Fire in the East

by Harry Sidebottom

  The warship, a little Liburnian galley, freed herself from the roundship, spun round and, with an interesting variety of obscene gestures from the deck, skimmed off north-west towards the Bay of Issos. Possibly chastened, the merchantman plied its sweeps to push its way into the wind until it had enough sea room to make its intended course up or down coast.

  Seleuceia, the main port of Syria, had two harbours. One was a wretched thing. Little more than a semicircle open to the prevailing winds, it was widely considered unsafe, fit only for the local long-shore fishermen. The other was an altogether grander affair, a huge manmade polygonal basin protected from the westerly winds by a long dog-legged canal.

  Ballista was mindful of his imperial mandata to look to the safety of Seleuceia, if still unsure how he would carry this out when several hundred miles away in Arete. He studied the approaches to the city. As the canal was only wide enough for two warships abreast, it would be quite easy to rig up a chain or a boom to close it. There was no sign of any such thing.

  The harbour was little more encouraging. It was large, and there were several merchant vessels moored, yet the whole had an air of neglect. A jetty had collapsed, and there was a large amount of floating rubbish. Of more concern to Ballista, there were only three warships in the water. The rams of another six pointed out of their ship sheds. This was the home port of the Syrian fleet, and there were just nine warships. Looking at the state of the ship sheds, Ballista doubted that any of the galleys within would be ready for action.

  The Concordia, ignoring an impudent boy in a skiff who nearly disappeared under her ram, cut a tight circle through the harbour, came to a halt and neatly backed water to the main military dock. From the top of one of the boarding ladders, Ballista could see a well-turned-out welcoming party: sixty soldiers and a couple of officers with a standard-bearer in front. Certainly they had had plenty of time to prepare, both in the long term, as the Concordia was several days overdue, and in the short, as she negotiated the canal.

  ‘The officer ordered to meet you is Gaius Scribonius Mucianus. He is the tribune commanding the auxiliary cohors.’ Demetrius whispered the reminder in Ballista’s ear. Some large Roman households would keep a special slave for such moments but in Ballista’s small familia his secretary had to double as his a memoria.

  The new DuxRipae began to disembark. He was very aware of all the eyes on him - those of his own staff, the crew of the trireme and the ranks of the auxiliary soldiers. It is strangely hard to walk normally when you are conscious of being watched. As Ballista stepped off the ladder, he stumbled. The dock seemed to shift under his boot, then rush up at him. On his knees, he had to think quickly. This was embarrassing. Worse, some could take it as a bad omen. Of course it was just his land legs deserting him after three days at sea, it happened all the time. It had happened to Alexander, to Julius Caesar. They had turned it to their advantage with a few clever words. As he climbed to his feet, trying to dust down his knees in an unconcerned way, he wished he could remember what they had said.

  ‘I have hit Asia hard.’ He spread his arms wide. With a grin he turned to the trireme.

  The crew and his staff laughed. He turned to the auxiliaries. A laugh began to spread through the ranks. It was checked by a harsh look from the officer.

  ‘Marcus Clodius Ballista, Vir Egregius, Knight of Rome, Dux Ripae, Commander of the Riverbanks.’

  It seemed unnaturally quiet after the boom of the herald’s voice. Possibly there was a moment’s hesitation before the officer of the auxiliaries stepped forward.

  ‘Titus Flavius Turpio, Pilus Prior, First Centurion, of Cohors XX Palmyrenorum Milliaria Equitata. We will do what is ordered, and at every command we will be ready.’ The man snapped a smart salute.

  The silence stretched out. Ballista’s hot face turned pale as his anger mounted.

  ‘Where is your commanding officer? Why has the tribune of the cohors not come as he was ordered?’ In his fury the tribune’s name had slipped Ballista’s mind.

  ‘I do not know, Dominus.’ The centurion looked unhappy - but shifty too.

  Ballista knew this for a terrible start to his mission in Asia. To hell with the stumble, it was this snub that made it so. This bastard tribune had disobeyed a specific order. Why this deliberate and very public rudeness? Was it because Ballista was only an equestrian, not a senator? Was it - much more likely - his barbarian origins? Flagrant disobedience like this could only undermine the authority of the new Dux among the troops. But Ballista knew that the more he made of it the worse it would become. He forced himself to speak in a civil tone to the centurion.

  ‘Let us inspect your men.’

  ‘May I present the decurion, commander, of this turma, cavalry unit, of the cohors?’ The centurion gestured to a younger man, who stepped forward.

  ‘Titus Cocceius Malchiana. We will do what is ordered, and at every command we will be ready.’

  As the three men walked across the wide dock, the centurion Turpio kept up an anxious stream of talk. ‘As I am sure that you know, the Cohors XX Palmyrenorum Milliaria Equitata is a double-strength unit of archers, over one thousand men. It is a mixed unit, 960 infantry and 300 cavalry. What makes us unique in the army is our organization. The cohors has only six centuries of infantry and five turmae of cavalry, but all are at double strength. So we have 160 men not 80 in a century, and 60 not 30 cavalry in a turma. We have twenty men mounted on camels as well; mainly for messages and the like, although they are useful for scaring untrained horses - how horses do hate the smell of a camel, ha, ha.’ Ballista wondered at the mixture of obvious pride and extreme nervousness. The rapid flow of the centurion’s words stopped as it reached the line of soldiers.

  There were indeed sixty men in the turma of Cocceius. The troopers were dismounted, horses nowhere to be seen. The men were drawn up in a line thirty across and two deep. Their cavalry helmets and waist-length scale armour were brightly polished. Swords hung in scabbards on left hips. Combined quivers and bowcases poked over left shoulders. Right hands grasped spears and on each left forearm was strapped a small round shield painted with a picture of a warrior god. Above their heads the standard of the turma, a rectangular green signum, fluttered in the westerly breeze.

  Ballista took his time. He walked the lines, looking closely. The troopers were indeed well turned out. But they had had plenty of time to get ready. A parade was one thing, action quite another. He wondered if he detected a sullen, dumb insolence in the men’s faces - but possibly his stumble and the non-appearance of Scribonius Mucianus were making him oversensitive.

  ‘Very good, Centurion. Have the men had lunch?’ It was the eighth hour of daylight, nearly mid-afternoon. ‘No? Then let them be dismissed to their quarters. It is too late in the day to think of setting out to Antioch. We will march tomorrow. If we leave at dawn we should be there with plenty of time before nightfall. Isn’t that so?’

  Having been assured that his understanding was correct, Ballista announced that he would make his way up to the acropolis of the town to make sacrifice for the safe arrival of the ship.

  Assessing the defences of Seleuceia in Pieria under the cloak of honouring the gods was paradoxically depressing. The town was well fortified by nature. It had ravines on three sides and the sea close by on the fourth. It was well fortified by man. It had walls of fine ashlar masonry, with tall semicircular towers well placed at intervals. The great market gate on the road to Antioch was almost a fortress in itself. The only way up to the acropolis was by twisting and turning stairways cut steeply into the rock. It was eminently defendable. And yet, three years earlier, it had fallen to the Sassanids.

  The bathhouse attached to the new imperial fortress in Antioch was sumptuously decorated. Turpio thought it typical of the imperium Romanum these days that it was fully functioning while the fortress was unfinished. He was waiting in the corridor outside the apodyterium, the changing room. Under his feet was a mosaic typical of bathhouses all over the empire: a black at
tendant, a water vessel in each hand, a wreath of laurel on his head.

  Marcus Clodius Ballista, the new Dux Ripae, might rejoice in the three names which were the mark of a Roman citizen but he was a complete barbarian. On their ride into Antioch he had stared about him like a bumpkin. Turpio had lead him in by the bridge gate, through the town’s colonnaded streets, then over to the island in the Orontes where the new fortress was being built. Trust the present empire to send an imperial favourite - and a barbarian one at that - above a Roman who had worked his way through military service.

  Turpio looked again at the mosaic. An enormous penis escaped from under the attendant’s tunic. The artist had carefully detailed the bell-end in purple. Turpio laughed, as the artist had intended. Laughter was good here. Bathhouses could be dangerous places and everyone knew that laughter drove away daemons.

  At last they stepped out of the apodyterium. Like Turpio, they were naked except for the wooden clogs which would protect their feet from the hot floors. All except Ballista carried flasks of oil, strigils, towels.

  ‘Fuck me! Calgacus, it must be one of your relatives,’ said the one with the nose like a cat’s arse, pointing to the mosaic on the floor. ‘Look at the terrible size of the thing.’

  The Greek boy blushed. Ballista and Calgacus ignored the comment. Turpio, unaccustomed to such bold talk from a slave, followed their example. Ballista in the lead, they went into the caldarium, the hot room, the way indicated by the attendant’s jutting cock.

  ‘Is it not true, Calgacus dear, that for years you were known in Rome as Buticosus, “the big stuffer”?’ The bodyguard was enjoying himself.

  Turpio noted that the slave called Calgacus actually did have a large penis. Well, barbarians were notorious for it. Their big cocks were indicative of their lack of self-control in matters of sex, as in all other matters. A small penis had always been the mark of a civilized man.

  ‘They say that only the untimely death of that magnificently perverted emperor Elagabalus prevented the frumentarii kidnapping Calgacus here from the public baths so that he could employ that mighty weapon on his imperial majesty.’

  It was amazing that this new Dux let one of his slaves go on in this way in the company of freemen, of Roman citizens. It was a sign of weakness, of stupidity, a sign of his barbarian nature. All of which was good, very good. It would make it less likely that Ballista would find anything out.

  It was cold and foggy. The weather had closed in during the week in Antioch. Ballista pulled his waxed cloak up around his ears. It was just before dawn, and there was no wind at all. He sat on his new grey horse by the side of the road to Beroea. He was warm enough so far, and well fed: Calgacus had somehow produced a hot porridge of oats, with honey and cream. Ballista looked up at the outside of the gate: brick built, two huge projecting square towers. There would be double gates inside, creating a good killing ground, and shuttered ports for artillery among the ornamental brickwork.

  Ballista’s feeling of relative well-being began to fade as he studied the scorch marks around the artillery port holes. Seven days of buying supplies and organizing a caravan had allowed time to confirm his initial impression that Antioch was a reasonably strong site. To the east, Antioch climbed up the slopes of Mount Silpius to a citadel, while the Orontes river curled round the other three sides, creating a moat. At the northern extent of the city an oxbow lake enclosed a large island. The town walls looked in decent repair. Apart from the citadel and the fortress on the island, there were several large buildings (amphitheatre, theatre, hippodrome) which could serve as improvised strong points. The wide main streets made for good interior lines of communication and reinforcement. There was a fine supply of water from the Orontes and two small streams that ran off the mountain. And, despite all this, it had fallen to the Persians.

  It was a typically Greek story of personal betrayal. A member of the aristocracy of Antioch, Mariades, had been caught embezzling funds from one of the chariot teams. Escaping from certain conviction, he had turned outlaw. After a brief but initially successful career as a bandit, he had fled across the Euphrates. When Shapur invaded Syria three years ago, Mariades had acted as his guide. When the Persians encamped a short distance from Antioch, the rich fled the city. The poor, maybe more ready for a change, maybe without means of escape, stayed put. Friends of Mariades opened the gates. If promises had been made to the traitors, it seems they were not kept. The city was looted and large parts of it burnt. Mariades had returned to Persia with Shapur.

  For a man ordered to look to its safety, for a siege engineer, Antioch, like Seleuceia, was most depressing. There were two straightforward conclusions to be drawn. First, the Sassanid Persians were good at taking strong, fortified places. Second, the locals were bad at defending them. Ballista wondered how many locals would prove to be like Mariades, how many might decide to go over to the Persians, or would, at least, not fight against them. The more he saw of Syria, the worse his mission looked. He wondered what had happened to Mariades.

  His thoughts turned to Turpio. Why was he taking so bloody long to get this turma of cavalry in order of march? He and Cocceius, the decurion, were riding up and down the column, in and out of the pools of torchlight, shouting.

  To Ballista’s eyes, individually, the troopers looked the part - horses in good condition, helmets and armour cared for, weaponry complete and ready to hand. They looked tough. They handled their mounts well. But something was wrong. They did not work together as a unit. Men were getting in each other’s way. They appeared sullen. There was none of the banter Ballista expected in a happy unit.

  At last, Turpio appeared. He was bareheaded, his helmet strapped to his saddle. His short-cropped hair and beard were damp from the fog.

  ‘The column is ready to march.’ It always sounded to Ballista as if Turpio were challenging him to question what he said while at the same time dreading just that. He had not called Ballista Dominus .

  ‘Very good. Maximus, unfurl my personal banner, and we will inspect the men.’

  The bodyguard took the protective covering from the white draco. The windsock shaped like a dragon hung limp in the still air when he held it aloft.

  Ballista squeezed his horse with his thighs, and the grey set off at a walk. They first passed the rearguard, thirty troopers under Cocceius, then the staff and baggage train under Mamurra and, finally, the advance guard of the other thirty troopers, which would be under the direct command of Turpio. Leaving aside the usual problems with the hired civilians of the baggage train, all seemed serviceable enough.

  ‘Good. I will ride here with you, Centurion. Send out two scouts ahead of the column.’

  ‘There is no need. There are no enemy for hundreds of miles.’

  Ballista knew he needed to assert his authority. ‘Have them ride about half a mile in front of the column.’

  ‘We are just outside the main gate of the provincial capital. There is not a Persian this side of the Euphrates. No bandit would take on this number of men.’

  ‘We need to get used to being on a war footing. Give the order.’

  Turpio gave it, and two troopers clattered off into the thick fog. Ballista then gave the command to begin the march, their long march to the client kingdoms of Emesa and Palmyra, and then to the city of Arete, that isolated outpost of the imperium Romanum.

  ‘It was only three years ago that there were a lot of Persians here,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, Dominus.’

  Despite the man’s attitude, Ballista decided to tread carefully. ‘How long have you been with Cohors XX?’

  ‘Two years.’

  ‘How do you find them?’

  ‘Good men.’

  ‘Was Scribonius Mucianus already in command when you joined?’

  ‘Yes.’ Again, at the mention of the absent tribune’s name, Turpio took on that aggressive, hunted look.

  ‘How do you find him?’

  ‘He is my commanding officer. It is not my place to discuss him with you.
No more than it would be my place to discuss you with the Governor of Syria.’ There was no great effort to hide the implicit threat.

  ‘Did you fight the Sassanids?’

  ‘I was at Barbalissos.’

  Ballista encouraged Turpio to tell the story of the terrible defeat of the Roman army of Syria, the defeat which had led directly to the sack of Antioch, Seleuceia, and so many other towns, to so much misery in the time of troubles just three years earlier. The attack by swarms of Sassanid horse archers had seen the Romans caught in a cleft stick. If they opened ranks and tried to chase the archers away, they were run down by heavy cavalry, the clibanarii, mailed men riding armoured horses. If they stayed in close order to hold off the clibanarii, they made an ideal, dense target for the archers. Hours in the ranks under the Syrian sun, tormented by fear with the safety of the walls of Barbalissos visible in one direction, tormented by thirst with the glittering waters of the Euphrates visible in another. Then the inevitable panic, flight and slaughter.

  While Ballista heard little about the battle that he had not heard before, he did gain the impression that Turpio was a proficient officer - so why then was this turma of Cohors XX so miserable and unhandy?

  ‘What were the Persian numbers?’

  Turpio took his time replying. ‘Hard to say. A lot of dust, confusion. Probably fewer than most people think. The horse archers keep moving. Makes them look more than they are. Possibly no more than ten to fifteen thousand all told.’

  ‘What about the proportion of horse archers to clibanarii?’

  Turpio looked over at Ballista. ‘Again, hard to be sure. But a lot more light horsemen than heavy. Somewhere between five to one. and ten to one. Quite a lot of the clibanarii carry bows, which confuses things.’

  ‘They were all cavalry?’