21. Livy (xxi. 38) rejects both the St Bernard routes as bringing Hannibal down into the territory of the Libici, whereas everyone agreed (_quum inter omnes constet_) that Hannibal came down into the territory of the Taurini. This, however, is not exactly what Polybios says. He remarks in iii. 55. 9 that although the higher parts of the Alps were bare and tree-less and covered with perpetual snow, there were trees and shrubs and habitations half-way up the slopes (_hypo mesên tên parôreian_) on either side; and he says in iii. 56. 3, 60. 2, 8 that Hannibal came down to the plains of the Po in the territory of the Insubres and pitched camp just below the slopes (_hyp’ antên tên parôreian_) and that he subsequently (_meta de tauta_) attacked the Taurini who lived near the slopes (_pros têi parôreiai_) and were hostile to the Insubres. Ptolemy (iii. 1. 29, 31) fixes Novara, Como, Milan and Pavia as the cities of the Insubres, and Voghera, Tortona, Turin and Bene as the cities of the Taurini. Bene is about 35 miles south of Turin; and if it was a city of the Taurini, Hannibal would have come down into their territory if he crossed the Alps by the Col d’Argentière, or by the Col de la Traversette, just as much as if he crossed by Mont Cenis or Mont Genèvre. 22. Of course the boundaries between the territories of the Taurini and the Insubres may not have been the same in Hannibal’s time as in Ptolemy’s time or Livy’s. He may have come down into territory which then belonged to the Insubres but afterwards belonged to the Taurini, and might be described as territory of the Taurini by writers of a later age. 23. Strabo says (iv. 6. 12) that only four passes across the Alps were mentioned by Polybios. The nearest to the Mediterranean went through the territory of the Ligures; the next, “which Hannibal crossed,” through the territory of the Taurini; the next, through the territory of the Salassi; and the fourth, through the territory of the Rhæti. But the important words, “which Hannibal crossed,” are not in all the manuscripts of Strabo, and therefore are suspected as interpolations. Polybios does not mention the Salassi or the Rhæti in the extant portion of his work; but a pass through the territory of the Rhæti might have brought Hannibal into the territory of the Insubres, as Strabo (vii. 1. 5) says that these territories were conterminous, the Rhæti having some territory on the south side of the Alps as well as on the north side. The Rhætian pass might thus have been the Simplon; but it is incredible that Hannibal should have crossed a pass so far eastward as the Simplon or even the Great St Bernard.