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Updated: June 4, 2025
It is asserted that 80,000 Roman soldiers and half as many of the immense and helpless body of camp-followers perished, and that only ten men escaped: this much is certain, that only a few out of the two armies succeeded in escaping, for the Romans had fought with the river in their rear. It was a calamity which materially and morally far surpassed the day of Cannae.
The senate decreed, the first day they deliberated in the Capitol, that double taxes should be imposed for that year, one moiety of which should be immediately levied, as a fund from which pay might be given forthwith to all the soldiers, except those who had been at Cannae.
As after the battle of Cannae, the period of mourning was shortened by decree of the senate. The new enlistments brought out the most painful scarcity of men. All Italians capable of bearing arms had to swear that they would not leave Italy; the captains of the vessels lying in the Italian ports were instructed not to take on board any man fit for service.
Of those that survived the battle at Cannae, some had escaped by flight, and some were taken alive by the enemy; so great a multitude, that it was thought there were not remaining Romans enough to defend the walls of the city.
The consuls persisted in the same opinions they ever entertained; but nearly all acquiesced with Varro, and none with Paulus except Servilius, the consul of the former year. In compliance with the opinion of the majority, they set out, under the impulse of destiny, to render Cannae celebrated by a Roman disaster.
Thus ended the battle of Cannae, a battle where prodigies of valor were seen on both sides. "Of the six thousand horse of which the Roman cavalry was composed, only seventy Romans reached Venusia with Varro, and, of the auxiliary cavalry, only three hundred men found shelter in various towns. Ten thousand foot were taken prisoners, but they were not in the battle.
The erroneousness of the view of Livy, which transfers the Phoenician camp to the right, the Roman to the left bank of the Trebia, has lately been repeatedly pointed out. III. III. The Celts Attacked in Their Own Land III. III. Northern Italy The War under Hannibal from Cannae to Zama The Crisis
To Marcus Valerius together with Lucius Cincius, for these also were continued in command in Sicily, the troops which had fought at Cannae were given, with orders to recruit them out of the surviving soldiers of the legions of Cneius Fulvius.
Excited as they were by these words, they yet did not venture upon removing Fabius from his post, in spite of their feeling against him, but they decreed that Minucius should conduct the war, having equal powers with the dictator, a thing never before done in Rome, but which occurred shortly afterwards, after the disaster at Cannae, when Marcus Junius was dictator in the camp, and, as many members of the Senate had perished in the battle, they chose another dictator, Fabius Buteo.
Perseus, his son, followed in the same path, having slain his brother Demetrius, who was a friend of Rome. The war broke out in 171. For several campaigns the management of the Roman generals was ill-judged; but at last L. AEmilius Paulus, son of the consul who fell at Cannae, routed the Macedonians at the battle of Pydna. Immense spoils were brought to Rome by the conqueror.
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