British Alpine Hannibal Expedition

British engineer John Hoyte led an expedition that tried to reenact aspects of Hannibal's crossing of the Alps during the Second Punic War in 218 BCE.

The group took the female Asian elephant Jumbo, provided by a zoo in Turin, from France over the Col du Mont Cenis into Italy.

After the Carthaginian defeat in the First Punic War of 264–241 BCE, Hamilcar Barca secured an extensive territory in the Iberian Peninsula for Carthage.

[3] Hoyte had an interest in both history and mountain climbing, and spent the summer of 1956 with friends hiking the Alps and comparing possible routes to the ancient descriptions.

Hoyte wrote letters to the British consuls in Lyon, France, Geneva, Switzerland, and Turin, enquiring about the possibility of obtaining an elephant for the experiment, but without a serious expectation of success.

[6] The group retreated down the valley and crossed the Col du Mont Cenis, another pass suggested for Hannibal's route by the emperor Napoleon.