SPQR VI: Nobody Loves a Centurion

by John Maddox Roberts

  In front of my tent I found Hermes awaiting me. He had laid out my lunch on a folding table I had brought, along with a folding chair. There is no more useful object in a military camp than a comfortable folding chair. I sat and dropped my burden beside me while Hermes poured watered wine from my stock. He seemed oddly excited.

  “Master, I think I saw a goddess in the camp today! It must have been Venus. Doesn’t Caesar claim to be descended from Venus? Maybe she was visiting him.”

  I took a long drink and sighed. “Hermes, do you really think Venus goes around dressed in animal skins?”

  “It did look sort of odd, but the immortals aren’t like the rest of us.”

  “What you saw was a German slavegirl. I saw her, too.” The sight was as real as the cup before me. Even the barbaric custom of wearing furs did not mar her beauty.

  Hermes grinned. “Really? Then these Germans can’t be all that bad!”

  “You think not? That woman could probably snap you across her shapely knee. Imagine what the men must be like.”

  “Oh. I hadn’t thought of that.”

  I held up an admonitory finger. “And, Hermes, I cannot stress this strongly enough: Do not, I repeat, do not get caught staring at her.”

  “Are you serious?” he said, refilling my cup. “Tongues dragged on the ground wherever she passed.”

  “Nonetheless, keep your eyes and tongue firmly in your head when she is around. In fact, keep your eyes lowered just as I tell you to when I have distinguished visitors, not that you ever listen to me, you loathsome little wretch.” I bent, picked up the short sword, and tossed it to him. He caught it by the sheath and gave me a puzzled look.

  “You want me to clean this up for you? It’s not as good as the sword you’re wearing.”

  “It’s for you,” I said. “I’m going to enroll you with a sword instructor here. It’s time you learned how to handle weapons.”

  He looked dazzled, thinking he was Horatius already.

  “Don’t get any foolish ideas,” I warned him. “I am doing this because you have to accompany me into war zones and bandit-infested areas. You cannot wear weapons in any civilized place and you must never touch arms in Rome, unless you want to grace one of the many picturesque crosses planted outside the gates.”

  He went white the way slaves usually do when you mention a cross. “Never fear, master!”

  “Good. Now, what’s for lunch?”

  3

  THAT AFTERNOON WE RODE OUT in full strength, something just short of a hundred troopers. From the camp we passed through the long earthworks into the grassy, brushy lakeside plain beyond. We conducted a sweep to catch any ambitious Helvetian warriors who might try to work themselves close enough for an ambush after dark. We spread out in a wide line and rode slowly forward, paying special attention to the frequent areas of good cover.

  Several times we flushed two or three young, blue-painted braves from a clump of brush and my men would give chase, whooping and hallooing like men hunting hares. And the Gauls ran like hares, too, their colorfully clad legs flashing as they leaped and dodged, actually laughing as the horsemen chased them down. I have never liked seeing warfare treated as sport, but it was sport played in earnest. A couple of my men rode back with fair-tressed heads hanging at their saddles.

  In the middle of all this we saw a party of Gauls riding in, preceded by white-robed heralds bearing rods wreathed in ivy. These were the Helvetian envoys come to treat with Caesar. They rode with impressive dignity, ignoring the veritable human fox-hunt as it swept by them. Among them I noticed a few that didn’t look like the usual Gallic aristocrats: They were bearded men in white robes and wearing silver diadems, and others, also bearded, but wearing animal skins. These last might almost have been Gauls, but Gauls are clean-shaven except for their mustaches, and these were neither tattooed nor painted.

  I rode up to Lovernius. “Who were those other men with the envoys?”

  “The graybeards in the white robes are Druids,” he told me. I had heard of these priests and soothsayers but these were the first I had seen. “The others are Germans, Ariovistus’s men.”

  “Isn’t he the king of the Germans? I heard his name mentioned in a Senate debate. What are his men doing on this side of the Rhine?”

  “Is that all they know in Rome?” He laughed bitterly. “Captain, Ariovistus and about a hundred thousand of his warriors have been living west of the Rhine for a number of years now.”

  “What! How did this come about?” A great dread lowered itself over me like a shroud.

  “Surely you knew that most of Gaul is divided into two factions, one led by the Aedui, my own people, and the other led by the Averni, who live along the Rhine?”

  “That much I knew. And I heard that you Aedui were winning until the Averni brought in some German mercenaries on their side. That was one reason why Caesar got this extraordinary command. But nobody said anything about a hundred thousand savages and their king! What possessed the Averni to do such a thing?”

  “They were losing and men will do desperate things at such a time. Besides,” he shrugged his mailed shoulders, “they and the Germans are cousins.”

  Perhaps I should explain something here. We Romans usually assumed that everyone west of the Rhine was a Gaul, everyone east was a German. That was roughly but not completely true. The fact is, they could be difficult to tell apart. They had been living in close proximity for centuries, and in the border areas they intermarried and swapped customs. In one place you might find a village where the people wore colorful clothes and tattoos and mustaches but only German was spoken. Likewise, in some areas the Gauls were bearded and wore animal skins.

  You see this sort of thing all over the coastal areas surrounding our sea, where over the course of four centuries people of many lands have adopted the customs, grooming, and dress of the Greeks. More recently, we see imitation Romans everywhere. Primitive people often find a more sophisticated culture attractive and seek to join it, while those who feel their race has lost its warrior virtues will sometimes adopt the customs of a more primitive but more fierce and manly culture.

  “An oddly mixed party,” I commented. “Why Druids?”

  “They will be advisers to the Helvetii. They are consulted on all matters of importance.”

  I guided my horse around a mud hole. “We do the same. It is always a good idea to consult the augurs for signs and make sure all the proper rituals are observed before you commit yourself to crucial action.”

  “It isn’t quite like that. The Druids serve as advisers in worldly matters and they retain the history and lore and traditions of the people.”

  This was the first I had heard that the Druids were anything more than priests. “Are they politically influential?” I was not sure how a Gaul would interpret such an expression.

  “The kings listen to them.”

  “Even German kings?”

  He laughed. “Never! The Germans have only fierce gods they can see: the sun and the moon, lightning and thunder and the storm.”

  Then we started up another group of warriors and were off on another chase.

  When we returned to camp that evening, we found that a pack of merchants had arrived and a veritable market day was in progress. The camp’s forum had sprouted booths and the off-duty soldiers were allowed, a cohort at a time, to go there and purchase necessities or waste their money as they saw fit. I dismissed my ala and the men who had taken heads rushed away to show them off to their friends. Gauls set great store by these grisly trophies and even decorate their shrines and homes with them. They fancy the head to be the repository of many virtues such as courage and wisdom. We Romans hold that these qualities reside in the liver. Personally I am neutral, but I would regret losing either of them.

  That evening Caesar entertained the envoys at dinner and I got a good look at them. The Helvetii were elders dressed in richly patterned cloaks and a profusion of massive, golden jewelry. The Druids, differing from the usual G
allic fashion, had long beards, white in the case of the two elder priests, short and red on a younger man. Unlike the other two he wore no silver diadem around his temples, so I took him to be an apprentice or acolyte. All three had slender, long-fingered hands that had never been hardened by labor or practice at arms. In their long, white gowns and holding their staffs they might have been heralds.

  The three Germans were tall, burly men, whose hair and beards ranged from dark gold to near white. Their pale complexions were reddened and roughened by constant exposure. The evening had turned cold, but they wore only brief tunics of wolfskin and fur leggings that came no higher than their knees. Longswords hung at their belts and they leaned on spears forged entirely of steel. They gazed about them with fearless eyes that were of a blue so pale that you almost took them for blind men until that eagle gaze fastened on you.

  Once, in the big, stone amphitheater at Capua, I had seen a Hyrcanian tiger, the first ever brought to Italy. When it ambled into the arena, I was struck by its great beauty, but its size and the way it ignored its surroundings made it seem as slow and lazy as a big, male lion. Then it noticed the massive fighting bull that had been matched with it. Like a streak of golden light it was across the arena and had the much larger animal down so swiftly that it looked like magic. The tiger was a sensation and fought there for many years. To me, it was feral deadliness personified.

  When I saw those Germans, I thought about that tiger. These were not the semi-Gallicized Germans who dwelled along the river. They were the real thing; savages from the deep forests far beyond the Rhine.

  The dinner was somewhat less austere than that of the evening before, but it was not exactly a banquet. A few delicacies had been purchased from the merchants and a hunting party had brought in a wild boar, but the envoys had no taste for olives and seemed to be repelled by our fermented fish sauce. Well, there is no accounting for tastes. I noticed that the Druids ate no animal food, not even eggs.

  When the dinner was over, Caesar held audience. First to speak was the head of the Helvetian delegation. He wore a voluminous cloak woven in a dazzling pattern of checks and lines that intersected and overlapped bewilderingly. He had it wrapped about him against the chill of the evening. It was fastened at his shoulder by a golden brooch at least eight inches in diameter. His speech was translated by a respected Roman merchant who had lived in Gaul all his life, but I kept Lovernius close by me to make sure that the translation was accurate.

  I will not try to reproduce here the many and extravagant images, figures of speech, and circumlocutions employed by the envoy, for the Gallic love of rhetoric exceeds even the Roman fondness for that art. Instead, I shall convey the gist of his words, which shortens his speech tremendously.

  “Honored Proconsul of Rome, I, Nammeius, chieftain of the Helvetii, speak to you here on behalf of the glorious, the powerful, the ever victorious nation of Helvetia; ever just in her dealings with other nations, vigilant in peace and fierce in war, fair of face and form, sonorous of voice, generous, noble, and proud.” From this you may imagine how tedious it would be if I wrote down everything he actually said.

  “Rome listens.” Caesar’s vividly contrasting acknowledgment was in that spare, laconic style with which we were all to become so familiar. Nammeius was nonplussed. He had expected something more fulsome.

  “Noble Caesar, for a final time, I protest that your interference with our migration is unjust and uncalled for. We are a nation of true men, and only persons lacking in manliness and spirit dwell in a single place forever, wearing out the land and fighting only the same neighbors. In the honored tradition of our ancestors we intend to burn our towns and farms behind us and pass through the land of the Allobroges and through your province into the territory beyond, where Rome and her allies have no interests.

  “We promise to undertake this migration peacefully, and to cause no damage to the lands through which we must pass. No one will be killed or enslaved, no property will be stolen or harmed in any way. We have no need of plunder, for our movable goods will be on our wagons. We need not forage for provisions, for we will carry with us all the grain we need for the march. You must permit this, Caesar. Already, the smoke of our towns, our oppida, and our farmsteads rises to the heavens. Already the wagons are loaded and the folk have massed along the river. The season draws nigh when we must begin our migration, or it will be too late when we arrive at our destination.

  “Caesar, when last we spoke, you asked for time to consider our request. This seemed reasonable to us and we granted you this interval. Now we find that you have employed this time in building a great rampart, the sort of thing for which you Romans are famous throughout the world. I must urge upon you the futility of this thing, for we are not Greeks to be terrified by a wall. When the Helvetii move upon their chosen path, no little heap of earth and logs will slow them in any way, for they sweep all obstacles before them like chaff before the wind. Once again, Caesar, and for the final time, I urge that you remove yourself from before us.” With this the envoy resumed his seat.

  “Honored Nammeius, I have considered your nation’s proposal with great patience, despite the many provocations that I, and the friends of Rome, have received from your warriors. To begin with, I find your reasons for undertaking this migration to be totally unreasonable.

  “Aeneas, son of the goddess Venus, whose son, Julus, was the founder of my house, led his people from a city burned by his enemies. He did not burn it himself.” That was Caesar; always reminding people of the divine origins of his family. “Romulus, descendant of Julus, founded Rome 696 years ago. We have not budged since that time and feel no less manly for it.” He smiled and the Romans present laughed at his witticism. I could see what the Gauls were thinking: that we had simply expanded our territory and founded colonies instead of migrating. But it was not their turn to speak.

  “Your assurances that you can accomplish this movement of a nation through the territory of several others without causing harm I cannot accept. You are, as you have so eloquently stated, a nation of warriors, and while you can lead your warriors, you cannot control them. They will be in force in the land of ancestral enemies and will never be able to restrain themselves from plunder, rapine, and slaughter.

  “As for the feebleness of my rampart, it is true that a ditch and a heap of earth are not daunting to athletic young men. And the wooden palisade atop the wall is not more than can be scaled by spirited warriors. But behind that palisade you will find the ultimate barrier: the Roman soldier. All the nations of the world have learned that his shield is the firmest of ramparts, and all enemies fall before his sword. Boasts will avail you nothing should you dare to match arms with him.”

  The other Helvetian envoy stood. “I am Verucloetius, war chieftain of the Helvetian canton of the Tigurini. I do not fear the Romans, and neither do my people. When the consul Lucius Cassius marched against us, we killed him and his army passed beneath our yoke!”

  Caesar’s face reddened but his voice rang low and cold. “Forty-nine years ago all Gaul was on the move, not just a single people. It was one reason we determined never again to allow such movements near our territory. You will find that our military organization has much improved since that time. My uncle, Caius Marius, saw to these improvements personally and he tested them by putting your kinsmen to the sword.”

  The Gauls reacted to the name of Marius as if they had been slapped. Two Gallic nations simply ceased to exist when they tangled with Marius, and several others were badly shredded. His was a name with which the Gauls frightened small children into obedience.

  One of the Germans indicated that he wished to speak. Caesar nodded and the man stood. His wolfskin tunic was encircled by a belt six inches wide studded with bronze nails, and it creaked as he rose and hooked his thumbs into it.

  “First Spear,” Caesar said, “summon your interpreter.”

  Vinius clapped his hands, producing a sound like a large catapult hurling a missile. I smiled in anti
cipation, expecting to see the German slave girl. Great was my disappointment when instead the ugly, gnomish, fox-haired slave I had seen standing in the doorway of Vinius’s tent walked through the guarded opening in the praetorium wall. He stood by the envoy and the man looked down his long, German nose as at a toad or other lowly, unattractive creature, and said something in a language that sounded like wolves fighting for leadership of the pack.

  The slave translated, grinning insolently, displaying a mouth in which teeth and gaps associated equally. “Is this proper? My people drown all such creatures at birth.”

  Caesar laughed richly. “In a truly well ordered world, nothing so ugly would be suffered to live. However, we live in the real world, not in Plato’s. Sometimes uncomeliness must be overlooked in favor of utility. Molon was a slave east of the Rhine for many years, so he is fluent in your language. He fears the whip too much to tamper with the translation. He will render our words with precision. Pray continue.”

  After this the Germans behaved as if the slave was not there. “I am Eintzius, nephew of King Ariovistus, and with me is my brother, Eramanzius.” Again, these are at best approximations of their names. “For some time now my king has been in contact with the councilors of the Helvetii and it has been agreed among us that our cousins, the Harudes and the Suebi, are to move onto the land vacated by the Helvetii. Those tribes are already on the move and preparing to cross the Rhine. If the Helvetii are not permitted to migrate, severe hardship will result. The Harudes and the Suebi will be greatly angered.”