The woman from Colchis sat stiffly erect in her chair, baleful viridian eyes like gems in an ivory face. Thyestes assiduously plied her with food and wine and conversation; he might as well have talked to the wall. Her attention and regard stayed immovably fixed on her husband.
Jason smiled sardonically. ‘Medea’s mastery of our tongue is slight as a harlot’s virtue. I fear my lord of Tiryns wastes his breath.’
Atreus laughed. ‘My brother’s a vaunted seducer - boasts that he never fails. Do him good to assault an impregnable fort. Will you go back to Colchis?’
‘Not flaming likely! I’ve made my pile and crave a quiet life. Settle in Corinth, perhaps - a pleasant town.’
Atreus, deep in thought, drummed fingers on the table, swallowed a honeyed fig and said, ‘You’ve found an opening for trade, and a perennial source of gold.’ He addressed the king. ‘I believe, sire, we should emulate Jason’s cruise, and equip an annual expedition to bring the gold from Colchis. Not a single ship, but several, all laden with the goods the Colchians want.’
Eurystheus looked doubtful. ‘Surely a risky venture? You encountered many perils on the voyage?’
‘Nothing insurmountable. Quite straightforward for well-found ships and capable seamen. Only one genuine obstacle. The Hellespont.’ Jason wetted a fingertip in wine, traced lines on the cedarwood table. ‘A narrow strait and a day’s hard rowing. The entrance is a problem: tortuous and full of reefs. Northerly four-knot current and strong north-easterly winds three-quarters of the year. A proper brute.’
Atreus looked disappointed. ‘Is there no way round?’
‘You don’t know the geography, my lord.’ Jason sucked wine from his nails. ‘No way round, but one across. You could disembark here’ - a finger stabbed - ‘at a promontory abutting the entrance, carry your cargoes over the projecting peninsula, thus, and re-embark at a bay - about there - within the Hellespont.’
‘Which means,’ said Atreus, ‘a squadron stationed permanently at the re-embarkation bay and a fleet of wagons ashore to carry the goods.’
‘Exactly. Worth it, I’d say.’
Eurystheus said uncertainly, ‘The overlaid route crosses Trojan territory. Should we not get leave from Laomedon of Troy?’
The Marshal nodded. ‘It might be wise. I can’t see him raising objections. Do you consider the project feasible, sire?’
‘It sounds possible, certainly - and we want that gold. The plan demands a lot of ships. We can hire galleys from Crete, and perhaps --’
‘No!’ said Atreus strongly. ‘Let’s not depend on foreign fleets. Far wiser to build our own in Nauplia’s yards. It is time, and more than time, Mycenae sailed a navy of her own! How otherwise can we guarantee safe passage for our gold ships against pirates roving the seas from Phoenicia and Caria? Would Pylos threaten our shores if we had a fleet in being?’
His Marshal’s vehemence shook the king. An obstinate expression crossed sere and wrinkled features. ‘You urge an ambitious programme, my lord - and a considerable change in policy. This is not a matter for decision during gossip after dinner. Tomorrow, at Mycenae, we’ll discuss the scheme in Council.’
Eurystheus rose from the throne. Everyone stood respectfully. Attended by squires he left the Hall. Atreus lifted a golden goblet, drank deep and winked at Jason. ‘I’ll sway him, never fear. You’ll see regular voyages to Colchis before three years are out!’
(Atreus kept his word. A fleet navigated the Hellespont in the second year of his reign; every spring thereafter a convoy lifted anchor and sailed from Nauplia’s harbour, transhipped at the Hellespont’s mouth and awaited return of the gold ships. Every captain, in Jason’s honour, named his galley ‘Argo’, and many notable Heroes crewed the first and subsequent trips. They all liked to pretend they had braved the original voyage with Jason; and the tactful bards who enshrine our legends never contradict Heroes.)
Thus was born the genesis of Mycenaean sea power - and a cardinal cause of the war we fought against Troy.
***
At the King’s command Scribes recorded Jason’s instructions for sailing a ship to Colchis, noting landfalls, tides and currents, stellar observations, the friendliness - or otherwise - of inhabitants on the way. Jason and his formidable wife then departed for Corinth, where King Eurystheus granted him a manor. (They lived in Corinth for several years and bred a brace of children; until a harried and henpecked Jason skipped to Thebes and married Creon’s daughter. Medea’s smouldering savagery flared in a blaze of vengeance. She immediately killed her children, followed her errant husband and contrived to poison his bride. Escaping to Athens she bewitched old King Aegeus, who installed her in his palace as a concubine. Nobody seems to know what became of her thereafter; she may be alive today - a frightening thought.)
Atreus devoted himself to building a powerful fleet. Woodmen roamed the forests, felled cypress and oak and pine; waggoners in hundreds hauled the logs to Nauplia; shipwrights adzed and sawed and planed; sail- and cable-makers laboured from dawn until nightfall. The Marshal journeyed often to the port, supervised construction and hurried on the work. Combined with his other duties - adviser-in-chief to the king, Leader of the Host, ambassador-at-large - the task became a burden heavier than even Atreus could bear.
He conceived the idea of a deputy to lighten the load at Nauplia. ‘At the moment I’m forced to depend on the harbour master, and the man’s a fool, and idle as well. I need someone entirely reliable to whom I can depute authority. A Master of the Ships, in fact.’ He eyed me speculatively. ‘You’re young, Agamemnon, but I think you’d fit. Do you fancy the job?’
‘Not I,’ I answered fervently. ‘I know nothing of ships and the sea!’
Atreus looked unconvinced, and I feared - with reason - the intention remained in his mind.
News from the north brought further distractions. The Heraclids, successfully concluding alliances, had gained an Athenian contingent, some Locrian slingers and detachments from Boeotian territories which Thebes controlled. A tentative raid on the Isthmus ravaged an outlying demesne a Corinthian Hero held, and the Warden of Corinth expected further forays.
King Eurystheus in Council considered the pros and cons and, after long and wordy argument, proposed a pre-emptive strike. Levy the Host, he said, burst across the Isthmus, bring the Heraclids to battle and smash them into fragments with an overwhelming force. The Council’s greybeards croaked agreement; Mycenae, they reminded the king, had not waged full-scale war for years, and Heroes were getting soft.
Atreus heatedly demurred. A campaign demanded a bulky train which would absorb draught animals, wagons and drovers and deprive the transport hauling timber for the fleet. A trifling delay, the Council murmured; the war would be over, the Host returned before the moon waxed full.
Very well, said Atreus; then what about Pylos? - an immediate threat they could not ignore. Intelligence sources declared King Neleus’ armada crowded Pylos’ beaches; only a contrary wind prevented him from sailing. The Council’s recommendations delayed the launch of galleys to oppose the Pylians; would they also strip the kingdom’s shore defences when an enemy was poised to wreak destruction from the sea?
Eurystheus would not be deterred. Atreus opined later (I did not attend the meeting) that the king in his declining years craved a glorious and not too difficult victory before the grave engulfed him. But he could not stay blind to the challenge from Pylos, and concocted a proposal to counter his Marshal’s warning.
“We will make peace with Neleus,’ he told the Council, ‘and offer generous restitution for the destruction Hercules wrought. You, my lord Atreus, will lead an embassy to Pylos, taking valuable gifts, cattle and horses, slaves and gold and bronze. Offer the king our friendship, plead our deep contrition for the wrong that he has suffered.’
‘You will humble yourself to Neleus?’ Atreus asked.
‘A wise political gambit, my lord. Pylos can do us enormous harm; we’ll find it hard to retaliate. Of course, when you’ve built you
r fleet ... Meanwhile let us extinguish Hercules’ troublesome brood.’
‘Are you seriously suggesting,’ Atreus raged, ‘that I, Marshal of Mycenae, Pelops’ son, sprung from Zeus through Tantalus, should crawl like a beggar to Neleus, Thessalian Tyro’s by-blow?’
‘He claims descent from Poseidon. It’s statecraft, Atreus, statecraft. Take when you’re strong, bluff if you’re weak, yield when you must. We are forced, for a time, to yield.’
Then who,’ demanded Atreus, ‘will lead the Host? I can’t be in two places at once!’
‘I am quite capable,’ said Eurystheus warmly, ‘of conducting a campaign. You will make arrangements immediately for the embassy to Pylos.’ He addressed the Curator. ‘Provide the Marshal with an opulent treasure. I shall call a levy of arms and march when the moon is new. That is all, gentlemen. The Council is ended.’
You can’t, without losing your lands, defy a royal command. Atreus brooded in sullen fury, recognized realities and the urgency of the mission, recovered his temper and quickly collected a wagon train and escort for the journey. I expected to accompany him, and made my preparations. He entered my house, brusquely dismissed the slaves packing accoutrements and baggage and said, ‘You go with King Eurystheus and the Host.’
A cuirass I was holding clattered on the floor. Clymene retrieved the piece and polished a smear on the bronze. ‘Why, my lord? Surely --’
‘Excellent reasons. Come!’ The Marshal beckoned me outside. ‘I want somebody whose judgment I can trust to scrutinize palace politics when I’m gone, and also observe the Heraclid war. With Eurystheus in charge I have an ugly feeling things could easily go wrong. He’s never led a major campaign, and is getting on in years. You’ll watch like a hawk, Agamemnon, and send me word in a flash if anything untoward happens.’
I was not altogether displeased. A Hero far prefers the chance of a fight to a dull diplomatic mission. The Marshal watched my face, read my thoughts and said coldly, ‘No false heroics, if you please. Don’t get yourself stuck on some asinine Heraclid’s spear. If we look like being defeated move out fast. There’s no disgrace in running when the odds are turning against you.’
Atreus left in the morning. He held Mycenae’s throne when next I saw him.
***
Heroes flocked to the citadel in response to the royal levy, each bringing his Companion, a troop of spearmen and slaves, and ox-carts to carry his baggage. Almost every nobleman answered Eurystheus’ call; a few exceptions - sick or elderly, perhaps, or engaged in private quarrels with unforgiving neighbours - paid fines instead. Though King Adrastus of Argos offered a detachment Eurystheus declined allied aid: he reckoned Mycenae’s vassals alone could beat the Heraclid gang. Two hundred chariots and two thousand spearmen encamped around the city: a considerable Host by any standards before the Trojan War. The rasp of grindstones whetting blades and bronzesmiths’ clanging hammers resounded from dawn till night.
When kings go warring they delegate administrative powers to one of their principal Heroes. The machinery can’t be allowed to grind to a halt. A flow of petitioners daily besieges the Throne Room, ranging from importunate Daughters seeking extended estates to humble freemen disputing a boundary fence. Wrongdoers have to be punished, and the kingdom’s accounts inspected. Someone has to carry on the work.
Eurystheus summoned Thyestes.
I began worrying directly his bull-necked figure swaggered into the Hall. For an indefinite time the man would control Mycenae, his machinations only obstructed by a dotard or two on the Council. From the Marshal’s dissertations I knew Thyestes’ ambitions were unlimited and pitiless, his capacity for mischief beyond all calculation. He profoundly hated his brother and, since Plisthenes’ death, hungered for revenge. I pretended to myself that while the king went warring he couldn’t do much damage: he had no troops at his command save a slender palace guard; neither Argos nor Sparta, friendly neighbours both, were likely to lend their Heroes to further his designs. Pylos? He might be in touch with Neleus, but Atreus hurried to draw that serpent’s fangs.
Neverthless I remained uneasy.
A series of minor incidents added to my anxieties. Thyestes was quartered in chambers adjoining the Marshal’s staterooms where my mother kept her court. He strolled in and out of her rooms all day, his visits far more frequent than courtesy required. I managed to be present at several of these meetings--Aerope declared her surprise at her son’s unwonted attentions--and disliked the glint in Thyestes’ eye, the responsive gleam in my mother’s. She had always had a weakness for burly, muscular men - Thyestes was certainly that - and I called to mind unhappily a long-forgotten scandal dating from her spinster days in Crete. Catreus had surprised his daughter in bed with a lusty Hero, and was only just dissuaded from selling her to slavery. (The unfortunate Hero he burned alive.) They hushed the matter up; perhaps Atreus had never learned of it. Perhaps he had, and the knowledge of her frailty incited him to seduce her while Plisthenes still lived. Yet I was tolerably certain she had never horned the Marshal since her marriage.
But Atreus travelled Laconia’s distant roads, the court would shortly remove to war - and my mother’s fragile defences faced a redoubtable foe.
I debated the problem. Should I send the Marshal a courier urging a quick return, a warning suitably veiled? - you couldn’t be blatant with verbal messages. Difficult. Atreus obeyed a royal command: nothing short of Eurystheus’ seal would turn him back. Least of all a young man’s callow counsel based on grounds no stronger than foreboding and suspicion.
I abandoned the thought - which proved unfortunate. From my weak-kneed dereliction flowed a torrent of catastrophe whose scars endure today.
***
Menelaus, still a Companion, arrived with the Tiryns contingent. A brisk argument and a hearty bribe - three jars of olive oil - persuaded his Hero I could take him as my driver. (While seeking a Companion among Mycenaean gentry I found nobody very anxious to share my chariot. A driver and his Hero grow very close; most of the younger men believed me the Marshal’s son and feared - I wouldn’t say wrongly - I might betray their confidences.)
On a morning in late summer, the harvest safely gathered, the Host started from Mycenae. Eurystheus and five sons - he seemed determined to make the campaign a family affair - rode in the van behind a sprinkle of scouts, a brilliant sight despite his age in armour washed with gold. Palace Heroes followed, then noblemen from Tiryns and our tributary cities. Every chariot, including mine, trailed a troop of slaves and spearmen, carts and mules and donkeys: the Hero’s personal entourage. A long disjointed column straggled into the hills.
I saw nothing singular in the order of march, for this was my first campaign. (Atreus, when I described it, almost threw a fit. His chariots invariably led, all spearmen in a body marched behind; he sternly relegated transport to the rear, and a rearguard closed the column. Such uncomfortable innovations imposed by a great commander who thought in advance of his times met with nobody’s approval. With his presence removed, the Heroes - King Eurystheus included - happily reverted to the old chaotic ways.)
The sun blazed down in fury, dust clouds scarved the column and gritted your teeth and nettled your skin. I sweated like a bullock beneath my newly-wrought bronze; Menelaus, lightly armoured, fluttered his whip and smirked. ‘A Companion has advantages you’d never suspect in peacetime! I hope, in the coming battle, you’ll order your course in a way that’ll win me my greaves! Where do you think we’ll find Hyllus and his friends?’
‘The Lady and, I presume, Eurystheus knows.’ I wiped a dribble of muddy sweat from my chin. ‘I’m told we halt at Nemea tonight and Corinth late tomorrow. Slow progress. Atreus, herding the Heraclids, did Mycenae to the Isthmus in a day!’
‘So I heard.’ Menelaus reviewed the noisy rabble rambling through dancing dust. ‘We could do with a modicum of discipline and order. A pity he isn’t here.’
Menelaus spoke more truly than he knew.
After a restless night in the open at
Nemea - the palace so small it could house only the king and his sons - the Host absorbed the Nemean levy (five chariots and fifty spears) and followed a mountainous road that led to Corinth. The slender sinuous track which alternately climbed and fell as the bones of the hills dictated played havoc with the column’s brittle cohesion. Wagons toppled down bluffs, lost wheels and blocked the way. The vanguard entered Corinth’s gates in early afternoon; the last of the stragglers plodded in by starlight.
Spies from Attica reported the enemy at Eleusis, the strength estimated at less than a thousand all arms: the Heraclid band, detachments from Locris and Athens, a Theban contingent and various odds and ends. Eurystheus called leaders to a council in the Hall. There followed a heated discussion under the flickering light of torches amid the debris of a meal, servants clearing tables, a bard crouched in a corner and crooning to himself. Gelanor of Asine and Alcmaeon of Midea advised that the Host remain at Corinth and await the Heraclids’ onset, thus fighting on ground of our choosing with a firm base at our backs. The king’s eldest son Perimedes, supported by Tiryns’ captains, advocated seizing the initiative by an advance across the Isthmus to catch the foe unbalanced on the Eleusinian Plain. Eurystheus, normally the most cautious of men, uncharacteristically resolved on the latter course. (I am sure his greed for belated glory nurtured a rash decision.) The Host, he stated, would march at dawn to Megara, encamp there for the night and advance to battle the following day. He declined to take the Corinthian levy - which proved a fortunate judgement.
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