Editing Battle of Cannae (section)

== Battle ==
[[File:Battle cannae destruction.svg|thumb|upright=1.35|The encirclement and destruction of the Roman army]]
As the armies advanced on one another, Hannibal gradually extended the center of his line, as Polybius described: "After thus drawing up his whole army in a straight line, he took the central companies of Hispanics and Celts and advanced with them, keeping the rest of them in contact with these companies, but gradually falling off, so as to produce a crescent-shaped formation, the line of the flanking companies growing thinner as it was prolonged, his object being to employ the Africans as a reserve force and to begin the action with the Hispanics and Celts." Polybius described the weak Carthaginian center as deployed in a crescent, curving out toward the Romans in the middle with the African troops on their flanks in [[echelon formation]].<ref name="Fordham University website" />

It is believed that the purpose of this formation was to break the forward momentum of the Roman infantry, and delay its advance before other developments allowed Hannibal to deploy his African infantry most effectively.{{sfn|Healy|1994|p=77}} While the majority of historians feel that Hannibal's action was deliberate, some have called this account fanciful, and claim that the actions of the day represent either the natural curvature that occurs when a broad front of infantry marches forward, or the bending back of the Carthaginian center from the shock action of meeting the heavily massed Roman center.{{sfn|Healy|1994|p=84}}

The battle began with a fierce cavalry engagement on the flanks.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|pp=118–120}} Polybius described many of the Hispanic and Celtic horsemen facing the Romans dismounting due to the lack of space to fight on horseback, and called the struggle "barbaric" in the sense of its utter brutality.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=120}} When the Carthaginian cavalry got the upper hand, they cut down their Roman opponents without giving quarter.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=126}}<ref name="Fordham University website" /> On the other flank the Numidians engaged in a way that merely kept the Roman allied cavalry occupied.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=126}} Hasdrubal kept his victorious Hispanic and Gallic cavalry under control and did not chase the retreating Roman right wing.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=126}} Instead, he led them to the other side of the field to attack the socii cavalry still fighting the Numidians.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=149}} Assailed from both sides, the allied cavalry broke before Hasdrubal could charge into contact and the Numidians pursued them off the field.<ref name="Fordham University website" />{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=149}}

While the Carthaginian cavalry were in the process of defeating the Roman horsemen, the masses of infantry on both sides advanced towards each other in the center of the field. The wind from the east blew dust in the Romans' faces and obscured their vision. While the wind was not a major factor, the dust that both armies created would have been potentially debilitating to sight.<ref name="Dodge2004" /> Although it made seeing difficult, troops would still have been able to see others in the vicinity.{{sfn|Daly|2002}}

The dust was not the only psychological factor involved in battle. Because of the somewhat distant battle location, both sides were forced to fight on little sleep. Another Roman disadvantage was thirst caused by Hannibal's attack on the Roman encampment during the previous day. Furthermore, the massive number of troops would have led to an overwhelming amount of background noise. All of these psychological factors made battle especially difficult for the infantrymen.{{sfn|Daly|2002}}

The light infantry on both sides engaged in indecisive skirmishing, inflicting few casualties and quickly withdrawing through the ranks of their heavy infantry.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|pp=114–116}} As the Roman heavy infantry attacked, Hannibal stood with his men in the weak center and held them together in a controlled retreat. The crescent of Hispanic and Gallic troops buckled inwards as they gradually withdrew step by step. Knowing the superiority of the Roman infantry, Hannibal had instructed his infantry to withdraw deliberately, creating an even tighter envelopment around the attacking Roman forces. By doing so, he had turned the strength of the Roman infantry into a weakness. While the front ranks were gradually advancing, the bulk of the Roman troops began to lose their cohesion, as troops from the reserve lines advanced into the growing gaps.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=147}}

Soon they were compacted together so closely that they had little space to wield their weapons. In pressing so far forward in their desire to destroy the retreating and seemingly collapsing line of Hispanic and Gallic troops, the Romans had ignored (possibly due to the dust) the African troops that stood uncommitted on the projecting ends of this now-reversed crescent.{{sfn|Healy|1994|p=84}}

This also gave the Carthaginian cavalry time to drive the Roman cavalry off on both flanks and attack the Roman center in the rear. The Roman infantry, now stripped of protection on both its flanks, formed a wedge that drove deeper and deeper into the Carthaginian semicircle, driving itself into an alley formed by the African infantry on the wings.<ref>Cottrell, Leonard. ''Enemy of Rome''. Evans Bros, 1965, {{ISBN|0-237-44320-1}}. p. 99</ref> At this decisive point, Hannibal ordered his African infantry to turn inwards and advance against the Roman flanks, creating an encirclement in one of the earliest known examples of a [[pincer movement]].{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=148}}

When the Carthaginian cavalry attacked the Romans in the rear and the African flanking echelons assailed them on their right and left, the advance of the Roman infantry was brought to an abrupt halt.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=150}} The Romans were henceforth enclosed in a pocket with no means of escape.{{sfn|Goldsworthy|2001|p=152}} The Carthaginians created a wall and began to systematically massacre them. Polybius wrote: "as their outer ranks were continually cut down, and the survivors forced to pull back and huddle together, they were finally all killed where they stood."{{sfn|Healy|1994|p=85}}

As Livy described, "So many thousands of Romans were dying... Some, whom their wounds, pinched by the morning cold, had roused, as they were rising up, covered with blood, from the midst of the heaps of slain, were overpowered by the enemy. Some were found with their heads plunged into the earth, which they had excavated; having thus, as it appeared, made pits for themselves, and having suffocated themselves."<ref name="Livy xxii.51">Livy, ''Ab urbe condita'', xxii.51</ref> [[Victor Davis Hanson]] claims that nearly six hundred legionaries were slaughtered each minute until darkness brought an end to the bloodletting.<ref name="Hanson1996">Hanson, "[http://college.hmco.com/history/readerscomp/mil/html/mh_008300_cannaebattle.htm Battle of Cannae] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050921005928/http://college.hmco.com/history/readerscomp/mil/html/mh_008300_cannaebattle.htm |date=2005-09-21 }}" ''The Reader's Companion to Military History'', Cowley, Robert and Parker, Geoffrey (eds.), p. 70. Houghton Mifflin, 1996, {{ISBN|0-395-66969-3}}.</ref> 

A few Romans managed to escape the disaster. Both Livy and Polybius agree that the consul Varro managed to escape with 70 horsemen to [[Venusia]].<ref>Livy, ''Ab urbe condita'', xxii.49; Polybius, iii.117</ref> However, both authorities differ about how many more escaped. Polybius states "perhaps 3,000" infantry and 300 allied horsemen escaped, but his surviving narrative furnishes no further details.<ref>Polybius, iii.117</ref> Livy is more informative. He singles out a group of 600 men under Publius Sempronius Tuditanus who fought their way out of the smaller encampment to the larger one, then from there to [[Canusium]].<ref>Livy, ''Ab urbe condita'', xxii.50</ref> Another group from the larger camp, numbering 4,000 infantry and 200 horsemen, also made their way to Canusium "some marching in column, others, which was no more dangerous, making their way over the countryside."<ref>Livy, ''Ab urbe condita'', xxii.52</ref> Livy mentions that Varro reported to the Senate that he assembled a force of 10,000 survivors, "bits and pieces from various units, and nothing like a coherent force".<ref>Livy, ''Ab urbe condita'', xxii.56</ref>