The Alps of Hannibal

Front matter

THE ALPS OF HANNIBAL. IN TWO VOLUMES. THE ALPS OF HANNIBAL. BT WILLIAM JOHN LAW, M.A. FORMERLY STUDENT OF CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. II. 'ganbmx : MACMILLAN AND CO. 1866. [The Sight of Translation, and Reproduction is reserved.] LONDON : R. CLAY, SON, AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS, BREAD STREET HILL. CONTENTS OF VOLUME SECOND.

PART VIII. KNOWLEDGE OF THE ALPS IN EARLY TIMES.

PAGE Chap. I. — Strabo on the Alps. His allusion to Polybius and Hannibal. Doubtful that he wrote the three words. Improbable that the four Passes were named by Polybius. Errors of AL Letronne 1 Chap. II. — The Salassian hyperbasis of Strabo 13 Chap. III. — The Taurinian hyperbasis of Strabo, being also the Medullian of Mr. Ellis.— On the Medulli of the Dictionary of Geography , 1856 16 Chap. IV. — Polybius knew no Taurinian hyperbasis. The Po of Polybius 28 Chap. V.— The Po and the Doria of Strabo : Lib. IV. p. 203 35 Chap. VI.— The Po and Doria of Strabo : Lib. V. p. 217 . . 44 Chap. VII. — Mr. Ellis on the early use of the Little Mont Cenis. His appeal to Ammianus Marcellinus Contents. VI PAGE Chap. VIII. — Mr. Ellis on the Little Mont Cenis. His appeal to the Peutingerian Table 57 Chap. IX. — Mr. Ellis ou the Mont Cenis. His appeal to Cæsar's march from the Inner to the Outer Province ... 76

Appendix

. Narrative of Polybius translated 253 Narrative of Livy translated 277 Comments on doubts entertained concerning Hannibal's first conflict with the Romans in Italy. 1. The Encounter on the Po 299 2. The Battle of the Trebia 303 Tabula Peutingeriana To face page 57 ERRATA. Page 17, line 25, for " could" read "could not." ,, 138, ,, 35, for " Dnrentiua" read "Druentius." „ 176, „ 15, fur " of the summit" read " the summit." 1Q1 .. 6, for " Walckenner" read " Walckenaer." THE ALPS OF HANNIBAL.

PART VIII. KNOWLEDGE OF THE ALPS IN EARLY TIMES.

Chapter I

Strabo on the Alps. His allusion to Polybius and Hannibal. Doubtful that he wrote the three ivords. Improbable that the four Passes were named by Polybius. Errors of M. Letronne. Having done what I can to interpret Polybius, I find myself caBed upon to touch some subjects which others have resorted to in interpreting him. I postpone, therefore, for a while the examination of Livy. One would have desired that, for this interpretation, it might not be necessary to explore the topography of Strabo, to dissect the narrative of Cæsar, to notice so late a writer as Ammianus MarceHinus, or to contemplate that curiosity, nearly contemporary with him, the Chart or Table of Peu tinger. But the task cannot be avoided : it is not enough to answer argument : we must meet the influence of learned men, attending them where they caB us, though they may bring into their service things which hardly belong to the subject.

On whatever topics our laborious and dexterous adversaries vol. n. b have exhausted their efforts of invention, we must grapple with them ; and some inquiry into the early knowledge of the Bomans on Alpine passes may aid us in exposing the errors of prevailing theories. Strabo on the Alps. Many commentators rely on Strabo, not as being himself an authority on Hannibal, but as an interpreter of the views of Polybius. M. Letronne says gravely, " La geographie de " Polybe la source unique ou B puisoit ce qu'B rapporte " des Alpes." We may not find elsewhere a proposition quite so rash as this ; but the learned Ukert, the zealous Larauza, with other French and English critics, — in short, every theorist who favours the Cenis, the Genevre, or the Viso, — all rejoice in the aid of Strabo as guiding them to the meaning of Polybius.

We, then, who repudiate their theories, are com pelled to investigate the worth of the evidence. In his account of Gaul, in the fourth book, Strabo treats the Alps as a distinct subject of inquiry. He notices tracks by which they had been surmounted, and clearly recognises some as leading into Gaul. In speaking of the first conquests made by the Bomans beyond the Alps, in a warfare of many years along the coast, he indicates a maritime pass : in the route which he describes from the Bhone, through Briancon, over the crest of Alps, to the boundary of the Cisalpine pro vince, he designates the Genevre pass ; and he points out, in the most explicit terms, the passes of the Great and Little St. Bernard as two ways that lead to Lyons. In his notice of the chain of Alps eastward, and the nations that belong to them, his words do not identify any particiBar pass until he aames the extreme Ocra, the pass of the Carnic Alps, which led from Aquileia to Nauportus ; but he certainly apprehended passages through the mountains into the Grisons and the Tyrol.

CHAP. I.] Strabo on the A Ips. 3 His allusion to Polybius. Towards the end of the book there are aBusions to Poly bius. Strabo refers to him on the elk, the gold in Noricum, and the comparative magnitude of the Alps and the mountains of Greece. We then read these words : — Ter-rapa? B inrepfidaeis ovofid^ei fiovov Bid Aiyvcov [lev, Trjv 'iyyicna T&5 Tvppr/viKm TreXdyer eiTa ttjv Bid Tavplvcov, rjv 'Avvi/3as BirjXOev elra trp> Bid SaXacraiov TerdpTvv Be Bid 'PaiT&V a7ra'o-a? Kpvp.vd>Bei,<;, p. 209. " He names four passes only : " that through the Ligyes, being the nearest to the Tyrrhenian " Sea ; then that through the Taurini, which Hannibal went " through ; then that through the Salassi ; and the fourth " through the Rhæti : aB precipitous." This sentence has attracted notice : not, as it might have done, for a question on the Rhætian pass, but by the mention of Hannibal.

It is pressed by some as important, and slighted by others as unimportant. The patron of a Taurine pass is ready to adopt conclusively the three words rjv Avvt/Ja? BirjXdev, as an interpretation of Polybius by one who was sure to understand him. Now, I conceive that Strabo was by no means sure to understand him ; and others who have before them the details of Polybius himself on Hannibal's march, claim the right of interpreting him for themselves : they ought to be more capable of doing this rightly, inasmuch as there is now ample knowledge of Alpine passes such as no man in Strabo's time had attained, or had the means of attaining. Whatever may be deemed the value of the three words touching the passage of Hannibal, it is not clear that Strabo ever wrote them. There is a manuscript of high value, lately examined by the learned Gustavus Kramer, Epitome Vati cana No. 482, in which the words rjv 'AvvlBa<; Bii]\6ev do not appear : he examined every letter of this manuscript ; he b ranks it among those " quorum maxima est auctoritas," and pronounces it " quantivis pretii."

Præfat. pp. xBii. lxxxix. Further, if the three words are genuine, it is quite possible that Strabo placed them after 2aXaao-a>v, and that they have been shifted into their present position after Tavplvcov. Those, therefore, who have so greedily seized the three words for identifying the track of Hannibal with a track through Cottian Alps, are threatened with these casualties : — 1. That the words have been shifted by some careless or officious copier into a wrong place ; 2. That in Strabo's own edition they had no place at all. I will not rest on either contin gency as dissuading from inquiry. If Strabo had expressed his opinion on Polybius in the most unequivocal manner, we are not bound by it when we find it unsound, on a deliberate study of the original narrative. It is best, however, to face all objections ; and to take the text as it stands in the printed editions.

One preliminary observation is requisite : that the phrase Bid Tavplvwv does not imply that the mountain pass was in the Taurini ; but that, in making your way to the Cisalpine province in those Alps, you must go through the Taurini : in the same manner Strabo caBs the two more northern passes virepftdaeis Bid SaXacraoov, because, to reach them, it was necessary to travel through the Salassi. The Oxford Dissertation insists that the words are Strabo's own words : and by the logic of the sentence they are so. Others have expressed the same idea, saying that the words are a parenthetical comment or gloss of Strabo. Such remarks, however, do not deprive the sentence of importance : as it stands, it exhibits four passes as having been named by Poly bius ; and Strabo would hardly append to one of them the notice of Hannibal, if he did not imagine Polybius to concur upon the fact so introduced. * He might himself be under the impression erroneously : he might, Bke others, assume the fact for no better reason than that the first operation in Italy told CHAP. I.] Strabo on the Alps. 5 by Polybius was against the Taurini : still, if his words, taken altogether, make it probable that he wrote under that im pression, they claim attention.

The inquiries, to which such a subject leads us; wiB be found also not uninteresting in themselves. Those who assent to the leading facts of Polybius's narrative, and take pains in drawing a conclusion from them, may be indifferent to a construction made by the later writer : they wBl rely on the historian as his own interpreter. But, if any are inclined to submit their judgments to the three words as presented, let them advert to questions which fairly offer themselves. Is Strabo safely to be relied on, when he quotes an earlier author ? For instance, is he justified, when, in his fourth book, he appeals to Cæsar's Commentaries, as giving the same descriptions as himself of Aquitani, Celtæ, and Belgæ ? Is Hannibal's line through the mountains a subject that interested him, so as to engage his attention, and produce accuracy ?

Was Polybius likely to speak of vwepBdcrei<; Bid 1aXacraoi)v, or Bid Tavpivwv, or of any inrepBaais at all ? Hannibal's Route did not interest Strabo. If there was reason to suppose that Strabo would care for the Alps of Hannibal, it would be more Bkely that he should be accurate in the allusion to Polybius : if it did not interest him, he might, without scrutiny, adopt an hypothesis which was entertained by his contemporary Livy. There is not in aB Strabo's works an aBusion to the Carthaginian march from Spain to Italy, unless it be in those three words rjv AvviBa<; BirjXdev. He had abundant opportunity of noticing the ex pedition in its earBer stages. He has been exhibiting the o-eooraphy of Valentia, Catalonia, the Pyrenees, Outer Gaul, and the regions of the Bhone, the approaches to the Alps, and portions of the Alps themselves.

Nevertheless, the Cartha ginian invasion is nowhere alluded to by Strabo till it reaches the confines of Etruria, unless it be in those three words. He describes particularly the route from Spain to this very pass, the Mont Genevre, but with no note of Hannibal. It was his habit to illustrate geography by ascertained features of history, as in the case of the Salassian vaBey ; and he often alludes to the later operations of Hannibal in the regions nearer to Borne. It seems, therefore, that if he had cared for the question on the Pass, and himself studied the route of the invaders, he would have annexed to his own description, whether of a Taurinian or of a Salassian hyperbasis, some commemoration of the great exploit. This is unquestion able : that, B the words rjv 'Avvifias BiijXOev, which appear in this list of four passes, should be shifted from one of those passes and attached to another, there is not a thought in Strabo's works that would be offended by the exchange.

Reasons against Polybius having authorized those names of Passes. We do not find any of Strabo's nominations of passes in the extant writings of Polybius. Rhæti are not mentioned at aB. Salassi are not mentioned at aB. Ligurians are called Aiyvo-Tivot, not Avyvei ; and Taurini are not connected with a pass. If Polybius had been prepared to speak of a Salassian, a Taurinian, or a Ligurian pass, there were opportunities for doing so in those parts of his works which survive to us. He tells of the early invasions of Northern Italy by the Gauls, and of their irruption before the second Punic war : they made their way through the valley of Aosta ; he might there fore have introduced them Bid SaXaaaœv. He details the nivasion of Hannibal, and might have introduced him Bid laXatrawv : or, if he apprehended the invasion to be by the pass which Strabo calls Bid Tavpivwv, he had every provoca tion to name it.

But, on the contrary, he completes his narrative of the passage through the Alps ; he launches CHAP. I.] Strabo on the Alps. 7 Hannibal into the plain and the nation of Insubres ; describes his encampment; and, when the army is restored to stealth and fit for service, relates how he turned his arms against the Taurini, who were at war with his friends, the Insubres : then only do we find a notice of that people. As to a pass Bid Aiyvaiv, this also he had full opportunity to speak of. Throughout his life the Bomans were working to bring their schemes along the coast to maturity : he records their first enterprise beyond the boundary of Italy, when the consul Opimius invaded the country of the Oxybii, beyond Nice and Antipolis. He marched Bid tcov 'ATrevvivusv opoiv : not a word of a pass Bid Aiyiiojv.

If these expressions were truly imputed to Polybius, we might fairly expect to meet with them : his second book exhibits a geographical description of Italy, the plains of Italy, the great river of Italy, the seas of Italy, the mountains of Italy; and, if he had recognised by those titles four en trances through the great barrier, he might have added such information to the rest. There is not a word which gives countenance to these names of passes ; and the words of Strabo, in which he seems to assume that those which he recognised himself had been similarly recognised by Polybius, are not to deter us from weighing the probabilities that this historian ever designated those things as virepBdaeis Bid Aiyvav, Bid Tavplveov, Bid laXacroSiv, Bid 'Paircbv. Though I find no reason to suppose that Polybius ever gave expression to any one of these virepfidaeis, I need not dweB on the first and last of them : they are not involved in our inquiry, Bke the other two.

The routes through Salassi and Taurini are closely concerned with our controversy, and these I propose to consider more deliberately. I have against me an ample Bst of critics, ending with Mr. Ellis, who have professed obedience to the words of Strabo. But M. Letronne has "one beyond the rest, by discussing the value of the sentence ; and I wBl advert to his doctrines before I proceed further. Errors of M. Letronne. This eminent man, the first assailant of De Luc, has thus expressed himseff : " Ce passage contient non seulement la " pensfe de Polybe, mais jusqu'a ses expressions " . . . " dans " tout ce qui precede et ce qui suit, Strabon ne fait que rap " porter les opinions et les propres paroles de Polybe ; — que " Strabon suit sans restriction pour tout ce qui concerne les " Alpes." Again : " La geographie de cet historien, ou plutot " la partie de son histoBe qui traite de la geographie, dtoit la " source unique ou il puisoit ce qu'B rapporte des Alpes ; " and further : " l'ouvrage de Polybe son unique guide." * These propositions are one and all erroneous.

Most of what Strabo says concerning the Alps is drawn from events which arose after the death of Polybius : he by no means foBows him, and I doubt that in any instance he adopts his expressions. The Alpine matters drawn from Polybius are few and easBy told : Strabo refers to him on the fact that the elk is found in the Alps ; he refers to him on the superiority of the Alps to the mountains of Greece and Thrace, adding the sentence on the passes now under discussion ; and he refers to him on the Alpine lakes, naming and describing the three large lakes of Italy, — Benacus, Verbanus, Larius, — and the rivers issuing from them. This is all. And, as Strabo throughout his work is from time to time citing Polybius as his authority for facts, we are not to presume that he has that authority where he does not adduce it.

Indeed, if we search for other things on the Alps that could have been derived from Polybius, though not so alleged, we find very little, and may be the more surprised with M. Letronne's proposition, that one foBowed the other " pour tout ce qui concerne les Alpes." * Journal des Savans. Janvier et Decembre, 1819. CHAP. I.] Strabo on the Alps. 9 So far as the Alps had been connected with Roman events, they were likely to be noticed by Polybius. But the scope of this connexion was very Bruited. The Romans in his day were just beginning to feel their way towards either ex tremity of the great chain that severed them from the rest of Europe. The enthe central range was unvisited by them. The eastern Alps were approached in the unauthorised and fruitless attempt of Cassius Longinus, in 171 B.C., and Strabo's appeal to Polybius on the gold mines near Aquileia, and the salt springs at Timavum, might lead to the conjecture that the historian had himself made the land journey between Italy and Greece.

The first advance of the Romans along the Mediterranean coast took place whBe Polybius was an exBe in Italy ; the movement in aid of the Massilians against the Oxybii and Deciatæ, tribes in the neighbourhood of Frejus. Strabo refers to him on the existence of those peoples. Twenty-nine years elapsed before such an effort was repeated. How small then at that period was the knowledge of Alps arising out of Roman transactions ! If we look to aB prior history of the great natural rampart, the only operations which had been recorded were in the passage of Hercules ; the irruptions of the Gauls; and the invasion of Hannibal. On the passage of Hercules Strabo says nothing: on the Gaulish invasions through the Alps nothing: on Han nibal's pass the three words which produce this discussion. And never does he aBude to Polybius as the historian of Hannibal, unless you suppose him to do so in those three words.

Strabo himself abounds in matter connected with the Alps, especially with the outer side of them : but it is not derived from Polybius. I beBeve that the only fact on the Transal pine cited on his authority is the fact of the Rhone having two mouths. The Romans in the time of Polybius had little acquaintance with those regions : the agents of their intrigues were hardly as yet moving in the interior of Gaul when he made his journey through the Alps : their communication was through Marseille by sea. They gained no footing in Gaul tBl after his death. In his time, what they knew, he knew. They may have heard of the lake of Geneva : but there is no evidence that they had, or that he had. As to the other Swiss lakes, there is strong reason to think that he did not know them. When Strabo tells the pecuBarities of the Rhone and its great lake, and names the nations bordering on the Rhine and its great lake, he makes no reference to Polybius.

He rather shews that Polybius had never mentioned these things : for he does say that Polybius had spoken of Alpine lakes, and that three were large ones : he names them, and they are all ItaBan. Polybius acknowledged the obscurity of those re gions. When he opens his narrative of the march from the Pyrenees, he announces that he shall not attempt to express names belonging to countries so unknown. Accordingly we do not meet with the name of any town visited by the invaders between Spain and Italy, and only of one people. Names begin when mountains end. Thus trifling in fact is the amount of Alpine matter that Strabo did or could draw from Polybius. The history of conquest brought geography along with it : Strabo's memo randa on the Alps were drawn from later events. His notices of southern Gaul are founded on the performances of Fulvius, Sextius, Domitius, Fabius, Marius : and his details of the passes are Roman details.

Before he came to write on the passes, they had been traversed by Pompey, Cæsar, D. Brutus, Augustus, Tiberius, Drusus. Some exploits he had heard of : not aB. Every anecdote which he brings forward, excepting in those three words, concerns some event which was after the death of Polybius. In the route from Spain to the Cottian pass he names places and distances. But he stops CHAP. I.] Strabo on the AIjjs. 11 much short of the plains; and introduces no anecdote or historical matter whatever. How then does M. Letronne trace Polybius throughout the Alps of Strabo? How persuade himself that the mass of Strabo's materials was derived from that early source? Strabo's information came from Roman intercourse with the Alps, which in the days of Polybius had not begun. M. Letronne has no facts for his hypothesis : and where there are facts, he is not observant of them.

Strabo, where he might refer to Polybius, is not always inclined to foBow him. Poly bius, ii. 14, says that the Alps begin near MarseBle : Strabo, iv. 201, 210, makes them to begin near Genoa or Vado. Polybius, ui, 47, says that the foimtains of the Bhone face westward, and that the course of the river is to south-west : Strabo, iv. 186, says that the first course of the Rhone is to the north — KaTapxds Trpos dpKTov. Polybius, ii. 16, de scribing the Alpine course of the Po, says that the poets call him Eridanus : and it is pleasing to recognise the " fluviorum rex" on so ancient authority: Strabo, v. 215, denounces Eridanus as the creature of fable, said to be near the Po, but in truth having no existence. Polybius, B, 14, exhibits the Alps as the base of the Italian triangle : Strabo, v. 210, in express opposition to him, declares that Italy is a figure of four sides rather than of three — TeTpaTrXevpov jidXXov to crxVP-a. M. Letronne not only declares Strabo's matter to be all Polybian, but insists that he expresses it in the very words of that historian.

It seems to me, that every part of the phrase virepBao-is Bid Tavplvav rjv Awt'/3a? BirjXdev, as weB as the whole taken together, is most unlikely to have been used by Polybius, but probable in Strabo. -First of aB, inrepBaai<; is not a Polybian word : Strabo employs vwepBaivco and inrep- Ti'Svpt, to tell the passing over a mountain, and represents the transcent or pass by inrepBaais and virepOeais: in the second [part VIII. 12 Early Knowledge of the Alps. book, p. 68, &c. he appBes both terms to the same thing at the interval of a few sentences : v e'7™ t*>v 'Yptaviav 6dXaTTav vvepdeai<; — r) eVl ttjv Kacnriav inrepBacris. Polybius never so uses those words : his words are inrepaipw, inrepBdXXco, virepfioX-rj. He uses inrepdeai? in the sense of postpone ment : inrepfiaai<; he did not use at aB : we see it indeed printed in lib. iv. 19, 6, meaning the conveyance of vessels across an isthmus ; where probably it should be inrepfiiBaais.

His descriptions of Alps, his notice of GauBsh invasions, and his history of Hannibal, gave opportunities to use the word, if it had been his word. Many compounds of /3a<rt? are found in his works : e)tt/3ao"t?, e/e/3ao"t?, crvp.Bacri'i, iiriBaais, Bid fiaats, dvdBaais, «aTa/3a<7t? : never inrepjBacrK. Strabo uses both his words in the plural, for expressing several distinct mountain passes, as when we speak of several passes together, the Cenis, the Simplon, the Splugen. Polybius never so speaks, as intending by a plural word different passes through the chain. He uses virepBoXal for mountain heights generaBy, and for the course of heights which constitute a pass from one side of the chain to the other : thus one section of the march from Carthagena to the plain of Italy is al r&v "AXirewv virepBoXai.

The singular vTrepBoXrj represents the passage of, or act of crossing the Alps, as in 7roivcrdp.€vo<} ttjv t&v "AXireay vTrepBoXrjV. So, in iii 34, 6, and 47, 6. Where, then, has M. Letronne found " les propres paroles de " Polybe, que Strabon suit sans restriction pour tout ce que " concerne les Alpes ? " Strabo is the rightful owner of virep fiaais: and the three words which have brought the sentence into notice, rjv 'AvviBa? BirjXOev, have the same stamp of authorship. When he speaks of the marshes and the draining of them by Scaurus, he says, oY &v 'Awt'/Ja? BirjXde, irpoiwv eirl Tvppgvlav. In a similar way he refers to Han nibal, on mentioning the lake Trasymeuus — Kad' rjv al e« T-79 CHAP. II.] Strabo's Salassian Pass. 13 KeXTiKrjs et? Trjv Tvppvvtav ipiBoXal aTpaTOTreBois, al? Trep Kal AvvtBas ixpvaaTO, V. 217.

When M. Letronne, reading Strabo, thought he was reading Polybius, he had before him not only words and the com bination of words, but the general frame of the sentence bore the style of the geographer. The method in which Strabo names and enumerates the four passes is exactly the method in which he has a few lines before enumerated four roads— T-nv Bid twv Kep,p,evœv opwv p-kx?1 Kal t>;9 'AKoviTavia<;, Kal Tgv iirl tov 'Vijvov, Kal Tphvv ttjv eVt tov 'ilKeavbv, ttjv 77-00? /3e"\AoaK-oi?, Kal 'ApBiavols, TeTapTV B' IcttIv eVt tt)V NapfieoviTiv Kal Trjv MaaaaXiwTiKrjv irapaXiav. These will not be claimed as the " propres paroles de Polybe : " for the work is attributed to Agrippa.

Chapter II

The Salassian hyperbasis of Strabo. We know that Strabo speaks of a Salassian pass : and our question is, whether, as he is thought to allege, Polybius had done the same. Strabo has used the term virepBaai<; Bid SaXacraiov for himself, before he alludes to the passes known to Polybius. He uses the expression, to mean at once two distinct Passes of Alps : he says, p. 208, that " of the passes " of Alps (twv inrepdecrewv Tav £k tt)? 'iTaAias et? Tgv efjco " KeXTiKvv Kal Trjv TrpoerdpKTiov) there is one through the " Salassians leading to Lyons — v &a SaXaaawv dyovaa eVt " AovyBovvov." By this transcent of Alps leading to Lyons, he means both the Great St. Bernard and the Little St. Bernard: for he goes on to say of it that " it is twofold ; one practicable Early Knowledge ofthe Alps. [part viii.

" for a waggon from its greater length, through the Centrones; " the other steep and narrow but short, through the Pænine." This explanation, that he means to include both passes, so far corrects the expression as to prevent any ambiguity in his meaning. But the expression is a bad one, and peculiar ; and must be looked upon as his own. The road of ascent from the plain is common to both passes as far as Aosta : but that common approach is no VTrkp9ea-i<; : the word imports tran scent. At Aosta the lines of ascent diverge : one is to leave Mont Blanc and his dependencies away to the left ; the other wBl leave them to the right. Such nomination of passes is the nomination by Strabo. While I deny for Polybius both the supposed use of inrepBacri<; and the word itself, I have no doubt that he had some information of a passage by the Great St. Bernard as well as experience of the Little St. Bernard.

The invasions of the Gauls had given to these mountain regions an interest and a celebrity which would engage his attention : his history tells their earlier inroads, and the more recent irruption of the Gæsatæ ; who are likely to have come by the Great St. Bernard, though he does not denote the pass by which they came. Niebuhr was fuBy satisfied that the barbarians issued into the plain from the vaBey of Aosta : but does not pursue an inquiry as to the point from which they came down. Transl. Hare and Thirlwall, ii. 535. In the Oxford Dissertation, p. 29, it is supposed that some of those earlier invaders came up the Isere and over the Graian Alp : on the Gæsatæ it is said, " Polybius informs us " that they derived their name from their mercenary dispo " sition. He also clearly intimates that Hannibal foBowed " the same route which this people had taken to cross the " Alps : " — and further, " From the description given of this " people by Polybius, their going to battle naked, their mer " cenary disposition, and extreme ferocity, it appears that they CHAP. II.]