Gallicanus and myself will replace them. At the sixth hour, we too will relinquish office, and Maecenas and Claudius Julianus be elected, the latter, as governor of Dalmatia, in absentia. Then, in the afternoon, the Senate can proceed with the election of the Board of Twenty.
Consul for six hours, Gallicanus said. It makes a mockery of the constitution.
Rome does not have a written constitution, Menophilus said.
Balbinus heaved himself up to speak, doubtless something offensive.
Pupienus forestalled him. The greater good. He pointed at the stern, marble features of Cato. We must all remember the greater good.
A libation, a toast to each other, and the meeting was over.
Back in his house, a few steps from that of the Consul, Pupienus retired to a private room with Fortunatianus. His secretary handed him writing materials. Opening the hinged wooden block, Pupienus focused his memory. Smoothing the wax, he took up the stylus, and wrote his list, annotating it only in his mind.
XXviri ex Senatus Consulta Rei Publicae Curandae
Menophilus the voice of the Gordiani
Valerian their dutiful, if dull follower
Egnatius Marinianus Valerians brother-in-law
Lucius Virius father of Menophilus closest friend
Appius Claudius aged ally of Gordian the Elder
Five men, only Menophilus and Lucius Virus of any consequence
Balbinus repulsive compound of privilege and low cunning
Valerius Priscillianus idem, embittered by the killings of his father and brother
Rufinianus another Patrician, but somewhat thinner, somewhat more capable
Praetextatus rich, ill-favoured, pliable
Claudius Aurelius elderly descendant of Marcus Aurelius, recalled by sense of duty from self-imposed semi-exile on his estates
Claudius Severus indistinguishable from the above
Six, united by their estimates of their own abilities
Pupienus a novus homo, risen to the heights, his origins carefully hidden; know yourself, said the Oracle of Delphi
Sextus Cethegillus his brother-in-law
Tineius Sacerdos father of the wife of his elder son
Crispinus another successful new man, nothing shaming in his past
Four, all men of substance, especially the novi homines; Delphic self-knowledge was not to be confused with humility
Gallicanus a posturing, violent ape or dog
Maecenas his companion in everything
Two, their dangerous self-righteousness buttressed by philosophical aspirations
Fulvius Pius the presiding Consul
Licinius the orator and treasurer
Latronianus a great noble
Three individuals, or an incipient faction?
As it read, Balbinus had the largest faction. Certainly, he had left with an air of ill-concealed triumph. And yet and yet.
Pupienus tapped the stylus against the ring on the middle finger of his right hand.
The two Claudii had put their heads on the block by their own volition. Virtus, not loyalty to Balbinus had impelled their return. Descendants of Emperors made bad followers. They would pursue their own line. With persuasion, the factio of Balbinus might be reduced to four. And then, with a bold stroke, perhaps, to three.
It was a pity Maximus was already wed. He was the more biddable of Pupienus sons. Africanus had developed a fine estimate of himself since he had held the Consulship. But there again, he had always been the more ambitious. With the right handling, he might accept the influx of wealth and influence that would come with a less-than-attractive wife. Beauty should reside in her obedience and chastity, not her form. Pupienus would call on Praetextatus without delay.
Twenty Men Elected from the Senate to Care for the Res Publica
And to further their own interests. What a cohort. Still, often in politics it was easier if you did not care for your travelling companions.
Pupienus smoothed the wax clean. He always wrote lightly, taking care to leave no marks on the underlying wood. All gone.
Chapter 17
The Northern Frontier
Sirmium,
Two Days before the Ides of March, AD238
Mark the day with a lucky white stone. Pour out an offering of pure wine to your Genius. Simple birthday rituals, time hallowed. They had always sufficed for Maximinus. But not for his son, not now he was Caesar.
Verus Maximus sat on his throne as if the theatre, the speaker and everyone else in it, as if the whole town of Sirmium and the imperium itself, all were arranged for his pleasure.
Since from you and your love of mankind we receive honour, dignity, glory and protection in short, all the rewards of life we would consider it a sin if we celebrated your birthday, the day that brought you into the light for the benefit and happiness of the entire world, more casually than our own.
The orator spoke from the stage in front of the curtain. His tone was unctuous, the flattery immoderate.
All your young life, we have wondered what you would look like in the purple. Now, by the foresight of your noble father, we know. The people of Rome, the venerable Senators, the soldiers under their standards, all may be able to take an oath that there has never been a more handsome Caesar.
A smile of complete and open self-satisfaction was spread across Maximus features. How had he become this creature?
Maximinus looked beyond his son to Iunia Fadilla. As usual, she sat very still, her face giving no indication of her thoughts. She was not veiled, and no bruises were visible. Yet the spies in their household reported that his sons brutality towards his wife if anything had increased since the return from campaign. Maximinus would have liked to intervene, but there were limits to the powers of even the Emperor. He had never raised his hand to Paulina, but in the usual run of things a wife could expect physical chastisement. When the pervert Emperor Elagabalus had taken the part of a woman in a wedding ceremony, the next day he had appeared in public with black eyes to show it really was a marriage. It was all a question of degree.
At last the rhetor had stopped talking and vacated the stage. The curtain was lowered. The set of the mime was revealed as Mount Ida, a wild and deserted district. It was the story of Tillorobus the huge brigand who had terrorized Asia.
If you were going to celebrate your birthday with a theatrical show, why not something with gravity, something where the actors wore masks, one of the great tragedies? An Emperor was expected to attend such things. Now and then, in winter quarters, Maximinus had sat through some performances. Many of their subtleties might have escaped him, sometimes central parts of the plot as well, but he had understood enough to know that the hero or heroine of a tragedy exhibited fortitude in the face of disaster, even in the face of the gods. If the play had to be a mime, did it have to be a low farce about a cunning criminal? Why not something improving like the adaptation of the Eclogues of Virgil that Maximinus had felt obliged to attend the previous winter? It was not how he remembered life as a shepherd, but it had given an improving lesson in rustic resilience and simple virtue. At least this Tillorobus was not as filthy as something like The Adulterer Caught.
As the players, without masks or dignity, capered on the stage, Maximinus thoughts drifted. His old commander Septimius Severus had had the good sense not to let his sons arrange their own birthday celebrations. He had understood how such things should be organized. Nothing simpering and unmanly, instead military games: races on foot or horseback, archery, javelin throwing, sword fights with tipped blades, and wrestling. Severus had been touring the Danubian frontier, back from his second eastern campaign, when Maximinus had come into his presence. The games had been for Severus younger son, Geta, the one who became the traitor, who tried to kill first his father then his brother. Not that anyone had suspected such horrors then. At that point the imperial familia embodied concord, at least to those outside the Palace.
If Maximinus narrowed his eyes, the barren Asian hillsides of the stage props blurred and took on the more verdant hues of that day in the valley of the lower Danube. It was long ago, more than three decades. Yet to Maximinus, the memory of meeting Severus for the first time was as fresh as yesterday.
The stories people told about that encounter were wrong in large part. Volos spies brought reports, Apsines the secretary recounted conversations he had overheard. As Emperor, Maximinus barely recognized the tales told about him. It was like the blurred reflection of himself as a boy in the one tarnished mirror possessed by his home village. He had not been a goatherd straight from the hills. Severus had not set him to wrestle sixteen sutlers from the camp. Maximinus was unsure if the gossip was intended to boast his audacity and strength or reflect unfavourably on his lowly origins. Some said an Emperor was what an Emperor did. Maximinus thought it was more the case that an Emperor was whatever his subjects believed.
He had been a trooper in the auxiliary cavalry. The Emperor had noticed his great size. Severus had wondered if his stamina matched his physique. Maximinus had run at the Emperors stirrup until Severus himself had tired of riding. Matched against seven soldiers, Maximinus had laid them in the dirt, one after another. As well as the normal prizes of silver arm rings and belt ornaments, Severus had appointed him to his bodyguard, and handed him the golden collar Maximinus wore around his throat to this day.
An actor had minced to the front of the stage, and gazed up at Maximus as he recited.
Like to the star of the morning when he, new-bathed in Ocean,
Raises his holy face and scatters the darkness from heaven,
So did the young man seem.
Maximinus watched his son almost squirm with pleasure. When an embassy from Sirmium had greeted them on their return from campaign, Maximinus had stood, showing due respect for their age and dignity. Maximus had remained seated. The frumentarii reported that at audiences when his father was not present, Maximus stretched out his hand, and suffered his knees to be kissed, sometimes even his feet.
How had he become such a weak and vain and vicious young man? Maximus had been wilful and petulant as a child, but open and affectionate. Too easy and luxurious an upbringing, that was the cause. The expensive tutors that Paulina had insisted they hire had pampered and spoilt the boy. A relative of his mother had given him the works of Homer, all written in letters of gold on purple vellum. All too often Paulina had intervened when Maximinus had tried to instill some discipline. Maximinus should have beaten him more, beaten the insolence and self-regard out of him before it became ingrained, before he became a man.