Gaius Terentius Varro

Gaius Terentius Varro (fl. 3rd century BC) was a Roman consul and commander. Along with his colleague, Lucius Aemilius Paullus, he commanded at the Battle of Cannae during the Second Punic War, in 216 BC, against the Carthaginian general Hannibal. The battle proved to be a decisive Roman defeat.

Prior to being consul, he had been a praetor in 218 BC. He was elected proconsul in Picenum from 215–213 BC, and in 208–207 BC, as propraetor he held Etruria against Hannibal's younger brother Hasdrubal Barca. He went to Africa, in 200 BC as ambassador.

Varro reassessed

Varro's role in the defeate at Cannae has been re-assessed recently by modern historians and historiographers, who point out that Livy emphasized Varro's low birth and his rashness. Livy's own stress on Varro's rashness runs contrary to internal evidence in Livy's own history that the plebeian consul was held in high regard by the Senate and People of Rome, even after the defeat. One view is that the defeat was more the work of Aemilius Paullus who commanded the right wing of the army (the wing traditionally commanded by the commander-in-chief). Polybius's surviving histories say little of Varro at Cannae, but since his informants were the other general's son Lucius Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus and grandsons Scipio Aemilianus and Quintus Fabius Maximus Aemilianus, this is not surprising. Livy relies heavily on Polybius.

References

*Livy, [http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/txt/ah/Livy/ "History of Rome"] , Rev. Canon Roberts (translator), Ernest Rhys (Ed.); (1905) London: J. M. Dent & Sons, Ltd.