Titus Livius (Livy), The History of Rome, Book 30
Frank Gardener Moore, Professor Emeritus in Columbia University, Ed.

¹ that Syphax had been captured, that they had been driven out of Spain, driven out of Italy, and all this accomplished by the courage and strategy of Scipio alone, they dreaded him as a predestined commander, born to work their destruction.

XXIX. By this time Hannibal had reached Hadrumetum.² [2] From there, after he had spent a few days that his soldiers might recuperate from sea-sickness, he was called away by alarming news brought by men who reported that all the country round Carthage was occupied by armed forces, and he hastened³ to Zama by forced marches. Zama⁴ [p. 471]is distant five day's marches [3] from Carthage. Scouts⁵ who had been sent in advance from that position were captured and brought before Scipio by their [4] Roman guards. Thereupon he turned them over to a tribune of the soldiers, and bidding them go and see everything without fear, he ordered them to be led about the camp wherever they wished to go; and after questioning them as to whether they had examined everything quite at their leisure, he sent them back to Hannibal, furnishing men to [5] escort them.⁶ Hannibal did not indeed hear with joy any of the reports of his scouts, for they reported that Masinissa had also arrived that very day, as it happened, with six thousand infantry and four thousand cavalry. But he was particularly dismayed by the enemy's confidence, which surely seemed to be not [6] without foundation. Consequently, although he was himself at once the cause of the war and by his coming the breaker of a truce already arranged and of a prospective treaty as well, nevertheless, thinking that fairer terms could be obtained if he should sue for peace while his army was intact, rather than after defeat, he sent a messenger to Scipio, requesting that he grant the privilege of a conference [7] with him. Whether he did so on his own responsibility or that of the state, I have no means of deciding either this way [8] or that. Valerius Antias⁷ relates [p. 473]that he was defeated by Scipio in their first engagement,⁸ in which twelve thousand soldiers were slain in battle and seventeen hundred captured; and that as an envoy with ten other envoys Hannibal came to Scipio in his camp.

[9] To resume, once Scipio had assented to the conference, both generals by agreement advanced the position of their camps, so that their meeting might be at a short distance. Scipio established himself not far from the city of Naraggara,⁹ in a situation otherwise favourable, but particularly because water was to be had within the range [10] of a javelin. Hannibal occupied a hill four miles away, safe and convenient otherwise, except that one had to go far for water. Half-way between them a spot was chosen which was visible from all sides, that there might be no ambuscades.