SPQR X: A Point of Law

by John Maddox Roberts

  “That’s Greek, isn’t it?” said Hermes. He could read and write Latin well enough, but he had never learned to read Greek, although, like me, he could speak conversational Greek passably. Anyone who traveled widely has to learn some Greek, as it is spoken everywhere. But poetic and literary Greek is another matter. Many educated men, like Cicero, were as comfortable with Greek as with their native language, but I was not among them. I could piece my way through a simple letter in Greek if given enough time, but I could see that my schoolboy Greek wouldn’t serve me here.

  “It isn’t just Greek,” I told him, “it’s in some sort of cipher.”

  “Someone coming,” Hermes muttered. I heard footsteps on the stairs. The noise from the street outside had masked the sounds of someone entering the house. I swept up the documents I’d spread out and stuffed them inside my tunic even as Hermes shut the tiny drawer. By the time the men shouldered their way into the room, we had assumed poses of dignified innocence.

  “What are you doing here?” demanded the first one through. He was the red-haired lout, and he wasn’t alone. Behind him was the one Hermes had pummeled, and there were others on the stair. “How did you get in?”

  “Same as you, through the front door,” Hermes said. “It wasn’t locked.”

  “As for what we’re doing here,” I said, “I came here to see these putative witnesses against me. But we’ve found no sign that anyone was ever here except Marcus Fulvius, despite your claim to the praetor Juventius this morning.” Actually, we had not yet had time to examine the top floor, but by now I was convinced that these witnesses were entirely fictitious.

  “You’re a liar!” shouted the battered one. “You came here to steal!”

  “How about you?” I said, going immediately on the counterattack. “Thought you’d take advantage of your friend’s death, did you? Thought you’d just run over here and lift whatever’s loose and easily fenced before his relatives showed up, eh? Well, you won’t get away with it this time!” Meanwhile, we were sidling toward the door.

  “Don’t be absurd!” said the red-haired one. “Stop them!”

  Immediately, we reversed direction. We had no way of knowing how many might be on the stairway and in the rooms below. I sprang for the balcony as Hermes drew his dagger and covered my retreat. One of the political perquisites of age, dignity, and high office was that you could let someone else do most of your fighting and concentrate on saving your own hide. In my younger days, engaging in street fights was seen as merely one of the ordinary activities of Republican political life. It was, however, thought to be beneath the dignity of a candidate for praetor or consul.

  I looked over the low railing, picked the softest-looking patch of pavement below, and—encumbered by my toga—scrambled over the rail, hung by my fingers a moment, then dropped. I landed without incident, grateful not to have slipped in one of the many noxious substances that coat Rome’s streets. One good thing about recent sea duty: It keeps the knees supple.

  Hermes, show-off that he was, flourished his dagger, gave a last, defiant shout, then actually leapt over the railing, dropped ten feet, and landed on the balls of his feet, as easily as a professional tumbler. He grinned at me and resheathed his dagger while passersby gaped. They didn’t gape all that much though. Senators flying out of windows and off balconies were not all that rare a sight. Caesar had once flown thus, stark naked with his nose streaming blood, broken by an aggrieved husband.

  “What now?” Hermes asked.

  “Would’ve served you right if you’d slipped in a pile of shit,” I said, unreasonably jealous that he’d cut so much better a figure than I had in our escape.

  “I see no one’s pursuing us,” he said, casting a wary eye toward the front door of the house.

  “It’s not what they were there for,” I said, “and they don’t want to make a public fuss about it right now.” I studied the angle of the sun. We still had some hours of daylight left. I patted the front of my tunic, causing a reassuring crackle of papyrus. “I got some of those letters. Let’s go find someone who can translate them for us.”

  “Maybe we can find out about this, too.” He made a magician’s flourish and the massive signet ring lay in his hand. He’d deftly palmed it as he’d shut the hidden drawer.

  “Sometimes,” I admitted, “I’m glad I didn’t raise you right.”

  5

  THE GOLDSMITHS’ QUARTER IN THOSE days lay in a small block of houses and shops on the Via Nova just across from the ancient Mugonia Gate, near the eastern end of the Forum. Unlike other quarters of the City, this one had its own wall, low but strong, its heavy gates guarded by club-wielding slaves whose loyalty was guaranteed by their excellent terms of service: five years of duty followed by freedom and a large enough stake to buy a house or a small shop. The Goldsmiths’ Guild had a special license for their little fortress and its arrangements, granted by the censors and renewed every five years as long as anyone could remember. The jewelers and other dealers in precious materials had similar arrangements with the censors. Rome was so full of thieves that they needed these special precautions to practice their trade at all.

  The headquarters of the guild was in a modest house just within the main gate. They needed nothing more pretentious because they held their annual banquets at the nearby Temple of the Public Penates.

  Next to the old gate Hermes and I paused long enough to buy snacks from a street vendor, our narrow escape having given us an appetite. We bought grilled sausage and onions wrapped in flat bread and doused with garum. From another vendor we got cups of cheap wine, and we sat beneath the shade of a fine plane tree to discuss matters before consulting with the goldsmiths.

  “The furnishings of that house,” I said, “the desk and the inkstand, for instance—those were the sort of things wealthy men give to one another as gifts for Saturnalia or as guest gifts or to celebrate the naming of sons. What was a man like Fulvius doing with such possessions?”

  “Maybe they were loaned to him,” Hermes said, around a greasy mouthful, which he finally swallowed. “If Marcellus lent him the house, why not the furnishings as well?”

  “But why would he do that? Why did he want Fulvius to put up such a fine front?”

  “You could go ask him.”

  “Something tells me that would not be a wise move just now.” I weighed the ring in my hand. The fine, strange granulation of its surface gave it an exotic look. I knew I had seen such metal work before, but I did not remember where. “You could buy a decent house with this and have enough left over to staff it with slaves. How did he get it, and why wasn’t he wearing it?”

  Hermes thought about this. “Could be he was waiting to gain the reputation to go with it, just like the senator’s tunic and the toga praetexta. A nobody like him standing for tribune or quaestor would look like a fool wearing such a ring. It would be right at home on a praetor’s hand.”

  “That’s a thought. It makes me wonder who could dangle such prizes in front of him.”

  “Caesar could,” Hermes said. “Or Pompey. They’ve both been known to raise obscure men to high office and power.”

  “Ridiculous!” I said. “Those two would never—”

  “I just meant,” Hermes went on, “that they are the type of men to do such a thing. And there are more ways of rising in the world than through birth or politics. Look at me. All my life I was a slave. Now I am a citizen with the name of a great family, which my descendants will inherit. This happened because you wanted it to. The lives of humble men are there for great men to make use of. We needn’t wonder that it is done. We just need to discover the reason.”

  “You’re uncommonly thoughtful today,” I said, taken a little aback.

  “Well, I don’t carry your bath things around anymore, so I might as well do some of your thinking for you.”

  I brushed crumbs from my hands and downed the last of the wine. “Come on, let’s see if we can find someone who can tell us about this ring.” We gave our cup
s back to the vendor and walked across the street.

  The year’s guild master, a man named Laturnus, recognized me the moment I walked in. His office was laid out almost like a shop: a single, long room opening onto a courtyard, the whole upper half of the wall on that side open to admit maximum light. Except for chairs, the only furnishing of the room was a single, long table. It held a balance and selection of official weights, a touchstone, and a case holding samples of pure gold and silver and all the alloys of those metals. I could see that most of the business done here consisted of settling disputes concerning the purity of gold being sold in Rome. There were very strict laws regulating this, and the guild was held responsible for its members’ honesty.

  “Senator! Or should I say Praetor?” He took my hand and guided me to a comfortable chair. “How good it is to see you!” He was a fat man with keen eyes and nimble hands, both requirements of his craft. “I suppose you’ve come to discuss next year’s legislation?”

  My mind, distracted by other matters, failed to grasp his meaning. “Legislation?”

  He was puzzled. “Why, yes. You will surely be holding court next year. And we will also have new censors. If Appius Claudius is elected censor, and surely he shall be, he plans to institute a new slate of antiluxury laws. I, and the members of my guild, feel that these laws will be a very bad idea.”

  “I couldn’t agree more,” I said. “But the praetors have no power over acts of the censors. Since you goldsmiths deal in the marketplace, your cases are heard by the aediles and they will be enforcing any decrees of the censors.”

  “Of course, you are right,” he said, with a flutter of the fingers, “but the aediles and the praetors often work closely together, as your jurisdictions sometimes overlap.”

  “Certainly,” I said, “and I assure you that I shall look with great leniency on frivolous accusations of luxury-law violations. Somehow I do not believe that the prime threat to the Republic comes from how many rings a man wears or the weight of gold around his wife’s neck. I plan to dismiss out of hand all cases except those involving serious crime.”

  “We shall all be most grateful,” he assured me, meaning that he would pass the word and I could expect a fine price break for any jewelry I bought from a guild member.

  “Your best bet though,” I advised him, “is to cultivate the other censor. He can overrule Appius’s acts.”

  “Oh, believe me, we are doing just that. Calpurnius Piso is most likely to be elected, and he is a man, how shall we say, amenable to persuasion. But he will have very weighty matters on his mind next year, and he may be fully occupied trying to protect his friends whom Appius Claudius plans to expel from the Senate.”

  “The Senate is in severe need of pruning,” I said. “But I’ve recently spoken with Appius, and he seems far more concerned about the indebtedness of the senatorial class than about luxury per se.”

  “Let us hope,” said Laturnus.

  “Now, my friend,” I said, “what I came here to inquire about is this.” I took the heavy ring from my tunic and handed it to him. “Can you tell me anything about this?”

  He took it, stepped closer to the open wall to catch the best light. “A lovely piece. It’s very old.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “It’s Etruscan work. This granulation of the surface is quite unique, and the art of making it has been lost for generations.”

  That explained it. I’d seen that surface before, many times, on old bronze lamps and vessels, always of Etruscan make. “Why is it no longer done?”

  “It was probably only done by a few families, and the families died out without passing the secret on. The granulation is not chased onto the surface with gravers, as such surfaces are done now. First, they made thousands of minute, gold beads, all exactly the same size. That, too, is a lost art. Then the roughened surface of the piece—the ring, in this case—was prepared with a layer of the finest solder.” His voice grew wistful, explaining the arcana of his vocation.

  “Then the tiny beads were laid atop the solder, one at a time. This task was so demanding that it is said only children could do it properly. No one older than ten or twelve at the oldest, had the eyesight and the lightness of touch to accomplish it. Then, without disturbing the surface preparation, the piece was put into a furnace. It had to be removed the instant the temperature was perfect. Remove it too soon and the solder would not hold. Leave it too long and the solder would run off, taking the granulation with it. There were a hundred stages at which work this delicate could be ruined. It is amazing that any saw completion at all. But, when done properly, the effect is incomparable. Modern granulation work done with a graver or chisel is gross and coarse by comparison.”

  “The stone looks Greek,” I said.

  “It is. But the old Etruscans often incorporated Greek work into their own, just as we do today. Or, this could be a modern stone set into an old Etruscan ring. For that you will need to consult a lapidary. It is not my field.”

  I took the ring back from him. “Many thanks, Laturnus. I believe that your guild and my future office will enjoy the most excellent of relations.” I rose from my chair.

  “I rejoice to hear it. Why, if I may ask, is the origin of this ring of interest to you?”

  “A matter of an inheritance. Several heirs claiming to be the rightful owner, you know how it goes.”

  “Alas, so I do.”

  Back out in the street I checked the angle of the sun. Still plenty of daylight left.

  “That was interesting,” I said, “but probably irrelevant. Let’s go see if the stone has any surprises for us.”

  We went to the nearby quarter of the lapidaries. Most of the workers in precious substances lived and worked in the same small area near the eastern end of the Forum. Their shops were often located in the Forum itself, but I was looking for a dealer who traveled widely and bought from many sources; one who specialized in sapphires.

  A bit of questioning led me to the shop of such a man, a resident alien named Gyges. Despite his Greek name he had a distinctly Syrian look, not an uncommon combination in the eastern coastal cities. I explained what I wanted, and he looked at the stone.

  “The stone is from Egypt,” he said without hesitation. “Once it had a different shape, but it was cut down and polished flat to prepare it for this carving. That is done a great deal with Egyptian stones. Outside of Egypt, nobody much likes Egyptian jewels. Fortunately, they liked massive, irregular stones, so it is relatively easy to alter them for a more refined taste.”

  “How old is it?” I asked. “I mean, when was this carving made? Can you tell?”

  “It’s quite recent. This treatment of the hair—snakes, I should say—was first used by Eunostes of Caria no more than fifty years ago. But this wasn’t carved in Caria. The style is that of the Greek cities of southern Italy and Sicily. I am afraid I can’t name you a specific lapidary, but I am almost certain that this came from one of the workshops of Croton.”

  Croton is in Bruttium, of course, but its inhabitants are not Bruttians: they are Greeks. Croton was the home of Pythagoras, who knew things about triangles and music and said people shouldn’t eat beans. It was also the home of a great Olympic champion named Milo around five hundred years ago. Lately the place didn’t amount to much.

  “That doesn’t help us greatly,” Hermes said as we left.

  “You never know what bit of information may come in useful,” I assured him. “Now for something that should be truly enlightening, let’s go find someone who can decipher these documents.”

  Rome is full of Greek schoolmasters, most of them penurious. But I needed something better than a man who could drill well-born schoolboys in their alpha-beta-gamma or teach youths of senatorial families to repeat the speeches of Demosthenes. Nor did I want someone who had memorized the entirety of Homer. I spoke of this to Hermes.

  “So what are we looking for?” he asked.

  “A cipher is no more than a puzzle. Mathematicians
like to solve puzzles. We need somebody who is both a Greek scholar and a mathematician.”

  “I’m game. How do we find one?”

  “Let’s go ask Asklepiodes. He knows the better-educated Greek community here in the City.”

  It was not a great walk to the Temple of Aesculapius on Tiber Island. The streets were thinly populated because of the contio called by the Tribune Manilius. Those who had not gone to participate went there to watch.

  The beautiful temple on its shiplike island was where Asklepiodes practiced and taught in the afternoons. We found him conducting an early evening sacrifice and waited respectfully with our heads covered while he finished the simple, dignified ceremony.

  He smiled delightedly when he saw us. “Is someone else dead already?”

  “Not this time,” I told him. When I explained what I needed, he shook his head in wonderment.

  “Your activities are a source of unfailing marvel. Yes, I think I know exactly what you need. Callista is here from Alexandria, giving a course of lectures in the hall adjoining Pompey’s Theater.”

  “Callista?” I said. “This is a woman?”

  “Very much so. You have been to Alexandria. You are aware that female scholars and teachers are not at all uncommon there.”

  “They rarely come to Rome to teach. You think she has the qualifications I need?”

  “She is one of the foremost authorities on the Greek language working at the Library, and she is also a mathematician of the Archimedean school. I know of nobody else in Rome who enjoys such distinction.”

  “I am pressed for time. Would it be excessively rude for me to call on her this evening?”

  “Nothing easier,” he assured me. “I will take you there myself. It is a short walk from here, just on the other side of the bridge in the Trans-Tiber. And it will be no rudeness at all. In the Alexandrian fashion, she holds an open salon for persons of a scholarly bent. She should be receiving this evening.”