A few notes on Hannibal in Silius Italicus's "Punica"

Abstract

The article is an attempt at studying the image of Hannibal as presented in Punica. The aim of the paper is to sketch a portrait of the Carthaginian in Punica (with the image preserved both in historiography and in poetic epithets in mind), which would be a literary realisation of historiographic matter, with variatio typical for poetry, which was extended, shortened and mixed by Silius. The following review also looks at the topic of cruelty, which was a feature attributed to Hannibal himself as well as to Carthaginians in general, and that of death – demonstrated by such actions as (not) burying the bodies of Roman consuls or utilising bodies of the dead to build a bridge.