Publius Cornelius Scipio (254–210 BCE)
Born 254 BCE, died 210 BCE.
Publius Cornelius Scipio (died 211 BC) was a general and statesman of the Roman Republic and the father of Scipio Africanus. A member of the Cornelia gens, Scipio served as consul in 218 BC, the first year of the Second Punic War. At the outbreak of the war, he was ordered to conduct the war effort in the Iberian Peninsula and confront Hannibal himself, while his fellow consul Tiberius Sempronius Longus was allocated Sicily and Africa. Scipio was given permission to recruit two Roman legions, 14,000 allied infantry, 1,600 allied cavalry and given 60 quinqueremes. He sailed with his army from Pisa with the intention of confronting Hannibal in Hispania. Stopping at Massalia (today Marseille) to replenish his supplies, he was shocked to discover that Hannibal's army had moved from Hispania and was crossing the Rhône. Scipio disembarked his army and marched to confront Hannibal, who, by now, had moved on. Returning to the fleet, he entrusted the command of his army to his brother Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Calvus and sent him off to Hispania to carry on with the originally intended mission.
Text from the Wikipedia article Publius_Cornelius_Scipio_(consul_218_BC), licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.