannibal and his forces. Rome scorches the earth surrounding Hannibal’s camp, leaving the land unfit for any farming or lodging, and after months and months Hannibal’s army begins to lose steam, starve, lose faith, miss a paycheck, etc. and Hannibal is eventually waited out and ambushed. He takes his own life before being captured, not allowing Rome the satisfaction of delivering the final blow.
Julius Caesar is born 83 years later, just to say that time kept ticking and Rome moved on like nothing happened. Boy do they all owe Scipio.
So who is Surus?
Surus is the last piece to this “Hannibal was a real badass” puzzle, if you hadn’t already got there yourself. During the time of Hannibal, the overwhelming majority of Europeans had never seen or heard of an elephant. Opposing armies had never seen such a beast, much less one draped in war armor literally flattening troops, horses, supplies, and lodgings. So not only was the army an all star team of killers and soldiers but they also had “monsters covered in war armor” as described by a roman soldier. Now, Hannibals elephants were likely North African Forest Elephants standing about 8ft tall at the shoulder, smaller than African elephants, and likened to Asian elephants. However, to people who had never even heard of such an animal, that sure as shit didn’t matter.
There was 1 elephant in the group however, that was markedly larger. Standing over 11 feet tall at the shoulder. Large, and intimidating with a broken tusk. Believing this elephant to be a Syrian elephant, a much larger breed than the forest elephants, the elephant was called Surus, which meant “the Syrian“. Surus was Hannibal’s personal elephant. As his army marched into battle, sectioned into platoons, set in formation, he rode in atop Surus. From a platform he had built to mount atop Surus, Hannibal directed his troops, and it was from this perch that this legend fought his way across Europe and into the History books (figuratively of course, because Hannibal also would hop on a horse and go get himself dirty too. Did I mention this dude is a badass?).
Oh ya, somewhere along the way to Rome he lost an eye too. Didn’t matter.
Sawyer