Scipio Africanus

Born into Roman nobility around 236 BC, Scipio went to war as a boy alongside his father and survived Cannae, the worst defeat in Roman history. In 210 BC, after his father and uncle died fighting Carthage in Hispania, he was handed command despite never having been consul - an extraordinary break with tradition. He won Iberia at Ilipa in 206 BC, breaking Hannibal's brother Mago, then pushed for an audacious invasion of Africa itself. Elected consul in 205 BC, he forced Carthage to recall Hannibal from Italy, met him at Zama, and crushed him, ending the Second Punic War. Rome adored him, but Cato the Elder and other rivals did not. In 187 BC they hauled Scipio and his brother to trial on bribery charges tied to the Seleucid king Antiochus III. Disgusted, he left the city for his villa at Liternum and died there around 183 BC, a hero in exile.