Professor Josephine Quinn

So, Hamilcar, whose reputation is really enhanced by what happened in the First Punic War, even though they lost, he was the big Carthaginian star.

So, he takes a force to Spain in 237, and once he gets there, he basically acts a bit like an independent prince, but it's all with the permission of the Carthaginian Senate.

And the reason that Hannibal goes with him, and the story goes that he's nine years old when his dad leaves to go to Spain, and he begs to join the expedition.

Yeah.

And so his dad lets him and he doesn't get back to Carthage until he is 45 years old.

Whoa.

Nine.

Yeah.

And then his dad dies in battle in 229, 2298.

Hannibal's about 18 at this point.

And obviously he's too young to take command.

So the command of the Carthaginian armies in Spain goes to his brother-in-law, who's called Hasdrubal the Fair.

A lot of the family do seem to grow up in Spain together.

And they actually, they kind of get on OK.

And Hasdrubal seems to be a pretty good replacement for Hamilcar.

And we don't know very much about what Hannibal's doing in this period, but he's definitely leading some of the military campaigns against some of the local populations into their territory.

He didn't kill him.

Did he?

No.

Poor old Hasdrubal gets assassinated by one of their allies, apparently.