Siege of Alesia
September 52 BCE · in Battle View, played out step by step on the ground where it was fought
Caesar besieged Vercingetorix in Alesia and defeated a Gallic relief army, ending organised Gallic resistance.
The sides
- Rome, led by Caesar: about 60,000 men
- Gauls, led by Vercingetorix: about 238,000 men
States that fought: Roman Republic.
How it went
Siege of Alesia
Gaul has risen against Rome under Vercingetorix, a young Arvernian noble. After a summer of war he shuts himself and 80,000 men in the hill town of Alesia and sends his horsemen away to raise all Gaul to his relief.
Caesar's lines
Caesar rings the hill with a wall and ditches 15 km round, facing in, and a second ring 21 km round, facing out, with towers, stakes, hidden pits and sharpened branches between. Inside, the food runs out; the town's women and children are sent out, and Caesar will not let them through.
The relief army
Six weeks in, the relief army appears on the plain to the west. Its horse rides out to fight, and Caesar sends his own; the battle on the plain lasts all afternoon, until his German horsemen break the Gauls.
Attacks by night
The next night the relief army storms the lines on the plain with ladders and hurdles while Vercingetorix attacks from inside. Both fail on the stakes and pits in the dark.
Mont Réa
The Gauls find the weak spot: a camp on the lower slope of Mont Réa, overlooked from above. At noon Vercassivellaunus attacks it from outside with 60,000 picked men, while Vercingetorix attacks the inner lines nearby and the relief army threatens the plain.
Caesar in red
Caesar sends Labienus with six cohorts to the camp, then comes himself, recognised by the scarlet cloak he wears in battle. The defenders hold on the rampart.
The horse in the rear
Caesar's horsemen ride out of the outer lines and round, and fall on Vercassivellaunus from behind. His army breaks; he is captured and the relief army melts away.
Alesia
The next day Vercingetorix surrenders and lays his arms at Caesar's feet. Gaul is Roman from now on. He is kept six years in prison, led through Rome in Caesar's triumph and strangled.
Caesar gives the relief army 250,000 foot and 8,000 horse; modern historians think it far smaller. The siege works are drawn as Caesar describes them and as digs since the 1860s have traced them, simplified.
People and wars
- Julius Caesar (100 BCE – 44 BCE): Roman general and statesman who conquered Gaul, won a civil war and became dictator; his assassination led to the end of the Republic.
- Vercingetorix (c. 82 BCE – 46 BCE): Arverni chieftain who united Gallic tribes against Caesar; he surrendered at Alesia and was later executed in Rome.
- Caesar’s Gallic Wars (58–50 BCE): Julius Caesar conquered Gaul in a series of campaigns, bridged the Rhine, twice crossed to Britain, and crushed the revolt of Vercingetorix at Alesia in 52 BCE.