Hannibal marched dozens of war elephants across the Alps to invade Rome

In 218 BCE, Carthaginian general Hannibal led roughly 60,000 soldiers, thousands of horses and dozens of elephants over the Alps in winter to attack Rome from a direction it never expected. The crossing took about two weeks and cost him nearly half his army to cold, landslides and hostile tribes — but it worked, opening a war that came close to destroying Rome.

— Polybius, The Histories — Book III, c. 140 BCE
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