The Roman (10 page)

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spring, but even the senators unblushingly had braziers put under their ivory stools during the meetings at the Curia. Aunt Laelia complained that the old virtues of Rome had gone. In the time cit Augustus, many an old senator would have preferred pneumonia or a lifetime of rheumatism to such unmanly coddling of his body. Aunt Laelia naturally wanted to see the feast of Lupercalia acid the procession, too. She assured us that the Emperor himself was the high priest and we should scarcely be summoned to Palatine on that day. Early on the morning of Idus in February, I accompanied her to as near the ancient fig free as it was possible to get. Inside the cave the Lupercalias sacrificed a goat in honor of Faunus Lupercus. The priest drew a sign on the foreheads of all the Lupercalias with his bloodstained knife and they all wiped it off again at once with a piece of holy linen which had been dipped in milk. Then they all burst into the ritual communal laughter. The sacred laughter which came from the cave was so lucid and terrifying that the crowd stiffened with piety and several distracted women ran ahead down the route the guards were keeping open for the procession with their holy bundles of sticks. In 11cc� cave the priests cut the hide of the goat into long strips with their sacrificial knives and then danced their sacred dance clown the route. They were all completely naked, laughing the sacred laughter and, with the strips of goatskin, whipping the women who had pushed forward onto the route so that they received bloodstains on their clothes. Dancing in this way, they circled the whole of Palatine Hill. Aunt Laelia was pleased and said that she had not heard the ritual laughter sound so solemn for many years. A woman who is touched by the Lupercalias� bloodstained strips of hide becomes pregnant within a year, she explained. It was an infallible remedy for infertility. She regretted that noble women did not want children, for it had been for the most part the wives of ordinary citizens who had come to be scourged by the Lupercalias, and she had not seen a single senator�s wife along the whole route. Some people in the tight-packed crowd of spectators said that they had seen Emperor Claudius in person leaping about and howling as he urged the Lupercalias on to the scourging, but we did not see him. When the procession had circled the hill

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and turned back to the cave to sacrifice a pregnant bitch, we went home and ate the customary meal of boiled goat meat and wheaten bread baked in the shape of human sexual organs. Aunt Laelia drank wine and expressed pleasure that the wonderful Roman spring was at last on its way after the miserable winter. Just as my father was urging her to take her midday siesta before she began to talk about things which were not suitable for my ears, a messenger slave from Narcissus, the Emperor�s secretary, came running breathlessly in to say that we must go to Palatine at once without delay. We went on foot with only Barbus accompanying us, which surprised the slave considerably. Fortunately we were both suitably clad for the occasion because of the feast. The slave, who was dressed in white and gold, told us that all the signs were favorable and that the festival rituals had been faultlessly carried out, so Emperor Claudius was in a very good mood. He was still entertaining the Lupercalias in his own rooms, dressed in the robes of the high priest. At the entrance to the palace we were thoroughly searched and Barbus had to stay outside because he was wearing his sword. My father was surprised that even I was searched, although I was a minor. Narcissus, the Emperor�s freedman and private secretary, was a Greek, emaciated from worries and his prodigious burden of work. He received us with unexpected friendliness, although my father had not sent him a gift. Quite openly he said that at a time which foreboded many changes, it was to the advantage of the State to honor reliable men who knew and remembered whom they had to thank for their position. To confirm this he rustled in the papers concerning my father and extracted a crumpled note which he handed to him. �It would be best if you yourself took care of this,� he said. �It�s a secret note from Tiberius� day on your character and habits. They are forgotten matters which are of no importance today.� My father read the paper, flushed, and hastily thrust it into his clothes. Narcissus went on as if nothing had happened. �The Emperor is proud of his knowledge and wisdom,� he said, �but he is inclined to fasten on to details and sometimes persists with some old matter for a whole day just to demonstrate his good memory, while forgetting the main point.�

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Who in his youth has not occasionally kept vigil in the groves of Baiae?� my father said in some confusion. �As far as I am concerned all that is in the past. In any case, I don�t know how to thank you. I have been told how strictly Emperor Claudius, mid especially Valeria Messalina, watch over the moral conduct iii the knights.� Perhaps one day I�ll let it be known how you can thank me:� said Narcissus with a bleak smile. �I am said to be a greedy man, hut you must not make the mistake of offering me money, Marcus Manilianus, I am the Emperor�s freedman. Thus my property is tin� Emperor�s property and everything I do as far as I am able is for the best for the Emperor and for the State. But we must hurry, for the most favorable moment is soon after a sacrificial meal when the Emperor is preparing for his siesta.� He took us to the south reception room, the walls of which were decorated with paintings of the Trojan war. With his own hand, he let down the sun-blind so that the sun should not glare too strongly into the room. Emperor Claudius arrived, supported on each side by his personal slaves who, at a sign from Narcissus sat him down on the Imperial throne. He was humming the Faunus hymn to himself and he peered at us shortsightedly. When he was tented, he looked more dignified than when standing, although his head kept nodding in different directions, He was easily recognizable from his statues and the replicas of his head on his� coins, though now he had spilled wine and sauce on himself during the meal. He was obviously cheered by the wine for the moment and was ready and eager to tackle matters of State before In� began to feel sleepy. Narcissus introduced us and said swiftly, �The matter is quite clear. Here is the family tree, the certificate of income and the Censor�s recommendation. Marcus Mezentius Manilianus has been ii prominent member of the city council in Antioch and is deserving of full compensation for the injustice that has been done to him He himself is not an ambitious man but his son can grow up and serve the State.� While Emperor Claudius mumbled about his youthful memories iii the astronomer Manilius, he unrolled the papers and read here and there in them. My mother�s ancestry captivated him and he� ruminated for a while.

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�Myrina,� he said. �That was the Queen of the Amazons who fought against the Gorgons, but then it was a Trachian, Mopsus, whom Lycurgus had exiled, who killed her in the end. Myrina was really her divine name. Her earthly name was Batieia. It would have been more suitable if your wife had used this earthly name. Narcissus, make a note of that and put it right in the papers.� My father reverently thanked the Emperor for this correction and promised to see to it at once that the statue the city of Myrina had erected in memory of my mother would bear the name of Batieia. The Emperor received the impression that my mother had been a famous woman in Myrina as the city had raised a statue of her. �Your Creek ancestors are very noble, boy,� he said, looking at me benignly with his bloodshot eyes. �Our culture is of Greece but the art of building cities is of Rome. You are pure and handsome like one of my gold coins on which I have had a Latin text imprinted on one side and a Greek on the other. How can such a beautiful and upright boy be called Minutus? That is exaggerated modesty.� My father hurriedly explained that he had postponed my day of manhood until my name could be placed in the rolls of knights in the temple of Castor and Pollux at the same time. It would be the greatest honor if Emperor Claudius would himself give me a suitable second name. �I have property in Caere,� he said. �My family goes back to the days when Syracuse destroyed the sea power of Caere. But those are things you know more about than I, Clarissimus.� �I thought your face was known to me in some way,� cried Claudius in delight. �Your face and eyes I recognize from the murals in the old Etruscan tombs I studied in my youth, although even then they were being destroyed by damp and neglect. If you are called Mezentius, then your son should be named Lausus. Do you know who Lausus was, boy?� I told him Lausus was a son of King Mezentius who fought together with Turnus against Aeneas. �That�s what it says in your history of the Etruscans,� I said innocently. �Otherwise I shouldn�t have known it.� �Have you really read my little book, despite your youth?�

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asked Claudius, and then he began to hiccough with emotion. Narcissus patted him gently on the back and ordered the slaves to fetch him more wine. Claudius invited us also to take wine, but warned me in a fatherly way not to drink wine undiluted until I was as old as he was. Narcissus took the opportunity to ask C:laudius for his signature to confirm my father�s knighthood. He signed willingly although I think he had forgotten what the matter was about. �Is it really your will that my son shall bear the name of Lausus I asked my father. �If so, it is the greatest honor I can think of that Emperor Claudius himself wishes to stand as godfather to him.� Claudius drank his wine, his head trembling. �Narcissus,� he said firmly. �Write that down too. You, Mezentins, just send a message to me when the boy is to have his hair nit and I�ll come as your guest if important matters of State do lint hinder me at the time.� 1-fe rose decisively and nearly stumbled before the slaves had time to come forward and support him. With a loud belch, he remarked, �My many learned works of research have made me absentminded, and I remember old things better than new things. So it would be best to note down at once everything I have promised and forbidden. Now I had better take my siesta and must vomit properly. Otherwise I shall have stomachache from that tough goat meat.� When he had left the room, supported by his two slaves, Narcissus turned to my father. �Let your boy receive the man-toga at the first suitable moment,� he advised, �and then let me know. It is possible that the Emperor will remember his promise to stand as godfather. At least I shall remind him about the name and his promise. Then he�ll pretend he has remembered, even if he has not.� Aunt Laelia had to go to great trouble to find even a few nobles who could be considered related to the Manilianus family. One of the guests was an old former consul who kindly held my hand while I sacrificed the pig. But most of them were women, contemporaries of Aunt Laelia, who were largely tempted to the house in the hope of a free meal. They gabbled like a flock of geese when the barber cut my hair short and shaved the scanty down

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from my chin. It was an effort to keep calm while they dressed me in the toga and stroked my limbs and patted my cheeks. They could hardly contain their curiosity when, because of the promise I had made, I took the barber up to my room and had him also shave off all the body hairs which showed my manhood. These I put together with the down from my chin into a silver box, the lid of which was decorated with a moon and a lion. The barber chatted and joked while going about his business, but also told me that it was not at all unusual that noble youths receiving the man-toga offered the hair from their private parts to Venus to win her favor. Emperor Claudius did not come to our family feast, but he had Narcissus send me the gold ring of knighthood and permission to have it written in the rolls that he personally had given me the name Lausus. Our guests went with my father and me to the temple of Castor and Pollux. My father paid the necessary dues into the archive, and then I had to put the gold ring on my thumb. My ceremonial toga with its narrow red border was ready. The ceremony was not particularly formal. From the archive we went to the meeting room of the Noble Order of Knights, where we paid for permission to choose our horses at the stables on Mars field. When we returned home, my father gave me the complete outfit of a Roman knight, a wrought-silver shield, a silver-plated helmet with red plumes, a long sword and a spear. The old ladies urged me to put it all on, and naturally I could not resist the temptation. Barbus helped me fasten the soft leather tunic and soon I was marching around the floor in my short red boots, strutting like a turkey cock with my helmet on my head and a drawn sword in my hand. It was already evening. Our house was ablaze with lights and outside people stood watching as well-wishers came and went. The spectators greeted with acclamation the arrival of a finely decorated sedan which was carried up to our entrance by two coal- black slaves. Aunt Laelia, tripping over her garments, rushed up to meet this late arrival, and out of the sedan stepped a short plump woman whose silk gown revealed almost too clearly her voluptuous figure. Her face was hidden behind a purple veil, but she drew it to one side and allowed Aunt Laelia to kiss her

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on both cheeks. She had fine-drawn features and a beautifully painted face. Aunt Laelia, her voice shrill with emotion, called out, �Minutus, my dear, this is the noble Tullia Valeria, who wants to wish you good fortune. She is a widow, but her late husband was a real Valerius.� The woman, still startlingly beautiful although she had reached a mature age, stretched out her arms and swept me, armor and toward and all, to her bosom. �Oh, Minutus Lausus,� she cried, �I heard that the Emperor himself has given you your second name and I am not surprised now I see your face. If my fortunes and your father�s whims had allowed it, you could be my own son. Your father and I were good friends in our time, but he must still be ashamed of his behavior toward me as he didn�t come to see me as soon as he came to Rome.� She was still clasping me tenderly in her arms so that I could feel her soft breast and smell the stupefying scent of her perfumed salves as she looked around. When my father caught sight of her face he stiffened, turned deathly pale and made a movement as if he wished to turn and flee. The lovely Tullia took my hand and approached my father with a charming smile on her face �Don�t be afraid, Marcus,� she said. �On a day like this I forgive you everything. What is past is past, and don�t let us grieve over But I have filled many flasks with my tears because of you, you heartless man.� She let me go, wound her arms around my father�s neck and kissed him tenderly on his lips. My father shook himself free, trembling from head to foot, and said reproachfully, �Tullia, Tullia, you should know better. I�d rather see a Gorgon head than your face here in my house tonight.� But Tullia put her hand over his mouth and turned to Aunt Laelia, Marcus hasn�t changed at all,� she said. �Someone should take care of him. When I see how confused he is and hear him talk in that unreasonable way, I regret that I overcame my pride and came to him when he was ashamed to come to me.� This beautiful silk-clad woman entranced me, however old she