Tom Holland

And this had proved very effective and successful.

Obviously, by sending eight legions to go and fight Hannibal and then be wiped out at Cannae, the Romans had turned their back on this policy.

But now, with the news of Cannae brought to Rome, it's evident that Fabius's strategy had been the correct one.

And so he has a tremendous moral force and he takes full advantage of it.

He doesn't have an official position, but people look up to him as the guy who has been proved right.

And so what he does is to give an incredible display of sang-froid, of kind of cool and measured confidence, and it wins him the effective command of the city.

So what he does is to walk around Rome.

He kind of greets people in a totally measured manner.

state of mind, as though nothing particularly awful has happened, as though it's just a normal day.

He stops the women from staging their displays of mourning.

He forbids all these public meetings in which people are kind of venting their fear and distress.

And he puts guards on the city walls and particularly on the city gates.

And they are there not really to guard against Hannibal, but to stop anyone attempting to flee.

And what he also does and the Senate does is to consult the Sibylline books.

And the Sibylline books are very ancient collections of Greek writings.

You consult them when Rome is in particularly terrible straits.

It's a kind of an awful moment of ritual when this is done.

They consult the books and the books say, you must entomb alive a Gaul and a Greek.

And this is terrible news for the Romans because the Romans do not engage in human sacrifice.

And it's one of the things that marks them out as a civilized people.