Tom Holland

And the fugitives from Cannae, some of them had sought refuge in the town of Cannae itself, near the battlefield, of course.

And others had sought refuge in a second, smaller camp that had been built in the rear of the Roman battle lines.

So people should imagine that there's the plain where the battle is fought.

There's this smaller camp where the Roman generals and people had been based before the thing.

Then there's a river.

And on the other side, there is a massive Roman military camp.

There are 10,000 men in the large camp.

There are refugees in the smaller camp.

They're separated by this river.

So Hannibal in the morning turns his attentions to the Romans who've taken refuge in the town of Cannae and in this smaller fort.

The fugitives in Cannae are very quickly taken prisoner.

Then Hannibal is preparing to move on this small Roman camp, which is of course fortified.

I mean, the Romans there can hope to hold out.

And officers in the main Roman camp, so on the other side of the river, they've been urging the fugitives to, you know, don't stay there.

You're going to be, you know, you're going to be wiped out if you do stay there.

Cross the river, come and join us.

You can add to our numbers and hopefully we can kind of get away from here.

But the Romans fugitives are so demoralized that ultimately only about 600 make the attempt and managed to get away across the river.

And so they and the 10,000 reserves had then managed to march out of the main camp to avoid being cornered by Hannibal's cavalry.

And they cross the plain and they reach a walled town called Canusium, which is about six miles from the battlefield.