Bello:
hidden talent rediscovered
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Contents
Alfred Duggan 1903–1964
1. The Beginning
2. Sabine Women
3. The First Reinforcements
4. Jupiter Stator
5. The Coming of The Sabines
6. Envoys From Lavinium
7. Murder Breeds Murder
8. The Fugitive
9. Religion and War
10. The Colonist
11. Bloodguilt
12. King Romulus
13. The Senate And The King
14. Eintrregnum
15. Rome Lives
Alfred Duggan
Founding Fathers
Alfred Duggan
1903–1964
‘There have been few historical imaginations better informed or more gifted than Alfred Duggan’s.’ (The New Criterion).
Historian, archaeologist and novelist Alfred Duggan wrote historical fiction and non-fiction about a wide range of subjects, in places and times as diverse as Julius Caesar’s Rome and the Medieval Europe of Thomas Becket.
Although he was born in Argentina, Duggan grew up in England, and was educated at Eton and Balliol College, Oxford. After Oxford, he travelled extensively through Greece and Turkey, visiting almost all the sites later mentioned in his books. In 1935 he helped excavate Constantine’s palace in Istanbul.
Duggan came to writing fiction quite late in his life: his first novel about the First Crusade, Knight in Armour, was published in 1950, after which he published at least a book every year until his death in 1964. His fictional works were bestselling page-turners, but thoroughly grounded in meticulous research informed by Duggan’s experience as an archaeologist and historian.
Duggan has been favourably compared to Bernard Cornwell as well as being praised in his own right as ‘an extremely gifted writer who can move into an unknown period and give it life and immediacy.’ (New York Times)
1. The Beginning
It was just the place for a stronghold, a steep flat-topped hill on the eastern side of the river which marked the boundary of the Etruscans. Nearby rose other hills, some with slopes too gentle to be defensible, others too acutely pointed for comfort. To the south-east stretched level beech-forest, the tree-tops seen from above making a level floor to the horizon, rarely interrupted by the clearings of other settlements. There was good ploughland to be won from the beech-forest, though the task of clearing it was laborious; if the worst came to the worst, and the foreigners over the river proved to be too warlike and well-armed to be robbed, the men in the stronghold might grow their own barley.
All the same, it seemed a pity that the twins had decided to mark out the boundaries of the new camp with all the elaborate ritual that went to the founding of a city. If the place happened to be unlucky the knowledge that it had been consecrated would lead to endless delay before the newcomers cut their losses and abandoned it. As he stood among the throng on the hilltop, waiting for the ploughing to begin, Marcus ventured to grumble about this to the man standing beside him.
He was answered, as he might have expected, by a reference to the wonderful omens which had encouraged the twins. Even to suggest that the new settlement might be unsuccessful seemed to his neighbour to be blasphemy. ‘You ought not to utter such words out loud,’ he exclaimed angrily. ‘A god might hear you, and make it come true. But if silly young men don’t deliberately bring down bad luck on the place it can’t fail. Aren’t we led by the sons of Mars, sucklings of the war-god’s she-wolf? How long is it since you saw a vulture? They are getting rare in these parts. This morning the twins saw eighteen vultures between them. What do you think of that? And have you heard what they found on that knoll over there, where the working-party are digging the ditch for our outlying fort?’
‘No, I haven’t heard. They began digging only two hours ago, and I kept away for fear they might put a mattock in my hand. Did they find a crock of gold, or one of those great stones in which a god dwells?’
‘Nothing so obvious, but an omen even more powerful. They were digging in undisturbed soil, when suddenly they turned up a human head. Freshly severed it was, and still bleeding. Do you know what that means? It means that our stronghold will one day rule all the land roundabout. The twins have already decreed that the hill shall be called the Capitol, so that the portent will never be forgotten.’
‘Whose head was it, and where’s the rest of him?’ asked Marcus blandly. He knew that such a question must annoy any devout servant of the gods; but as a poor and insignificant spearman he disliked the suspicion that the leaders might be surreptitiously practising human sacrifice. One day they might choose him as the victim.
‘It was nobody’s head, you fool. It was put there by the gods, to show us how lucky we shall be. Aren’t you one of us? Aren’t you glad to be a sharer in all this good luck?’
‘I come from nowhere, and that’s where I am going. When my father threw me out I decided to follow the lord Remus. I have a shield and a spear, and when we fight I shall kill a rich foe and take his sword. I am worth my place in the ranks and my share of the booty. But, since I follow Remus, this isn’t really my stronghold.’
‘It is. Remus has accepted the omens, and his followers will live where Romulus has decreed. Besides, you mustn’t call it a stronghold. It is a city. Look, they are just going to make it a city. Here comes the leader, with the plough. Silence, everybody, so that the gods can hear his prayer.’
Marcus was glad to end the conversation. He was in a bad temper, and his neighbour was just the kind of prosperous, pious giver of good advice whom he disliked; such a well-fed, godfearing farmer had no business to join a band of desperate emigrants, warriors prepared to live by the sword until they died young or died rich. If the argument continued there would be a quarrel, and if they came to blows Marcus knew very well which of the pair would be expelled from the band. A leader always sides with the rich against the poor, and he had no kin to back him on this frontier hilltop.
Marcus was nearly seventeen, slender and dark and still gawky with youth. He wore nothing but a ragged tunic and patched sandals; but he had cut his hair short and combed it, and his body was clean. On his forearm, just below the elbow, could be seen the calloused mark made by his shield-grip; that was the emblem of manhood, and he looked at it often.
Now he stood in sulky silence, listening to the prayers. All this ritual meant nothing to him; he had not left home to hear it. Not that he had exactly left home, if that meant that he had gone of his own free will. His elderly father had been rash to take a young wife, and Marcus had never reached the point of doing anything unlawful with his stepmother; but that would have come if they had continued to share the same hut. His father had been within his rights in telling him to go. In fact his father had been merciful. He might have waited until he had caught the pair in adultery, and then tortured them to death with the approval of his neighbours; instead of sending his rowdy younger son off to seek his fortune before anything serious had occurred. All the same, his father’s second marriage had brought Marcus bad luck.
It was by chance that he had joined the band led by Remus, another example of the bad luck which seemed to be his fate. After all, the leaders were twins, weren’t they? Both children of Mars, both fosterlings of the she-wolf, both exceptionally endowed with the favour of the gods. How could anyone have foreseen, a month ago, that Romulus would consistently outshine and outwit his brother, who in Alba had the name of being the more daring bandit of the pair?
Marcus meditated in silence on that tricky business of the omens. There could be no doubt that Romulus had lied and cheated, and yet he had been signally favoured by the gods. It had happened only this morning, at sunrise, and all sorts of rumours were still flying through the band. But Marcus had been standing close to Remus, on duty as one of his bodyguard; and he had heard everything with his own ears. Each brother had gone to his chosen hilltop, marked out the sacred templum with his curved rod, and settled down to watch for omens. After quite a short wait Remus had seen six vultures flying together on the good side. That was a remarkable prodigy; for the vulture, which never hunts and yet lives on the fat of the land, is notoriously the luckiest bird in Italy. It was a rare bird, also, and no one on the hill had ever before seen as many as six at the same time. Naturally Remus had sent a message to his twin, bidding him come and hear about this remarkable demonstration of divine favour.
Romulus had replied by telling his brother to come to the other hill, for he had seen an even greater prodigy. That was where they had made their mistake, Marcus realised as he thought the matter over. Remus should have stayed where he was, and asked for details of his brother’s omen. Instead he had weakly obeyed the summons, merely because it was rumoured that Romulus was the elder by a few minutes; as though between twins there could be any question of the authority of an elder brother over a younger! And when he had got to the foot of this silly, slab-sided hill where they were standing now, he had been impudently told that as yet Romulus had seen no portent, but that he was sure he was going to see a good one!
Romulus was exposed as a liar and a cheat, who would not recognise a clear message from the gods if it supported his wretched, put-upon brother. That ought to have been the end of his pretensions as leader. But there is no arguing with favourites of the gods, and the gods often favour the most brazen scoundrels. While the common spearmen disputed hotly, and the well-born nobles attempted to keep the peace, Romulus climbed back to his consecrated templum on top of the hill. He had barely reached it when a clamour of excitement overcame the quarrelling below. Flying slowly and purposefully from the right, the side of good omen, came a whole flock of vultures, no less than twelve of them. There was no deception; Remus himself saw the birds, and so did his followers. Those hills must be a great place for vultures. But birds of good omen were what they had come out to see, in accordance with the rules laid down by the ancestors when a site was to be chosen for a new stronghold. The matter was decided beyond dispute; the hill chosen by Romulus would be their future dwelling-place.’
Now Romulus alone was marking out the boundary of an enduring city, and that was more than they had expected when they agreed to fortify a camp just on the Latin side of the river. The Etruscans on the other bank might prove too strong for them, for it was already known that they were rich enough to be worth raiding. A camp that was too dangerous might be deserted; but it would be shameful to flee from a newly founded city. Both bands were committed, though the followers of Remus had not even been consulted.
Besides, Romulus was performing the ceremony alone, as though he were not merely the senior partner in a dual leadership. Now he had finished his prayers, and was guiding the holy bronze Plough round the outline of what would one day be the defences. A crowd of helpers kept the plough-team steady, for a bull and a cow never work well together; even when they are special beasts, snow-white, dedicated, already garlanded for sacrifice. But alone Romulus wrestled with the blunt bronze ploughshare, that relic of the ways of the ancestors, used nowadays only in religious ritual. Marcus thought, with an inward sneer at all superstition, that if the chief wanted to be really old-fashioned and lucky he ought to mark out his furrow with one of those fire-hardened digging-sticks which were still used by the savages of the south.
Until this morning Marcus would have boasted that he did not fear, or even believe in, the gods. But those vultures took some explaining away, and now he had an open mind. Stories of the miraculous birth and childhood of the twins had weighted very little with him when he chose Remus for his leader. Remus was taking out a band of emigrants; he Marcus, had urgent reasons for getting well away from his father and his stepmother. There was no more in it than that.
From time to time some priestess who had dedicated her virginity to the gods scandalised the faithful by producing a child; though perhaps lusty male twins was overdoing it. If Rhea Silvia could persuade the elders that her virtue was unblemished and that it was all the fault of some incontinent god, well, good luck to her; though in future a prudent man would not believe her unsupported assertions. It was just possible that the twins were the children of Mars, but the excuse had really come out most conveniently when their mother was in a tight place.
As for the other story, about them being suckled by a she-wolf, Marcus believed some of it. He had heard it at first hand from Faustulus, the shepherd who found them in their abandoned cradle. Faustulus had joined in this new venture, and he was now watching the ceremony; a sensible, level-headed man, who would never invent such a surprising tale. But the original story, as told by Faustulus, was not very hard to believe. There was nothing in it about the children being reared in a wolf’s den, or living as members of a family of wolves. Faustulus himself had seen the cradle placed at the margin of the flooded river by the minions of the wicked King Amulius. He had crept away, meaning to come back and rescue the children as soon as the coast was clear. When he returned he was horrified to see a wolf standing over the babies; but they took no harm, for it was a she-wolf heavy with milk, who would permit any soft baby-mouth to suck at her swollen teats. The whole affair, though exceedingly ominous, had lasted only a few minutes. Marcus, who had seen a bereaved farm bitch suckling a young rat, did not doubt that a mother wolf might be guided by the same instinct for a short time.
All the same, whether the twins were the sons of Mars or not, whether they were the foster-children of the wolf or not, they were equal partners in this venture. Remus should have been helping his brother to guide the bronze plough instead of standing idle with the other spectators on the hilltop.
One angle of the sacred enclosure had been marked by the furrow when Romulus lifted the ploughshare to indicate the site of a gate. At last Remus took action. Carefully avoiding the newly turned furrow he strolled down the steep hillside and halted on the slope. As soon as they saw that their chief did not wish to be walled in by his brother’s foundation his band streamed after him; they made up nearly half the company, and soon more than a thousand young warriors clustered on the slope, looking up at the new city as though they were already besieging it. That was not so dangerous as it seemed, for of course they had all left their weapons with the baggage at the bottom of the hill: no one would come armed to the foundation of a city.
Presently Romulus completed the circuit and veiled his head in his cloak as he prayed to the gods, while attendants pole-axed the bull and the cow to honour the guardians of the new city. When all was finished Remus strolled back up the hill and halted just outside the new furrow, gazing at it quizzically with his hands on his hips. Marcus was only two paces behind him, for it amused him to hear the twins quarrel; and Remus would not have breasted the slope unless he intended to utter one of his unkind and unanswerable sarcasms.
Across the scratch in the ground the young leaders confronted one another; each twenty-seven years old, each tall, ruddy and strong, each a true child of Mars, a proven warrior at the head of a band of eager warriors, each as utterly sure of himself as a man can be only when he has survived numberless perils and knows
that he can rely on supernatural assistance. Remus looked intelligent and witty as well as strong; Romulus was so busy looking devout that there was no room for intelligence on his blank, regular countenance.
‘So there’s your city,’ Remus began. ‘Isn’t it time for another of your punctual omens? Perhaps the gods are late again. Last time, you remember, you had to lie about your vultures before they remembered to put in an appearance.’
‘This morning I told you that I had been favoured by portents stronger than yours,’ Romulus answered. ‘Perhaps it wasn’t true when I said it; but the gods made it true before you could gainsay me. My omens appear when I want them, and just now I don’t need another; so there will be no more. Are you looking at my wall? It has been filled with my luck, so that no enemy can cross it. If you want to come inside you must go round by the gate.’
‘Filled with your luck, is it, brother?’ said Remus. ‘That’s very strong luck, I know. May I remind you that I also have a little luck of my own? I too am a son of Mars, a fosterling of the she-wolf. This morning you saw more vultures than I did, but we are still joint leaders of this expedition. It might be interesting to see whether my luck will get me over your wall.’
Marcus, standing close, could feel the quiver of excitement that ran through his leader; the excitement that comes to the bravest man when he is about to test the protection that the gods granted him at birth. Romulus understood that his twin was about to do something desperate; he motioned quietly to his celeres, the gang of devoted henchmen who kept order in his rowdy band. A celer who had been piling the loose earth of the lucky wall moved up to stand behind his leader, mattock on shoulder.
‘Gently, brother,’ Remus continued. ‘We don’t want your new city to lose its luck because of a quarrel on the very day of its foundation. All the same, I really must test this famous luck of yours. Here goes. Will some god turn me back? Your wall won’t. An enemy could cross it as easily as I do.’ He took a pace forward, and leapt over the furrow.
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