“Historical” find in Spain: elephant bone used by Hannibal in the war against Rome

The find may be the only direct proof of the passage of Hannibal’s elephants through the Iberian Peninsula, on their way to Rome, during the Second Punic War. The elephant was killed in a battle near Córdoba.

A 2,200-year-old bone unearthed in Spain could belong to one of the elephants that were used by the Hannibal’s army during the Second Punic War, reveals a new study.

The bone, the size of a baseball, was found near the city of Córdoba, in southern Spain. According to what was published this month in the magazine Journal of Archaeological Science: Reportsthis finding could be the only direct proof of the Carthaginian general’s war elephants.

As is known, 37 elephants accompanied Hannibal and his army throughout the Iberian Peninsula, crossed the Pyrenees as far south as Gaul, they crossed the Alps andentered Italy to attack Rome.

Until now, the most solid archaeological evidence of their march was what may have been disturbed earth and other remains left by the giant animals as they crossed an alpine gorge on the current border between France and Italy.

The bone “may prove to be historic“, says the Spanish archaeologist Rafael Martínez Sánchezresearcher at the University of Córdoba and first author of the study. Until now, “there was no direct archaeological evidence of the use of these animals”.

The mysterious bone was unearthed in 2019 and initially perplexed scientists because did not correspond to any native animal. In the new study, it has now been identified as an elephant’s right carpal bone — the “ankle” of the right front leg, which is equivalent to the wrist in humans.

Researchers believe this particular elephant was brought to the site by the Carthaginians as war animal.

The bone was found during archaeological excavations at the site of a fortified Iberian village, in a layer of earth radiocarbon dated to around 2250 yearsbefore the Romans took control of the region, around 150 BC

The Romans called towns to these fortified villages; were commonly used by the ancient Celts and were often built on top of hills, but this was located on a defensible bend in a river.

Carthage, an ancient city-state on the coast of what is now Tunisiaoriginated as Phoenician colonyand its fleet of warships was particularly feared.

But their armies were also powerfuland Carthage used war elephants in the first two Punic Wars against the Roman Republic, which aimed mainly at control of strategic regions of the Mediterranean western.

According to the researchers write in the study, a Carthaginian army stationed nearby during the Second Punic War (218 to 201 BC) would have been involved in a battle in the old fortified village near Córdoba — and that the elephant was killed in the fighting.

Other signs of a military conflict at the site included 12 spherical stones which researchers believe were ammunition for Carthaginian catapults.

According to Martínez Sánchez, it is not possible to determine whether the animal was an Asian elephant (The elephant is the greatest indicator), the species that Greek king Pyrrhus of Epirusknown by his eponymous “Pyrrhic Victory”, had used against the Romans about 10 years before the First Punic War, or the now extinct species of African elephant that the Carthaginians preferred for their war animals.

The Carthaginian general and nobleman Aníbal Barca He began his famous attack on Rome around 218 BC, leading his armies to Italy the long way across Western Europe. Most of their war elephants died when crossing the Alps, but Hannibal’s armies were victorious against the Romans in Italy for many years.

Hannibal was recalled to Carthage in 203 BC to defend the city against Roman attacks. But the Carthaginians ended up losing the second war against Rome, just as they had lost the First Punic Warmore than 20 years earlier.

About 50 years later, Rome provoked a Third Punic Warwhich the weakened Carthaginians also lost and which led to his downfall.