‘And if Hostilius had won the duel, what would she have done?’
‘She would still have made peace, but on different terms.’
‘I suppose she would have found a way to make Hostilius King of Rome. It seems she can do with us what she pleases. Oh well, she has persuaded the King; and his followers must obey King Romulus. For myself I welcome peace, on any terms that are not downright disgraceful. When I have met your kin and paid over a reasonable bride-price you and I can live openly as the comrades and lovers we have been in truth ever since our wedding night. I had grown tired of helping you to pretend that you wanted Rome to be destroyed. Now there is no guilt between us, and I can look forward to meeting your father.’
‘And little Marcus will grow up among friends, with two clans to guard his back from his enemies. Perhaps that is the best thing of all. By the way, I know he had to be named Marcus, after his father; that’s the custom of the Sabines as well as the Latins. But are there names preordained for his brothers and sisters? I should like some day to name a child of mine for my brother.’
‘What? Number two on the way already? I shall have to ask Aemilius to get me more ploughland. Well, the Latin custom is that all your ten daughters are called just Aemilia Prima, Secunda, and so on; but for your ten younger sons you may choose the first names, though Aemilius must come second. That makes twenty-one children in all, which is as many as I shall be able to support. I hope that after that you will stop, if it is convenient to you.’
‘We’ll see what I feel like in twenty years’ time. At present I want to bear your children. In Rome there will be room for them.’
‘Room enough. But it will be a queer sort of Rome. Five years ago we founded a Latin city. When we put up the palisade there were only three thousand men in the levy. With the Asylum, and the colonies, we grew to ten thousand, mostly Latins. To help us fight against your kin we took in those mongrel Luceres, another ten thousand of them. Now we are to bring in ten thousand Sabines. I wonder where it will end? Thirty thousand men will make a great city; yet it’s spreading the luck very thin. In the beginning Rome had a lot of luck, for all that there was murder done on the day of the foundation. That bleeding head on the Capitol, and a son of Mars for our King! I doubted at first, but now I know we had luck. May the gods make it endure!’
‘They will. Look, little Marcus is laughing. That’s a good omen.’
5. The Coming of The Sabines
A whole people were on the march. So many were the oxwaggons, so dense the throng of cattle, that a stranger might have supposed the convoy to be a migration of those eastern savages who dwell always in carts and have no fixed abode. But dotted through the columns were pairs of oxen yoked together, though they pulled nothing; and crowning each pile of household goods on the sturdy waggons was a wooden, iron-tipped plough. The people were not nomads; they were farmers.
It was a peaceful journey, with no need for military precautions. Thus Publius, though he was a spearman of the first rank, might march by his own waggon. As he plodded through the dust, almost deafened by the squeal of ungreased axles, he had leisure to think, since he could hardly see or hear.
There was plenty to think about, for this move would be the most important change in his life. Not that he had changed his manner of living frivolously, at his own whim; his chief was moving house and all loyal clansmen must follow, whether they looked forward to the new customs as an improvement or thought them a regrettable mistake.
That made it easier, Publius reflected. It is always easier, especially for a Sabine spearman, to perform an obvious duty than to reach a difficult decision. There was a great deal to be said against the move, and he might have said it; but he had not been consulted, so there he was in the column.
He supposed, gloomily, that this uproar, this stink of dust and sweat, this sense of being hemmed in by a short-tempered crowd, would be his lot for the rest of his life. Tonight they would all sleep behind a crowded palisade, lying almost touching one another. Of course the hut he came from had been crowded enough, with his wife and children huddled as close as they could get to the little smudge of fire. But there had been only four other huts in the village; and then the unbroken ranks of the beech-forest, hiding even the smoke of the next hamlet. Tonight he would feel, as he slept, the nearness of hundreds of crowded huts.
He would have to sleep knowing that a barred and guarded gate shut him off from the greenwood. That would be very nearly the most unpleasant part of the new experience, at least until he got used to it. It would not actually be the most unpleasant part, he reminded himself with a scowl; the most irksome restraint, as he knew very well, would be the unremitting necessity to keep on friendly terms with all these crowding neighbours. He had past experience of that distasteful obligation, when he was exploring a lake beyond the mountains. Three companions had come with him, in a single canoe. They must sleep huddled together like fledgelings in a nest, and in the morning be considerate to one another at a time when any normal freeborn Sabine wanted to go off by himself and sulk until he was fully awake. That one voyage had been enough for him. It had ended suddenly, when he knocked out the teeth of the clumsy fellow-clansman who had accidentally spat on his knee. There was good hunting to be found among the lakeside cliffs, but he had never gone that way again.
In the new settlement he would never be out of spitting range of his neighbours; even when they went to war they would march in close-packed ranks, like Latins. What was that joke he had heard during the last inconclusive campaign? That if you knocked a hole in a Latin shield you would be set on by the three spearmen hiding behind it? He would never again wander alone under the canopy of beech-leaves. That was no life for a free Sabine.
The wild idea that he might stay behind had been dismissed from his mind without hesitation. Tatius would live in this new city, and wherever Tatius went it was the duty of his clansmen to follow. Latins could not see what lay behind such unquestioning obedience. They thought of Tatius as a king, and wondered that his followers never thought of deserting him, as those flighty Latins themselves would leave one king to follow a better. They did not understand that Tatius was something much greater than a king; he was the head of his family. Long ago, so long ago that no one could fix the date (though the reckoning by generations in the pedigree was clear enough) there had been only one Tatius, and his wife. Then his six sons had married, and the headship had remained with the eldest. Now Titus Tatius was rightful head of the whole extended family, and he, Publius, descended from the younger sons of younger sons, must give his chief the same obedience that even Latins (for even they had an inkling of decent behaviour) rendered to their grandfathers. If Tatius chose to live behind wooden palings like a milch cow, his relations must follow him.
They had come to an awkward place in the track, a hole which in winter was a slough and now in the summer heat had dried to a bottomless cushion of soft dry dust. The oxen lurched obstinately, scrambling up the far side as though they wanted to pull the wheels off the waggon. Publius steadied them, waving his spear before their eyes. In theory he travelled unarmed on this peaceful journey, as Tatius had commanded; his sword, corselet and helmet were among the bundles on the waggon. But he carried his spear and shield, partly to show that he was a freeman of his clan, partly because there was no other safe way of transporting such valuable objects without a risk of breakage.
With a rattle and groan the waggon lurched out of the hollow; the baggage swayed and toppled. Publius glanced up at his wife and children, perched beside the precious plough which must be saved from damage. Through the dust-haze he could make out his family but dimly, but he could see that there were still three of them; so nobody had fallen off. At the rear of the waggon the ploughman and his woman were freeing a leafy branch which had been caught up in a wheel. His household was complete. There was no more than usual to worry about.
Of course his family was always a worry; that was the natural penalty of being a free spearman with a family
to look after. He did not like to contemplate how much life in a city might affect them. Claudia, his wife, could of course be trusted absolutely; she was a free Sabine lady, wife to a free clansman. All the same, she would be continually meeting strange men, smooth artful Latin men, accomplished seducers. She might grow discontented. Worse still, she might complain that one of these strangers had insulted her. Then Publius did not know what he would be expected to do. The first rule for living in a city was that you must never fight your fellow-citizens; but did that outweigh the other binding rule, that you instantly killed anyone whom your wife pointed out as deserving of death?
In the middle of a crowded city slaves would be hard to control. That ploughman and his woman would be always dodging off into strange huts – impossible to keep an eye on them in such a throng. If they ran off they would not at first be missed, though there was no reason why well-treated slaves should run away; any stranger who sheltered them would naturally enslave them afresh. But probably in this new city there would be arrangements he had never thought of; for many years the Latins had been living in cities, and they must have devised some method of keeping their slaves steadily at work.
The children were the greatest worry. Publius was thirty years old, but he had been married only six years ago, and of the five children born to Claudia only two had survived infancy. Young Publius was now four, and Pomponia two. They were lively brats, and not particularly well behaved. In their native hamlet they would have grown up shielded from temptation, a stout spearman and a modest bride; amid all the wiles of a city, and a Latin city at that, they might bring disgrace on the Tatian clan.
There was nothing to be done about it. Tatius had decided, and his cousins must follow. All the same, it had been a very queer decision, and if he had heard of it as the act of a stranger Publius might even have considered it dishonourable (of course the act of his own chief could never be dishonourable). To make peace in the middle of a battle, while there was still every hope of victory and no particular danger of defeat, seemed on the face of it to show a lack of spirit. To make peace on the advice of a parcel of women was even more odd. To alter your whole way of life and become a city dweller among your Latin enemies – that was frankly eccentric. And among sturdy barley-growing, boar-hunting, forest-dwelling Sabines to be convicted of eccentricity was to be condemned. The path of duty led an honest spearman to strange destinations.
There was something familiar about that outcrop of rock above the path. Of course – the army had halted there for breakfast on the morning of the battle. They were getting near the end of their journey; but for this horrible cloud of dust Rome would already be in sight. Publius considered. He recalled that just before the track reached the isolated group of hills it swerved very close to the river. When they reached that point he would tell Claudia to get down from the waggon, and they would all wash and put on clean clothes so as to make a good impression on their new fellow-citizens.
Presently a message was passed down the line, bidding the spearmen form in their ranks for the ceremonial meeting between the two kings. Wives and children might look on, if they wished, waggons and baggage could be left in care of the slaves. Claudia lowered the heavy bundle of armour to her husband. He was proud of the full equipment which had earned him his post in the front rank. He had inherited corselet and helmet from his father; both were made of thin bronze over stout leather padding. A lucky skirmish with a band of Etruscan raiders had brought him a pair of greaves, solid bronze held in place by straps of woven linen. Greaves were rare on this side of the river, though many well-to-do Etruscans wore them. They were not very useful to a spearman who must scramble over mountains on foot, and Publius seldom wore them for serious campaigning. But they were just the thing for a state procession.
When all the straps had been fastened he slung over his corselet a gay baldric of embroidered wool. This supported a very fine sword, which he had bought from an Etruscan trader during a rare interval of truce. Though it came to him by way of Etruria the blade had been forged farther north; it was a leaf-shaped, double-edged weapon, longer and heavier than the common swords of central Italy, excellent steel which kept an edge even in damp weather. It had cost him three cows and a big jar of wine; he could not have bought it if he had not just captured more cattle than he had the right to graze in the common pasture. When he was armed he made such an imposing figure that it seemed surprising he should march on foot; there were mounted nobles who wore less valuable harness.
With the halting of the waggons the dust-cloud gradually dispersed, and it was possible to see the surrounding country. To Publius it was familiar ground, but it seemed odd to be looking at it without the taut nerves and dry mouth which comes even to the bravest spearmen before imminent battle. There, just beside him, was the flat boulder on which he had sat to fasten his greaves. Just ahead lay the bend in the river, below a cluster of steep-sided hills. He was already abreast of the garden-covered mount which the Romans called the Pincian; due south, in line, he could see the little knoll of the Capitol and the spreading, smoke-blackened palisade on the Palatine. They were on the edge of that wide marsh where the stubborn battle had been fought. A tough fight it had been, and once the Sabine line had been forced to retire (he could make out the bog where Curtius had lost his warhorse). But they had rallied and come again, to see the backs of those Latin women-stealers. If Jupiter had not answered the prayer of King Romulus they would have stormed the palisade before evening and Rome would have disappeared. Romulus, the king from nowhere, certainly enjoyed more than his fair share of luck; perhaps there was some truth in the legends about his divine parentage.
It seemed that King Romulus would welcome them on the very site of the battle. He sat there, on horseback, with all his men behind him. If they wished they could begin again that interrupted fight, and perhaps find out whether Jupiter would help the Romans a second time.
No, they could not fight, after all. The Romans were standing in line, drawn up in the usual three ranks (and doing it very well too; They must have been drilling recently). But they were unarmed, dressed in clean tunics and very large cloaks, all worn in the same way with the end thrown over the left shoulder. Standing thus, in clean white wool, they looked quite a pleasant set of men.
It was a graceful compliment, and Publius felt his heart warm to these Latin interlopers. To a meeting of ceremony the Sabines had of course brought their best armour and weapons, because in public a spearman carries his spear to show his status and anyway they none of them had long white cloaks of that fashion. To show that you trusted the truce-oath of strangers by coming unarmed to a conference was an elegant excess of politeness that would never enter the head of a plain, blunt Sabine spearman. All the same, it was a very good idea.
The two lines halted at a little distance, the two leaders embraced without dismounting, then King Romulus urged his horse forward so that all the visitors might hear his speech of welcome. But first he pointed to something on his right, and the Sabines craned to see it. At the foot of the Palatine stood a little square building of brick. It must be a storehouse of sacred things, for surrounding it they could see the peeled wands, stuck upright in the ground, that marked the limits of a consecrated templum. What a curious place to choose for the storage of sacred things, thought Publius; right out in the open, beyond the palisade, where any foe could break in.
King Romulus was explaining. ‘Friends, that building marks the spot where you nearly overcome me, when last you came to Rome. There I prayed to Jupiter the Stay of Armies, and he inspired my men to rally. In return I vowed to Jupiter that I would build a house for him to dwell in. That is the house, the dwelling of Jupiter Stator. Do you understand? Of course Jupiter has a templum, which I marked out with my own very lucky divining-staff. But within the templum we have built that house, of lasting brick, with the end open so that the god may come and go as he pleases. Inside an image of Jupiter reclines on a couch, and from time to time we carry in a table and put a g
ood dinner before him. Jupiter seems pleased, for when I watch the birds he sends good omens. So now you know. That building is the house of a god, the first house built for a god in these parts. Don’t go in if you have done anything that makes you ritually polluted. But whenever you look at it you can remember that it is a memorial to the courage of Latins and Sabines alike, who fought a drawn battle on this very plain; and that only a King who sees into the mind of a god as I do could have thoughts of building it. Your new home is under the special protection of the gods, and I interpret their will. This is a lucky city, ruled by a lucky King.’
Ruled by a long-winded King, Publius thought privately. But it was a sound idea, all the same, to persuade the Stay of Armies to live in Rome and keep an eye on Rome’s levies; and the building of the house on open ground below the palisade proved that King Romulus had confidence in the ability of his men to keep enemies at a distance. Perhaps this new plan of living cooped up with a lot of Latin foreigners would turn out better than he had expected.
King Romulus was speaking again. ‘Friends, you are very welcome. But my palisade is not big enough to hold us all, and I am sure you will feel more at your ease in a place of your own. For the present my people will remain on the Palatine, and you will build your huts and palisade on the Hill of the Spearmen over there, the Quirinal as we call it. But the two villages will remain one city, for our assembly will meet in this plain and all will be bound by the common decision. Here we are neither Latins nor Sabines, we are mere Romans. To prove it, let us gather at the assembly as individuals. Don’t let me see men marching in a body from either hill. I beseech you,’ he added more gravely, ‘in this lucky meeting-place, beside the house of the god, be Romans, not Quirinals or Palatines. Only thus can our city endure.’
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