Gods and Legions

by Michael Curtis Ford

  'The Princess hasn't seen her brother and friends for over a year now,' I offered. 'She's in a foreign land, surrounded by war, with a husband away half the year campaigning and obsessed with training even when at home; she's just lost her first child, to apparent murder. Even low-ranking officers are entitled to a leave of absence once a year; perhaps the Princess would benefit from a return to her family for a short time?'

  Oribasius thought this an excellent idea, if only, it occurred to me, because it would remove the blame that would fall to him if a royal patient were to die while in his care. I raised the idea with Julian the very night he was informed of Marcellus' escape.

  He thought carefully. 'A coincidence you should raise the subject, Caesarius,' he said. 'In fact, Eutherius is just now preparing a trip.'

  I looked at him questioningly, for Julian was highly dependent upon the old eunuch for keeping his household affairs in order, supervising everything from the quality of the cooking to the legibility of the accountants' figures. Julian would not be sending him away lightly.

  'Marcellus is heading straight for Rome, where Constantius and the Empress are spending the winter. He will no doubt bring charges against me, that I have improperly usurped his powers as commander of the army. His version of events must not be the only one to reach the Emperor's ears. There is no one in my circle more well-spoken than Eutherius, nor more highly trusted by the Emperor, so I have asked him to go and to explain Marcellus' conduct. Not only would it be convenient for Eutherius to take Helena with him, but her views would bolster his defense before the Emperor — she, too, witnessed the siege.'

  Although I doubted very much that mute, stricken Helena would be of much assistance to anyone, I heartily concurred with his idea of allowing the Princess to accompany Eutherius on his mission. Within two days a proper traveling party had been arranged, the dazed Princess's luggage packed, her now considerably depleted bulk eased into a sedan chair, and Julian's blessing bestowed upon her. She seemed not to know, or even care, where she was being taken. The party was accompanied by a hundred cavalry and six hundred heavy infantry, sufficient to dissuade all but the most vigorous of barbarian attacks.

  Helena's absence meant that Julian was no longer fettered with household cares, and he dove into his military duties with a gusto that surprised even his officers. Within a week of her departure he had collected fifteen thousand troops from their winter quarters in the various garrisons, including those of Marcellus' abandoned center of Reims, and had set off for the Vosges mountains. There, a number of recent raids by Alemanni on local farms and villages seemed to foretell a larger, better-planned movement by Chonodomarius in the near future. At the same time, the Emperor informed Julian by letter that he was preparing a new strategy, one that would crush the barbarians once and for all. He would be sending a newly formed army of twenty-five thousand men into Gaul from the southeast, to meet up with our forces at the Rhine. They would sweep the various barbarian tribes before them in a pincer movement, trapping them as if in an enormous net, and then destroy them or roll them up north to the far hinterland, where they would be dealt with by the Huns, never again to pose a threat to Gaul.

  Thus, our familiar General Barbatio reentered our lives, he who had previously been the commander of the household guard under Julian's doomed brother, and who had been the officer responsible for Gallus' arrest and murder. At the Emperor's orders, Barbatio advanced through the Alps with his legions as far as Augst. Rather than crossing the Rhine as planned, however, and pushing north to meet up with our troops in the vicinity of Strasbourg, he settled down on the far side of the river to wait. This was either, as he claimed, because of the unexpected resistance of the barbarians opposing his river crossing, or rather (as Sallustius charged) because of his own perverse negligence.

  In any event, Julian's intelligence about the barbarians' intent in the Vosges was wrong, for in fact the isolated attacks in the area were nothing more than another of the Beast's diversions. As soon as he saw that the Caesar had committed himself to Strasbourg, and that Barbatio had settled at Augst, Chonodomarius led a flood of barbarians pouring out of the Black Forest directly between the two Roman armies, driving a wedge through them. Moving with the force of a landslide, they raced across the plains of central Gaul to the very walls of Lyons, cutting off all communications with the coast. The gates of the city were barred just in time, however, and Chonodomarius, again thwarted in his plans to take a major city by surprise, in frustration ordered his forces to disperse throughout the region to pillage and plunder.

  When word of the debacle reached Julian he reacted swiftly, sending three cavalry squadrons racing south and taking the looters on the flank. The barbarians retreated into the woods and fields, leaving behind some dead and much of the booty. Enormous damage had been done, however. Barbatio's scouts had been watching the operation closely, and the general immediately began sending a series of reports back to the Emperor complaining how easily our lines had been infiltrated by the wave of Laeti storming out from the Black Forest, and how Julian had unwisely split off his cavalry to chase them down. When one of Julian's squadrons pushed even farther south in its pursuit, it was actually stopped by a larger contingent of Barbatio's cavalry, who claimed that the Caesar was not authorized to interfere in the territory assigned to the general. The fleeing barbarians were allowed to melt through Barbatio's lines and escape to the Rhine with impunity, and the general reported to Constantius that the true objective of our cowardly officers was to corrupt the soldiers under his command.

  Julian resolved to continue the operation on his own. The barbarians hindered us from chasing them through the already dangerous mountain roads, however, by an ingenious technique: They would first cut a row of enormous trees along our route in such a way that they remained upright, supported by only the slenderest layer of uncut bark. They then moved a hundred feet deeper into the forest and did the same thing with another row of trees, aiming their arc of fall at the first row carefully balanced along the road. Lastly, they hid in silence until our troops passed through the trap on their march, at which point, from deep in the woods, the barbarians used cunningly prepared ropes to pull down the farthest row of trees, which crashed in turn onto the huge trees nearest the road and sent them toppling onto our terrified troops. We lost a large number of men and wasted untold days clearing the roads after several ghostly attacks of this nature before we finally fought through to the Rhine.

  Here, however, the barbarians sheltered their raiding parties on sandbars in the middle of the river. To gain access to them we required boats, of which we had none. Barbatio, however, had many at his camp upstream. Julian sent a courier to him asking for a mere seven, and in response Barbatio burned all he had, much to the delight of the watching barbarians. Chonodomarius, in fact, even took it upon himself to offer us assistance by sending the half-burned hulk of a captured Roman grain barge floating downstream, draped with the crew's mutilated corpses and painted with obscene Latin epithets in huge red letters on the outside of the hull for all to see.

  Julian ignored the insult. By moonlight, he sent the scout Bainobaudes with a squad of auxiliaries to attempt access to the raiders' islands, using anything that floated. The first wave of troops, using rafts and dinghies hastily constructed from the timbers of Chonodomarius' gift vessel, reached the nearest island and actually took the barbarians by surprise, slaughtering them in their sleep. Then discovering the dug-out canoes the barbarians themselves used to move about, they seized those as well, and continued their raids on the other islands over the next several nights. After a week, Bainobaudes returned from his expedition loaded with Roman booty recovered from the barbarians, to the acclaim of the worried soldiers waiting on the banks. The remaining barbarians in the vicinity, seeing that they were no longer safe even on the islands, retreated with their possessions across the Rhine to the right bank.

  Barbatio, however, continued his obstruction and harassment, absconding with supply columns car
rying provisions to Julian, burning crops that were intended as forage for our animals, and rejecting all pleas for cooperation. The troops on both sides, as well as the barbarians, watched the rivalry between the two commanders with a great deal of interest, though ignorant of the motives behind it. Their confusion, however, did not prevent the soldiers from drawing their own conclusion, which was logical enough: that Julian, a novice in military matters though increasingly perceived as a potential threat to the Emperor's rule, had not really been sent to reconquer Gaul, but rather to meet death on the battlefield. Wrong though this deduction might be, it only further increased the loyalty of his men to the cause.

  Even Barbatio, however, could not simply remain an impediment forever, and he eventually received orders from Rome stating in no uncertain terms that it was imperative that he cross the river, establish a presence on the left bank of the Rhine, and meet up with the army of Gaul. Our couriers reported signs of increased activity at Barbatio's camp in preparation for a major movement, and a message we received from Eutherius about that time noted that the Emperor and his advisers were eagerly awaiting news from Barbatio of a major victory against the barbarians without help. Julian felt this tactic was senseless, and that a successful strategy would require the combined forces of both armies. One afternoon, however, as we walked back from a review of the troops, he confessed to me his frustration at being unable to effect this collaboration with Barbatio.

  'What is worse,' he concluded, 'I am running short of ambassadors. I've already sent my own household steward to Rome, and all of my military couriers to Barbatio have been insulted and ejected from his camp. I must resort to asking a personal favor of you, Caesarius — particularly since you and Barbatio are already old acquaintances.'

  I listened to him in silence and some consternation. As you know, Brother, ever since we were children it has always been you who has been the public speaker in the family. I myself have always been wholly incapable of putting two words together coherently in front of strangers, and it is fortunate that you found your calling as a priest and a polemicist, for I am much more comfortable silently examining the dead than verbally cross-examining the living. We strode over to Julian's camp tent, where Sallustius was waiting impatiently, reviewing a sheaf of reports from the scouts.

  'Explain to Caesarius the mission on which we are sending him,' Julian said.

  Sallustius scarcely looked up. 'Just this,' he replied tersely. 'Convince Barbatio to stop seizing our supplies and obstructing our affairs, and rather to concentrate on destroying any barbarians the Caesar's forces might drive his way. All he needs to do is cross the Rhine and stay put, with his eyes open and his legions ready, while we beat the bushes for Chonodomarius and his men. Barbatio will get the pleasure of the killing and credit for the victory, and can retire happily back to Rome, leaving the province free of Alemanni. Don't worry about your luggage, physician. Your bags are already packed.'

  I took a deep breath and looked at Julian. He smiled at me confidently and slapped me on the shoulder, wishing me a successful trip, and in less time than it would have taken me to say a paternoster slowly, I found myself on a military courier horse with a guard of six cavalrymen, galloping to Augst.

  BOOK FOUR

  THE CROSSING

  The death of earth is to become water, and the death of water is to become air, and the death of air is to become fire.

  — HEraclitus. The Obscure

  I

  We arrived several days later, shortly after the noon hour, after talking our way past Barbatio's guard outposts and across the river on a rickety supply ferry. Even this far toward the Rhine's source, and in the low waters of summer, the river was wide and sluggish. Trotting north along the well-traveled road, signs of Barbatio's camp became evident miles before we actually arrived. For yards on either side of the road the land had been laid bare — clear-cut of its enormous, centuries-old fir and pine trees, the terrain shorn and denuded of all but the slenderest of saplings. Limbs and brush had been dragged into mounds and burned to charred heaps. Skid roads and wagon ruts crossed the land at all angles where the huge logs were still being bucked and dragged away by Gallic drovers using enormous teams of oxen — twenty-four, sometimes thirty-six or more, enough muscle power and raw materials to build an entire city.

  Upon rounding the final bend before Barbatio's camp, I drew up my horse in astonishment. There before me lay not the small, temporary trading post and river docks I had been led to believe would be the site of the Roman encampment, but a veritable fortress city, constructed entirely of wood. For months Barbatio's army had been here, and the general had spared no effort or expense in securing the comfort and safety of his troops. Wharves extended far out into the river, braced sturdily on pillars of the same straight, heavy trunks I had seen dragged on sledges from the forests upstream; broad storehouses and depots were built directly on the piers, with others lining the riverbank for a hundred yards, all sided with sawed planks nailed on sturdy posts and beams; and the troops' barracks, hundreds of identical, flat-topped log huts neatly arrayed on carefully measured quadrants, each capable of sleeping eight or ten soldiers. The blocks of houses extended up the slope for a quarter mile, with the officers' quarters nearest the river somewhat larger and more luxuriously appointed. Surrounding the whole was a high palisade, the tips of the logs hewn to rough points, the walls fronted by a deep and broad ditch.

  There was clearly no fear of attack at the moment, however, and the guard posts were minimal. The few men in the city itself were calmly going about their daily tasks, the sick and injured were recuperating on their litters by the street in the warm sun. The entire population, it seemed, both legionaries and hired hands, was swarming over the quays and docks, for it was here that the most amazing structure of all was to be found.

  At this point the river was some five hundred yards across, at first glance a placid stream. But beneath its smooth surface, it bore a rapid current capable of carrying even the heaviest boats downstream at a man's jogging pace — in fact, the heavier the vessel, the faster. A deeper keel reached currents that would whisk the ship along at a speed that far surpassed that of lighter rafts and dinghies bobbing at the calm surface. Here Barbatio was constructing his bridge, one capable of sustaining the march of five Roman legions with their wagons and supplies, and their subsequent return loaded with barbarian plunder.

  Pairs of huge pilings had been laboriously driven into the river a hundred feet apart across the entire expanse of the water, while across each such span heavy hempen ropes were stretched securely, forming the solid bracing for what was to follow. Stretched in a gently curving train from the right bank was an enormous line of barges and rafts — not of uniform length or width, but a motley assortment of craft, including grain and supply barges seized from the Alemanni and rude pontoons assembled locally by the soldiers. These were lined up end to end, the bow of each vessel securely lashed to the stern of the next, with the entire column passing between each pair of pillars. The sturdy ropes stretched between these pilings prevented the lateral movement that would have caused the entire line to shift downstream from the pull of the current.

  The bridge was complete but for a short space in the middle, with room for perhaps two or three vessels, which were being poled along the existing portions of the bridge, readied for insertion into their places. Along the entire length hundreds of soldier-carpenters labored like ants, carrying flat-planed boards laboriously cut by teams of naked troops along the bank, working in pairs at crosscut saws. The planks too were laid end to end and nailed securely along the line of craft, lending rigidity to the entire structure at the joints between vessels, and forming two parallel tracks precisely the width of wagon wheels. This would provide a uniform surface on which the troops could march during the crossing the next day and, more important, stability for the hundreds of supply wagons to follow, drawn by skittish horses and oxen that would rebel at any more than a gentle swaying of the craft beneath their feet.


  I stood on the low ridge above the encampment for an hour watching the unhurried but relentless labor below, one of the greatest examples of Roman military engineering I had seen. Finally, feeling the fatigue of my journey, I urged my horse into a slow trot and made my way along the hardpacked street to the general staff building, a two-story, framesided structure with legion pennants fluttering at the door.

  This I was not even permitted to enter, for when the sentry was informed that I came from Julian, he curtly called into the doorway, summoning his cohort commander.

  'General Barbatio is occupied with final preparations for tomorrow's crossing,' the man stated in a matter-of-fact tone. 'He cannot see you now.'

  'May I at least make an appointment to see him later?' I inquired wearily.

  The officer looked at me more closely. 'Are you an army officer?' he asked suspiciously.

  'No, sir — the Caesar's personal physician and his envoy. I have an important request for your commander. I need a few moments of his time.'

  The man paused and stroked his chin thoughtfully. 'Come by this evening,' he said. 'I'll see what I can do. In the meantime, take your rest in the officers' barracks behind us. There are several empty cots. You can eat with us in the staff commissary while you're here.'

  I nodded gratefully, and leaving my horse I walked slowly to the barracks, the weariness now weighing on me like a leaden blanket. Seeing that the first cot at the door had no baggage and appeared not to have been slept in, I dropped my bag at the foot, collapsed onto it, and immediately fell asleep.