(Ἀσδρούβας). According to Gesenius (d. Pthoen. Mon. pp. 401, 407) this name is more correctly written Asdrbhal, without the aspiration, which has been adopted from a mistaken analogy with Hannibal, Hamilcar, &c. (See Drakenborch, ad Liv. 21.1.) The same writer explains it as signifying cujus auxilium est Baal.

1. A Carthaginian general, son of Mago, is represented by Justin as being, together with his father and his brother, Hamilcar, one of the chief founders of the military power and dominion of Carthage. According to that writer he was eleven times invested with the chief magistracy, which he calls dictatorship (dictatura, by which it is probable that he means the chief military command, rather than the office of suffete), and four times obtained the honours of a triumph, an institution which is not mentioned on any other occasion as existing at Carthage. But the only wars in which Justin speaks of him as engaged, are one against the Africans, which appears to have been on the whole unsuccessful, and one in Sardinia, in which Hasdrubal himself perished. (Just. 19.1.) He left three sons, Hannibal, Hasdrubal, and Sappho, who are said to have followed up their father's career of conqutest, and to have held, together with their cousins, the three sons of Hamilcar, the chief direction of all affairs at Carthage; but their particular actions are not specified. (Id. 19.2). The chronology of this part of the Carthaginian history, as related by Justin, is extremely uncertain.