The greatest ambush in military history took place on June 21, 217 B.C. Just one year earlier, Hannibal had crossed the Alps into Italy. After winning the Battle of the Trebia, Hannibal continued south and bypassed a Roman army under Flaminius. Scorching the earth as he marched, the Roman public demanded revenge. Flaminius was determined to give it to them. In hot pursuit, he pursued Hannibal into a valley with hills to his left and Lake Trasimene to his right. He could see Hannibal’s camp up ahead. No scouting necessary, right? It was early morning and there was a mist coming off the lake. Suddenly, trumpets were heard and the Romans turned worried eyes to the hills. They saw a horde of very angry soldiers running toward them. Many of them were Gauls who had vengeance on their minds due to Roman depredations. How had the Romans gotten themselves caught in this dilemma? Hannibal had laid a trap. The night before, he had encamped at the end of the valley and maintained campfires while he took most of his army on a risky night march to hide in the forested hills. He then waited for the Romans to march completely into the valley. The amazing thing was that Hannibal’s army was a mixture of nationalities, including 17,000 Gauls. Besides the language barrier, there was the fact that the Gauls were ill-disciplined warriors who could not wait to kill Romans. And yet, such was the leadership of Hannibal that not one Gaul blew the ambush by rushing out early. They all waited for the trumpets. That must have been tough when some of them were looking at the men who had killed their families. When those trumpets sounded, the slaughter was on. The Romans liked to fight in formation and were very difficult to defeat, but in this case they were taken by surprise and had the lake to their right. There was no escape. Flaminius, who was well-known as a Gaul oppressor (he supposedly had a Gaul scalp attached to his helmet), was Gaul Enemy #1. He was one of the first to die and now the Romans were leaderless. Not that it would have made much difference. It was a rout from the start. Only about 10,000 of the 25,000-man army survived. Many drowned in the lake. Hannibal lost about 2,000 men.
https://www.worldhistory.org/image/166/the-battle-of-lake-trasimene/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Lake_Trasimene
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