2. The Grass Crown

by Colleen McCullough

  Leaving a much happier Publius Rutilius Rufus to rattle around the governor's palace on his own (for he refused to desert his post), Gaius Marius took his family south to Halicarnassus and their villa, and spent a very pleasant winter there, breaking the monotony with a trip to Rhodes. That they were able to sail from Halicarnassus to Tarsus was thanks solely to the efforts of Marcus Antonius Orator, who had put paid at least for the time being to the activities of the pirates of Pamphylia and Cilicia. Before the campaign of Antonius Orator, the very thought of a sea journey would have been the height of foolhardiness, as no captured cargo was more appreciated by the pirates than a Roman senator, particularly one of Gaius Marius's importance; they would have been able to put a ransom of twenty or thirty silver talents upon his person.

  The ship hugged the coast, and the journey took over a month. The cities of Lycia played host to Marius and his family gladly, as did the big city of Attaleia in Pamphylia. Never had they seen such mountains in close proximity to the sea, even, said Marius, on his coastal march to far Gaul; their snow-covered heads scraped the sky, and their feet paddled in the water. The pine forests of the region were magnificent, never having been logged; Cyprus, only a short distance away, had more than enough timber to supply the needs of the entire area, including Egypt. But, thought Marius as the days went by and the Cilician coast unfolded, no wonder piracy had thrived here; every twist in the mighty mountains produced almost perfectly concealed little coves and harbors. Coracesium, which had been the pirate capital, was so right for this role it must have seemed a gift from the gods, with its towering fortress-crowned spur almost surrounded by the sea. It had fallen to Antonius by treachery from within; gazing up at its stark sides, Marius exercised his brain by working out a way to capture it. And then finally came Tarsus, a few miles up the placid stream of the Cydnus, and therefore sheltered from the open sea but able to function as a port. It was a walled and powerful city, and of course the palace was made available to these august visitors. Spring in this part of Asia Minor was early, so Tarsus was already hot; Julia began to drop hints that she wouldn't welcome being left in such a furnace when Marius began his journey inland to Cappadocia. A letter had come to Halicarnassus late in winter from the Cappadocian King, the seventh Ariarathes; it promised that he himself would be in Tarsus by the end of March, and would be very pleased and proud to escort Gaius Marius personally from Tarsus to Eusebeia Mazaca. Knowing the young King would be waiting, Marius had chafed when the voyage took so long, yet was reluctant to destroy Julia's pleasure in treats like disembarking in some enchanted cove to stretch her legs and swim. But when they did arrive in Tarsus halfway through April, the little King was not there, and no word had come from him. Several couriered letters to Mazaca failed to provide an answer; indeed, none of the couriers came back. And Marius began to worry. This he concealed from Julia and Young Marius, but it made his dilemma more difficult when Julia began to press to be included in the trip to Cappadocia. He could not take her with him, so much was apparent, nor could he leave her behind to become prostrated by the summer heat. Her plight was compounded by Cilicia's unenviably ambivalent position in that part of the world. Once an Egyptian possession, Cilicia had passed to Syria and then entered a period of neglect; during this time the pirate confederations had gradually usurped much of the power, even over the fertile flatlands called Pedia which lay to the east of Tarsus. The Seleucid dynasty of Syria was wearing itself out in a series of civil wars between brothers, and between kings and pretenders; at the present time there were two kings in northern Syria, Antiochus Grypus and Antiochus Cyzicenus, so busy fighting for possession of Antioch and Damascus that they had been obliged for years to leave the rest of the kingdom lying fallow. With the result that the Jews, the Idumaeans and the Nabataeans had all established independent kingdoms in the south, and Cilicia was quite forgotten. Thus when Marcus Antonius Orator had arrived in Tarsus with the intent of using the city as his base, he found Cilicia ripe for the picking, and endowed with full imperium declared Cilicia a province answering to Rome. But when he departed no governor was sent to replace him, and once more Cilicia entered into limbo. The Greek cities large enough and secure enough to have established themselves as economic entities survived well; Tarsus was one such. But between these centers were whole tracts where no one governed in anyone's name, or local tyrants held sway, or the people simply said they belonged now to Rome. Marius had very quickly come to the conclusion that not many years would go by before the pirates moved back in force. In the meantime, the local magistrates seemed happy to welcome the man they assumed was the new Roman governor. The longer he waited to hear from little King Ariarathes, the more apparent it became to Marius that he might be called upon to do something desperate in Cappadocia, or something requiring a lengthy stretch of time. His wife and son had become Marius's greatest worry. Now I know why we leave them safely at home! he thought, grinding his teeth. To leave them in Tarsus, a prey to summer diseases, was out of the question; so too was taking them to Cappadocia; and whenever he decided to consign them to a sea voyage back to Halicarnassus, the image of Coracesium's unreduced fortress loomed, peopled in his imagination by the followers of a new pirate king. What to do, what to do? We know nothing about this part of the world, he thought, but it is clear to me that we must learn; the eastern end of the Middle Sea is rudderless, and some tempest is going to wreck it. When May was almost half over and there was still no word from King Ariarathes, Marius made up his mind. "Pack up," he said to Julia more curtly than was his wont. "I'm taking you and Young Marius with me, but not to Mazaca. As soon as we're high enough for the weather to be cooler and hopefully healthier, I intend to leave the pair of you with whatever people I can find, and go on alone into Cappadocia." She wanted to argue, but she didn't; though she had never seen Gaius Marius in the field, she often picked up echoes of his military autocracy; now too she caught faint echoes of some problem preying upon him. Something to do with Cappadocia. Two days later they moved out, escorted by a band of local militia commanded by a young Tarsian Greek to whom Marius had taken a strong fancy. So had Julia. Which was just as well, as things turned out. On this journey no one walked, for the way lay through the mountain pass called the Cilician Gates, and it was steep and hard. Perched sidesaddle on a donkey, Julia found the beauty of the climb worth its discomfort, for they plodded over thin tracks amid vast mountains, and the higher they climbed, the heavier the snow lying on them became. It was almost impossible to believe that only three days before, she had been panting from the coastal heat; now she dug into her boxes for warm wraps. The weather remained calm and sunny, but when the pine forests enveloped them they were chilled to the bone, and looked forward to those parts of the journey when pine forests gave way to sheer cliffs, and turbulent streams fed into a roaring river which dashed itself in great foaming waves against rocks and precipices. Four days out of Tarsus, the climb was more or less over. In a narrow valley Marius found an encampment of local people who had accompanied their flocks of sheep up from the plains for summer grazing, and here he left Julia and Young Marius behind, together with his escort of militia. The young Tarsian Greek, whose name was Morsimus, was instructed to care for them and protect them. A generous gift of money purchased immense good will from the nomads, and Julia found herself the owner of one of their big brown leather tents. "Once I get used to the smell, I'll be comfortable enough," she said to Marius before he departed. "Inside the tent is warm, and I gather some of the nomads have gone somewhere or other to buy extra grain and provisions. Off you go, and don't worry about me. Or Young Marius, who is planning to become a shepherd, I gather. Morsimus will care for us beautifully. I'm only sorry that we've become a burden to you, dearest husband."