“It’s about that amulet, that family heirloom of yours. I see you’re wearing it today, Lucius.”
Lucius touched the lump of gold at his breast.
“I have been c-c-consulting with my old tutor, Titus Livius,” said Claudius, his speech slightly slurred. “Of course you’ve read his history of the city, from its earliest beginnings. No? Neither of you? Not even the parts about your own family? Most people at least have a slave search through the scrolls to find the mentions of their ancestors.” Claudius shook his head. “Well, my conversations with Livius have confirmed my initial belief that this talisman can be identified as a fascinum. In other words, long ago, before the details were worn away, it would have depicted a magical phallus, probably a winged phallus, considering the shape. If you squint and use a bit of imagination, you can visualize the amulet as it originally appeared.” Without asking, he reached out and took hold of the talisman, pulling the necklace towards him and Lucius along with it. “Yes, look – here is the shaft, and here the t-testes, and here the two little wings!”
Claudius released the amulet. Lucius took it between his fingers and gazed down at it, feeling profoundly disappointed. A fascinum? Such trinkets were exceedingly common, worn for protection by women in childbirth and put around the necks of infants to protect them from the harmful gaze of the envious, the so-called evil eye. Even slaves wore them.
“So that’s all it is?” Lucius said. “Nothing but a common fascinum?”
Claudius wagged his finger. “Ah, hardly c-c-common! No, this fascinum is special, very special. Indeed, if my conjectures are correct, it could be the oldest such amulet in existence. These days, a fascinum is thought of as a mere trinket, a good-luck charm. One sees them made of cheap metal, hanging from the necks of slaves. Hardly anyone remembers the god Fascinus, from whom such amulets take their name, but the winged phallus appears in some of the most ancient stories told by our ancestors. Such a manifestation appeared in the hearthfire to the mother of King Servius Tullius, and even earlier, another such manifestation appeared to one of the kings of Alba, Tarketios, and demanded to have intercourse with his daughter. No god who takes such a form was ever described by the Greeks, or indeed by any of the peoples that Roma has conquered. We may conclude that the god Fascinus appeared exclusively to our ancestors, and must have played some role in the origins of Roma.
“Furthermore, not every fascinum is a mere trinket. One of the holiest objects of the state religion is the sacred fascinum in the keeping of the Vestal virgins. I’ve seen the thing myself. It’s larger than life and very heavy, made of solid g-g-gold. For centuries, the Virgo Maxima has placed it in a hidden spot under the ceremonial chariot driven by generals during their triumphal pro cessions, to ward off the evil eye. You could count on one hand the people who know the origin of this c-c-custom – Titus Livius, the Virgo Maxima, myself
… and probably no one else, since you Pinarii seem to have neglected to pass the story down through the generations.”
“Are you saying a Pinarius was involved in the origin of this custom?” said Lucius’s father. He had been distracted earlier by the gambling with dice and certain lewd behaviour that was going on in the shadows elsewhere in the tavern, but now Claudius had his full attention.
“I am saying exactly that. The c-c-custom of placing a fascinum beneath the triumphal chariot originated with a Vestal who had a special devotion to Fascinus, and her name was… Pinaria! Oh yes, without a doubt, she came from the Pinarius family. This Pinaria served under the Virgo Maxima Foslia in the days when the Gauls captured the city, some 400 years ago. Back in those days, amulets like your fascinum were not at all common; indeed, I can find only one reference to a fascinum that dates as far back as the time of Pinaria. Now listen closely, because this is where the story gets tricky – especially when you’ve had as much wine to drink as I have!
“Thanks to the exhaustive history of Roma written by Fabius Pictor, who paid special attention to the contributions of his own family, the Fabii – I don’t suppose you’ve read that, either? – I have discovered a reference to a g-g-gold fascinum worn by a certain Kaeso Fabius Dorso. This Kaeso was the adopted son of the famous warrior Gaius Fabius Dorso, who was trapped atop the Capitoline Hill when the Gauls occupied the city, along with… the Vestal Pinaria! They were trapped on the Capitoline for about nine months. Almost immediately after their liberation, Gaius Fabius Dorso adopted an infant he named Kaeso, whose parentage is unknown. Given these circumstances, it is not hard to imagine that this Kaeso was the love child of the Vestal Pinaria and Gaius Fabius Dorso, and that the gold fascinum he was known to wear was a gift from his mother, the same woman who originated the custom of placing a fascinum under the triumphal chariot.” Claudius leaned back against the wall, looking pleased with himself, and waved to the serving girl to bring more wine.
The elder Pinarius frowned. “In the first place, the notion of a Vestal secretly, and criminally, bearing a child is distasteful to any respectable person-”
“But hardly unknown,” said Claudius. “I assure you, the history of the Vestals is full of such indiscretions, some made public and punished, but many others covered up. Thus the old joke: show me a Vestal who’s a virgin, and I’ll show you an ugly Vestal.”
Lucius’s father did not laugh. “Even so, if one accepts that this Kaeso Fabius Dorso was the love child of the Vestal Pinaria, and that she gave him a gold fascinum, what does that have to do with amulet handed down by my father and worn by Lucius?”
Claudius gazed at him in drunken disbelief. “You Pinarii! What sort of p-p-patricians are you, not to know every root, branch, and twig of your family tree? You are Kaeso Fabius Dorso’s direct descendants! Are you not aware of the Fabia who was your many-times great-grandmother from the era of Scipio Africanus? Oh yes, I am certain of the lineage: I have the genealogical proof in my library. And so we may conjecture that the fascinum you wear, Lucius – an ancient object which has been handed down through many g-g-generations – is the very fascinum that was worn by your ancestor Kaeso Fabius Dorso, which I conjecture came from the Vestal Pinaria. From whom did Pinaria inherit it? Who knows? It may go back much, much further in time. That little lump of g-gold is almost certainly the oldest specimen of a fascinum that I have ever encountered. We might even conjecture that it is the fascinum, the original prototype that predates even the fascinum of the Vestal virgins. Perhaps it was created by the god Fascinus himself, or by his first worshippers, the Pinarii, who also founded and tended the Great Altar of Hercules long before the city of Roma was founded.”
Claudius opened his eyes wide, overwhelmed by his own erudition. Talking made him thirsty. He swallowed the wine in his cup and ordered more. “The Pinarius family is very ancient, even more ancient than my own. My ancestor, the Sabine warlord Appius Claudius, arrived relatively late in Roma, in the first years of the Republic. But you Pinarii were here before the Republic, before the kings, even before there was a city, in the days when d-d-demigods like Hercules roamed the earth. And that ‘little trinket’ that hangs from your neck, dear Lucius, is a direct link back to those days.”
Lucius looked down at the fascinum, duly impressed but still a bit dubious. “But, Claudius, we’re not even sure that this is a fascinum.”
“Lucius, Lucius! I have an instinct for such things, and my instinct is n-never wrong.”
“Is that what history amounts to?” asked Lucius. “Looking through old lists and scraps of parchment, making genealogies, connecting odd facts, and then leaping to conclusions based on guesses or instinct or wishful thinking?”
“Exactly! You put your finger on the very essence of history!” said Claudius with a drunken laugh. Lucius had never seen him so inebriated, or so relaxed. It occurred to him that Claudius had stuttered very little since they had arrived at the tavern.
“To be sure, Lucius, history, unlike divination, is an inexact science. That is because history deals with the past, which is gone forever and which neither gods nor men can alter or revisit. But divination deals with the present and the future, and the will of the gods, which has yet to be revealed. Divining is an exact science, provided the diviner has sufficient knowledge and skill.”
Claudius glanced at the entrance and gave a start. He sat upright and his eyes grew wide. “Like a messenger in a p-p-play, arriving at the appropriate moment!”
The newcomer was Euphranor. Entering the dark room from the bright outdoors, he did not see them until Claudius called and waved to him.
“Looking for m-m-me, Euphranor?”
“Actually, no. I just arrived in the city and I need a drink.”
“Then j-j-join us.” Claudius made room on the bench and patted the spot beside him.
Euphranor sat with a wince. “Saddle-sore,” he explained. “I’d prefer to stand, but I’m too exhausted.” His cloak and tunic were covered with dust.
“What n-news, Euphranor?”
“For the love of Venus, man, let me have a drink first!” Euphranor called for the serving girl and downed two cups in rapid succession. He stared blearily at Lucius and his father and seemed reluctant to speak.
“Go on, Euphranor,” said Claudius. “You can speak freely. Surely you remember Lucius Pinarius. The other fellow is his father.”
Euphranor closed his eyes for a long moment, then spoke in a voice just above a whisper. “I’m the first to arrive with the news, so not a man in Roma knows this yet. The emperor is dead.”
“Numa’s balls!” whispered Claudius. “Now we all need another drink!” He waved to the serving girl. “When, Euphranor?”
“Five days ago.”
Claudius and Lucius exchanged glances. Augustus had died exactly one hundred days after the lightning strike.
“Where?”
“In the town of Nola.”
“That’s just east of Mount Vesuvius. Why has it taken so long for the n-n-news to reach Roma?”
“The delay was by order of Tiberius.”
“But why?”
Euphranor grunted. “I can only tell you the sequence of events. Augustus died. Tiberius gave strict orders that no one was to make the news public until he allowed it. Some days later, a messenger arrived with news that young Agrippa is dead-”
“The emperor’s grandson?” said Lucius’s father.
“Killed by the soldiers guarding him on the island where he was in exile. After that message arrived, Tiberius told me to ride to Roma as fast as I could and deliver the news to the imperial staff.”
“I see,” whispered Claudius. “Uncle Tiberius held off making Augustus’s death public until Agrippa was disposed of, that’s what you m-m-mean. Poor Agrippa!”
“I’ve only told you the sequence of events. I won’t speculate on the whys or wherefores,” said Euphranor, with the blank expression so often assumed by imperial servants. “When he received the message about Agrippa’s death, Tiberius immediately and publicly disavowed any responsibility.”
Claudius nodded. “It’s possible that Augustus left instructions that Agrippa be killed upon his death. Or that Livia forged such instructions. Technically, Uncle Tiberius may be innocent of Agrippa’s m-mmurder.”
“But, Claudius, what will become of you?” said Lucius.
“Me? Harmless, stuttering, half-witted Claudius? I shall be left to my b-books and my lituus, I imagine.”
The serving girl came to pour more wine. Lucius’s father waved aside her offer of water and took his cup full-strength. Lucius did likewise.
“How did the emperor die?” said Claudius.
Euphranor suddenly seemed to fade, done in by exhaustion and wine. His shoulders slumped and his face went slack. “We’d left Capri and were on our way back to Roma. The emperor had been unwell – weakness, a pain in his stomach, loose bowels – but he seemed to have gotten better. But on the road he took a turn for the worse. We made a detour to the family house at Nola. The emperor took to bed in the very room where his father died. He was lucid almost until the end. He seemed resigned to his death. He even seemed a bit… amused. He assembled his family and travelling companions, including Livia and Tiberius and myself, and he quoted a line from some play, like an actor seeking approval. ‘If I have played my role in this farce with convincing ease, then applaud me, please. Applaud! Applaud!’ And we did. That seemed to please him. But at the very end he became restless and frightened. He saw things no one else could see. He cried out a word in Etruscan, ‘Huznatre! ’ And then, ‘They’re carrying me off! Forty young men are carrying me off!’ And then it was over.”
Claudius and Lucius exchanged knowing looks.
“A dying man’s delusion,” said Lucius’s father.
“Not a delusion but a prophecy,” said Euphranor. “Tiberius has arranged for forty Praetorians to form an honour guard that will carry the emperor’s body back into the city.”
AD 16
It was a bright morning in the month of Maius. On this day, so long awaited, Lucius Pinarius and Acilia would become husband and wife.
Their marriage had finally been made possible thanks to the generosity of the late Augustus. In his will, besides naming Livia and Tiberius as his chief heirs, Augustus had made numerous smaller but still very generous bequests. Among these was a large sum left to Lucius Pinarius. The gossips of Roma, who pored over the details of the will like Etruscan soothsayers scrutinizing entrails, assumed that this bequest was the emperor’s way of making amends after a lifetime of ignoring his cousins the Pinarii, and perhaps it was; but Lucius assumed that the inheritance was also a kind of fee paid posthumously to him for his role in divining the lightning omen. For whatever reason, Augustus had made Lucius a wealthy man.
Yet, even with Lucius’s new wealth, Acilia’s father had insisted on a lengthy engagement. This gave Lucius time to pay off the family’s debts, to invest the money left over in the Egyptian grain trade, renewing his grandfather’s old business associations, and to buy and furnish a house for himself and his bride-to-be. He could not afford property on the Palatine, but he was able to buy a house on the more fashionable side of the Aventine, with views from the upper story of the Tiber and the Capitoline and just a glimpse of the Circus Maximus. This pleased his mother greatly.
At sundown, the wedding party departed from the house of Acilius. The procession was led by the youngest boy in the household, Acilia’s little brother, who carried a pine torch lit from the family’s hearthfire. Its flame would be added to the hearthfire of the bridegroom when they arrived at the house of Lucius Pinarius.
Following the torchbearer was a Vestal virgin. She wore linen vestments with a narrow headband of twined red and white wool called a vitta across her forehead, a headdress called a suffibulum that concealed her closely shorn hair, and a mantle that covered her head and shoulders. The Vestal carried a cake made from consecrated grain and sprinkled with holy salt; a few bites would be taken by the couple during the ceremony, after which the cake would be shared with their guests.
Next came the bride. Acilia’s golden hair was pulled back from her face, elaborately coiled and secured with pins of ivory. She wore a yellow veil and yellow shoes. Her long white robe was cinched at the waist with a purple sash tied at the back in a special configuration called the Hercules knot; later, it would be Lucius’s privilege to untie the knot. Acilia carried a distaff for spinning and a spindle with wool. Flanking her were two of the bride’s cousins, little boys hardly older than the torchbearer.