The Hadrian Enigma - A Forbidden History

by George Gardiner

  ‘Geta,’ he instructed me nearby, ‘ensure Antinous and Lysias of Bithynia share our company closely today. Make sure they and Senator Atticus accompany me close through the procession, and remain close throughout the day’s festivities. There’s much to discuss between us after all this time.’

  I beckoned the three to one side so I could assign them a special position in the cortege.

  Beyond the villa gateway a stream of Athenian citizens crowded the street accompanying a larger-than-life-sized wooden effigy of the god Dionysus held aloft by sturdy men. They were led by two youths who, traditionally, were ambiguously dressed in women’s attire. Arced boughs of vine leaves and springtime plants were being waved in the air while several huge, pronouncedly-erect wooden phalluses were trundled by teams of acolytes and choristers. Floral garlands symbolizing the arrival of spring adorned the cavalcade, while drummers and tambourine players beat-up a lively noise above the throng.

  Spotless black bulls were led by priests of the cult bearing their sacrificial sledgehammer, knives, blood bowl, and flaying tools. Caesar’s party fell in behind the musicians as the entire swarm veered gaily towards the looming crag of the Acropolis a mile distant.

  On arrival at the open-air Temple of Dionysus at the base of the steep slope beneath the Acropolis many of the women dispersed leaving the males to witness the ritual slaughter of the bulls with the portion-offerings to the god. The effigy of the deity, whose weathered timbers and faded paints told of having witnessed several hundred offerings of the annual Dionysia, was lifted carefully to the stage of the Theater of Dionysus nearby. The theater is a concave stone slab amphitheater rising up the slope of the hillside with a marbled semicircular stage fronting its base. Dionysus was placed prominently on the stage in view of the sixty ascending rows of stone ledges for seating an audience.

  On this day at least seventeen thousand persons, of whom only a fraction were women or older children, were clustered together in its concave arc. Several score of Athens’ flamboyant hetaerae courtesans in attention-grabbing décolletage, extravagant hairstyles, and exotically inventive face paints, accompanied by their high-paying clients, were attending this first performance day of the year’s Dionysia week

  The throng of spectators appreciate how this festival is one of the few occasions in the civic life of Athens where citizens, women, freedmen, foreigners, slaves, or even children are permitted to participate in judgment on performances by mass ovation. With many of the festival’s dramas possessing discernable parallels to current political life, the applause, jeers, or shrill catcalls could convey popular opinion to the city’s rulers with clarity. Century by century, Athens’ rulers had wisely listened to the massed ovation of the audience, or to any distinct lack of it.

  The row closest to the stage is a line of marble thrones. The central chair is designated to the High Priest of Dionysus at Athens with Hadrian’s beside it as the year’s President. The remaining thrones seated other priests, the city’s Archon, councilors of the city, and senior members of Hadrian’s retinue.

  Thirteen judges representing each of the city’s thirteen deme ‘tribes’ sat at one wing to umpire each new competing play. The judging panel assessed the quality of the drama and the responses of the audience with equal measure.

  Arrian too sat close by Hadrian, as did the elder Herodes Atticus. Elegant Commodus was not seated but stood behind Caesar’s shoulder in a close place of favor, while others arranged themselves in nearby positions. Horse Guards and Praetorians hovered discreetly at the end of each of the rows rising up the high amphitheatre, while the Athens Militia policed the upper rows.

  I guided Antinous and Lysias to sit or stretch on the stones at the feet of the first row near to Caesar, an agreeably casual arrangement for young men held in high regard, fronting Herodes Junior’s chair. I myself stood beside Commodus behind Caesar’s presidential throne within earshot of the surrounding conversations.

  The Bithynians youngsters were fascinated by the sartorial finesse and skittish manner of the young senator whose opalescent skin has rarely seen direct sunlight. His choice of a formal toga at an event where more relaxed dress predominated showed a degree of hubris. Commodus’s voguish persona sparkled and tinkled and effused amid the theater’s noisy swarm of earthy Greeks, his glittering twitter almost overwhelming Caesar’s imperial gravitas.

  The patrician’s sprightly manner was visible to all sixty rows. It was the flashy banter and studied fluttering of a noble Roman dandy.

  Perhaps, the two wondered with alarm, these were the Court manners and public style of educated gentlemen-of-quality at Rome? Yet they noticed how despite Caesar appearing to be amused and entertained by the bright young thing’s vivacity, he - our most lofty of Romans and ultimate arbiter of public taste - did not emulate the senator’s display. Nevertheless Commodus made himself the sparkling center of attention.

  Suddenly Antinous had a useful idea. I observed he turned to comment laconically to his friend seated beside him on the paving at the rim of the stage floor.

  ‘Don’t you feel it’s very hot here, Lys?’ I could hear at a distance.

  ‘Hot?’ Lysias responded quizzically. ‘What do you mean? No, not especially, Ant.’

  The spring sunshine of Athens was diffuse that day, but not especially intense now the rainy season had passed. Yet neither Lysias nor I sensed the sun was especially bothersome.

  A ceremony of the endowment of weapons and armors to thirteen orphans was underway. The thirteen, each barely into their teen years and slight of build, displayed their upper torsos to the assembled spectators while the donations of armor were being fitted and strapped across their bird-boned frames. This display of bare skin had given Antinous food for thought.

  ‘Yes, Lys, I think it is hot today. I need to cool down a little.’

  Antinous began to untie the cloth bows at the arms, shoulders, and midriff of his tunic. The folds of the upper half of his chiton dropped away to reveal the full extent of his bare torso lying beneath the diagonal swathe of his himation mantle. Antinous’s broad shoulders, cut chest line, orbed abdomen, and tanned muscles were exposed to public view. It was a conspicuously buff vision.

  In a city once renown for the athleticism of its young men with its long tradition of Olympic competition, plus its naked palaestrae training methods and cult of masculinity, Antinous’s nonchalant half-disrobing prompted a rustle of muttering across the assembly. A tide of whispers spread. It seemed Athenian youngsters, husbands, fathers, grandfathers, and devoted family men, as well as its more outward-going womenfolk, could still appreciate the contours of an ephebe at the peak of nature’s perfection.

  Lysias immediately understood Antinous’s intent.

  Using the pretext of the heat of the day he too took his cue to untie his tunic’s upper laces. His sturdy anatomy too was now on public display.

  Both lads sensed how Caesar’s group spied these actions with interest, focusing especially on Antinous. Arrian observably suppressed a wry smile, while Herodes Junior found his eyes settling with enhanced interest upon Lysias.

  The elder Herodes leaned to Arrian to comment quietly, while I was close enough to hear when Commodus asked something privately in Hadrian’s ear. The senator’s giddy manner had ceased its flightiness. Cool sobriety had taken hold.

  Reclining side by side on the flagstones to indulge the exhibition of their physiques, Antinous leaned to Lysias to whisper. I can only imagine what he may have asked, but I assume it would be in the order of ---

  ‘I wonder if this is the sort of thing Lord Arrian had in mind for us at the Baths yesterday? It seems to be working, Lys.’

  Both youngsters sat in casual indifference to the attention generated among those around them, while people in the rows above craned their necks for a better view.

  Antinous indirectly noticed an elderly man dressed in disheveled garb amble in veering paces from a doorway at the back of the theater’s stage. He teetered erratically through the
lines of orphaned juniors buckling on their oversized armor and weaponry.

  The man was a shaggy-haired, wild-eyed fellow with rickety legs and bony flesh. He was loosely garbed in a drab tunic and scrappy broad-brim sunhat tied behind his neck. He was holding a raised object in one hand while waving the other in emphatic gesticulation as he muttered incoherently at his surroundings. He moved unsteadily across the stage area as though he was a comic mime performing a special dance for the ceremony. Yet Antinous hadn’t noticed his participation earlier. For that matter, nor had I.

  Antinous tugged at Lysias’s elbow to draw attention. Amid the prevailing good cheer it hadn’t occurred to anyone the fellow might be following a less cheerful agenda. That was until a small, thin object in his raised fist glinted a flash in the sunlight.

  Both boys immediately realized the fellow’s fist was holding an instrument which, as he drew closer to the assembled row of thrones, took the shape of a small knife protruding from a covering. The man was stumbling forward across the stage intently towards Caesar, whose attention was turned away from the approaching menace.

  Instantly without a moment’s hesitation the two Bithynians leapt from the stones to fling themselves at the fellow.

  Lysias lunged head-first at the man’s midriff in a wrestler’s flying tackle which pounded the breath out of the old guy. Antinous simultaneously leaped high to snap an expertly maneuvered arm lock on his raised limb. He wrenched the upheld instrument from his grasp. All three toppled to the flagstones in a cloud of dust as several Horse Guards lurched forward with outstretched javelins and drawn swords. A loud collective cry went up across the theatre.

  Antinous grappled the man’s arm until his grip was released. The dismayed elder cried out and writhed about as Lysias planted one foot firmly on his squirming ribcage. Antinous lifted the offensive object to view.

  The old man’s hand had been grasping a small rolled parchment enclosing an antique fruit knife. The miniature dagger displayed a dulled point, blunted edges, and a rusty blade. On closer inspection the knife seemed too innocuous a weapon to be capable of any serious wound, except perhaps upon a piece of fruit. It was more likely to inflict nothing other than a nasty bruise on human flesh.

  Nevertheless the spluttering fellow with the wild eyes had been fortunate that neither a Horse Guard’s gladius blade had pierced his throat nor a Praetorian javelin skewer his entrails.

  Hadrian, Arrian, Commodus, and myself, accompanied by officials, guards, and the Herodes Atticus pair, circled around the elder. Hadrian looked over the unkempt, writhing fellow whose tongue uttered words of rabid inconsequence while his body struggled beneath Lysias’s firm boot. When Antinous displayed the sorry weapon for all to see I retrieved the small scroll from his grasp to unroll and read its contents.

  ‘It appears to be a letter or document from long ago addressed to ‘Philip, a hoplite of the Achaea Militia’, and carries the name and title of an archon of this city,’ I announced.

  ‘Tell me, old man, are you the Philip of this document?’ Hadrian demanded, waving the scroll at the struggling fellow.

  The man was so visibly shaken he was incapable of a civil response. It dawned on the assembled group the fellow was not simply confused, he was thoroughly disoriented in the manner of a demented geriatric. His eyes displayed little comprehension of his circumstances while his features were visibly gaga. Saliva dribbled from his mouth.

  The senior Herodes Atticus, Prefect of the Free Cities, took the scroll to read its contents.

  ‘It seems, Caesar and friends, this fellow was once a soldier of this city. His face is vaguely familiar to me, so I guess he’s a military pensioner on the city payroll. He wears no evident nameplate, branding, or the tattoo of a slave, so he’s probably a freeborn citizen fallen on hard times.

  The paper is in Greek, but appears to be of the time of Caesar Trajan or even earlier? The Archon listed is from very long ago. It commends him for his service to the state as a captain of hoplites. Perhaps he served in past wars or the city militia? Maybe he wished to make a petition to Caesar to improve his pension, or suchlike? If so, he chose the wrong time and way to do it,’ Atticus explained.

  Hadrian stepped closer to the figure lying beneath Lysias’s foot and waved the pressure off him. He looked down upon the startled fellow.

  ‘Old Soldier, what is your meaning here? What are you up to? Did you intend me some injury with your fruit knife? If so, your Last Day would have arrived very swiftly, I assure you,’ he called to the stricken ancient who was straining to mouth incoherent words.

  The military tribune in command of the Guards made his presence known.

  ‘My lord, if I may, this man should be made an example of,’ he stated with his sword point aimed directly at the man’s throat. ‘A severe public beating or even death itself is necessary to punish him and dissuade others of like mind.’

  ‘No, no, no, no, Tribune. The fellow is plainly mad, demented, or just old,’ Hadrian responded. ‘He’s a tired soldier whose judgment has fled him in his dotage. He’s probably done this city great service in his time. But he’s also probably received a hard hit on the head that’s damaged his reason along the way. Let him be, and let him be unharmed as well,’ he soothed. ‘Talk with the city’s militia to see if the man’s family or abode can be traced. If he is alone in life, see to it he receives a useful adjustment to his pension so he can live his final crazed days in comfort,’ Hadrian instructed. ‘This the second time in a year I’ve been attacked by a malcontent. Remember that lunatic slave at Tarraco in Iberia last year? Release the fellow and escort him home safely so we may continue with our holy purpose here today.’

  The startled graybeard was gathered up by several Praetorians and bundled away.

  Hadrian meanwhile, in barely suppressed amusement, looked over the two dusty, knee-and-elbow-scraped combatants with grazed tunics kneeling on the flagstones. Commodus languidly wandered across from the President’s throne to join the circle. His presence was heralded by a surge of floral fragrance.

  Hadrian scanned the boys as they dusted themselves down.

  ‘Well, my two young friends from the provinces, you performed magnificently on the stage of this theatre today, didn’t you?’ Hadrian said with a grin. ‘I suppose I must be gratified you kept your wits about you? I might have met a fate similar to the old fellow’s fruit peels or cheese rinds?’

  ‘It was our duty, sir,’ Antinous responded in polite modestly to this whimsy, ‘if a bit rough on our new clothes.’

  Commodus was visibly put on edge by this exchange. Hadrian continued.

  ‘I think such observant bodyguards deserve to be kept closer about us,’ the emperor jollied, ‘especially through the performance we are about to witness. I am told the choristers are to sing and dance the ancient drama of Alcestis today? I invite both of you eagle-eyed lads to stay by my side through the play to watch against further assailants, and to help me translate its Attic intricacies into my Latin understanding. As students of history you are probably more familiar with Euripides than I, so you can explain his finer points to me.’

  Commodus emitted an audible hiss through pursed lips.

  He turned smartly on his heel, and strode off brusquely from the stage. He realized Caesar’s invitation to Antinous and Lysias had displaced he and I from our privileged places behind the President’s throne. He may have interpreted the gesture as implying he should stretch on the dusty tiles at the feet of the first row in his unblemished formal toga. In fairness to his patrician status, this is an unlikely expectation of a Roman senator.

  No one, including Caesar, tried to stop him departing. Even I resisted leaping to my usual conciliatory gestures, though two of the younger Romans in nearby rows accompanied Commodus in a theatrically dramatic flounce. The senator dispensed with the usual departure etiquette or permission from Caesar.

  A Praetorian tribune nearby tensed ready for orders from Hadrian to act on this slur. But no order came. Instead, thei
r departure merely raised a faint smile from Hadrian.

  Suddenly drums were beating, cymbals clashing, and pipes and horns shrilled as a priest of Dionysus entered centre stage to proclaim the start of the performance. Seventeen thousand pairs of feet noisily shuffled in their seats while Antinous and Lysias accompanied Caesar to his President’s chair and stood behind his shoulder like dutiful sons or honored emissaries. Their close proximity meant Caesar could mutter queries back over his shoulder to one or the other so they could respond in whispers. I too stood close by to overhear as much as was possible.

  ‘Remind me again, Antinous, what are we hearing here today?’ Hadrian asked.

  ‘We are to hear ancient Alcestis sung, I’m told. It is a tragedy which won its Dionysia trophy for the playwright Euripides in the days during the Great War between Athens and Sparta long ago,’ I heard the lad reply. He seemed to know his Greek dramas.

  ‘And what is Alcestis all about, remind me of that too,’ the emperor enquired.

  ‘As I recall, sir,’ Antinous began, ‘Euripides was from a family of priests of Apollo similar to my own kinsmen. So the drama is based on the legend of Apollo when he was the lover of the mortal, King Admetus of Thessaly. Apollo rewards the king for his affection by granting him the great boon of freedom from death if he can find someone willing to die in his fated place. After searching widely, the king finds no one is willing to be a substitute for his death. Then his beautiful wife, Queen Alcestis, volunteers to do so.’

  ‘Ah, yes, the drama of the substituted death. Queen Alcestis,’ Hadrian recollected. ‘And then?’

  ‘Alcestis loves Admetus so much she believes it is her duty to die

  in place of her husband to permit him Apollo’s gift of extended life. That’s the basic story, but Euripides cleverly uses the legend to explore sensitive issues between men and women, and between freeborn and slave.