HANNIBAL'S ELEPHANTS Part.5

Two things are clear from such sublime piece of nonsense: neither Polybius nor Livy knew much about elephants, and their histories include fanciful fabrications presented in careful detail, as if related by actual witnesses—caveat lector. What neither classic historian was aware of is that elephants not only are not terrified of rivers, but can swim and are actually very good swimmers! The aquatic prowess of pachyderms would have been well known to the Carthaginians, who had been training elephants for more than a century prior to the wars with Rome. Consequently, it is highly unlikely that Hannibal would have attempted such complicated and unnecessary procedure to get his animals across the Rhone. The Romans, on the other hand, and even the Greeks, would have been less likely to be cognizant of such matters—Livy and Polybius were clearly uninformed.

The modern reader can enjoy stunning photographs of swimming elephants in Steve Bloom’s Elephant (Chronicle Books, 2006), or view a sampling by doing a Google search for “swimming elephant pictures.”