FOR WANT OF THE HAMMER
- Thread starter tuareg109
- Start date
tuareg109
Banned
Looks like Sulla had a hard attack
Speaking of licentiousness, any more stuff with Calva?
Gah, I'll never live it down!
The months are picking up pace again (wow that Grain Robbery phase went by slowly!), so we'll be seeing a bit more of her, yes.
tuareg109
Banned
FOR WANT OF THE HAMMER
THE ELECTIONS, 647 AVC
THE ELECTIONS, 647 AVC
Though the weather was fine and perfect all through that September, the Ludi Romani were absolutely dismal. The solemn pompa circensis and the chariot race were of course celebrated; however, they were the only entertainment forthcoming from this year's four Aediles. The Aediles--two Curule, who could be patrician or plebeian; and two Plebeian, who as their title indicated had to be plebeians--were in charge of the upkeep and repair of Rome's public buildings, the streets, fountains, sewers, canals, aqueducts, temples, and more. The four men elected each years were given a woefully small stipend form the Treasury at the beginning of the year, and naturally had to dig into their own purses long before the ornate and lavish Ludi Romani that started on September 5th and lasted 14 days. What a disaster, and after such a radically violent year.
"Well," said Romans to each other as the heavily anticipated elections drew to a close, "at least we have Quintus Mucius as Aedile next year; he's sure to do a good job." Quintus Mucius Scaevola Pontiff had been elected senior Curule Aedile; his deep purse and generosity had helped secure that office despite stinging reminders of his ex-wife's unfaithfulness. Being a Patrician Mucius, he could not have even run for Plebeian Aedile; the same was true for his colleague, Appius Claudius Pulcher. A doggedly determined, though not quite wealthy enough for his position, man, Pulcher was married to Nepos's sister Caecilia Metella Balearica, but was too proud to ask any of that huge and rich clan for assistance.
Gaius Servilius Glaucia was, of course, returned as senior Consul; his monumental Veto and his actions during the terror of Gaius Fulcinius were on every Roman's lips. Lucius Cassius Longinus Ravilla was his junior colleague, and had in fact left the city for Macedonia accompanied by his own son Longinus Junior, and by Marcus Livius Drusus Junior; his son held status only as a cadet, but the decorated hero Drusus was accorded the status of unelected Tribune of the Soldiers.
Ravilla had really only sought the Consulship in order to be able to persecute a more aggressive war against the Thracian, Illyrian, and Macedonian tribes. Though the title itself had a fine and prestigious ring to it, Ravilla was a military man at heart, and valued the broad and powerful Consular Imperium it endowed upon him more than he did the social distinction; besides, he wouldn't be in Rome long enough until the end of next year at the earliest to capitalize on that distinction. His wife Claudia could stay in Rome and lord it over her friends and deal with her brother's Aedilician woes; Lucius Cassius was going to Macedonia to teach his son to be a man, and perhaps to gain an agnomen along the way.
Lucius Aurelius Cotta didn't go back to Macedonia with Ravilla, because he had not been requested. It was a blow to the friendship between them, of course; however, since it had been Lucius Cotta who had begun to drift away from the Cassii in the first place, it didn't wound him too much. The only awkwardness was that Ravilla's wife Claudia was the sister of Lucius Cotta's biological mother, who had died when he had been nine years old. A much better prospect had presented itself in a place with Spurius Dellius against the Germans in the Hispaniae! Since Lucius Cotta's beloved stepmother was Rutilia, and her brother was Publius Rutilius Rufus, and his good friend was Sulla, Lucius Cotta had managed to get an introduction with Sulla, who had liked what he saw. The young man was noble, brave, and quite determined, but not too ambitious; he got along famously with two other young men Sulla cultivated closely: Quintus Caecilius Metellus (son of Numidicus), and Marcus Livius Drusus. A shame that Drusus had elected to go to Macedonia in order to keep his beleaguered friend Caepio Junior company! Sulla just couldn't understand helping somebody so beneath one's self in dignity and intelligence, if that aid hampered one's career.
Only Marcus Cotta--for show--and Marcus Atius Balbus--noble brother-in-law of Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo--ran for Consul otherwise; to their chagrin, this election was a landslide in all respects.
As for the Praetors, Publius Licinius Crassus came to the fore despite his sister's indiscreet affair and Repudietmatrimonium; indeed, he garnered the greatest number of votes, and thus became next year's Urban Praetor. Things did not bode well for Spurius Dellius's investigation into the murders of the three rogue Senators; Crassus, though not knowing Metellus Nepos's involvement, was still tied enough to the man's ideology. What's done is done, he thought, and good riddance! Another Licinius, Publius Nerva, took the second place; also included were Lucius Marcus Philippus--a Plebeian Marcius, and not a mean orator--and Quintus Varius--the ineffective Grain Quaestor of last year.
Rome proved that it was not opposed to sexual scandal, if this was also coupled with stunning competence and ruthlessness; Metellus Nepos polled the top spot for Quaestor, and joined lucky Propraetor Lucius Valerius Flaccus in the party preparing to depart for Sicily. Since Lucius Valerius was as much Nepos's toad as Ahenobarbus's, he would do as he was told; yes, Nepos--since he was not greedy, and had quite enough money already--would leave Sicily with thousands and thousands of clients in all the right places. Ideal for a man who aimed for the highest offices.
Polling in second place due to his extensive canvassing and tales of his competency and perseverance in Gallia Narbonensis was none other than Picentine Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo; since Nepos was leaving to serve under a governor, the task of Grain Quaestor fell to the second-highest-polling man. Ostia, having heard the tales of his brutality, would work hard to keep him happy and avoid any other mistakes such as that which had seen Marcus Antonius dead.
Polling third, strangely enough, was Sextus Julius Caesar, son of impoverished Gaius Julius Caesar and brother of Spurius Dellius's wife; it seemed as though that man's popularity had extended to include his in-laws. Sextus Julius was immediately admitted into the Hispanic fold, and would be joining Dellius and his large party for that governorship.
Also elected were that popular--for no other reason than that he was so contrarian, and had defied the Boni--little man Gaius Coelius Caldus, and amateur historian Publius Cornelius Sissina, and that dull Publius Rutilius cognominated Lupus who revolted and embarrassed his distinguished and distant cousin Rutilius Rufus, and the Quintus Marcius Rex who was elected more for being the son of the famous aqueduct-builder than for his own merits--he was also Sextus Caesar's cousin, for Sextus Caesar's mother was a Marcia Regina. The man polling tenth, scraping in last and just ahead of the usual huddle of failed aspiring New Men, was Gnaeus Servilius Caepio, Quintus Caepio Senior's younger brother; it had been he who surprisingly and disastrously lost the election for Quaestor during the dark Populist days after Catulus Caesar's defeat. This Caepio promptly attached himself to Ravilla and went to the aid of his nephew Quintus Caepio Junior.
The Tribunes of the Plebs were, as was always the most interesting, a mixed bag. Coming in at the top of the poll, and thus President-elect of the College of Tribunes of the Plebs, was none other than Lucius Appuleius Saturninus; word of his information and aid had spread from Scaurus, who was grateful, and the unassuming but efficient Grain Quaestor's popularity--high in any case due to low grain prices--soared overnight. Coming in at a somewhat distant second was Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus; he didn't care that he wasn't in the top spot, because his arrangement with Glaucia ensured that Glaucia's friend Saturninus wouldn't interfere with his planned legislation. Also elected were silver-tongued and golden-voiced Lucius Licinius Crassus Orator, and the less highly-regarded Lucius Licinius Lucullus; this was a year for Licinii. Quintus Pompeius Rufus, distant cousin to Pompeius Strabo, also sallied in to round off the more famous names among the Plebeian Tribunes.
Only one more election remained: that for Censor. Since the Censors were only elected once every five years, there were usually ten men--five sets of two Consul in each year in between, and perhaps several more Consulars who hadn't gotten the post in the last election, running for Censor. This year's election was just as hotly contested. Though two men--Quintus Caecilius Metellus Numidicus and Titus Bruttius--of the intervening years were dead, and two--Spurius Postumius Albinus and Marcus Junius Silanus--exiled in disgrace, and two--Lucis Vettius and Catulus Caesar--quite disgraced, and two--Quintus Hortensius and Servius Sulpicius Galba--were widely regarded to be whimpering pansies, the election was dangerous. Among those running were such greats as Scipio Nasica, Manius Acilius Balbus, Lucius Calpurnius Bestia, Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus, Gnaeus Papirius Carbo, and Marcus Caecilius Metellus--one of Metellus Nepos's three uncles. This list did not even include Marcus Minucius Rufus and Publius Rutilius Rufus--the only two Consuls of the past five years unequivocally popular enough to run; nor did it include Marcus Aemilius Scaurus Princeps Senatus Consul Suffectus!
"Marcus Aemilius!" cried Lucius Pontifex Maximus in the Senate House when he announced his candidacy for the Censorship. "You can't! You're Princeps Senatus, and Consul Suffectus; besides, you were Censor just five years ago, during the last term!"
"So?" was Scaurus's only reply. He sat in the greatest ease on his stool at the very bottom middle of one of the Senate's sides.
"Why--it's--" began Lucius Pontifex Maximus, flustered at the legality of the act.
"It's too much power in one man's hands!" said Catulus Caesar from his seat a few men down from Scaurus. Since the trial and Scaurus's attempted conviction of him, Catulus Caesar had remained understandably distant; holding great grudges, he now attempted to drag Scaurus down at every opportunity.
"Power, pah!" snorted Scaurus derisively. "I am the only man I know to be beyond reproach, and the only man who can do the job well enough. I will not disgrace the Censor's chair, because I have not in the past."
"You can't run!" shouted Drusus from his seat next to Scipio Nasica and across the Senate floor from Scaurus; his hard black eyes were trained on his momentary enemy.
"I piss on you!" shouted Scaurus. "Why can I not run? I am greater than all of you, I am First Man in Rome!"
Of course, being Scaurus, he had his way in the end. His actions as investigator of Marcus Antonius death, and his bold conduct in the Senate, ensured him the top spot. And, despite all the canvassing and politicking and badmouthing that they did, all those august and anciently noble men lost the second place to the last horse entered into the race; Publius Rutilius Rufus, due to his relative successes against such mighty boogeyman savages as the Germans, was now Censor of the Res publica.
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tuareg109
Banned
FOR WANT OF THE HAMMER
LOSS, 647 AVC
LOSS, 647 AVC
Naturally news of the elections reached the home of the Aurelii Cottae long before Marcus Aurelius Cotta came home from the Forum. Though Cotta had announced that he would come home at an early hour and tell them the news himself, Rutilia had not been able to wait; she'd sent a fleet slave to the Forum with orders to report back to her as soon as the Consuls were elected. The slave had returned and duly reported to his mistress.
Aurelia, who was in the process of beginning a magnificent wedding dress, jumped with fright as her mother Rutilia rounded the corner and shouted "Aurelia!" It was a shout because Rutilia only spoke in two voices; she was either placid and quiet--but not timid, or loud with rare anger. So it was with a sigh of combined relief and resignation that Aurelia put down her work at the loom and turned to look at her mother. Rutilia was frozen at the door with a look of disbelief, not rage, on her face.
"You're father's lost the election," she said simply, so strange after the shout of her daughter's name.
"Oh," said Aurelia who, along with all of Rome, had quite expected it. "Well, he has next year. I doubt any of this year's Praetors will appeal to the electors next year."
"Aurelia, a man who loses election in his proper year is always regarded as less than a man coming home from a successful governorship abroad! Do you think that Lucius Valerius Flaccus won't do stunningly in Sicily, with that fiend Metellus Nepos to help him? And what about Spurius Dellius in Spain, huh? This humiliating trick of Fate that brought your father home before news of the Germans arrived in the Hispaniae will come to the fore again when Spurius Dellius returns more-or-less victorious; don't make that face, Aurelia. You've admitted yourself that the man's very competent."
"At least," admitted Aurelia, still making that face. "He hasn't got the blood, though."
"He came in as Urban Praetor this year, without the blood. Two New Men were Consuls this year, without the blood."
Aurelia rolled her eyes, "This year's crop of magistrates are a freak accident, a symptom of Quintus Lutatius's defeat. It won't happen again."
"The electors are so fickle, of course it will happen again! All it takes is another mistake, and your father will never be Consul. It could have happened this year."
Aurelia sighed. Her mother had changed so much in the past few months. First she had been very supportive of Aurelia's biding her time, and waiting for the right man; likely she'd been afraid of losing her only daughter. But then, when Cotta came back from governing the Hispaniae, she'd begun overnight to pressure Aurelia into marrying some august nobleman. Of course the list of men who qualified was endless: Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Junior, Macus Livius Drusus Junior, Lucius Cassius Longinus Junior, Gnaeus and Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, Quintus Caecilius Metellus (son of Numidicus), the young Metelli Caprarilli, Quaestor Quintus Marcius Rex, divorced Quintus Mucius Scaevola, bumbling Quaestor Gnaeus Servilius Caepio, and many many others.
Cotta's fortune was large enough that Aurelia's dowry was 200 talents--about twice the usual dowry for the daughter of a respected Senator; coupled with her stunning good looks and intelligence, and it was apparent that Aurelia was the most eligible bachelorette in all of Rome--perhaps in all of Roman history, even.
A marriage with any one of the men above would have brought Cotta political ties and alliances for himself as well as his sons, and would have ensured election, what with the new allies ordering their clients to vote for Cotta. However, Cotta had refused to allow Aurelia to marry for his sake, and so he had lost.
"Mama," said Aurelia in a strained voice, "you know that the Consulship is not so important to father. There must be another reason for your anger. Is it because I'm leaving? Is it because you want the pain to be over; you want me gone and the anticipation over as soon as possible?"
Typical of Aurelia, she had hit the issue squarely. All angry defiance from Rutilia collapsed and she ended in clutching at her daughter, crying. The two women sat on Aurelia's bed and their positions were reversed; normally a Roman mother would be comforting her daughter at the prospect of marriage, but it was now the daughter who comforted the mother. When Marcus Aurelius Cotta arrived home several hours later it was to find quite a tranquil home.
"Come on, out here girls! We're all going out," shouted Cotta into the house, shattering the silence with his voice and with the tumult and shouts that always accompanied his three sons, who had gone with him to the Forum. When Aurelia and Rutilia emerged from the former's room wondering what was the matter, though they knew of course of his loss at the election, Cotta answered happily, "Uncle Publius has secured election as Censor; we're going to his house to congratulate him."
"Oh that's wonderful!" the women beamed; Rutilia especially was proud that her brother, the son and grandson of men who had gotten no higher than Tribune of the Plebs, had attained the final and crowning title that a plebeian could hold--only a patrician could be Princeps Senatus. Off the Cotta clan went to the Publius Rutilius Rufus house, which already had several well-wishers and revelers inside of it.
"Sister!" cried Rufus to his sister. "Brother!" he cried to his brother-in-law. "Daughter!" he cried to his niece, whom he loved as a daughter. Off Aurelia went to see the other woman he called his daughter, with whom she had always gotten along with well. There she was, Caecilia Metella Sullana, standing with her aunt Metella Calva. So...yes, there was Tribune of the Plebs-elect Lucius Licinius Lucullus, talking with Sulla. Such a eerily beautiful man--Sulla, that is, thought Aurelia. Nobody would quite think of Lucullus as being beautiful.
"Caecilia Metella," said Aurelia after she had kissed Metella Calva's cheek; one had to, after all, accord respect to elders first. Then, "Caecilia Sullana," and she kissed the girl's cheek and hugged her with much more vigor; they'd basically grown up together. "How is little Cornelia?" she asked; Aurelia was quite enamored of the baby.
Caecilia Sullana got a bewitched, loving gleam in her eyes. "Oh, she's amazing! The most wonderful little darling, oh she's beautiful!"
Aurelia was beaming; she adored the mite so much, that it was mostly when thinking of her that she certainly wished to get married, if only to have an adorable child of her own. "Is she crawling yet? Or talking?"
"Oh, she's far from talking, Aurelia, but she does have this adorable little crawl! I lay her down on her belly a she wriggles around like the cutest little worm, making the most adorable little sounds of effort."
"You'll have to invite me some day!" cried Aurelia, heart melting. "So I take it you don't avail yourself of nannies?"
"Certainly not!" exclaimed Caecilia Sullana, aghast. "A Roman child shouldn't spend its first few years with a Greek or Gallic nursemaid; it isn't proper. In any case, Lucius Cornelius would never allow it."
"Very sensible," Aurelia nodded, and resolved to be the only one involved in her children's infancy. "Just look what happened to Aulus Manlius Torquatus."
"Poor man," said Sullana, shaking her head. "He doesn't know whether he's a Gaul or a Roman, and all because his parents left him to a Gallic nursemaid until his sixth year; he's practically unelectable. Mind you," said Sullana, making a face, "I still don't think it was fair at all for his parents to crucify that Gallic slave; it wasn't her fault."
"And you two girls weren't even alive during all that!" exclaimed Metella Calva, jealous enough of this conversation to butt in. "I was about, oh, ten years old during all that; Rome had never seen anything quite like it. The poor boy scarcely knew a word of Latin."
"Well," said Aurelia with finality after a pause of contemplation, "rest assured that I will always be by the side of my children! Their Latin will be impeccable, and their Greek will come from the most Attic of tutors."
"Very good," nodded Sullana, and then broke into a smile. "Oh, Lucius Cornelius's Greek is of the purest Attic dialect; it's as if he was born in Athens. Would you believe it, though, he knows what seems like ten different types of Latin! Our noble Latin, the Latin of the Third Class shopkeepers, and that Latin--if you can even call it Latin, that is--of those in the Subura. That last...what a hodgepodge of Latin, Aramaic, Greek, Hebrew, and the gods know what else that is!"
"It seems as though Lucius Cornelius," said Metella Calva innocently, "has a very talented tongue."
Six days after the elections, Consul Ravilla was in Brundisium awaiting transport to Macedonia, and Quintus Servilius Caepio Senior received a letter from the Consul's destination. He screamed, and his servants came running; when they asked what was wrong, he wrenched away from them and ran out into the street, howling and crying and tearing at his hair. He became entangled in his toga and tripped and fell onto the street, accumulating cuts and scrapes and bruises; he stumbled up clad only in tunic, the center of much noble attention on the Palatine, and became stained with the green grass and brown mud of the open park-like spaces of the Palatine. Slaves ran out to see who was disturbing the peace in this very strict and noble neighborhood, and reported back to their masters that Quintus Servilius Caepio Senior had gone mad. Not that Caepio Senior cared, for he was Caepio Senior no more; he was plain Quintus Servilius Caepio, now that his son was dead.
After Ravilla's departure from Macedonia for Rome, Caepio Junior had wasted no time in making himself hated. He would strut around with an air of superiority, casually insulting rankers for the smallest of offenses and then retreating into the very comfortable governor's house when the heat of Quintilis and Sextilis sun and the hate of thousands of men became too much for him. The rankers, of course, had to drill and build and stand and live and sleep in the very hot and very dry weather; they didn't contemplate mutiny, of course, but they resolved not to follow this idiot on an idiotic venture.
So it was that Gnaeus Gavius, Ravilla's best and more respected centurion and coincidental third cousin of Sulla's late stepmother's late nephew, had no trouble with convincing the legions not to leave camp when the plume of smoke was seen one day. It was shortly after dawn that the smoke rose, and it was accompanied by a wave of dust that inexorably approached the camp wherein resided six Roman legions. Shouts and screams drifted into the camp with the wind, and the men knew that it was the nearby farming village populated by Romanized Dardani that was being attacked.
Caepio Junior had sallied out of his command house and into the sun, there to address the legions and whip them up into battle readiness, only to find them not at all receptive to his emotions. "What are you, cowards? Women? Sheep?" he harangued, not aware that when Ravilla and others insulted them so, it was with a different air and tone of voice.
The men stood quietly, grinding their teeth at these insults from a boy who'd never killed a man, never constructed a palisade, never dug the trenches for a camp, never done anything for himself in his life. Then Gnaeus Gavius had spoken up. "Sir, were you Lucius Cassius Longinus with his Propraetorian command, we would follow you; however, you're here only to hold the fort, and don't know much about command besides. It could be an ambush," he added quickly, trying to appeal to Caepio Junior's sense of self-preservation; though he hated the arrogant shit, it was no part of Gnaeus Gavius's plan to be the cause of a Patrician Servilius's death.
"That is a grievous insult!" shouted Caepio Junior, unaware of the irony of this statement and of the rage it provoked in the rankers. "My ancestor Publius Servilius Priscus was Consul in the second decade of the Republic's existence! My ancestor Gaius Servilius Ahala killed Spurius Maelius, who tried to make himself king! My ance--"
His high voice was interrupted by the deep roar of one old centurion near the front of the crowd. "We know history too, you patrician shit! Maelius was a wealthy man who sold grain to the plebs for cheap, because you patrician assholes wanted the plebs to starve to death!"
"You liar, he wa--" Caepio Junior's shout was drowned out in boos and cries of "patrician scum" and "little shit". Red-faced and shouting, he left the assembly and marched over to the camp of the Thraco-Illyrian auxiliary cavalry, who were stunned at the noise and venom coming from the center of the Roman camp. "Come on," he said harshly to Lucius Cassius Teres, a man of the Triballi who had been awarded by Ravilla with the citizenship. "We're going out to ride against those raiders; the legions are too slow and incompetent."
Aware that something was wrong, but not wishing to endanger his new citizenship and also angry that someone should raid these lands, which were his ancestral homelands, Lucius Cassius Teres gathered the 5,000 troopers around and sallied out with Caepio Junior in the lead. The Roman legions of Ravilla's piled onto the creaking eastern walls and watched them depart.
Gnaeus Gavius had been quite correct; it was a Dardanian ambush. The sounds of battle lasted only half an hour--it only took half an hour for dozens of thousands of Dardanians to draw Caepio Junior and his auxiliary troopers and slaughter every single man. A lone young man, tall and very strong from the look of him, rode toward the Roman camp and stopped just out of bowshot. Taking a round object out of the bag at his side, he swung it round and round and round, gaining momentum until he let go. It flew up and up, and landed just inside the Roman camp.
It was the head of Quintus Servilius Caepio Junior.
tuareg109
Banned
So incompetent Caepio Jr. dies.
And Metella Calva would definitely know something about Sulla's "talented tongue".
Does he really??? Well, I have to have some way of keeping people interested in the TL!
You do. Something you haven't shown us yet: Cimbri-Teutonic POVs!!!
Well, I have to have some way of keeping people interested in the TL!
tuareg109
Banned
So incompetent Caepio Jr. dies. And Metella Calva would definitely know something about Sulla's "talented tongue".
!!!!! Why the name change???
Grouchio said:
All in due time my pretty, all in due time.
tuareg109
Banned
FOR WANT OF THE HAMMER
DEATH OF BLACKBIRDS, 647 AVC
DEATH OF BLACKBIRDS, 647 AVC
It was October 4th, two months and a few days since the deaths of Fulcinius, Memmius, and Fimbria, and everything in Rome seemed to be returning to normal. Aulus Hirtius, Deputy-Governor of Sicily and competent subordinate of the late Marcus Antonius, was fully complying with the Senate; all of Sicily's hidden grain was being sent to Rome. As a result, prices plummeted and the Senate's popularity soared.
As for the deaths of the swindlers and their unwitting victim-collaborator, Spurius Dellius was only reaching dead end after dead end; it seemed as if the prime mover of the whole affair, whether he was Marcus Anicius or Numerius Viccius, had completely disappeared. It was well for Spurius Dellius that his steady year-long fairness and competence allowed him to remain popular, and allowed him to keep his command in the Hispaniae.
The Senate, confident of its popularity, had listened to Marcus Livius Drusus and agreed: the man to govern the Hispaniae and fight the Germans had to be a Consular with vast amounts of military experience; a Propraetor would not do. It issued its Senatus Consultum--its suggestion, for the Senate was now trumped even in the issue of governors and provinces by the Plebeian Assembly--and waited to see what would happen. The next day the nine Tribunes of the Plebs--the tenth, Gaius Fulcinius, was of course dead--convened and drafted a law to force the Senate to accept Spurius Dellius's command; the popularity of Dellius and of the law's main drafter, Tribune and Consul-elect Gaius Servilius Glaucia, was what gave it nearly one hundred percent of the vote. The Senate had lost, and Spurius Dellius had his command etched in stone.
That meeting ended in tumult and argument, with strained Lucius Vettius adjourning early and looking harried; Flamen Dialis Lucius Cornelius Merula, as usual, walked the short distance to his home not much bothered. Some Senators shivered in the new autumn wind and chill, and others suffered under the weight of many cloth layers; Merula, being Flamen Dialis, had his heavy and warm woolen laena cloak, and was quite used to it by now.
He was the man who Caninia--widow of Marcus Antonius--and Servilia Caepionis--wife of Catulus Caesar--had seen with ten-foot pole in hand and banging away at the side of his house. What he'd actually been doing, however, was dislodging and destroying a wasp's nest. Though wasps were not forbidden for the Flamen Dialis to deal with or coexist with, they were a nuisance and could drive away what few visitors he had. So he had knocked the nest down and rested easy.
Until a few weeks later, when he arrived home from his friend Lucius Cornelius Sissina's house and found--of all things!--a nest of blackbirds under the eave of his house, exactly where the wasp's nest had been! Birds and other creatures of the sky were sacred to Jupiter Optimus Maximus; for Merula, who was the Great God's High Priest, this was an excellent omen. Combine this with the fact that the cognomen Merula literally meant "blackbird", and the magic of this event was certainly enough to cancel out any residual ill feeling from the Supplicia Canum. The College of Augurs logged the omen in the Sacred Books and disseminated the news throughout Rome; Rome's standing with the Great God was high once again!
Merula and his friend Sissina would walk around talking of all things scholarly and collecting likely twigs and grasses; these items were then piled near the blackbirds' nest, for their use. And use them the birds did! Soon they were cooing and begging to be petted by either of the two friends; when some of the mean alley cats of Rome came, drawn to the fat quarry, Merula and Sissina forced them away in the most brutal ways possible. Once they even managed to hit one in the head very hard with a stone; it was dead, and was placed on the walk to Merula's door, to drive away evil spirits and other cats.
The birds had grown to their full size, and the female had lain eggs some weeks ago; these eggs were due to hatch any day now. So Merula hurried home, eager to see the hatching, and disappointed when the eggs were safe but unchanged. He went into the house and sent a muttering, wrapped-up slave out into the cold wind to watch the nest. Merula went inside, still hearing the howl of the wind that wrapped around his public house, and wrote several short letters to the various other scholars and shut-ins he knew around Rome; most of his time was occupied drafting a long diatribe for Sissina, on a matter of philosophical dispute. Then came the shout from without.
Merula ran outside as fast as the heavy laena would allow him, pausing only to don the ivory apex that he had to wear outside of his own house, and saw disaster. Twigs and grasses and dirt were scattering in the wind, and clumps of dried mud lay quaking on the flagstones that were his front walk. Six eggs of almost-developed birds lay smashed against the ground, and a large, crooked black crow lay with its neck broken next to them. Of the adult birds there was no sign.
Merula ran forward shouting and went down on his knees, down to examine the eggs. The slave was blubbering apologies and excuses. "Dominus, a s-sudden gust o-of wind; please D-domin-nus, I swear I had nothing to d-do with it!"
The slave kept protesting his innocence until Merula said flatly, "I know." Five slimy almost-birds, already almost dry in the dust and dirt that the wind carried, had never breathed; one was quaking and opening its mouth in Merula's hands. It was so small, only the length of his pinkie finger, and yet he saw so much of it, so much in it. The closed, bulging eyes, the tiny orange beak, the wings plastered to the body, the hard twig-like legs. Something broke in Lucius Cornelius Merula. Ironically, it was not the fact that this was an even worse omen and transgression than the touching of a dog during the Supplicia Canum that changed him; it was the simple brutality of it, the fact that this poor little thing that had never harmed a thing, had no chance.
He calmly went into his house, drew a hot bath, and slit his wrists.
Rome was in a complete uproar the next day. Not in living memory had there been such an insane and unfortunate year, even before the Flamen Dialis's suicide; now that the Great God's main servant had killed himself, there was nobody to guide the spirit-forces that the Roman state had contracts with. Who would be the new Flamen Dialis, and what degree of rituals would be needed to wash away the stain of Merula's sin?
As it stood, there were in fact only two men who fit the criteria to become Flamen Dialis. Namely, that they had never been married, that they were Patricians, that they were the sons of Senators, and that they held no public office; these two young men were Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Junior and Gaius Julius Caesar--son of the poorer Gaius Julius of the junior branch, and brother of Spurius Dellius's wife Julia.
Scipio Nasica Senior, with his connections all over the city, naturally heard the news almost before everybody else. Determined to see his son become Consul--something a Flamen Dialis could never do--he summoned his son to him and said, "You're marrying Livia Drusa tomorrow." Since Caepio Junior's death fifteen days ago, 19-year-old Livia Drusa--who had been betrothed to the young man--was once again single and eligible; many men had sued for her lucrative hand--for she was beautiful as well as possessed of a huge dowry of 400 talents--not the least of whom was Scipio Nasica Junior. Now the father planned to speed the process along, and to put all his pressure on Marcus Livius Drusus. Surely the man would see the urgency in the matter?
And he did. "We all know the grudges those bastard Flamines hold against us Pontiffs; if your son does not marry Livia Drusa tomorrow, they will force him, and not unnoticeable Gaius Julius Caesar, to be Flamen Dialis." Livia Drusa passed from her father's possession and into Scipio Nasica's Junior on the 6th of October.
Which left only one young man to be Flamen Dialis. "Don't worry, father," said young Gaius Julius Caesar to his father; Lucius Pontifex Maximus had arrived to explain the situation, and had left to allow the Caesars to talk it out. "I am intelligent and scholarly, but you've always known that I'm not very ambitious. Sure, I love a race on the Campus Martius now and then, but the great Greek works and our own Latin and Etruscan Sacred Books interest me far more now. As Flamen Dialis I can serve Rome and the Great God in my own way, and without needing to press you and Sextus"--Gaius Junior's brother, elected Quaestor and preparing the depart with Spurius Dellius--"for money and land. In fact, both Sextus's sons and mine have a much better chance at the curule chair if I go this way. The state is forced to provide me with land, slaves, a house, and a salary. As it stands, you can give all that is yours to Sextus, and I will be fine."
Gaius Julius Caesar Senior did not weep, for a Roman never wept, but he did want to. What better way was there for a man to prove himself but upon the field of battle? And how could his son, as Flamen Dialis, even spend a day outside of Rome, let alone touch metal or see death? Oh, were that it had been Sextus! Sextus was just as intelligent, and the father loved Sextus just as well, but the young man had the wheezes; these whistles heard on expiration of breath worsened with exposure to horses and stress. Horses and stress were two things that a soldier dealt with daily; Sextus would have made a much better Flamen Dialis!
But alas, Sextus was an elected official; it was not to be. Now Gaius Julius Caesar had only to find a virgin patrician for wife; one was duly offered. The greatest irony of them all? She was Cornelia Scipionis Nasica, younger sister of Gaius Julius's quick and lucky temporary rival.
I have the creeping suspicion that this update as it was written this early morning would have been a lot better
I have the creeping suspicion that this update as it was written this early morning would have been a lot better
Trust me, this is quite good.
tuareg109
Banned
Okay, I trust you
Tsar Gringo said:
Thanks and no, the Romans are simply very superstitious; this terrible omen coupled with the events and omens of the past year simply got to the (socially isolated and somewhat weird) Flamen Dialis.