Scullard Howard Hayes. Scipio Africanus in the Second Punic War

Cambridge University Press, 1930. — 352 p.There has recently appeared a book which deals with Scipio's military campaigns in the Second Punic War from the angle of modern war, but which is perhaps not based on a very critical use of the sources. The importance of Scipio's Spanish campaign has not always been adequately emphasised in recent literature or its difficulties discussed. Also, apart from the place which he holds in the annals of military history and his great influence on the development of the Roman army, Scipio's extraordinary personality, which combined the religious mystic and the man of action, together with his central position in the history of the Roman Republic, has been neglected. While the scope of this work is confined to the first part of Scipio's career (which was more military than political) and so precludes a detailed discussion of all these aspects. Scipio realised more fully than have many soldiers that the aim of war is the establishment of a truer peace. Further, he was not merely the natural product of his age, but he was one of those outstanding personalities who stand like rocks in the stream of history and divert its course.