I was watching a video about the history of the Punic Wars that estimates that Hannibal may have lost up to 75 thousand men crossing the alps. Would any of those corpses survived the rigors of nature and be discovered today?
Thanks /u/Polybios. your answers were very informative.
There's pretty much no chance at all of that happening, and not just because conditions have to be just right for human remains to be conserved for 2200 years. That is of course an important factor, but more important in my opinion is this: we have no idea where to look!
Strange as it may appear, we don't know what route Hannibal took across the Alps! He entered somewhere in what is now France and he exited somewhere in Italy, some place near Turin. That's basically all we know.
Polybius tells us Hannibal started crossing the Rhone river "at a distance of four days' march from the sea". That's not very specific - all it tells us it is some distance inland. After crossing the river (and fighting off some 'barbarians'), Hannibal marched along the river for four days, to a place Polybius called "the island". We have no idea what place this refers to. Ten days (or "800 stades", ~150 km) later, Hannibal began the ascent of the Alps. The passage of the Alps took 15 days, after which Hannibal "boldly entered the valley of the Padus" (the Padus is the Po river). [Source: book 3 from Polybius]
That's it. That's all we really know about the route Hannibal took. Historians have been debating for ages what possible routes Hannibal could have taken. Some are more likely than others, but never has there been any consensus on a route.
On his losses
estimates that Hannibal may have lost up to 75 thousand men crossing the alps
That estimate is totally off. I can guess where it comes from. Polybius mentions at one point that in Spain, "Hannibal got his army in motion, which consisted of ninety thousand infantry and about twelve thousand cavalry.". Once in Italy, Hannibal's army consisted of "twelve thousand Libyans and eight thousand Iberians, and not more than six thousand cavalry in all, 3.56"
Some basic maths tells us that (90000 + 12000) - (12000 + 8000 + 6000) = 102000 - 26000 = 76000 losses. That calculation is only used by people who want to exaggerate and who can't read. In between the two quotes above, Polybius also mentions that Hannibal had to subdue tribes south of Pyrenees "not without severe fighting and serious loss", Furthermore:
He then detached from his army ten thousand foot and a thousand horse for the service of Hanno,—to whom also he entrusted the heavy baggage of the troops that were to accompany himself,—and the same number to go to their own land.
So that's 22000 men left behind in recently conquered northern Spain, after taking serious losses. Polybius says that Hannibal took "fifty thousand infantry and nine thousand cavalry, and led them through the Pyrenees to the passage of the river Rhone". There was fighting with some losses at the Rhone river. So at most Hannibal lost (50000 + 9000) - (12000 + 8000 + 6000) = 59000 - 26000 = 33000 men, or about half his army, on his crossing across the Alps. Still significant losses, but nowhere near the 75000 claimed in the video.