Robert Graves - I, Claudius

by I, Claudius(Lit)

  Only Macro kept his head. "It's a nonsensical lie," he shouted. "The slave must have lost his wits. Have him crucified, Caesar! We left the old Emperor dead an hour ago." He whispered something to Caligula, who was seen to nod in grateful relief. Then he hurried into Tiberius's room. Tiberius was on his feet, cursing and groaning and tottering feebly towards the door. Macro picked him up in his arms, threw him back on the bed and smothered him with a pillow. Caligula was standing by.

  So Arruntius's fellow-prisoners were released, though most of them later wished that they had followed Arruntius's example. There were, besides, about fifty men and women who had been accused of treason in a separate batch from this. They had no influence in the Senate, being mostly shopkeepers who had baulked at paying the "protection money" that Macro's captains now levied on all the City wards. They were tried and condemned and were to be executed on the 16th of March. This was the very day that news came of Tiberius's death, and they, and their friends went nearly mad with joy to think that now they would be saved. But Caligula was away at Misenum and could not be appealed to in time and the prison governor was afraid of losing his job if he took the responsibility of postponing the executions. So they were killed and their bodies thrown on the Stairs in the usual way.

  This was the signal for an outburst of popular anger against Tiberius. "He stings like a dead wasp," someone shouted. Crowds gathered at the street corners for solemn commination-services under the ward-masters, beseeching Mother Earth and the Judges of the Dead to grant the corpse and the ghost of that monster no rest or peace until the day of universal dissolution. Tiberius's body was brought to Rome under a strong escort of Guards. Caligula walked in the procession as a mourner and the. whole countryside came flocking to meet him, not in mourning for Tiberius but in holiday clothes, weeping with gratitude that Heaven had preserved a son of Germanicus to rule over them. Old country women cried out, "O our sweet darling, Caligula! Our chicken! Our baby! Our star!" A few miles from Rome he rode ahead to make preparations for the solemn entry of the corpse into the City. But when he had passed, a big crowd gathered and barricaded the Appian Road with planks and blocks of building stone. When the outriders of the escort appeared there was booing and groaning and cries of "Into the Tiber with Tiberius!"

  "Throw him down the Stairs!"

  "Eternal damnation to Tiberius!" The leader shouted: "Soldiers, we Romans won't allow that evil corpse into the City. It will bring us bad luck. Take it back to Atella and half-bum it in the amphitheatre there!" Half-burning, I should explain,-was the usual fate of paupers and unfortunates, and Atella was a town celebrated for a kind of rough country masque or farce which had been performed there at the harvest festival every year from the very earliest times, Tiberius had a villa at Atella and used to attend the festival nearly every year. He had converted the innocent rural bawdry of the masque into a sophisticated vileness. He made the men of Atella build an amphitheatre to present the revised show, which was produced by himself.

  Macro ordered his men to charge the barricade, and a number of citizens were killed and wounded, and three or four soldiers were knocked unconscious with paving stones. Caligula prevented further disorders and Tiberius's body was duly burned on Mars Field. Caligula spoke the funeral oration. It was a very formal and ironical one and much appreciated, because there was a good deal in it about Augustus and Germanicus, but very little about Tiberius.

  At a banquet that night Caligula told a story which made the whole country weep and gained him great credit. He said that early one morning at Misenum, being as usual sleepless with grief for the fate of his mother and brothers, he had determined, come what might, to be avenged at last on their murderer. He seized the dagger that had been his father's and went boldly into Tiberius's room. The Emperor lay groaning and tossing in nightmare on his bed. Caligula slowly lifted the dagger to strike but a Divine Voice sounded in his ears: "Great-grandson, hold your hand! To kill him would be impious." Caligula answered, "O God Augustus, he killed my mother and my brothers, your descendants. Should I not avenge them even at the price of being shunned by all men as a parricide?" Augustus answered, "Magnanimous son, who are to be Emperor hereafter, there is no need to do what you would do. By my orders the Furies nightly avenge your dear ones, while he dreams." And so he had laid his dagger on the table beside the bed and walked out. Caligula did not explain what had happened next morning when Tiberius woke and saw the dagger on the table; the presumption was that Tiberius had not dared to mention the incident.

  XXIX

  CALIGULA WAS TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OLD WHEN HE BECAMB

  Emperor. Seldom, if ever, in the history of the world has a prince been more enthusiastically acclaimed on his -accession or had an easier task offered him of gratifying the modest wishes of his people, which were only for peace and security. With a bulging treasury, well-trained armies, an excellent administrative system that needed only a little care to get it into perfect order again-for in spite of Tiberius's neglect the Empire was still running along fairly well under the impetus given it by Livia-with all these advantages, added to the legacy of love and confidence he enjoyed as Germanicus's son, and the immense relief felt by Tiberius's removal, what a splendid chance he had of being remembered in history as "Caligula the Good", or "Caligula the Wise", or "Caligula the Saviour"! But it is idle to write in this way. For if he had been the sort of man that the people took him for, he would never have survived his brothers or been chosen by Tiberius as his successor. Claudius, remember what scorn old Athenodorus had for such impossible contingencies', he used to say, "If the Wooden Horse of Troy had foaled, horses to-day would cost far less to feed."

  It amused Caligula at first to encourage the absurd misconception that everyone but myself and my mother and Macro and one or two others had of his character, and even to perform a number of acts in keeping with it. He wanted also to make sure of his position. There were two obstacles to his complete freedom of action. One was Macro, whose power made him dangerous. The other was Gemellus. For when Tiberius's will was read (which for secrecy's sake he had had witnessed by a few freedmen and illiterate fishermen) it was found that the old man, just to make trouble, had not appointed Caligula his first heir, with Gemellus as a second choice in case of accidents: he had made them joint-heirs, to rule alternate years. However, Gemellus had not come of age and so was not even allowed yet to enter the Senate, while Caligula was already a magistrate of the second rank, some years before the legal age, and a pontiff. The Senate was therefore very ready to accept Caligula's view that Tiberius had not been of sound mind when he made the will and to give the whole power to Caligula without encumbrance. Except for this matter of Cemellus, from whom he also withheld his share in the Privy Purse, on the ground that the Privy Purse was an integral part of the sovereignty, Caligula observed all the terms of the will and paid every legacy promptly.

  The Guards were to receive a bounty of fifty gold pieces a man; Caligula, to ensure their loyalty when the time came for Macro's removal, doubled the amount. He paid the people of Rome the four hundred and fifty thousand gold pieces bequeathed them and added three gold pieces a head; he said that he had intended to give them this when he came of age, but the old Emperor had forbidden it. The armies were awarded the same bounty as under Augustus's will, but this time it was paid promptly. What was more, he paid all the sums owing under Livia's will, which we legatees had long ago written off as bad debts. To roe the two most interesting items in Tiberius's will were: the specific bequest to me of the historical books which Pollio had left me but which I had been cheated of, together with a number of other valuable volumes, and the sum of twenty thousand gold pieces; and a bequest to the Chief Vestal, the granddaughter of Vipsania, of a hundred thousand gold pieces to be spent as she pleased, either on herself or on the College. The Chief Vestal, as the granddaughter of the murdered Gallus, melted the coin down and made it into a great golden casket for his ashes.

  With these bequests from Livia and Tiberius I was no
w quite well off. Caligula astonished me by further paying me back the fifty thousand that I had found for Germanicus at the time of the mutiny: he had heard the story from his mother. He did not allow me to refuse it and said that if I made any further protest he would insist on paying me the accumulated interest too: it was a debt he owed his father's memory. When I told Calpumia about my new wealth she seemed more sorry than pleased. "It won't bring you any luck," she said. "Much better be modestly well off, as you have been, than run the risk of having your whole fortune stripped from you by informers on a charge of treason." Calpumia was Acte's successor, you remember. She was very shrewd for her years-seventeen.

  I said, "What do you mean, Calpumia? Informers? There are no such things in Rome now, and no treason-trials."

  She said; "I didn't hear that the informers were packed off in the same boat with the Spintrians." (For Tiberias's painted "orphans" had been banished by Caligula. As a public gesture of pure-mindedness he had sent the whole crew of them off to Sardinia, a most unhealthy island, and told them to labour honestly for their living as roadmakers. Some of them just lay down and died when picks and shovels were put into their hands, but the rest were whipped into work, even the daintiest of them. Soon-they had a stroke of luck. A pirate vessel made a sudden raid, captured them, and carried them off to Tyre, where they were sold as slaves to rich Eastern profligates.)

  "But they wouldn't dare to try their old tricks again, Calpumia?"

  She put down her embroidery. "Claudius, I'm no politician or scholar, but I can at least use my prostitute's wit and do simple sums. How much money did the old Emperor leave?"

  "About twenty-seven million gold pieces. That's a lot of money."

  "And how much has the new one paid out in legacies and bounties?"

  "About three million and a half. Yes, at least that amount."

  "And since he has been Emperor how many panthers and bears and lions and tigers and wild bulls and things has he imported for the huntsmen to kill in the amphitheatres and the Circus?"

  "About twenty thousand, perhaps. Probably more."

  "And how many other animals have been sacrificed in the temples?"

  "I don't know. I should guess between one and two hundred thousand."

  "Those flamingoes and desert antelopes and zebras and British beavers must have cost him something! So what with buying all those animals and paying the huntsmen in the amphitheatres, and then the gladiators, of course- gladiators get four times what they got under Augustus, I'm told-and all the State banquets and decorated cars and the theatre shows-they say that when he recalled the actors whom the old Emperor banished he paid them for all the years they were out of work-handsome, eh?-and my goodness the money he has spent on racehorses! Well, what with one thing and the other he can't have much change left out of twenty million, can he?"

  "I think you're right there, Calpumia."

  "Well, seven million in three months! How is the money going to last at that rate, even if all the rich men who die leave him all their money? The Imperial revenue is less now than it used to be when your old grandmother ran the business and went over the accounts."

  "Perhaps he'll be more economical after the first excitement of having money to spend. He's got a good excuse for spending; he says that the stagnation of money in the Treasury under Tiberius had a most disastrous effect on trade. He wants to put a few million into circulation again."

  "Well, you're better acquainted with him than I am. Perhaps he'll know just when to stop. But if he goes on at this rate he won't have a penny left in a couple of years, and then who's going to pay? That's why I spoke of informers and treason-trials."

  I said: "Calpumia, I'm going to buy you a pearl necklace while I still have the money. You're as clever as you are beautiful. And I only hope you are as discreet."

  "I'd prefer cash," she said, "if you don't mind." And I gave her five hundred gold pieces the next day. Calpumia, a prostitute and the daughter of a prostitute, was more intelligent and loyal and kind-hearted and straightforward than any of the four noblewomen I have married. I soon began to take her into my confidence about my private affairs and I may say at once that I never regretted having done so.

  The moment that Tiberius's funeral was over, Caligula had taken ship, in spite of very bad weather, to the islands where his mother and his brother Nero had been buried; he gathered up their remains, half-burned, and brought them back, burned them properly, and piously interred them in Augustus's tomb. He instituted a new annual festival, with sword-fighting and horse races, in his mother's memory and annual sacrifices to her ghost and that of his brothers. He called the month of September "Germanicus", as the previous month had been called after Augustus. He also heaped on my mother by a single decree as many honours as Livia had been given in her lifetime, and appointed her High-Priestess of Augustus.

  He next pronounced a general amnesty, recalling all banished men and women and releasing all political prisoners. He even brought together a large batch of criminal records covering the cases of his mother and brothers and publicly burned them in the Market Place, swearing that he had not read them and that anyone who had acted as informer or contributed in any other way to the deplorable fate of his loved ones need have no fear: all record of those evil days was destroyed. As a matter of fact, what he burned were only copies: he kept the originals. He followed Augustus's example by making a strict scrutiny of the Orders and rejecting all unworthy members of either, and Tiberius's example in refusing all titles of honour except those of Emperor and Protector of the People and in forbidding statues of himself to be set up. I wondered how long this mood of his would last, and how long he would keep by the promise he had made to the Senate on the occasion that they voted him the Imperial power, to share it with them and be their faithful servant.

  After six months of his monarchy, in September, the Consuls in office finished their term and he undertook a Consulship for himself for a while. Whom do you suppose he chose as a colleague? He actually chose me! And I who had twenty-three years before begged Tiberius to be given real honours, not empty ones, would now willingly have resigned my appointment in anyone's favour. It was not that I wanted to go back to my writing (for I had just completed and revised my Etruscan history and had begun on no new work), but that I had quite forgotten all the rules of procedure and legal formulas and precedents that I had once studied so painfully, and that I felt thoroughly ill at ease in the Senate. From being so little at Rome, too, I knew nothing about how to pull strings and get things done quickly, or who were the men with real power. I got into great trouble with Caligula almost at once. He entrusted me with the task of having statues made of Nero and Drusus, to be set up and consecrated in the Market Place, and the Greek firm from whom I commissioned them promised faithfully to have them ready on the day fixed for the ceremony early in December. Three days before I went along to see how the statues looked. The rogues hadn't begun on them. They made some excuse about the right coloured marble having only just come in. I flew into a temper (as I often do on occasions of this sort, but my anger doesn't last long) and told them that if they didn't get workmen busy on the blocks and keep them at the job night and day I would have the whole firm-owner, managers and men-thrown out of the City. Perhaps I made them nervous, because though Nero was done on the afternoon before the ceremony-it was a good likeness too- a careless sculptor somehow broke Drusus's hand off at the wrist. There are ways of repairing a break of this sort, but the join always shows and I couldn't present Caligula with a botched piece of work on so important an occasion. All that I could do was to go at once and tell him that Drusus wouldn't be ready. Heavens, how angry he was! He threatened to degrade me from my Consulship and wouldn't listen to any explanation. Fortunately he had decided to resign his own Consulship the next day, and ask me to resign mine, in favour of the men who had originally been chosen for it; so nothing came of his threat and I was even chosen again as Consul with him for four years ahead.