Caesar's Sword: The Complete Campaigns

by David Pilling

  Weary and dispirited, weighed down by exhaustion and grieving at our losses, we led our plodding horses back into Rome. Night was falling, but there was no rest for Belisarius. Almost as soon as the gates were closed again, he ordered fires to be lit on the walls, to keep a watch through the night in case the Goths tried a sudden assault.

  We had escaped, and preserved the life of our general, but there was no sense of victory. The Milvian Bridge had fallen, and now there was nothing to stop the Goths from crossing the Tiber and surrounding the city.

  Our army was trapped, like rats in a cage.

  15.

  We scarcely had time to draw breath before a panicky rumour blew up that the Goths had broken into the city, overcoming our guards manning the gate of Saint Pancratius, on the Tuscan side of the Tiber.

  “You must fly, sir,” cried one of Belisarius’ Guards, “there are secret ways in and out of Rome. Use them, and save yourself!”

  Belisarius scowled at the man. “I have had my fill of cowards today,” he said quietly, and called for Bessas.

  “Take thirty men and investigate this alarm,” he ordered. I quailed, praying that Bessas would not choose me. Thankfully, I and the remainder of my command were left behind. The rumour proved to be false anyway, spread by some of the more nervous citizens.

  Once this final alarm had died down, Belisarius wearily took himself off to his quarters on the Capitol Hill, where his wife and her attendants waited to strip off his soiled armour, bathe his exhausted body and anoint his bruises with soft lotions and unguents.

  I had access to no such luxuries, but had to be content with a quick wash in a water-butt, a mouthful of bread and wine, and a dreamless sleep on a hard pallet. I saw to my men first, or the six that remained. Four had spilled their life’s blood on the field beyond the Flaminian Gate, though I did not see them die, and (to my shame) cannot recall their names or faces.

  Next morning I woke feeling like an old man. My body was a mass of cramps and pains, and my wounded shoulder felt as though a fire had been lit inside my flesh.

  Bessas allowed his officers little rest. I managed to swallow some coarse rye bread and a morsel of goat’s cheese before the accursed trumpets were sounding again, summoning us to a briefing.

  He had set up a table in a cobbled square, lined with shops and galleried walkways, and looked little the worse for wear as his surviving officers gathered around him.

  “Brisk work yesterday,” he snapped in his businesslike way, “I see some of you were hurt. Get used to it. The Goths have us sewn up.”

  I wondered at that. Rome was twelve miles in circumference, and even Vitiges’ massive host would struggle to surround the entire city.

  “They are building six main camps,” he explained, “fortified in the usual way, ditches, stakes and earthen ramparts. As you know, or damn well should do, Rome has fourteen gates. Vitiges appears to be concentrating his infantry to cover seven of them. Five on the southern bank, two on the north. His cavalry is deploying to keep a watch on the remainder, so there is no escape.”

  Bessas flashed one of his crooked grins, as though there was something amusing about the situation.

  “Regarding the tower on the Milvian Bridge,” he went on, “some of you may be wondering how the Goths came to capture it. Well, earlier this morning a few Isaurian deserters came crawling back into the city, pleading for the general’s forgiveness. They had been part of the garrison on the tower. Apparently they took fright at the size of the Gothic host and abandoned their posts during the night. The Goths forced the gates and seized the tower, just in time to ambush Belisarius when he sallied out of Rome.”

  “Will the general forgive them, sir?” asked one of my brother officers, “and the men on the Flaminian Gate who refused to admit us yesterday?”

  “They should all die,” commented another, to a general murmur of agreement, “flogged through the streets, and beheaded as traitors.”

  Bessas shrugged. “They will be punished, certainly, but not with death. We cannot afford to start reducing our own numbers with executions.”

  I disagreed. Mercy is a noble trait, but the presence of cowards and deserters within our ranks could only lower morale. My voice, however, was too faint to be heeded, so I kept quiet.

  The Goths were soon firmly entrenched around the city, though as I suspected they lacked the numbers to encircle us completely. Their light horsemen scoured the countryside, but the passage between Rome and Campania was not completely cut off. If Justinian overcame his envious suspicions of Belisarius and saw fit to send enough reinforcements, they could still reach us from the south.

  For the time being, we were stranded inside Rome, and could do nothing but watch helplessly as Vitiges took measures to starve us out. First he ordered his men to destroy the fourteen great aqueducts outside Rome, thinking to cut off our supply of water.

  These ancient brick archways were duly dismantled, but the attempt to deprive us of water failed. The waters of the Tiber, though turgid, and the many wells located inside the city, were more than enough to supply our needs.

  The destruction of the aqueducts did succeed in stemming the flow of water needed to turn the city mills. Without the mills, we could not grind corn for bread, and the supplies of Sicilian corn inside the granaries would soon be used up.

  Belisarius devised a brilliant solution, proving he was something of an engineer as well as a soldier. He noticed that the current of the river flowed strongest under the Bridge of Hadrian, which spanned the Tiber between the centre of Rome and Hadrian’s mausoleum.

  He consulted with his workmen, and they built facsimiles of the mills that no longer turned, small enough to be placed inside boats. The boats were then moored under the arches of the bridge, where the current of the river was powerful enough to turn them.

  Ingenious, you might think, but the Goths soon got wind of this innovation, thanks to some deserters who fled the city at night and gave Vitiges the information in exchange for being allowed to pass unmolested. Our army was rotten with such traitors, and I often wondered if Belisarius was ever reduced to despair. If so, he did well to hide it in public, for he always appeared cheerful and lively, as though victory was just around the corner.

  The Goths threw the rotting bodies of our soldiers, killed in the recent battle outside the walls, into the Tiber, along with tree trunks and various bits of rubbish. The strong current carried all this detritus down the Tiber, and it broke through the ropes guarding the bridge and smashed our boats all to pieces.

  “What, have they sunk our mills?” Belisarius said lightly when he was informed of the disaster, “then we shall build new ones, and guard them with more care.”

  Undaunted, he ordered more of the floating mills to be constructed, and this time had several thick lengths of iron chain thrown across the outer side of the bridge. When the Goths threw more rubbish into the water, it got caught in the chains, giving our men on the banks time to fish it out with long hooks. Thus the mills continued to turn, and the city was adequately supplied with bread for weeks afterwards.

  I saw little of Procopius, thanks to my new duties, until one day he appeared as me and my men were helping to block up the Flaminian Gate with piles of rubble. Belisarius had chosen to render the gate inaccessible, judging it too close to the Gothic lines and vulnerable to assault.

  “Tacitus remarked that the Britons make poor workmen,” I heard him say, “as lazy as they are rude and uncouth. I see now that his words had some merit.”

  I put down the heavy block I was carrying and slowly straightened up, wincing at the ache in my lower back. It was good to hear his voice, laden with its usual sarcasm.

  “Romans are poorly placed to criticise the work of others,” I said, turning, “since they never do any, but have to pay stronger races to do it for them.”

  Procopius was sitting on an upturned piece of masonry. He looked worn-out and thinner than ever, with dark smudges under his eyes. His hands, I noticed, were s
potted with ink.

  “You look well,” he said, studying me with narrowed eyes, “save that bit of stained linen wrapped around your shoulder. Are you wounded?”

  “Spear-cut,” I replied, flexing the shoulder with a grimace, “it is healing, but still aches. Just a graze, really.”

  “Really. I’ve heard stronger men than you dismiss their wounds as nothing, and seen them buried a few days later. Let me look at it. I know something of medicine.”

  “You are a master of every art,” I said sourly, but allowed him to gently unwrap the binding and poke his nose into the cut on my shoulder. It was scabbing over, but slower than I would have liked, and the pain was refusing to go away.

  “No odour, thank God,” he said, straightening, “but it needs washing out. Come with me.”

  I protested that I could not leave my duties, but Procopius’ authority was second only to his master’s, and the centenarian overseeing the work on the gate said nothing as he led me away.

  He took me to the Pincian Hill, in the northeastern quarter of the city, where Belisarius had fixed his new headquarters. The hill offered an unrivalled view of the rest of the city, and the encampments of the Goths.

  “The walls here are in a poor state,” said Procopius, indicating the dilapidated and crumbling ramparts, “Belisarius has stationed himself here until they are repaired, to dissuade the Goths from trying an assault. He relies on the terror of his name to preserve Rome.”

  “Until when?” I said with asperity, “does he hope that Vitiges will simply give up and go away?”

  “Something like that,” replied Procopius, “at least the Gothic king is willing to talk.”

  Now I saw his real reason for bringing me here. A group of Gothic envoys were clustered at the foot of the steps leading up to the fine colonnaded mansion Belisarius had chosen for his headquarters.

  The envoys were large, well-formed men, proud and arrogant in their bearing, clad in polished mail and fur-lined cloaks, their wrists and throats adorned with golden torcs. They clearly regarded themselves as superior beings, and disdained to look at the short, swarthy Isaurian spearmen who had escorted them into the city.

  After a time they were admitted to the house, escorted by a strong guard. Procopius and I followed the procession up the steps, into a large, echoing hall of white marble.

  Belisarius sat waiting to receive the Goths, on a high chair flanked by twenty guardsmen. Antonina sat on a smaller chair to his left, lovely as ever. Photius stood behind her, rigid and upright, silver breastplate shining like a freshly minted coin, his plumed helmet tucked underarm.

  I felt an irrational twinge of jealousy. It had once been my duty to guard the general, but he had chosen to set me aside. The sight of Antonina made me wonder if my dismissal from the Guards had been her doing. Perhaps she thought I was too close to her husband, and had to be removed in case I influenced him against her.

  The hall rang to the chatter of the assembled senators and lesser dignitaries. Their voices died away when Belisarius raised his arm for silence.

  “Come forward,” he said, beckoning the chief envoy, “and state your case. King Vitiges asked for this meeting to take place. We pray that he has sent you with reasonable terms to lay before us.”

  The envoy, also the tallest and most richly-dressed of the Goths, swaggered forward and gave the most perfunctory of bows.

  “My royal master sends greetings, Flavius Belisarius,” he boomed, “and congratulates you on the victories you have won so far. Your Emperor is wise and fortunate in his choice of generals.”

  Belisarius bowed his head to acknowledge the compliment.

  “No general, however skilled and favoured by God,” the Goth continued, “could hope to prevail against such overwhelming odds as are now stacked against you. Rome is invested from all sides. You have no hope of relief from Constantinople. My master charges you not to prolong the sufferings of the citizens of Rome, who for long have prospered under the beneficent rule of our kings.”

  He turned and spread his brawny arms to address the senators. “Have my people not made Rome great again?” he demanded, “have we not lifted her from the pit of shame and ruin she had fallen into, under the tyranny of your degenerate Emperors? Senators, the time of the Caesars is long past. The last Emperor of the West died in exile, and his regalia lies in a vault in Constantinople. Why, then, did you open your gates to receive Belisarius and his army of hirelings? Why do you choose the slavery that Justinian would subject you to, over the enlightened rule of the Goths?”

  A white-bearded senator stepped forward to speak, but Belisarius waved him back.

  “I speak for the people of Rome,” the general said in a voice that brooked no protest, “and I will tell you why the Romans admitted us. They know we are engaged in a national and rightful cause. Rome does not belong to your barbarian kings, no matter how wisely and well they might rule the city. Should we applaud a thief for spending the treasures he steals on worthy causes? He is still a thief. My master is the direct heir of Romulus Augustus, the last Emperor of the West, and has sent me to reclaim his inheritance.”

  The envoy clasped his hands together and gave a sorrowful little shake of his head. “King Vitiges feared that would be your reply. If you are so bent on your own destruction, he begs you to think of the people of Rome, and not seek to hide any longer behind their walls. He challenges you, Belisarius, to march out with all your army and meet us in open battle. If, however, you prefer the path of reason, and agree to surrender, you and your men will be permitted to depart from Italy in peace.”

  “Your king savours a victory he has not yet won,” Belisarius replied in a tone of amused contempt, “my system of warfare shall be guided, not by his judgment or yours, but by my own. Far from viewing my prospects with any gloomy forebodings, I tell you that the time will come, when, reduced to your last detachment, driven from your last camp, you shall seek and scarcely find a refuge in bushes and brambles. If any one of your soldiers thinks to enter Rome, without fighting for every foot of ground, and meeting with the most determined resistance, he shall find himself grievously mistaken. So long as Belisarius lives, expect no surrender.”

  It was a fine speech, and drew a smattering of applause from the onlookers. Not for the first time, it struck me that Belisarius cut a regal figure, far more so than his master, and was fitter to rule an empire than serve one.

  The envoy made no reply to this defiance, but turned and swept out at the head of his comrades, his bearded face suffused with rage.

  “That’s it, then,” said Procopius, delicately stepping aside as the Goths barged past, “war to the knife, and may God have pity on the loser.”

  16.

  If Belisarius’ defiant response was intended to drive the Goths into a fury, then it succeeded. Very soon after their envoys had returned to repeat the general’s word to Vitiges, they started making preparations for an all-out assault on the walls.

  They worked, day and night, to construct siege engines. Four mighty wooden towers, each larger than the one that had guarded the Milvian Bridge, built on gigantic rollers. Dozens of scaling ladders, and great piles of faggots and reeds to fill up the ditch when they attacked, and four battering rams. These last were the most impressive, and the most terrifying.

  The rams were made of several tree trunks bound together and topped with a lump of iron crudely forged into the form of a ram’s head, complete with curling horns. They were placed on timber carriages with four wheels, and pushed by no less than fifty men inside a covered compartment at the base.

  “Some barbarians, eh?” said Procopius as we stood on the western wall one evening and watched this frightful arsenal take shape, “it seems Belisarius has woken a bear from its slumber.”

  Meantime Belisarius was far from idle. His workmen laboured feverishly to build war-machines. Onagri, a kind of mechanical sling for hurling rocks, were mounted on the towers, alongside ballistae, large crossbows capable of shooting darts the si
ze of lances, powerful enough to pierce wood or even stone.

  One of his engineers devised a particularly fearsome machine called a lupus to defend the city gates. This consisted of a thick wooden beam with holes bored into it, suspended over the archway of a gate. A lattice of sharpened iron spikes was held above the beam, and dropped through the holes when an enemy passed underneath, impaling him.

  At daybreak on the thirtieth day of March, eighteen days after the beginning of the siege, the Gothic host broke camp and advanced to attack the Salarian Gate, on the northern side of the city. Vitiges appeared to have history in mind, for this was the same gate via which his famous forebear, Alaric, had forced entry into Rome over two hundred years previously.

  Belisarius crammed as many fighting men as possible on the walls flanking the semi-circular towers of the gatehouse, with reserves deployed in the streets below. I and the remaining Heruls under my command were among the men on the wall, where we enjoyed (if that is the right word) a spectacular view of the advancing host.

  I have mentioned that Procopius was no soldier, but he had found a helmet and a breastplate from somewhere, neither of which fitted him, and joined us on the walls. He was armed with his long knife, which I suspected he knew how to use, and a spear, which I was certain he didn’t.

  “What a sight!” he exclaimed, lifting the rim of his oversized helmet to stare, pop-eyed, with genuine delight at the teeming squadrons of Goths.

  His voice was almost drowned by the hellish din of their advance: thousands of marching feet, the deep, drawn-out booming of their bull-horns, their guttural prayers and war-songs, the thunder of drums and squalling trumpets.

  I made no answer, incapable of tearing my eyes from the monstrous ram wheeling slowly towards the gate. The other three were lined up in a row behind it, ready to be pushed forward if the first failed in its task.

  As for the main part of the Gothic army, the sight of those legions converging on Rome has haunted my nightmares for the best part of thirty years. It seemed to me that they needed no ladders or war-engines – that great boiling mass of bodies could simply pour over our flimsy defences and suffocate us with sheer weight of numbers.