The relationship between Scipio and Polybius was one of the great friendships of antiquity, one that nevertheless was complicated by the fact that Polybius was, strictly speaking, a prisoner of the Romans, a Greek nobleman obliged by circumstances to accept a request to be mentor to the younger Scipio in Rome. Scipio had an elder brother, Fabius (a name resulting from his adoption into the gens Fabii), also a pupil of Polybius; I have used his praenomen and his relationship with Polybius in the creation of my fictional legionary Fabius Petronius Secundus, the bodyguard and companion of Scipio whose relationship with him in the novel is in some ways akin to that of brothers.
I have speculated that Polybius was in Rome by 168 BC and was present on the Roman side at the Battle of Pydna, so had surrendered himself as a captive somewhat earlier than most of his contemporaries, consistent perhaps with his admiration for Rome. He certainly became a great proponent of Rome, and found in Scipio a young man who fell outside the usual parameters, sensitized by the opprobrium that may have been heaped on him by his adoptive family in the gens Scipiones for his failure to show due interest in the law courts and social niceties of Rome. Like Polybius, he was bookish and intellectual but also a passionate hunter and warrior, one who above all relished the idea of war and a destiny that was to lead him in 146 BC to stand astride the walls of Carthage and contemplate the momentous possibilities that lay ahead of him and of Rome.
Much of the account in this novel of the final hours of Punic Carthage draws on Appian, particularly the fighting and slaughter in the old quarter of the city beneath the Byrsa. As for the fate of Hasdrubal, Appian tells us that he surrendered to Scipio, but that his wife slew her children and flung them and herself into the fire of the temple, ‘as Hasdrubal should have died himself’ (Appian, Libyca, 131); I have taken this cue from Appian as the basis for the final apocalyptic scene in the novel.
The coin used as an illustration in this novel is a beautiful example of the only Roman issue known to date from 146 BC, as contemplated by Scipio in chapter 22; you can see a film of me handling this actual coin at www.davidgibbins.com, where you can also find more facts behind the fiction and imagery related to my archaeological work at Carthage and other sites mentioned in the novel.
Antestius coin
Photographs of the obverse and reverse of a denarius by the moneyer Antestius, minted in 146 BC, have been used on the title pages of each Part of the novel. The obverse shows the goddess Roma in a helmet, and the reverse shows two armed horsemen and a dog with the inscription ROMA beneath.
Also by David Gibbins
ATLANTIS
CRUSADER GOLD
THE LAST GOSPEL
THE TIGER WARRIOR
THE MASK OF TROY
THE GODS OF ATLANTIS
PHARAOH
About the Author
David Gibbins is a New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling author whose novels have sold almost three million copies and are published in thirty languages. He is an academic archaeologist by training, and his novels reflect his extensive experience investigating ancient sites around the world, both on land and underwater.
He was born in Canada to English parents and grew up there, in New Zealand and in England. After taking a first-class honours degree in Ancient Mediterranean Studies from the University of Bristol he completed a PhD in archaeology at the University of Cambridge, where he was a research scholar of Corpus Christi College and a postdoctoral fellow in the Faculty of Classics. Before becoming a full-time author he worked for eight years as a university lecturer, teaching Roman archaeology and art, ancient history and maritime archaeology. As well as fiction, he is the author of more than fifty scholarly publications, including articles in Antiquity, World Archaeology, International Journal of Nautical Archaeology, New Scientist and other journals, in addition to monographs and edited volumes, including Shipwrecks (Routledge, 2001).
He has researched and excavated extensively in the Mediterranean region, from Turkey and Israel to Greece and Crete, Italy and Sicily, Spain and North Africa, as well as in the British Isles and North America. Over the years his work has been supported among others by the British Academy, the British Schools of Archaeology in Rome and Jerusalem, the British Institute at Ankara and the Society of Antiquaries of London, and by a Fellowship from the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust. For two seasons he worked at the ancient site of Carthage, leading an expedition to investigate offshore harbour remains. He learned to dive at the age of fifteen in Canada, and underwater archaeology has been one of his main passions; he has led expeditions to investigate shipwreck sites all over the world, including Roman wrecks off Sicily and elsewhere in the Mediterranean, as well as off the British Isles. He was an adjunct professor of the American Institute of Nautical Archaeology while he worked for two seasons on an ancient Greek shipwreck off the coast of Turkey.
He has a long-standing fascination with military history, partly stemming from an extensive military background in his own family. His wide-ranging interest in arms and armour has focused in recent years on collecting and shooting nineteenth-century British and East India Company firearms, as well as making and shooting reproduction American flintlock longrifles on the wilderness tract in Canada where he does most of his writing. His military interests are reflected in his previous novels, including Roman campaigning in the east (The Tiger Warrior), Victorian warfare in India and the Sudan (The Tiger Warrior, Pharaoh), and the Second World War (The Mask of Troy).
More biographical material is found on his website:
www.davidgibbins.com.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.
An imprint of St. Martin’s Press.
TOTAL WAR ROME: DESTROY CARTHAGE. Copyright © 2013 by David Gibbins. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.thomasdunnebooks.com
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gibbins, David J. L.
Total war Rome : destroy Carthage / David Gibbins.—1st U.S. ed.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-1-250-03864-7 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-250-03865-4 (e-book)
1. FICTION / Historical. 2. FICTION / Action & Adventure. 3. FICTION / Media Tie-In. I. Title.
PR6107.I225T68 2013
823'.92—dc23
2013020413
First published in the UK by Macmillan, an imprint of Pan Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
First U.S. Edition: September 2013
eISBN 9781250038654
First eBook edition: August 2013
Total War Rome: Destroy Carthage Page 33
