There's a reason that you see working elephants all over East Asia, but not in Africa.
African elephants are pretty badass. I have not heard of them being successfully trained, but then, it's never really been a subject I studied.
Also, as we are learning, more and more, when it comes to war, big is not necessarily better. Big targets. These days, a speedboat with a missile, could take out an aircraft carrier.
It's also worth noting that, despite the insane effort it must have taken to get elephants over the alps, all but one of Hannibal's elephants died during the first winter in Italy. They made for a great story and were a propaganda coup for the Carthaginians, but didn't wind up making much of a military impact. They were only present for the first couple of battles Hannibal fought.
For centuries, Romans had grabbed land and defeated enemies mostly by projecting immense power and using shock and awe tactics. Hannibal of course learnt a lot about Roman tactics from his father, Hamilcar, and the “treachery” with which Rome had taken Sicily off Carthaginians. But he also grew up in Spain, in close proximity to Romans, and studied them and their methods for years.
He knew he needed to have an instrument of shock and awe himself, something the Romans had never seen before, and elephants were perfect for that.
For those interested, the Rest is History podcast did a 4 series on Hannibal last year which is highly engaging and informative
Which claim are you referring to that they made? I looked through all the parts where they were quoted and most seemed to have couched language.
You realize you are giving people the indication that you are knowledgeable on the subject, have read the article, or the underlying research - by framing your statement this way?
"much narrative archaeologists construct"
This comment has it's own narrative, to be skeptical of archaeologists. Be skeptical of the skeptics too.
Anyway you can read about the additional archaeological contexts which are used for evidence of the claim here (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S23524...).
https://columbiagemhouse.com/pages/anthill-garnet
https://myeldesign.com/blogs/journal/the-fabulous-story-of-a...
It is quite interesting to see that the depicted elephant has wrong proportions. This makes one wonder whether the artist who created that mosaic, ever saw an elephant himself.
Oh, that’s hysterical. I’ve seen drawings exactly like that, in illuminated manuscripts, and your description is perfect :D
It's interesting because they don't monotonically get better over time. Some of the oldest depictions are pretty good, and there's some zaniness in the middle of the timeline
This famous "skeleton" mosaic has the proportions wrong as well, even though the artist almost certainly saw some actual human skeletons, and definitely some living humans with their longer arms and smaller heads than depicted :)
https://www.thehistoryblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Ha...
Even then we're assuming it's not stylized. They clearly wanted a nice tile pattern, and might have made deliberate tweaks to get that.
The Roman bridge is fascinating as well.
Plus, if you arrive in summer, you will learn what heat is. Córdoba is hot even for the standards of Spanish summers. Hence, interesting night life. Not just drunkards, normal families and everyone who barely survived the day and now has the opportunity to live and socialize outside.
