The Dedalus Book of Roman Decadence: Emperors of Debauchery

by Geoffrey Farrington

  He never wore the same pair of shoes twice, and is said never to have worn the same ring twice, either. He often tore up expensive garments. Once he took a whale and weighed it, and then sent his friends what was reckoned to be its weight in fish. He sank some laden ships in the harbour, and said that this showed his great magnanimity. He emptied his bowels in a golden pot and urinated in vessels made of fluorspar. He is also supposed to have said: `If I have an heir I shall provide him with a tutor who will make him behave as I have done and as I propose to go on doing.' He made a habit of having dinners served to him of a specific kind; one day he would only eat pheasant, and at every course pheasant-meat would be served, another day chicken, another day fish of some kind or other, pork another day, and on another ostrich, or vegetables, or apples, sweets or dairy produce. He often used to lock his friends its overnight rest-houses until morning with ancient Ethiopian women, saying that the women who worked there were said to be the most beautiful. He did the same thing with boys as well, but this was allowed at that time, before the prohibition imposed by Philip I. He used to laugh so loudly that sometimes he was the only one who could be heard in the public theatre. He himself sang, danced, played the pan-pipes, blew the trumpet and played the lute and the pipe-organ. It is said that on one day he visited every whore in the Circus, the theatre, the amphitheatre and all the public places, hidden by a muleteer's hood, so that he would not be recognized, but giving them each a gold piece without making use of them sexually, saying: `Don't tell a soul, but Antoninus is giving you this.'

  He invented several new kinds of licentious behaviour, which went beyond the group-perversions of the old, wicked emperors, and he was well acquainted with what was done by Tiberius, Caligula and Nero.

  It had been predicted by a Syrian priest that he would die violently. Therefore he prepared ropes of wound purple and scarlet silk, so that if necessary he could hang himself. He got golden swords ready to stab himself if violently attacked. He prepared, too, poisons hidden in onyxes, amethysts and emeralds with which to kill himself if in danger. He also built a very high tower with golden and jewelled slabs beneath it, from which he could throw himself, saying that even his death should be a rich and luxurious one, and so that it might be said that no-one else had died like that. But it was all to no avail. As already mentioned, he was killed by ordinary soldiers, dragged through the streets, dumped unceremoniously into sewers and thrown into the Tiber.

  This was the end the Antonines in public life, though everyone knew that with this Antoninus the name was as false as he was.

  It may perhaps appear strange to some people, most worshipful Constantine, that the scourge I have been describing had the position of emperor, and for nearly three years, too. But the state had nobody who could remove him from the government of mighty Rome, where in the cases of Nero, Vitellius, Caligula and others of their sort there had been someone ready to kill the tyrant. But first of all let me apologise for having put down things I found in various writers; I have been silent on many unworthy details, and things that I absolutely could not say without blushing. Indeed, what I have said I have tried as best I could to express in oblique terms. Furthermore I have always believed that we should consider your own words, your Excellency: `It is Fate that makes a man emperor.' There have indeed been less good rulers, and also extremely bad ones. And as you, most pious sir, are accustomed to say, we have to make sure that those whom the force of fate has made emperor are worthy of it. And since Heliogabalus was the last of the Antonines, and no-one else of this name ruled the state after this, something must be added, to prevent any misunderstanding when I start to tell the stories of the two Gordians, father and son, who wanted to be named after the Antonine family. First, they did not have the family name but only the fore-name, and secondly I find in many books that they were called Antonius rather than Antoninus.

  That, then, was Heliogabalus, whose life-story you wanted, a story which I (somewhat reluctantly and unenthusiastically) researched in Greek and Latin texts, to write and offer to you, having already done so with earlier emperors. I shall now begin to write about those who came afterwards, of whom Severus Alexander was the best, worth writing about in detail; he ruled for thirteen years, where the others had six months, or at best a year or two. Aurelian was the most distinguished, but the glory of them all was Claudius Gothicus, founder of your line. I am somewhat afraid to write about this man to Your Excellency, in case I appear to my ill-wishers to be a flatterer. But I shall be absolved of any charges laid by envious and evil people because plenty of others have seen him as a fine man. To these we must add Diocletian, father of the golden age, and Maximianus, father (as is commonly said) of the age of iron, as well as the rest down to yourself, most noble sir. You yourself, most revered emperor, shall be described in many more eloquent pages by those to whom kind fate has granted this. We shall have to add Licinius, Valerius Severus, Domitius Alexander and Maxen- tius, all of whose power gave way to yours, but I shall write of them in such as way as not to play down their strengths. For I have no intention of doing what many writers do, and belittle the achievements of those who have been defeated; it will enhance your glory, if I tell the truth about all their merits.

  Juvenal

  Satire VI

  Juvenal's famous diatribe against the women of his day.

  VI

  THE ACTS OF THE APOSTATES - Geoffrey Farrington

  `His was the most monstrous crime a man could commit. In this land it was an act of desecration without parallel.'

  In the last days of the Emperor Nero's dark reign, in a closely guarded room in the palace, a man tells his story.

  Neophytus, Imperial dream interpreter seer, has returned to Rome from Judea in flight from the death grip of an ancient cult. He has not returned alone, for his nightmares have followed him into the palace. The Acts of the Apostates is an odyssey undertaken by mystics, charlatans and sorcerers through occult mysteries and madness.

  £6.99 ISBN 0 946626 46 4 272pp B Format

  The Acts of the Apostates is one of the many works of contemporary fiction inspired by the literature and history of the Romans and we include a few pages to give the flavour of the novel and as an act of homage to its predecessors.

  When the play was over, and Canace's incestuous bastard dutifully thrown to the hunting dogs, Nero, red faced and smiling, took up his lyre and began to sing. His energy was boundless. Actors who performed with him complained privately that they were ready to drop from exhaustion before Nero worked up a decent sweat. He sang through the whole afternoon and on into the evening. It was typical of him to forget about the time. The flagging audience tried to keep up their enthusiasm for the Emperor's undeniable vocal talents, but after about six hours the heat and overcrowding inside the theatre was beginning to take its effect. Most of them had no interest in music or drama anyway. They attended to court the Emperor's goodwill. And naturally no one would leave before the performance finished, for fear of giving offence.

  Gradually people began to faint and had to be carried from the auditorium by the Emperor's guards and slaves. Several people saw their opportunity and feigned unconsciousness as a means of escape.

  Finally Nero laid aside his lyre. The relieved spectators realised that at last the entertainment was over and burst into thunderous applause, which for one awful moment threatened to bring Nero bounding back on stage for another encore. Everyone rose stiffly and hurried out into the streets.

  At once the Emperor began to dash about in a panic. He had not planned that his performance should last so long, he said, but clearly the audience were so enraptured it would have been unfair to deprive them.

  `But now I am behind myself,' he cried, `and there are urgent matters to attend to.'

  `There are, Caesar!' Epaphroditus stepped forward resolutely. `First, we must discuss the grain shortage ...'

  `Not that!' Nero glared at him. `I mean that now I shall be late for rehearsals.'

  Epaphroditus did not fli
nch, nor betray any sign of emotion save that his face turned puce. Nero grinned.

  'I have become so absorbed lately with affairs of state that my performances are becoming irregular. I must be dedicated. My public deserve nothing less.'

  To avoid the slow and weary business of making his way through the crowds outside, Nero walked by way of a cryptoporticus, a subterranean passageway that led to an entrance hall of the palace. This was a rebuilt section of an old network of passages mostly destroyed by the great fire in Rome four years earlier. It was gloomy, and a musty odour hung in the air. The stucco reliefs of elegant pavilions, nymphs and cupids that covered the walls did little to lighten the sense of oppression. As the Emperor, with his party of guards and attendants, made his way along it, Epaphroditus recalled that it had been somewhere nearby, more than twenty-five years earlier, that Nero's uncle, the Emperor Gaius Caligula, met his death. Another Caesar who had broken with the Senate, lured here after a morning in the theatre by a group of assassins - some of them members of his own Guard - who leapt upon him from all sides and hacked him to death. At one point, so the story went, his murderers, believing him to be finished, backed away from his body. But Caligula had raised his head, his jaw half severed from his face, and bellowed: `I am not yet dead!' A peculiarly stupid thing to say in Epaphroditus' view. But then, Caligula had always been over critical of his Guard. It was said throughout the city that Caligula's ghost roamed these gloomy cloisters by night, repeating the dreadful screams he had made choking out his savage life.

  Epaphroditus glanced at the Emperor. He was pale faced, his heavy, handsome features frowning nervously. His blond curls were lank and he seemed to be sweating even more profusely than he had on stage. Clearly he too was aware of the stories that circulated about this place, and combined with the eerie effect of torchlight, they were making him uneasy. When his reign had begun, Nero's appalling mother Agrippina - who had schemed, seduced, committed incest and murdered that she might make her son Emperor and rule through him - had reminded him of the harrowing details of her brother Caligula's demise whenever he had shown independence of spirit, intimating that if Nero was foolish enough not to be guided by her experience in all things, a similar fate might befall him. Nero had never been able to forget her words. Because of them he had developed an obsessive terror of assassination. At this moment, the ghosts of both Caligula and Agrippina rose to haunt him. Well, that was no bad thing, Epaphroditus reflected. A healthy scare was perhaps just what the Emperor needed to make him start taking the present threats against him seriously. Nero quickened his pace.

  Back at the palace, Nero did not join the company for dinner, but went straight away to rehearse. A special diet, he said, was most necessary to a singer, whose vocal chords might suffer from the wrong kinds of food.

  Throughout the banquet, Neophytus and Epaphroditus spoke little and ate less, each caught within their own private concerns. In silence they reclined upon dining couches while handsome slaves in short white tunics bathed guests' hands and feet in rose scented iced water, and an orchestra played vigorous excerpts from the Emperor's own musical compositions. Little girls moved to and fro amongst the diners, sprinkling exotic perfumes while epicene actors circled giant pillars in the gloom beyond the torchlit tables and couches, their voices made resonant in the great chamber while they recited verse - Nero's verse - to accompany his music.

  When toast and libation to gods and Emperor were done, there began the procession of dinner courses: oysters from Britain, lobster and mullet, fried calves' testicles, thrushes in garlic, pate of lark tongues, every variety of game bird, honeyed dormice, sows' udders in pepper sauce, roasted boar stuffed with spiced mushrooms, and much more. Epaphroditus nibbled at some quail encased in an orange jelly then abandoned the effort as he felt indigestion begin to rise. Neophytus too ate barely a thing, but drank heavy quantities of Nero's vintage Falernian wine while staring blankly at the floor. Epaphroditus leaned towards him finally. The matter must be broached again. He must be persistent.

  `Sometimes he invites leading citizens to banquets so he can perform for them. When he does you can bet a brass sesterce to a gold talent that it will be something obscene. Not long ago he played the part of a bride. Some actor was the bridegroom. They recited the marriage vows in all solemnity, then retired behind a curtain where he imitated the squeals of a girl being deflowered. And his going about with the pretty eunuch done up like Queen Dido of Carthage doesn't help matters much. Have you seen the walls about the city? There is offensive graffiti everywhere.'

  'Yes, I've seen some,' Neophytus nodded. `There was one verse outside the Temple of Saturn about Nero and Sporus the eunuch. The punchline was the eunuch has nothing to look forward to, but plenty to look back on. Quite witty, I thought.'

  * Tiberius' astrologer.