Hannibal was in a conflict.
Hannibal . One of his most famous achievements was at the outbreak of the Second Punic War , when he marched an army which included war elephants from Iberia over the Pyrenees and the Alps into Italy . An enemy counter-invasion of North Africa forced him to return to Carthage , where he was decisively defeated by Scipio Africanus at the Battle of Zama . Scipio had studied Hannibal 's tactics and brilliantly devised some of his own , and finally defeated Rome 's nemesis at Zama , having previously driven Hannibal 's brother Hasdrubal out of the Iberian Peninsula . His flight ended in the court of Bithynia , where he achieved an outstanding naval victory against a fleet from Pergamon . The Second Punic War , also referred to as The Hannibalic War and ( by the Romans ) the War Against Hannibal , lasted from 218 to 201 BC and involved combatants in the western and eastern Mediterranean .