Single bone in Spain offers first direct evidence of Hannibal's war elephants

Something often left out of fiction about war is how easily a moving army can overwhelm a local ecosystem, particularly if its supply lines sag. You might not even be their target, and yet you will be pillaged. No more easy hunting for you for years. No more quick trips for firewood, or tinder.

It stands to reason that if an occupying force doesn’t stay long in an area, and its animals die along the way, that the now destitute locals will take the “road kill” and scrounge every possible calorie from it. And marrow was a dish rather than something for soup stock up until the modern era. The Illiad basically won’t shut up about it.

So I have no doubt that every dead elephant anyone could find was 100% rendered down into food and leather by the beleaguered locals. And probably every cousin from one village over got told about the find too. (I suspect elephant leather would make amazing peasant shoes)

This month I read "Carthage Must Be Destroyed" (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10133950-carthage-must-b...), which dives deep into Hannibal's war against Rome (and the other punic wars).

I highly recommend reading about what happened from the Carthaginian perspective instead of the typical Roman perspective.

There's also some elaboration on the usage of elephants, the feasibility of of this, and how ultimately ineffective it was for war. (It was great for scaring the enemy, but the issue is they indiscriminately hurt both armies).

Worth noting that these would have been North African elephants, a now-extinct subspecies. It is not as tall as the modern African elephant - 2.5m at the shoulder, as compared to 3 to 3.5m for African elephants. A large warhorse might measure 1.5m tall, for comparison.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_African_elephant

I highly recommend "The Fall of Civilisations" podcast's episode on this topic. it's such an epic story and the narrator builds such a rich picture of the times and events.

https://fallofcivilizationspodcast.com/2023/04/11/%F0%9F%90%...

Hannibal loved it when a plan came together.

The latter years of his life must have been very disappointing

After interacting with some Asian elephants with handlers recently this makes a lot more sense. Even if he used North African elephants - they can hike up and down mountains and rough terrain easily with stability. I’m assuming they could pull equipment and even potentially be armed and armored. They are incredible creatures.

Terror Lake salutes Hannibal crossing the alps

Herodotus wrote of fire breathing ants in Egypt.

score yet another win for the stories of antiquity being more right than wrong.