Sacred Band: Cavalry disbanded after 1st Punic War?

[Ymarsakar]

Hi, I was wondering what the deal was concerning historical gaps concerning what happened to the Sacred Band cavalry after the First Punic War?

It was noted that the Sacred Band had both a cavalry and infantry portion, recruited from the Carthaginian citizenry, the upperclass ones, to be used as a sort of training regiment.

Since one of the pivotal reasons why Hannibal lost Zama was due to a lack of sufficient cavalry, I was wondering if there were any stories or incidents noted about where the rest of Carthage's cavalry was when they were shipping Hannibal to Tunisia.

If the Sacred Band no longer had a cavalry portion because it got annihilated circa whatever, that is one thing. But it is another thing if the Sacred Band had its cavalry portion in tact, but political reasons prevented them from joining Hannibal at Zama.

[Beefy187]

If my memory is correct the Carthaginian senate couldnt be bothered (didnt like Hannibal much) to send the sacred band to Hannibal. I think they had about 2000

[hoom]

Well, the reason that they called Hannibal back to Africa was that they had already lost two armies in Africa.
Presumably many/most of the Sacred Band would have been killed in those?

[Parallel Pain]

Eeeeer really?

Cause the Carthaginian Senate had just stupidly tore up the treaty they signed with Scipio (before Hannibal got back). Which means they are risking everything on Hannibal being able to defeat Scipio.

It seems really stupid to me that the Senate would not give their best troops to Hannibal when they are risking everything on him able to obtain victory.

But then the senate was quite stupid.

EDIT: A bit late, was on the 2nd one...

[Watchman]

Then again, but that point Carthage had been losing the war with Rome on at least two major fronts (Sicily and Iberia) for a while and one would assume what high-end troops had been available had been sent and lost there instead... Hannibal in comparision was doing well in comparision in Italy (given that he stomped around there for what, fifteen years), so it's sort of understandable if he wasn't high priority for reinforcements.

[Parallel Pain]

Zama dude, Zama.

Hannibal was on home turf, in North Africa.

And if Wikipedia is to be believed (and we all know what that means) the Sacred Band were kept out of Zama due to the Senate.

Which sounds really stupid, if not suicidal, to me and I already explained why.

[Watchman]

Zama was the *last* battle of the war. Given how long it had been going on and the fact the Carthies had sort of been losing most of it, it'd be very surprising if the SB was up to anything like full strenght. More like most had been sent to try to shore up the losing fronts (and duly never seen again), and what they had left in Africa amounted about to a training cadre.

[TWFanatic]

What are our sources for the Sacred Band? I don't recollect ever hearing of it from my readings of Polybius and Livy.

[Strategy]

There are no references in our sources to a Sacred Band of Cavalry.

[Intranetusa]

Sacred Band Cavalry was probably all disbanded after the first Punic War.

But it just looks so damn cool ingame XD

[Strategy]

There are no historical references at all to Sacred Band Cavalry - after OR before the 1st Punic Wars. :no:

@TWFanatic: The so-called "Sacred Band" is talked about in the Life of Timoleon (Plutarch) where they are wiped out at the Krimisos river. The primary source, however, is the Library of Diodorus Siculus.

[Moros]

I don't recollect ever hearing of it from my readings of Polybius and Livy.
Not like Livy knew what he was writing about...

[Intranetusa]

There are no historical references at all to Sacred Band Cavalry - after OR before the 1st Punic Wars. :no:

@TWFanatic: The so-called "Sacred Band" is talked about in the Life of Timoleon (Plutarch) where they are wiped out at the Krimisos river. The primary source, however, is the Library of Diodorus Siculus.


There are references to Sacred Band Cavalry.

Yup, here are a couple of sources:

Hannibal: A History of the Art of War Among the Carthaginians and Romans

http://books.google.com/books?id=vpiFc_OvM0oC&pg=PA14&lpg=PA14&dq=carthage+sacred+band+cavalry&source=web&ots=3GGxlOU1MB&sig=GHmN3RoIwfdm2R6DI4JZ2PqKatM

"But in the cavalry, where wealth was required and honor sought, and especially in a corps d'elite called the Sacred Band, - the body-guard of the commander-inchief and a sort of training school for officers like Macedonian pages..."

http://www.fanaticus.org/DBA/guides/Painting/paintingII32.html

"The Sacred Band also fought on horseback as rather good cavalry. They dressed much like the foot soldiers, except they had a white cloak..."

[Strategy]

Note Dodge's choice of words: The cavalry ... appears to have formed an appendage to the Sacred Band. Dodge is speculating, and in this case with no foundation in fact. Just briefly browsing the book (which I have), pretty much all the information he has on the Sacred Band is either unsubstantiated guesswork unsupported by the sources available or a direct contradiction of the sources (e.g., he posits a 1500 troop strong Band, when all references to it indicate at least 2000-3000 infantry alone). Sadly, this is a fairly common feature of all Dodge's books on the ancient world.

I won't comment the Fanaticus reference. ~;)

To be very precise, then:
- no ancient source makes any reference to Sacred Band Cavalry
- no ancient source makes any reference to the Sacred Band at all after 310 BC

[The Wandering Scholar]

Not like Livy knew what he was writing about...

Opinionated