Dominus

by Steven Saylor

  Zenobius could not show his son the whole length of that enormous wall, of course, but he could show him the Colossus originally built by Nero, the huge quadriga atop Hadrian’s Mausoleum, the towering columns erected in honor of Trajan and of Marcus Aurelius, and many more landmarks, which displayed the artistry of the Pinarii and their engineering skills. In recent years, Zenobius himself had contributed substantially to the family legacy, with his many projects for the emperor Maxentius. It seemed to Zenobius that this was the precise moment to reflect upon and to celebrate all these accomplishments, for in the days to come—perhaps as soon as tomorrow—anything could happen, even the unthinkable: the complete destruction of Rome, especially if the attackers resorted to fire in their determination to conquer and subdue the city.

  In the vestibule of the House of the Beaks, his father checked that Zenobius’s toga was properly draped and then gave young Kaeso a kiss on the forehead. Kaeso was not quite a man yet, and still wore a boy’s simple, long-sleeve tunic.

  “Will you not come with us, Father?” asked Zenobius.

  “No, I think not.” At eighty, Gnaeus Pinarius still had his wits, but his voice quavered. His back was stooped and his legs frail. “To go any distance from this house I would have to take a litter, and on a day like this, with so many people out, I don’t care to deal with large crowds, nor to be seen by the common folk resorting to the luxury of a litter. Call me old-fashioned, but I still think that such vehicles are for the effete and the lazy—and for women, of course. Your late mother always used a litter, with the curtains shut, on those rare occasions when she left this house.” He sighed. Zenobia—melancholy, philosophical, imperious, beautiful Zenobia—was now many years dead, making Gnaeus twice a widower. Gone, too, was his sister, Pinaria. So close to each other in life, the two women had died within a month of each other.

  “Besides, I’m retired. The family legacy is yours now, Zenobius, to show off to your own boy.” Gnaeus had always addressed his son not by his first name but by his last, the cognomen that proclaimed his distinguished pedigree. Saying it aloud reminded Gnaeus of Zenobia, and did her honor.

  “You are wearing the fascinum?” he asked.

  “Of course.” Zenobius touched the place where it lay hidden on its chain, beneath his toga.

  “Good. The occasion demands it, eh? Maxentius’s anniversary—six years of sound rule, with plenty of imperial commissions for the Pinarii.” He reached out and touched his fingers to his son’s chest, above the place where the talisman lay hidden. “Keep it close about you, son. Especially … in days to come.” He did not have to elaborate. The threat posed by the invader hung over them all.

  * * *

  The family’s prosperity and influence were at the highest they had been in many decades. For the last six years, Zenobius and his artisans and engineers had been kept very busy by the new emperor. Like Zenobius, Maxentius was in his thirties, and he had directed his considerable energy toward the most ambitious building program in Rome since the era of Septimius Severus and the Emesene women, which now seemed a far-off golden age. Once again, the Pinarii had been in the right place at the right time, under the right emperor, to see a grand flourishing of their fortunes.

  This followed upon a period of hardship and uncertainty endured by the generation that came of age with Zenobius in Rome. Aurelian had reunited the empire, but ruled only five years before being murdered. Once again, a military coup had determined Rome’s future. After a series of short-lived rulers, the emperor who emerged victorious was Diocletian, a military man from Dalmatian peasant stock. His origins were as far from those of Rome’s senatorial ruling class as could be imagined, but he possessed a keen intellect and a powerful personality. Like the unfortunate emperors before him, Diocletian might have been overwhelmed by the job of administering the state and fighting wars on multiple borders. His innovation, which seemed an act of genius at the time, was to split the empire into four parts, to be ruled by two senior partners (each with the title Augustus) and their junior partners (each with the title Caesar). The co-rulers he had chosen were not Roman in the strict sense. They did not even come from Italy, but from a clique of military men south of the Danube frontier. One of them, Galerius, pointedly and proudly called himself a Dacian rather than a Roman—and even called his quadrant the Dacian Empire. Nonetheless, this system of Tetrarchy, as it was called, was productive and stable.

  Diocletian was in power for over twenty years. His reign (with his fellow Augustus, Maximian) had seen plenty of building projects in Rome, some involving the Pinarii, but except for a triumphal arch and a new baths complex, these were mostly repairs and reconstructions, including the Senate House (which had been destroyed by fire) and a large section of stands and boxes in the Circus Maximus, after a huge collapse that killed thirteen thousand spectators, the most lethal disaster in the city’s history.

  Diocletian himself had no interest in ruling from Rome, and little interest even in visiting. The idea of a single capital city seemed outmoded. There were four capitals now, and these were located wherever each of the four emperors needed to be at a given moment, a circumstance usually determined by threats at the frontiers. The imperial courts followed the rulers. Lip service was duly paid to the religious and state institutions of Rome, but months and even years had passed without any of the emperors setting foot in the city.

  Diocletian did visit Rome to celebrate his Vicennalia, marking twenty years in power. The occasion was a grand show of unity with his fellow Augustus, the short, blustering Maximian. That was the only time young Kaeso Pinarius ever had a chance to see the great Diocletian. The boy had been seven at the time, and all he could remember clearly were the thirteen elephants that appeared in the grand procession.

  A couple of years later, Diocletian innovated again, doing something no emperor had done before: he resigned his office, and retired to the land of his childhood, Dalmatia. Begrudgingly, Maximian also retired, to a villa in Campania. Their two Caesars moved up in rank to became Augusti, and two new Caesars were appointed.

  Diocletian had hoped that his Tetrarchy would provide a second generation of harmony, but without his firm leadership, the arrangement quickly descended into bickering, backstabbing, and civil war. As Zenobius had explained the situation to Kaeso, the empire was like an unseaworthy boat on a stormy sea, with not one but four captains, each plotting to throw the others overboard.

  To put an end to the conflicts, many senators begged Diocletian to come out of retirement. He issued a curt refusal, saying he preferred—“as would any sane man!”—to grow cabbages at his gigantic new palace on the Dalmatian coast across from Italy.

  Now the great man was dead, and so was his partner, Maximian, who attempted a return to power but failed miserably, and was driven to suicide—by the very man who was now poised to attack Rome.

  Amid the turmoil there had been one very positive development. Rome now had an emperor who not only resided in the city, but seemed intent on making it once again the true capital of the empire, or at least his portion of it: Maxentius, the son of Diocletian’s now-dead partner, Maximian.

  Early in Maxentius’s reign there was an incident that might have ended it. A fire broke out in the Temple of Venus and Roma. When a frustrated soldier fighting the flames let slip some blasphemous slur against Venus, a mob of outraged citizens tore him to pieces. Leaving the fire unchecked, the soldiers turned on the mob. A wholesale riot ensued. More soldiers were killed, and a great many citizens. It was a test of Maxentius’s authority to put an end to the violence, which he did, first gaining control of the soldiers, ordering them to retreat, and then dispersing the mob. Meanwhile, the fire burned itself out, sparing most of the temple. Maxentius proclaimed this to be a merciful omen from Venus. Afterward, the Temple of Venus and Roma was splendidly refurbished, making it once again what Hadrian had intended, one of the most lavish temples in Rome—a project that brought much work to the Pinarii.

  Maxentius emerged from the c
risis as a pacifier and unifier of the many quarrelsome factions in the city. “We are one people, one Rome,” as he put it. Diocletian had renewed long-dormant laws against Christians, which barred them from government service, deprived them of legal rights, and punished them with imprisonment and execution if they refused to comply with religious rites. Maxentius magnanimously put an end to all such persecution in Rome and throughout the provinces he ruled. “Such edicts only serve to divide us,” he said. To be sure, there were far fewer Christians in Rome and the western provinces than in the East, where the cult had originated, and where most of the friction between Christians and their neighbors occurred. In Rome, the small sect was so riven by squabbles over arcane doctrines that for a while they did not even have a bishop, as they called their leaders. Christians were simply not a big problem in Rome. Maxentius saw no reason to draw attention to them by creating more martyrs.

  Maxentius also gained popularity by putting an end to a scheme by Diocletian’s successor, Galerius, to directly tax the citizens of Rome. The idea was unprecedented. Romans taxed others; they themselves were never taxed. Yet tax-gatherers from distant parts of the empire had been sent by Galerius to Rome, to compile lists of citizens, take inventories, and assess property values in advance of taxation—as if Rome were a conquered province! The indignity of it had outraged every Roman. Maxentius canceled the scheme. He alone of the multiple emperors seemed to understand the primacy of the capital city and the special status of those who lived there.

  Somewhat controversially, Maxentius had decided not to live on the Palatine. (“Too old and musty,” he said. “One can hardly breathe for the mold!”) While the decrepit Palatine complex was being extensively refurbished, Maxentius built a new palace for himself on the Appian Way, calling upon the Pinarii to oversee the overall design and decoration. This included a private stadium and racetrack, where the emperor and his young sons could enjoy riding horseback and racing chariots.

  Maxentius commissioned a great many new sculptures to decorate every part of the city. Many of these were statues of himself, but the most striking new sculpture was a bronze statue of the she-wolf that suckled Romulus and Remus, her udders hanging heavy with milk. Zenobius himself had designed it, and, despite its modest size, it was one of his proudest accomplishments. The she-wolf was dedicated, on the birthday of Rome, “to unconquered Mars and to the founders of our eternal city, by Our Lord Imperator Maxentius Pius Felix, Unconquered Augustus.” The words “eternal” and “unconquered” were not casually chosen; nor was the dedication to Mars. As the ferocious she-wolf had protected the Twins from all danger, so Mars—through the instrument of his pious servant, the emperor Maxentius—would defend the city, now and forever.

  Then tragedy struck: the death of the older of the emperor’s two sons, who was then only fourteen, about the same age as Kaeso. The whole city was plunged into mourning. The Senate, at Maxentius’s behest, deified the boy. Valerius Romulus was his name. Next to the new palace, Maxentius erected a temple to Romulus the Founder to house a mausoleum for his son. It was Zenobius who suggested it be round, to recall the ancient temples of Hercules and of Vesta. The lavishly decorated interior made it seem a small version of the Pantheon.

  The Colossus, overdue for a major refurbishment, was reconsecrated as a statue of the Deified Romulus—meaning the late son of Maxentius, not the founder. The Pinarii had overseen every previous makeover of the Colossus, from Nero to Severus. All the relevant plans and records had been lost in the fire that destroyed their house and workshop on the Esquiline, but Maxentius, ever the traditionalist, never considered anyone but the Pinarii for such an important and prestigious project.

  Directly to the west of the restored Temple of Venus and Roma, overlooking and dominating the ancient Forum, was the grandest of all Maxentius’s projects, the New Basilica, a building where elaborate court ceremonials could be staged in a vast hall with a raised apse at the far end from the entrance. It was the biggest building by far in the Forum. When fully finished and decorated inside, it would be as lavish as any temple or palace that had ever existed on earth. Zenobius had been allowed to bring all his creativity to bear on the project.

  * * *

  Zenobius’s tour of the city with his son at last brought them to the center of the city, the ancient Forum, which Maxentius had made once more the center of the world. They strolled through the unfinished New Basilica, then ventured inside both halves of the gleaming Temple of Venus and Roma, and then arrived at the Amphitheater, where the teeming multitude was dwarfed by the towering Colossus of the Deified Romulus.

  “Rather tall for a fourteen-year-old,” quipped Kaeso. “And so muscular! I remember wrestling with the real Valerius Romulus at the gymnasium. A rather skinny boy, as I recall.”

  Zenobius smiled. The boy had his grandfather’s dry sense of humor. Altering the statue’s face, so high in the air, had presented a huge challenge. Changing the physique had never been an option, so the face of a teenager now looked out from the magnificently proportioned body that had previously been that of Sol Invictus.

  Zenobius and Kaeso made their way through the privileged gate reserved for senators and their families. They took their seats, close to those of the Vestal virgins. As Zenobius looked around the vast circle of the Amphitheater, he noted the great number of soldiers in the crowd. In response to the threat now approaching Rome, Maxentius had assembled a large army. There were his own soldiers and those he had taken over from his late father; there were troops who had defected to him from two fellow emperors, Severus and Galerius, who had each disputed his right to rule, tried to invade Italy, and miserably failed; there were even legions brought from across the sea, from grain-rich Africa and Mauritania.

  Many of those troops were now camped north of the city, on both sides of the Tiber, preparing to do battle with the approaching enemy. More troops were garrisoned all over the city. Despite inevitable friction between soldiers and civilians, the crowd was united in giving Maxentius a thunderous ovation when he appeared in the imperial box along with his wife and young son.

  The opening ceremony began with a pious invocation to the gods, with special attention to the Deified Romulus, founder of the city. A huge replica of Zenobius’s she-wolf statue was wheeled into the arena, made of terra-cotta and painted to look like bronze. The Pinarii’s workshop had created this elaborate prop, and Zenobius was gratified to see its effect on the crowd, which set to howling. The sound echoed all around the circular space, rising to such a din that even the invaders north of the city must have heard the baleful wolf-calls.

  “May the sound fill them with dread!” Zenobius whispered.

  His thoughts wandered, from the she-wolf to her whelps, the original Romulus and his twin, Remus—the brother murdered by Romulus when the city was founded. The man set to attack Rome was a sort of brother to Maxentius, his brother-in-law, married to Maxentius’s sister. Marriage alliances were meant to bring peace. This one had failed. The conflict could be seen as a sort of sibling rivalry, like that between Romulus and Remus, which would end only when one was dead. Zenobius touched the fascinum under his toga and whispered a prayer that Maxentius, rightful and beloved ruler of Rome, would be victorious.

  As the howling continued, Maxentius rose from his throne. He stepped to the front of the imperial box. He raised his hands in the air and waved them flamboyantly, like the conductor of a chorus, encouraging the howls and seeming to bask in the noise. Then he threw back his head, cupped his hands around his mouth, and howled.

  Zenobius was acquainted with the program for the day’s events, and knew that the howling was not planned, but completely spontaneous. Maxentius had seized the moment, and by joining in had done exactly the thing that would delight his audience most. People elbowed each other and laughed with joy, releasing their tension and forgetting their fears. Gradually the howling died down, turned into cheers, and then dropped to a murmur as the emperor raised his hands for silence.

  He held
forth his right arm. His young son stepped forward and placed in his father’s hand a scepter, a staff that culminated in a metal flower, its petals holding a blue-green glass globe, a symbol of the earth, that glittered in the sunlight.

  Maxentius spoke of that which was uppermost on the mind of everyone present: the usurper who had swept down from Gaul, just like the Gauls of old who attacked Rome, and with the same intention—to sack the city, to enslave its people, to destroy the temples and the shrines of the ancestors, to put an end to the long and glorious status of Rome as capital of empire and center of the world. The invader was a canny military commander, to be sure, which made him a very serious threat—indeed, the greatest threat to Rome in all her long and fabled existence.

  The enemy of Rome was also the emperor’s personal enemy. “First he took my sister as his wife,” said Maxentius, “thinking to insinuate himself into a family far more ancient and accomplished than his own—for is he not the son of a common whore? The marriage is illegal and bigamous, because he was already married to a peasant woman.”

  Zenobius smiled wryly at this assertion, for in fact Maxentius and his family were hardly “Roman” in the strictest sense, not the way the Pinarii were Roman, with roots going back centuries. Maxentius’s father came from Pannonian stock, and his mother was Syrian. But what did it mean, anyway, to call one family more ancient than another? Were not all families equally ancient? Zenobius himself came from mixed stock, though his mother had been no ordinary barbarian but a queen, of course, descended from Cleopatra. It amused him that Maxentius was always seeking to portray himself as more Roman than the most native Roman.

  Maxentius continued his invective against the invader. “After taking my sister unlawfully in marriage, this half barbarian as good as murdered my father, who ruled so wisely for so many years alongside the Deified Diocletian. He ceaselessly threatened and hounded the old man—supposedly his own father-in-law—until he drove him to suicide. Now this man looks to depose me—but not to take my place. He has no desire to become ruler of Rome, your champion and defender, because he has no love for this city. He despises Rome! The man is more a Gaul or a Briton than a Roman, and as savage and bloodthirsty as any barbarian. After he slaughtered the Franks and the Alemanni and captured their kings, he held games and exposed his captives to wild beasts, smiling as he saw them torn to shreds, laughing when they screamed, smacking his lips as the wretches were eaten alive! What will such a man do to the people of Rome? If he should take the city, he will tear down your temples, enslave your children, make a mockery of all that sets Rome apart as the greatest and noblest of all the cities on earth. He is your enemy and mine. He calls himself … Constantine.”