by Paul L Maier
But where was Tiberius? In near hysteria, the praetorians resumed their grisly excavations. Since neither the emperor nor Sejanus had been found under the rubble around the entrance to the grotto, they were obviously trapped deeper in the interior, behind a wall of clay and rock—or under it. Tunneling deep inside, the guards kept shouting “Princeps!” “Princeps!” having little hope for the survival of either their emperor or commander. Clawing their way through moist earth and putting their shoulders to huge stones that blocked their path, the rescuers found that part of the ceiling had held, allowing passage into the grotto. With renewed hope, they inched their way into the darkness.
Finally they heard an anguished call for help from the very bowels of the cavern. Pulling away still more debris, they found Tiberius cringing near the floor, while Sejanus hovered over him, shielding him from falling rock with the trunk of his body. Sejanus himself had sustained several wounds and had to be helped out of the grotto, but a lusty cheer went up from the troops as they found their emperor distraught and dirty, but very much alive and physically unscathed.
The villa was transformed into an emergency hospital, as attending physicians did what they could for the injured. They promised Pilate and Sejanus that they would recover with no permanent disfigurement—barring complications. Pilate was given the cheering information that had he been in only a slightly different spot in the grotto, the falling slab of stone would have crushed his head instead of only gashing his arm.
Later that evening, while his circle sat in the villa recovering from the afternoon’s disaster, Tiberius was in a reflective mood. “It puzzles me,” he said, “why so many at Rome presume to give the princeps advice…such wrong advice. How many senators during the past months have warned me of a danger to the state. There is an overambitious man, they say, who will stop at nothing to gain personal power for himself. Who? Sejanus. The man who saved my life. Sejanus is splitting the state, they whine. He is plotting against the princeps. His loyalties are only to himself. Who? The man who risked his life to save mine.”
Frowning, Tiberius got up and stalked about the room. Then he stopped and spoke with marked emotion. “Know this, my friends, and see that Rome learns it too: today we have had the proof of blood. While all of you were scampering out of the grotto like so many mice from a foundering trireme, one man thought to serve his emperor. Let there be no further questioning of Lucius Aelius Sejanus. In loyalty and service, this man is the greatest in the Empire.”
Chapter 4
Departing in August, Pilate had a choice between land or sea travel to Judea. Since the overland journey across Greece and Asia Minor was notoriously long and tedious, and since the Mediterranean was a predictable sea, offering safe, calm waters from May to September, Pilate chose the direct sea voyage.
With Rome dependent on Egypt for her wheat supply, Tiberius regarded the shuttle of grain ships from Alexandria to Puteoli as the lifeline of the Empire. These great, wide-beamed merchantmen, the largest ships afloat on the Mediterranean, unloaded their cargoes at Puteoli on the Bay of Naples, Italy’s major port, and returned with plenty of space for passengers. Pilate booked passage for Palestine via Alexandria with a grain fleet that would sail the third week of August.
When he, Procula, and their personal staff left for Puteoli, a near-caravan of carriages trailed after them, loaded with gear and effects that could probably have been bought in Egypt or even Judea; but Procula, with her patrician tastes, did not want to take her chances in provincial marketplaces. Because it might be several years before they would return, they stopped over for a few days in Caudium so that Procula would have the chance to meet those of her husband’s relatives who had not been able to attend their wedding.
Tiberius intentionally had not specified the length of Pilate’s tenure, since he would want a free hand to remove him after a short time in case he did not fulfill Sejanus’s promises. On the other hand, if he governed well, his term of office might extend as long as a decade.
From Caudium it was only a short trip down to Puteoli. The port was nestled in a northern corner of the Bay of Naples, with the domineering Mount Vesuvius hovering over the eastern shore. Pilate pointed out for Procula two bustling towns near its base, Herculaneum and Pompeii, and, just off the southern end of the bay, the fluted, gray-white palisades of the isle of Capri.
The imperial harbor master had arranged for Pilate’s passage on the Trident of Neptune, a reliably large Alexandrian merchantman, about 180 feet long with 45-foot beam. Its tall, central mainmast towered over a smaller foremast, which slanted rakishly toward the bow. Hanging from the single fat yard was a multicolored squarish mainsail, rippling in the breezes as if impatient at being docked.
Surprisingly spacious passenger cabins were provided aft below deck, and the best had been reserved for Pilate, Procula, and the modest company of three military aides and four household servants who accompanied them. The captain made a special point of giving Pilate a gracious welcome on board, for although he was in charge of the maritime responsibilities of the voyage, the moment a Roman magistrate stepped on board a vessel chartered for imperial service, he, not the captain, was in supreme command of the ship.
A fleet of eight merchantmen would make the voyage together—there was safety in numbers—and an extra day was needed to load and synchronize the convoy. Just before sailing, an honor guard of praetorians marched onto the wharf to bid Pilate farewell and present personal gifts from the imperial party at Capri. Sejanus sent him a specially tailored governor’s military standard with the image of Tiberius in gold and the name “Pontius Pilatus” beautifully woven into the purple fabric. An even more significant gift came from Tiberius himself, a gold ring engraved with his image, signifying that Pilate was now welcomed into the inner circle of amici Caesaris or Caesar’s friends, an elite fraternity open only to senators and equestrians high in imperial service. It all portended well indeed for the new prefect of Judea.
Since Pilate was the highest-ranking officer in the flotilla, the Trident of Neptune now set sail as the lead ship. While rounding the promontory of Misenum, they passed several ships of the Roman navy. They were long, slender warships driven by oar, not sail, for maneuverability, each painted with a glaring eye near its bow and projecting ugly iron-clad beaks at water level for ramming enemy ships. Out across the bay, past Capri on their portside, and into the blue Tyrrhenian Sea glided their ships, aiming south-southeast for the Straits of Messina, the narrow channel between Italy and Sicily.
“If the Etesian winds hold out, we should make Alexandria in twenty days or less,” the captain assured Pilate. “Every summer around the ides of July, the Etesians start blowing in from the northwest, and they keep at it for about forty days. We catch the wind at our backs and try to run before it all the way to Egypt.”
In less than two days they were at the Straits, the presumed location for Homer’s Scylla and Charybdis. As legendary navigational hazards, they failed to impress Pilate. The projecting rock from the Italian shore was hardly Scylla, the six-headed monster who dined on Ulysses’s sailors; and the lazy whirlpool on the Sicilian side was a rather poor Charybdis, which supposedly had a vortex so fierce that even the sea god Neptune was powerless against it. And running aground on either side would require some very sloppy navigation, since at their narrowest the straits were still some two and one-half miles wide. Still, no sailor liked to run the passage in a storm.
Once past Sicily, the Etesian winds resumed with magnificent tempo, carrying the ships out of sight of land for the first time. Mariners loved these winds because they rarely blew before noon, allowing ship repairs and servicing to be done mornings, and giving time for the seasick passengers to recuperate.
A week passed without sighting land. Pilate strolled back to the gubernator or helmsman, who controlled the twin paddles that rode astride the stern to steer the ship, and asked, “How do you do it? Aim for Egypt when you can’t see a thing?”
“Oh, but I can,” the p
ilot replied. “See that red streamer flying ahead of us from the rigging? It shows our wind’s direction, and we aim at just a slight bias from that.”
“Are the Etesians that constant?”
“Usually. But we have ways of checking on them.”
“How?”
“See this metal ring and pointer? We use it to gauge the height of the sun or stars, which helps fix our position.” Then the helmsman smiled. “This isn’t to say we never make mistakes. Notice that the other ships are strung out so far on both sides of us that we can’t even see them all? That’s intentional. If the Pillars of Hercules at the end of our port flank sights Crete, then they’ll signal from ship to ship that we’re too far north of course and we can correct accordingly. But if the Medusa to our starboard sights Africa, then we’re too far south. Of course, that’s not so bad, since then we can sail up to Alexandria without missing it.”
Pilate only hoped the man was jesting. At any rate, no warnings were flashed from the other ships; evidently they were making a proper passage.
Procula was not a very good sailor—her maritime experience had been limited to a rowboat excursion on Lake Nemi near Rome—and she was having trouble riding up and down with the choppy Mediterranean rollers. Even before Sicily she had had a touch of nausea, but that was as nothing compared with the lingering siege of seasickness that set in at mid-sea. Pilate pleaded with the ship’s officers for remedies, but every concoction from the galley confidently served to Procula she swallowed only temporarily and then surrendered to the Mediterranean. The one expedient which worked she discovered for herself. In the mornings, when the sea was calmer, she sat outside amidships and tried to imagine herself back in Rome.
On the evening of the eighteenth day came a glimmer of hope that her sufferings might end. The forewatch on the Trident called out, “Ho! Pharos ahead!”
Straining his eyes, Pilate could see only a tiny blemish of luminous orange on the southeastern horizon. But that speck grew in intensity and started flickering like the flame it was. Later on, many other lights came into view, all considerably lower than the original fireball, which now looked like the moon blazing out of control in some cosmic catastrophe.
“A-ve Pha-ros! A-ve Pha-ros!” the sailors reverently called out to the towering display of manmade pyrotechnics, which was the Pharos Lighthouse at Alexandria. The Trident assumed a steep list as passengers crowded the starboard rail to see one of the seven wonders of the world. But the good-natured helmsman claimed this list only assisted his sharp turn between the breakwaters into the Great Harbor of Alexandria.
The colossal lighthouse soared a staggering four hundred feet into the Egyptian night. Since it was constructed throughout of milk-colored marble, Pilate and Procula had no trouble discerning its great square base rising from a harbor island, the octagonal midsection, and its pillared upper stage. At the apex, a continual fire of pine logs blazed in front of highly polished metal mirrors to signal ships many miles at sea. Even more impressive than its obvious height was its age: by now the Pharos was three hundred years old, yet in perfect repair.
Since it was too late in the evening to make other arrangements, Pilate and his staff decided to stay on board ship for the night. Early the next morning, a company of Roman soldiers, marching in their unmistakable cadence, clattered onto the creaking deck of the Trident. “Pontius Pilatus, please identify yourself!” their centurion announced, his helmet pulled low over his forehead.
“I am he,” replied Pilate, as he stepped out of the rear cabin.
“You, sir, are under arrest.” The centurion spat out the words with frigid formality. “You have violated the emperor’s specific orders that no Roman of senatorial or higher equestrian rank is to set foot in Egypt without his written consent. This regulation was first made by the Divine Augustus to safeguard the grain supply from interference by—”
“But I have such written permission, Centurion.”
“Let me see it.”
Pilate retrieved the document from his cabin quarters, and the centurion spent some time scrutinizing it. Pilate studied his face more closely, then reached over to push up his helmet.
“Gaius Galerius!” he shouted.
“Pilate!” laughed the pseudo-centurion, as the two clasped arms. “And what might the Prefect of Upper and Lower Egypt be doing in the costume of a lowly centurion?”
“You don’t sound appreciative, Pilate. I’ve been scheming for days in order to provide you this reception.”
“Galerius, I’ve not had my nose tweaked so well since we served together with the Twelfth in Syria. And now you’re at the summit of success…imagine…ruler of Egypt, successor to the Pharaohs!”
“Only as representative of Tiberius, or we’ll haul you up for treason, too.” Galerius chuckled. “And who is this incarnation of Venus? Perhaps Cleopatra, freshly revived, come to reclaim her Egypt?”
“Gaius, this is Procula, my bride of four months,” said Pilate with quiet pride.
“May it go well with you.” She smiled.
“And with you.” Galerius bowed gracefully. “Now, Pilate, your ship for Judea doesn’t leave until next week, so I’d be delighted to have you as my guests at the Palace of the Ptolemies just across the harbor there,” he pointed. “Somewhere among its 150 rooms we just might be able to find enough space for your staff as well.”
They cheerfully accepted Galerius’s hospitality and spent a delightful week in the city that was second only to Rome, for Alexandria had replaced Athens as cultural capital of the East. In fact, in some respects Alexandria easily outdid Rome. Its grid-pattern streets were much wider, much straighter, and were illumined at night. Its magnificent civic buildings, parks, and gardens were better conceived; its hippodromes, gymnasia, and theaters more artistic. The great library at Alexandria was the finest in the world, boasting a half million papyrus scrolls, and the Museum adjacent to it was really a scholar’s university, staffed by the most outstanding scientists of the day.
Galerius himself showed Pilate and Procula several of the city’s prime sights, including the mausoleum of Alexander the Great, in which the waxlike body of the world conqueror could still be seen, embalmed in honey. Then there was the memorial to Pompey, the least the city could do to honor the man it had treacherously stabbed and decapitated in order to present his head, pickled in brine, to his rival, Julius Caesar.
But the monument which electrified Procula was the Mausoleum of Cleopatra. With all the suavity of a veteran guide, Galerius told them the story of how Augustus’s friend Gaius Proculeius had climbed up the back of the mausoleum and dropped in through a window to seize Cleopatra after she had barricaded herself inside.
“Prefect,” said Pilate grandly, “let me introduce to you the Lady Proculeia, granddaughter of this selfsame Gaius Proculeius.”
While Galerius was recovering from astonishment, Procula said, “Sorry to have made you go through the story. I was just checking on Grandfather’s version of it, and it seems he didn’t exaggerate.”
Toward the close of their stay in Alexandria, Pilate casually hinted that they had seen all of the monuments but few of the people. Galerius responded by hauling them through the various ghettos of the city, and Pilate soon discovered that there was not one Alexandria, but at least eight.
“This city is an Egyptian-Greek-Roman-Jewish-Cyrenian-Anatolian-Syrian-Phoenician conglomeration,” Galerius commented. “And trying to keep peace in this ethnic maelstrom is next to impossible. Small riots we have every year, but why no general insurrection has broken out only the great Father of the Gods knows.”
“Is it true that there are more Jews in Alexandria than in Jerusalem?” Pilate asked.
“Easily. You see that section of the city over there?” He pointed southeastward to an area not far from the palace veranda. “That’s the Jewish quarter of Alexandria, a city within a city.”
“Any trouble from them?”
“Not really. Oh…some Alexandrians hate them, and it m
ay come to bloodshed one of these years, but generally they’ve been a commercial and cultural success here. They have citizenship, and their own ethnarch to take care of internal affairs…But why don’t we drop over to visit the Jewish quarter? It’s the only district we’ve missed. Besides, you can get a preview of your future subjects.”
This was not Pilate’s first contact with a Jewish community. Back in Rome, he had visited the Jewish colony across the Tiber in Ward XIV and been repelled by the bad living conditions and low economic level of the district, a ghetto of petty shopkeepers, peddlers, and prostitutes. But the Jewish quarter of Alexandria was a surprise. The section had attractive dwellings with pleasant gardens and even pools. After Pilate and Galerius had visited several synagogues, a rabbinical school, and the marketplace, the picture of a proud, well-organized, and thriving community was unmistakable.
“Alexandria would seem to prove, then, that Jews can live happily under Roman administration,” Pilate concluded.
“Of course. Rome’s policy until Tiberius was even pro-Jewish,” Galerius said. “Jew and Roman certainly started out as friends. It all began when a Syrian king, who modestly called himself Antiochus God-Manifest, tried to absorb Egypt and was ordered out by Popilius, our agent in Alexandria. The king said he’d have to think it over first. Popilius took his swagger stick, drew a circle in the sand around Antiochus’s feet, and said, ‘Decide before you step outside that circle.’—The God-Manifest was last seen running back north!—But he took his humiliation out on the Jews and tried to set up a pagan cult in the Jerusalem temple itself. That ignited a patriotic revolt led by a priestly family, the Maccabees, who beat off the Syrians. And who warned the Syrians to stay out of Palestine in the future? The Roman Senate.”
He went on to explain that as early as 161 B.C., Rome even drew up an alliance with Judea, which actually held the Syrians at bay. Though it was part of Rome’s usual policy in championing an underdog—Judea—to hold a potential rival—Syria—in check, the Judeans used the alliance to good advantage in winning diplomatic recognition and special privileges for Jews all over the Mediterranean, such as exemption from military service and freedom of worship on the Sabbath. Only when later Maccabean princes failed to renew the alliance did Judeo-Roman relations change from friendship to suspicion, to the kind of animosity which brought Pompey’s invasion in 63 BC.
