Tyrant

by Valerio Massimo Manfredi

  Such a huge clamour arose in the Assembly that even Dionysius and Philistus had difficulty in quelling the uproar. Heloris proposed immediately that the traitorous generals be sentenced by default that very day. When his proposal was approved by an enormous majority, he presented a list of candidates to cover the positions of command in the main battalions of the army. They were mostly unfamiliar names, except for Dionysius, who won nearly unanimous approval.

  When he left the Assembly at noon amidst ovations, Dionysius was the most powerful man in Syracuse; his fellow officers were less than his shadow and they owed him everything, including their election.

  Three days later, Daphnaeus and his generals received a copy of the proceedings of the session which sentenced them to exile. Dionysius was officially named the supreme commander of the armed forces, and he presented himself to the troops wearing a suit of shining armour decorated in silver and copper, holding his spear in his right hand and a shield with the image of a bloody-fanged gorgon in his left. The shouts and cheers of his warriors rose all the way up to the Temple of Athena on the acropolis, their echo booming against the great doors of bronze.

  14

  THE EXILED SYRACUSAN generals settled in Henna, awaiting better times. They must certainly have realized what hundreds, or even thousands, of citizens had felt when political defeat drove them from their cities. Daphnaeus was said to be planning his return, but he was found dead in his house at the end of the winter. His death was rumoured to be a summary execution ordered by Dionysius and carried out by some member of the Company.

  Dionysius in the meantime was preparing to consolidate his power in the city and to wage the war his way. He wanted no limitations, would accept no conditions.

  ‘That won’t be easy, in a democracy,’ observed Philistus as they met one day in his study.

  ‘I want to win, and to win I need full command.’

  ‘Diocles had full command at Himera, as did Daphnaeus at Acragas, and both lost.’

  ‘They lost because they were incompetent. If they had been given greater powers, it would have been worse. That won’t happen to me: I know what needs to be done, I swear it. Everything is very clear in my mind. Remember that night in Gela?’

  ‘That night it was storming

  ‘After you left, I tried to get some rest. I was dead tired, but I couldn’t fall asleep and so I decided to take a look around. I covered the entire sentry walkway up on the walls, both on the side facing the sea and on the side facing inland. I’ve been back, several times, in secret. Himilco will strike Gela soon, when the weather begins to turn warm, and I’ll be ready. I’ll rip him to pieces.’

  ‘Careful.’

  ‘I know what I’m saying. You’ll leave as soon as it’s possible to set out by sea and you’ll go to our allies in Locri, Croton and Rhegium and convince them to send all the troops they have available. Convince them that if they let us fall, it will be their turn next. If necessary, you can make up some false document in Punic detailing a plan of invasion of the Greek colonies in Italy, tell them that we got it from a spy and . . . you know, you’re good at these things. You know what I mean.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘Will you do it?’

  Philistus smiled. ‘Have I ever disappointed you?’

  ‘Good. Now I have to get rid of the other officers, at least the ones who are getting in my way.’

  ‘You can’t do that!’

  ‘Of course I can.’

  ‘You know what that means, don’t you?’

  ‘No, no, it’s not what you’re thinking. I just want to discredit them for the time being. We’ll start the rumour that they’re in league with the Carthaginians, that they’re taking money from Himilco.’

  ‘Don’t count on me. They want nothing to do with him and you know it. What you propose is detestable.’

  ‘It’s necessary to save the city.’

  ‘And the security of the city coincides with your rise to power.’

  ‘With my leadership. I must lead the people into battle, because only I can deliver the city from annihilation, protect her temples from profanation, save her people from slavery.’

  Philistus fell silent, not knowing what to say. He was pacing back and forth in his study and he felt Dionysius’s gaze resting heavily upon him.

  ‘You know,’ he said, stopping right in the centre of the room, ‘you should have been born at the time of Homer. That was your era. You should have been born a king, like Achilles, Diomedes, Agamemnon . . . But those times are over, Dionysius. For ever, and they’ll never come back. We live in big cities where all the social classes want to be represented, and where leaders are elected and dismissed on the basis of their merits and demerits.’

  ‘On the basis of their scheming!’ exclaimed Dionysius.

  ‘Scheming? And just what are you doing? Are you any better?’

  Dionysius loomed up close in silence, with a look so fierce that Philistus feared he was about to attack him. Instead he lowered his head and his voice: ‘I need your advice, I need your friendship. Don’t leave me alone. I don’t know how to make you think I’m any better. I can only ask if you believe in me or if you don’t, if you’re my friend or if you aren’t. If you’re with me or against me, Philistus.’

  ‘You have Leptines. He’s your brother.’

  ‘Leptines is a good lad and he’s faithful to me, but I need your intelligence, your experience and, most of all, your friendship. What’s your answer?’

  ‘You’re asking me to blindly accept your decisions, and your vision of the world.’

  ‘That’s what I’m asking. In the name of everything that binds us, of everything we’ve gone through together.’

  Philistus sighed. ‘You know I’d do anything for you. But I have certain moral convictions that are difficult to give up. More than difficult . . . painful.’

  ‘I know. And as strange as it seems, I understand you. In any case, the problem is troublesome but simple: you must simply look inside yourself and see whether the love you have for me is stronger than your principles. That’s all. But I need your answer. Now.’

  Philistus fell silent and walked over to the window to watch the seagulls flying amidst the masts and sails of the Great Harbour, over the red roofs of Ortygia and the Temple of Athena. When he turned, his eyes were shiny and he seemed to have lost his usual assurance, his proverbial control over his emotions. ‘I’m with you,’ he said with a sigh. ‘I’m ready to follow you.’

  ‘All the way to Hades?’

  ‘All the way to Hades.’

  Dionysius embraced him, then looked him straight in the eye. ‘I knew you wouldn’t abandon me.’

  ‘I was about to do just that.’

  ‘You’re still in time. No one’s stopping you.’

  Philistus said nothing.

  Dionysius handed him a little slip of paper with a list of names. ‘These are the officers we need out of our way. The others owe us their election, so they’ll do as I say, at least for a while.’

  Philistus nodded and took the sheet as Dionysius turned to go. ‘Wait,’ he said.

  Dionysius, already at the threshold, stopped.

  ‘You weren’t like this. You were never like this; why such ruthlessness now?’

  A despairing light flashed in Dionysius’s eyes, so sudden and brief it was nearly imperceptible. ‘You know very well why,’ he said. And left.

  Philistus returned with slow steps to watch the seagulls wheeling outside. But only the swallows circling close under the roof saw his tears.

  Seven days later, the narrow streets of Ortygia echoed in the deep of night with the pounding footsteps of Dionysius’s mercenaries: six of the ten officers who formed the War Council were arrested as they slept and taken to prison, accused of collusion with the enemy. The remaining four were quick to confirm their complete, unquestioned loyalty to their chief. The imprisoned officers were replaced by friends of Dionysius, including his adoptive father Heloris, his brother Leptines and
his friends Biton, Iolaus and Doricus, members of the Company all.

  Springtime came late that year and a series of storms made navigation impossible for long months. When Himilco left Acragas, it was nearly summer; he had burned down the temples, profaned the sanctuaries and disfigured the artwork that adorned them. The statues of the gods and heroes, many of which were true masterpieces, were hammered to pieces. The bronze, the silver, the gold and the ivory were plundered and sent to Carthage.

  Among them was the famous bronze bull that the tyrant Phalaris was rumoured to have used to torture and kill his political adversaries. The Carthaginians sent it to Tyre, their metropolis, as a token of their homage and respect.

  Then the army moved towards Gela overland, as the fleet followed by sea, carrying the disassembled pieces of the war machines.

  Gela’s citizens decided at first to evacuate their women and children to Syracuse, but they refused to obey. As the women of Selinus and Himera had before them, they took refuge in the temples and hung on to the altars, vowing not to abandon their city and their homes for any reason. There was no convincing them, but the reoccurrence of the same gestures in the same situations was an ominous reminder of what had already come to pass.

  At first Himilco had planned to locate a detachment east of the city on the Gela river, as he had at Acragas, but he then changed his mind and concentrated his forces in a fortified camp west of Gela. He assembled the assault towers and began to batter the walls with the rams.

  The walls of Gela were similar to the walls of Selinus, built when machines of that sort were not even imaginable, and they began to crumble and give way at the first blows of the huge, powerful rams. But by night, while the combat-weary warriors slept to recover their strength, the women, old men, slaves and children worked like ants to repair the damage, to close the breaches, to reinforce the weakest stretches. In this way over a month passed without either of the adversaries prevailing.

  Vexed by the obstinate resistance of the Geloans, the Carthaginians turned to one of the city’s most sacred symbols: a gigantic statue of Apollo which stood outside the walls, not far from their camp. It was twenty-two feet tall, and had stood there on the beach from time immemorial, marking the spot where the city’s founders had landed. The monument commemorated Apollo, Leader of Men who had guided the voyagers by sea to the foot of the hill where they had established their community.

  The Carthaginians used their war machines and the winches from their ships to wrench it from its pedestal and tip it over. They then slid it down tallow-greased wooden ramps, loaded it on to a ship and had it towed all the way to Carthage.

  Watching that sacred image being taken from Gela was a terrible blow for all her people, as if the whole history of the city had abruptly been wiped out. But their rage sustained the combatants and imbued them with new energy.

  Time passed, and the Geloan generals sent continuous, desperate requests for assistance to Syracuse, where Dionysius had still not resolved all his problems with the Assembly. In a tempestuous meeting, he proposed the recall of the political exiles who had participated in Hermocrates’s attempted coup, arousing indignant protests from many of those present.

  ‘With what courage can we ask our allies,’ proclaimed Dionysius in an ardent speech, ‘to risk their lives to support us when we are preventing hundreds of Syracusans from fighting for their own city? I’m not here to discuss the gravity of their offences, and you all know that I have never had any sympathy for aristocrats and landowners: I am one of you, one of the people! But one thing is certain: they’ve often been asked by the barbarians to fight in their ranks, lured by promises to restore their lost pride and confiscated property, but they have always refused! Now our city needs all of her sons. Now that we are facing mortal danger, we cannot be divided by internal disputes. I’m asking you now to call them back and allow them to atone for any misdeeds they may have committed.’

  Once again, Dionysius’s sweeping eloquence had the desired effect, and his order of the day was approved. He also succeeded in having himself named autocrator, or sole commander, a position which gave him nearly absolute power.

  The Italian allies finally arrived, accompanied by Philistus. Dionysius felt greatly encouraged, and certain now that he could win, despite the news arriving from Gela which described the city as being on her last legs, incapable of resisting much longer. But Dionysius was not thinking of the military campaign alone.

  Convinced as he was that his power must be consolidated at any cost, he delayed taking action until his friends were successfully installed in the key roles of the State and in all the centres of power.

  Still not content, before leaving he persuaded the Assembly to double the salaries of his mercenaries, producing evidence that Himilco had infiltrated paid assassins into the city with the aim of having him murdered. By the time he was finally ready to move, it was the end of the summer.

  His army boasted nearly thirty thousand Sicilian Greeks, of whom twenty thousand were Syracusans. They were joined by fifteen thousand Italian Greeks and five thousand mercenaries. The cavalry, composed almost completely of aristocrats, counted a couple of thousand equipped with the finest gear money could buy.

  When the confederate army came within sight of Gela, the cheering from the walls was so loud that it reached the Carthaginians’ fortified camp. Dionysius entered the city on horseback, his armour blazing and his crested helmet low over his forehead, as the crowd screamed with joy, parting to let him pass. Behind him were his select troops, marching with a cadenced step, covered with bronze and iron, carrying big shields decorated with fantastic monsters: gorgons, dragons, hydras and sea serpents. A triskelion, the symbol of Sicily, stood out on Dionysius’s shield of shining silver.

  And yet, even amidst all the applause and acclamation, many in the crowd could not help but think of the enemy army camped outside, towards the west: unceasingly victorious, inexorable, implacable. They had uprooted and destroyed one community after another, and neither men nor gods had ever been able to stop them.

  Dionysius held council that same evening alongside the Geloan generals, some of whom were haughty, presumptuous noblemen, and he immediately met with difficulty. After their initial euphoria, they remembered that they had already seen that arrogant young man the previous winter, and they couldn’t believe that he held the supreme command of such an army. They felt, on the contrary, that the direction of the war should be shared equally, and decisions made collectively.

  Leptines took care of the matter personally, doing away with four out of seven, the most stubborn, in less than eight days. He spread the word that they had deserted and gone over to the enemy. Their property and goods were confiscated and Dionysius used the money to pay Dexippus’s mercenaries, who were considerably in arrears of their salaries. He detested the man and considered him incompetent, but at the moment he had no choice; he needed all the help he could get.

  Dionysius called a War Council seven days later. Leptines, Heloris, Iolaus, Biton and Doricus were present, along with the three Geloan officers and two Italians, the cavalry commander, Dexippus and even Philistus, admitted as councillor to the commander-in-chief. They met on the highest tower of the walls, from which they could view the entire city, the inland region, the coastline and the Carthaginian camp.

  ‘My plan is perfect,’ Dionysius started. ‘I’ve been studying it for months. It’s all engraved in my mind: every move, every phase, every detail of the action.

  ‘Now we’re on difficult ground here, because the city is stretched out on this hill parallel to the sea; Himilco was very astute to set up camp so close. It doesn’t leave us much space to manoeuvre. If I had commanded the army here in Gela, I would have made sure to occupy that land a long time ago, but what’s done is done, and there’s no sense laying blame now.

  ‘You’ll notice that the Carthaginian camp is unfortified on the seaward flank: they’re obviously not expecting a threat to come from there, and it is from there that d
estiny will strike. We’ll make the first move. Heloris will lead the Sicilians, flanked by the cavalry; they’ll approach from the north shortly after dawn and will immediately draw up in fighting order. Himilco will imagine that we are seeking a decisive frontal battle as Daphnaeus did at Acragas, and will send ahead the Libyan heavy infantry, who will have to fight with the morning sun in their eyes. But at the very same time, the Italians will be attacking from along the sea; they will assault the entrenched camp at the one point in which it isn’t defended . . .’

  ‘How’s that?’ asked one of the Geloan generals. ‘There’s not enough space to put through a contingent that would be numerous enough to storm the camp. They would have to advance in single file, and when the first are ready to launch the attack, the others will be too far behind.’

  Dionysius smiled. ‘They’ll be landing from the sea, all at once. The fleet, concealed behind the hill, will advance until it’s very close to the shore and will disembark five battalions. They’ll wait on that wide clearing you see down there, hidden from the enemy’s sight, until they receive the signal that I myself will give from the western gate: a red cloth, raised and lowered three times. In the meantime, I will have crossed the city from east to west at the head of my select troops and the mercenaries. At this point Heloris, leading the bulk of our troops, will send ahead the cavalry in a converging manoeuvre. Doricus and Iolaus will back him up.