Roman army of the mid-Republic placed unprecedented strains on Roman manpower, not least on the Order of Knights and the First Class of commoners which provided the cavalry. During Hannibal's apocalyptic march through Italy (218–216 BC), thousands of Roman cavalrymen were killed in the field. The losses were especially serious for the equestrian order, which also provided the army's senior officers. Livy relates how, after Cannae, gold rings (a badge of knightly rank), recovered from the corpses of Roman knights formed a pile one "modius" (about 9 litres) large. In the succeeding years 214–203 BC, the Romans kept at least 21 legions in the field
Titus Manlius Torquatus (consul 235 BC) to cross the Po river, then defeated the Boii there. The Celts lost 23,000 men and 5,000 of them were captured, but the consuls had to retreat because of poor weather and decease among their troops. In 216 BC, as one of the most senior senators then living, he successfully opposed the ransoming of the Romans taken prisoner at the Battle of Cannae, on the grounds that they had made no effort to break out of the Carthaginian lines. In 215 BC he was sent to Sardinia, after the illness of Quintus Mucius Scaevola and defeated a Carthaginian attempt under