How the two Roman armies collapsed in sequence

The often-cited 80,000 may count only Roman troops or only the dead rather than the entire force, because each legion normally marched with allied infantry and a large body of camp followers. A plausible estimate places the combined Roman strength around 120,000 and potentially as high as 156,000 soldiers, with tens of thousands more supporters. After Caepio's veteran army was destroyed, the victors captured its camp and supplies. They then turned on Mallius's recently raised force after it had watched the more experienced army disappear. The sequence transformed a major Roman numerical advantage into two isolated defeats and gave the coalition fresh supplies between them.