The Battle of Zama in 202 BC was a strange climax indeed for the war that made Republican Rome into an unstoppable superpower.

When Scipio — later known as “Africanus” — returned to Italy, having secured control of Hispania for Rome, he was granted the province of Sicily as governor but struggled to gain support for a landing in Africa to end the war; in the first of many conflicts to come between the senate and a successful, ambitious general, Scipio ended up invading Africa with a volunteer army anyway.

Scipio’s early success in the campaign led to a peace accord with Carthage, as the local senate agreed to give up its overseas empire. However, Hannibal was recalled from Italy in 203 BC and his presence tilted the balance in favor of continuing the war.

Cicero, in “De Finibus,” cites what probably was a common theory among the learned of his time (well over a hundred years after the fact): that Scipio actually agreed to stop operations just to let Hannibal return to Africa so he could fight him there. As Cicero writes:

“Scipio had the chance of winning great renown by enticing Hannibal back to Africa. To do so, he risked enormous dangers. For honor and pleasure was the aim of that great enterprise.”

On Oct. 19, 202 BC, about 30,000 Roman infantry plus 6,000 mostly Numidian cavalry under Scipio faced Hannibal’s 40,000-strong army, with about the same amount of cavalry plus 80 war elephants, in the most momentous, if not decisive, battle of the war.

Both men met face to face just before the battle on the plains of Zama Regia, southwest of Tunis, but there was no agreement. Even though Scipio told his troops before the encounter that they were fighting not just to defeat Carthage, but for the domination of the world, both generals were really fighting for their political future, since the war was already decided: even if Carthage was to prevail in the battle, it had no real prospect of resuming the war in Iberia, much less in Italy or Sicily, and could only hope for a better settlement with Rome or a stalemate.