Battle of Cissa

Battle of Cissa
Part of the Second Punic War
Scipio's landing in Iberia
Date Fall 218 BC Location Cissa or Tarraco, present-day Spain 41°06′57″N 1°14′59″E / 41.1157°N 1.2496°E / 41.1157; 1.2496 Result Roman victory
Belligerents
Roman Republic	Carthage
Commanders and leaders
Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Calvus	Hanno (POW)
Strength
20,000 – 25,000 8,000 Roman infantry 6,000 heavy infantry 2,000 skirmishers 14,000 Italian allied infantry 600 Roman cavalry 1,600 Italian allied cavalry unknown number of auxiliary Iberians	11,000 10,000 infantry 1,000 cavalry unknown number of auxiliary Iberians
Casualties and losses
Unknown	8,000 6,000 killed 2,000 captured

The Battle of Cissa was part of the Second Punic War. It was fought in the fall of 218 BC, near the Celtic town of Tarraco in north-eastern Iberia. A Roman army under Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Calvus defeated an outnumbered Carthaginian army under Hanno, thus gaining control of the territory north of the Ebro River that Hannibal had just subdued a few months prior in the summer of 218 BC. This was the first battle that the Romans had ever fought in Iberia. It allowed the Romans to establish a secure base among friendly Iberian tribes, and due to the eventual success of the Scipio brothers in Spain, Hannibal looked for but never received reinforcements from Spain during the war.^[1]