KING OF NUMIDIA AND ARBITER OF THE DESTINY OF TWO
WORLD EMPIRES (238-149 B.C.)
MASSINISSA, King of Numidia, may be compared to the
feather that tipped the scale. When two great nations were struggling
for the mastery of the world, he threw himself on one side and it
won. There seems nothing extraordinary in that. But at the time he
was a fugitive with only five followers. And all for the love of a
woman. Massinissa's love affair is one of the most poignant in history.
The leading figures of this mighty drama are:
Hannibal, the Carthaginian, renowned military genius, and himself
an African.
Scipio, foremost Roman general of his day, calm in judgment, cultured,
ruled by his head.
Syphax, king of Numidia, the kingpin of the situation--both Rome and
Carthage were trying hard to win him over.
Sophonisba, the most beautiful woman of her time, the daughter of
Hasdrubal, Carthaginian general, and niece of Hannibal.
Massinissa, son of Gala, king of Massylia, a petty kingdom in southern
Numidia, Africa.
The Numidians were of mixed Berber and Ethiopian ancestry. The Berbers
claimed descent from the Mazoi, the Negro soldiers of ancient Egypt.
Their numbers, like others of the peoples of northern Africa, were
continually reinforced by Negro peoples from the south brought in
as captives and slaves. The great strength of both Carthage and Numidia
was the renowned Numidlan cavalry.
As a lad Massinissa had been sent to Carthage to study military tactics
and while there had fallen in love with Sophonisba. Hasdrubal, her
father, disliked Numidians but had consented largely because of Massinissa's
exceptional ability. A giant in size and strength, none could equal
him on horseback or with the sword. At the lyceum he excelled in Latin,
Greek, and military tactics.
At the age of seventeen Massinissa was so greatly in love with Sophonisba
that he felt he must do something to impress her and the world. Accordingly
he induced her father to declare war on Syphax, and marching against
the latter, defeated him in two battles after which he went with Hasdrubal
to Spain where Carthage was fighting Rome for mastery of that land.
This was at the time when Hannibal had overrun Italy and was winning
brilliant battles not far from the walls of Rome.
Arriving in Spain, Massinissa, not yet eighteen, attacked Scipio,
Rome's foremost leader, and defeated him. Another Roman general, Gneus,
sent against him met the same fate. With his black cavalry, Massinissa
seemed invincible.
But while Massinissa was trying to distinguish himself in the eyes
of Sophonisba, events at home were shaping themselves against him.
Syphax, an old ally of Rome, had rallied his forces and was threatening
Carthage. To make peace, the Carthaginians forced Sophonisba to marry
Syphax.
Massinissa heard the news in Spain. In a great rage he went to the
tent of Hasdrubal, her father, to demand an explanation. The latter,
indignant at the thought that his daughter was being forced by the
state to marry, found himself having to choose between the national
welfare and his private feelings. He finally decided in favor of Syphax.
Massinissa thereupon resigned his command to return to his own country.
Before leaving Spain, however, he went secretly to Scipio's camp and
pledged himself to Rome. Henceforth Carthage would find him an implacable
foe.
Syphax now invaded Massinissa's country and ravaged it. Badly Wounded,
Massinissa was forced to hide in a cave and to give out that he was
dead. Hearing that Scipio had landed in Africa, he joined him with
all that remained of his army: five men.
Aided by the Romans, he now rallied his people, and joining his forces
with those of Scipio, marched to meet the allied Numidian and Carthaginian
armies under Hasdrubal.
Finding themselves greatly outnumbered, Massinissa and Scipio resorted
to strategy. Camping not far from the Numidian army, they sent Hasdrubal
an offer of peace, and while this was being considered, stole in at
night and set the Numidian camp afire. The Numidians, suddenly awakened,
thought the fire was accidental and ran out unarmed to fight it, on
which Scipio and Massinissa cut them down with great slaughter.
Not far away was the Carthaginian camp, and there too, the men, seeing
the fire and hearing the cries, thought it an accident and rushed
out to the Numidian camp unarmed. Their camp also was now set ablaze,
and caught between their own fire and the foe, they were easily massacred.
Forty-five thousand were killed and wounded and 17,000 Numidian horses
and six elephants were captured. Hasdrubal and Syphax, utterly routed,
took refuge behind the walls of Carthage.
Syphax consoled himself by saying that he had been beaten not by skill
and valor but by stratagem. "One is inferior," he said,
"only when beaten by arms." Gathering another army, he attacked
the Romans but was beaten again.
In this battle Massinissa beat down Syphax with his own hand and made
him prisoner. Taking him with a guard, he pushed on to Cirta, Syphax's
capital, within whose walls there reposed a prize greater than any
military conquest of which he had ever dreamed: his beloved Sophonisba.
It was four years since he had seen her-four tortured years.
Reaching the city, he displayed Syphax in chains to the inhabitants
and they surrendered.
As soon as the gates were opened, Massinissa in all the ardor of his
one and twenty years rode at full speed to Syphax's palace, where
Sophonisba, who had heard the news, awaited him with her maidens.
Reaching the palace, he sprang from his horse and ran up the steps
to meet her, but she, thinking he had come as a conqueror, threw herself
at his feet, begging him not to let her fall as a prize to the Romans.
"The gods," she said, "thy courage and thy fortune
hath given thee power over us. If it is permitted to a captive to
embrace the knees and touch the hand of a conqueror, I pray thee by
the royal majesty with which we ourselves were invested but yesterday
not to hand me over to the caprice of some cruel Roman. Dispose of
me thyself."
Massinissa, overcome with love for her, was speechless. Sophonisba
went on: "I love better to depend on a Numidian than a Roman.
I prefer those born as I, under the skies of Africa. Let death take
me rather than a Roman."
Massinissa tenderly lifted her to her feet and led her into the palace
where he embraced her and assured her that he still loved her and
would save her. But he had to think quickly. Sophonisba, he knew,
was really a Roman prize and Lelius, the Roman commander, with his
army was approaching. Not far behind the latter was Scipio, the supreme
commander.
Massinissa saw but one possibility and even that was risky, for it
might offend the Romans: he would marry her at once. He had the ceremony
performed without delay.
When Lelius arrived and heard what had been done he was very angry
and wished to snatch Sophonisba from the marriage bed and send her
off with the other capitves but thought it more prudent to await Scipio.
As fate would have it, Scipio saw Syphax first, and when he reproached
Syphax for his desertion of Rome, Syphax, who preferred to see Sophonisba
dead rather than married to Massinissa, placed the blame on her. He
said,' "Yes, I have committed a great fault. It is a folly for
which I am extremely sorry now. But the moment I took arms against
Rome was the end, not the beginning, of my folly.
"It began when I fell in love with Sophonisba. She was so bewitching
and so devoted to her country that though I was your friend, she made
me the friend of her country. It was her beauty, her charm that was
responsible for all that I have done." He added, "Now I
am ruined. But I have one consolation. She has passed into the hands
of my enemy, Massinissa, who has already shown himself no wiser than
I."
Scipio, who when he had heard from Lelius of the marriage had been
disposed to let Massinissa have her, now saw it in a different light.
Sending for Massinissa, he said to him affectionately, "I believe,
Massinissa, you found in me qualities that you admire when first you
came to seek my friendship in Spain and again in Africa. Of all these
my qualities the one I am most proud of is my continence--the empire
I wield over my passions. This virtue, Massinissa, I would also like
to see crown your distinguished services because, believe me well,
at your age we have less to fear from the arms of the enemy than from
the passions which besiege us."
Telling Massinissa that a victory over himself would be greater than
one over Syphax, he continued: "Now I shall leave you to your
reflections rather than speak in a manner to hurt your pride. But
permit me to say this: Syphax, his throne, his country, lands, and
people, his all, are now the property of the Roman Republic. Their
fate is in the hands of the Roman Senate.
"Is not his wife a part of all this? Is she not accused of having
alienated our ancient ally and thrown him into the war against us?
"Now I urge you to be victorious over yourself. Do not tarnish
all your virtues by a single vice. Do not efface all the services
you have rendered Rome by one step, the effect of which will be to
nullify all that you have done."
Massinissa heard him with leaden heart. He pleaded with tears but
Scipio sent him to his tent to think it over. Alone there he spent
several hours uttering groans that could be heard on the outside.
To keep Sophonisba would be the ruin of his people and himself. Without
her life would be empty.
He shuddered too at the thought of seeing her led in triumph through
the streets of Rome. There was only one thing for him to do. He took
a small package from the folds of his robe, emptied its contents into
a cup of wine, and bade his favorite slave take it to Sophonisba.
"Say to her," he said, "I would have been happy to
keep my first promise but a superior force has made it impossible.
Now the only thing left me is to keep my second one not to let her
fall into the hands of the Romans. May the remembrance of her father,
the illustrious general, and the thoughts of her country dictate her
conduct."
Sophonisba received the fearful present calmly. "Tell him,"
she said, "that I accept the wedding present without regret,
if it be true that my husband can do no more for his wife. Tell him
that I would have died more willingly if more time had elapsed between
the wedding and the funeral." A few minutes later she was dead.
When Scipio heard the news, he was troubled lest the fiery Massinissa
take some extreme step; for then and only then had he learned the
story of their early love. Sending for Massinissa, he presented him
to the assembled army in the most glowing words, proclaimed him king
of Numidia, and conferred on him the highest honor possible to an
alien: Roman citizenship of senatorial rank. Taking a toga bordered
with purple, he draped it about the shoulders of Massinissa. "You
are," he said, "the first stranger that Rome has ever deemed
worthy of wearing it."
Massinissa, grief-stricken, heard all as in a dream. He blamed the
Carthaginians as being the cause of all his sorrow and took a great
oath to be further revenged against them.
Rome rejoiced greatly at the news that Hasdrubal had been killed and
Syphax was a prisoner. It was also much stirred by Massinissa's sacrifice,
and when his envoys arrived in Rome, they were treated like kings.
But Carthage was still very powerful. Hannibal, the terror of Rome
for fifteen years, had returned to Carthage and was preparing for
a fight to the finish.
Hannibal sent an offer of alliance to Massinissa but the latter refused
it and joined Scipio. The rival amies met at Zama in 202 B.C. Hannibal
had 55,000 men and the allied Romans and Numidians, 40,000. Outnumbered,
Massinissa and Scipio once again resorted to strategy. In the forefront
of Hannibal's army were eighty armored elephants which were to be
used to trample the foes. Massinissa, assembling his trumpeters, had
them make such a noise that the elephants, not sufficiently trained
for battle, turned and ran amuck into Hannibal's army, completely
disorganizing his ranks, at which Massinissa let loose his famous
cavalry on Hannibal's left wing, cutting it to pieces. Scipio at the
same time attacked the right one, completing the rout. Thus ended
the long fight between Rome and Carthage for mastery of the world.
Following this Massinissa had sixty years of peace during which he
devoted himself to the development of his kingdom. From being robbers
and marauders, the Numidians became one of the wealthiest and most
cultured people of the times. But he had never ceased to remember
Sophonisba and the oath he had taken against Carthage for having given
her to Syphax. He now resolved as the final act of his career to attack
Carthage, which had grown prosperous again, and deliberately provoked
her into a war.
Though eighty-eight years old, he had not lost his cunning, and when
the Carthaginians came to attack him, he pretended to flee and drew
off their forces into a desert region, surrounded by mountains and
lacking in food and water. There he made a stand, occupying the plains,
while the Carthaginians seized the heights, thinking them the more
advantageous. Surrounding them in that position, Massinissa besieged
them.
Appian, ancient Roman writer, says of this fight, "Day came and
Massinissa, eighty-eight years old, but still a young and vigorous
soldier, was mounted on horseback without saddle or other covering
as is the custom of the country, equally acting in the capacity of
general and soldier, for the Numidians are the lustiest of all the
people of Africa."
The Carthaginians, after eating their horses and even the leather
of their saddles, finally surrendered. This was Massinissa's last
exploit. He died two years later.
Livy, Polybius, Appian, Justin, and all the historians of the period
speak in highest terms of him. Polybius says:
Massinissa was the greatest and the happiest sovereign of our epoch.
He reigned more than sixty years in perfect health.
Physically he was the strongest and the most robust man of his time.
Thanks to the harmony that reigned in his family, his kingdom was
never troubled by intrigue or domestic strife. But this was his greatest
merit, his most admirable work; before him, Numidia was wild, uncultivated,
and alien to all culture. He was the first to show that it could produce
all kinds of fruit like any other country. He has, therefore, more
title and rights than anyone that his memory should be honored. A
short time before his death he inflicted a great defeat on the Carthaginians.
The day after the battle he was to be seen before his tent eating
wholewheat bread.
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