onsuls, and Gaius Terentius Varro. Polybius says only that the two co-commanders of the Roman army had different views of how to conduct the campaign, and thus found it difficult to cooperate. Once they took direct command of the army, Varro was more eager for an immediate engagement than was Paulus, and thus "difficulties and disputes arose between the generals, one of the most pernicious things possible." The immediate military consequnces of their differences, and of the peculiar Roman command arrangements, will be dealt with below.
Livy, however, offers a detailed account of the political circumstances behind the election of these two men as consuls, an account which--in spite of Livy's biases--may illuminate some of the political constraints upon Roman strategy for dealing with Hannibal. Paulus was a patrician and Varro a plebeian. More particularly, according to Livy, and as recounted in the last chapter, this was the same Varro who had roused popular hostility toward Fabius and led to the de-facto appointment of Minucius as co-equal commander.
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