A Week in the Life of Rome

by James L. Papandrea

  “I also own some apartment buildings across the river, and I often speculate on commodities, primarily iron, lumber, and pottery. I have many clients, including my tenant farmers and freedmen.”

  Claudius frowned. “Also a trader, eh? I don’t like it. Businessmen are greedy. Can’t be trusted. Tell me, do you travel a lot? Away from home overnight? Leaving your wife too much leisure time?”

  Urbanus’s eyes darted nervously around the room as he desperately tried to think of how best to respond. He was worried that he had already said too much. As he cleared his throat, Narcissus leaned toward Claudius and said, “It is one of his freedmen who has a son that needs a tutor.”

  Urbanus was happy for the change of subject. His voice became enthusiastic, if a little forced. “Yes, that would be my freedman Stachys. As a slave, he rose to the position of foreman of my olive groves and manager of oil production. He was given his freedom after my father’s death, and now he is a successful oil merchant. He has a son, called Tertius, I believe . . .”

  Claudius grew impatient. “Where do you live?”

  “Um, I live outside the Esquiline Gate, along the Tiburtinian Road.”

  Claudius wiped his drooling mouth and his running nose in one swift motion, obvious to all that it was a combination of habit and muscle memory that no longer required any thought. “Nice neighborhood. Quiet. Wish I lived there.” Agrippina rolled her eyes, but Claudius just kept on talking. “I could curse my great-grandfather Julius for outlawing carts in the city during the day. Now they all run at night and I can’t get any sleep. It’s as though all of Rome is at my bedside!” Claudius’s nervous tic kicked in, causing his eyes to blink rapidly and his head to twitch to the left. Then he paused for what seemed like a long time and started to nod off. Narcissus gave a signal to the slave with the peacock-feather fan, and he “accidentally” brushed the fan against Claudius’s face, waking him up, something Claudius was used to. “Go to Tartarus!” he yelled at the slave, waving the fan away from his face.

  Geta was now screaming in Stachys’s face. “Well, I do know the emperor! I command nine cohorts of his Praetorians—that’s nine thousand men at my command, all of whom share a bond of loyalty with the emperor that is born of the fact that we made him emperor in the first place. Does your patron think I will let him disrespect me like this? And what do you get out of this? What is your connection to Urbanus’s hopes of being named prefect?”

  Stachys didn’t want to talk about his involvement, and he certainly didn’t want to mention his son. But when he hesitated, Geta called for some of his men, and before Stachys knew what had happened to him, he was in chains and Geta was calling for the torturer. Stachys’s mind raced. How had this happened? He was not guilty of any crime, and yet this sudden turn of events had him fearing for his life. The torturer arrived with two more soldiers, and Geta turned to Stachys, pausing for effect.

  “This is your last chance to stop lying to me.” Geta hissed and growled at the same time. “Soon I’m going to hand you over to these men, and then you can try lying to them, if you can.”

  Stachys’s eyes were wide, his heart pounding. “I’m not lying. I have nothing to hide.”

  “Then tell me what part you have to play in this.”

  Stachys knew that if the soldiers took him from the barracks, all would be lost. He would probably die without ever seeing his family again. The best he could hope for was to return to them maimed and unable to work. He tried to give Geta enough information to satisfy him but without including the part about Tertius. He told Geta that he hoped Urbanus could set him up as an importer of lumber.

  But Geta did not relent, and the Praetorians tightened their grip on the bonds that held Stachys. Geta paused in silence for a moment as sweat dripped into Stachys’s eyes. Then, without saying anything else, Geta gestured for the soldiers to take Stachys away and turned to leave himself. Stachys’s knees buckled. Then Geta stopped and turned back toward Stachys.

  Geta bent down to put his face at the same level as Stachys’s and pulled his head up by his hair to force Stachys to look him in the eye. “What’s your connection?”

  Stachys looked puzzled at first, and then a wave of realization hit him. He relented. He told Geta everything. He told him that in exchange for the appointment as prefect of the grain supply, Urbanus was going to provide one of Narcissus’s men with a position as a tutor. And he told him that in exchange for Urbanus setting him up in imports, Stachys was going to hire the tutor for his son. The soldiers let go of Stachys, who dropped to his knees.

  “So . . . ,” Geta thought out loud as he paced, “the key to this whole arrangement . . . is your son.”

  In his mind Stachys was wild with guilt and fear over Geta now knowing about Tertius. Geta could solve his problem by simply having Tertius killed. Stachys racked his brain to find something to say. All he could come up with was, “But my wife is against it.”

  “The boy’s mother?”

  “Stepmother.”

  “And why should she be opposed to such an arrangement?”

  “She belongs to the table of the Way-followers, and . . .” Stachys stopped himself, knowing that he had already said too much.

  “What is a Way-follower?”

  Stachys tried to think of a way to describe the group that would not make them sound political. But he was so nervous that all he could do was repeat a description he had heard in the school of the catechumen. “The Way-followers are not one kind of people, but they invite everyone to their table—rich or poor, slave or free, man or woman. They do not expose their offspring. They share their food, but not their wives.”

  Geta scoffed, “Or, apparently, their sons.”

  Stachys took a deep breath. “I am the head of my household. And if I say the boy will have a tutor, then he will have a tutor.”

  Geta looked Stachys in the eyes. “Are you one of these Way-followers?”

  Stachys hesitated. “No,” he said. “I am not.”

  Urbanus had hoped that the emperor would name him prefect on the spot, but he was dismissed without any decision. He sent his litter bearers away, preferring to walk home, and he slowly made his way across the bridge to the Capitoline Hill and the ancient Etruscan-style temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus. There he made some sacrifices to Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva, as well as Mercury, the god of commerce. He promised to always be committed to increasing their honor, if they would just grant his request to be the prefect of the grain supply. As he ritually ate some of the meat from the animal sacrifice, he realized that he felt hungry for lunch, but he was in no mood for the noise of the tavern. Coming down the Capitoline Hill on the north side by the Fontinalis Gate, he decided to stop at Stachys’s house to see whether he was there, to ask him how the meeting with Geta went. As he came through the gate, he could see Stachys pacing in front of his house, looking down at his feet.

  Figure 4.3. Stone foundation from the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus on the Capitoline Hill (Capitoline Museum, Rome)

  Urbanus called out, “Stachys!”

  Stachys looked up, nodded toward Urbanus, but just kept pacing. Urbanus walked over toward him. “Salve, Stachys! How was the meeting at the Praetorian camp?”

  Stachys shook his head and spoke quietly. “He was going to torture me.”

  “What?!” Urbanus was worried but wanted to smooth things over. “Come, I’ll buy you lunch. I know a quiet place where we can talk.”

  Just then the door to Stachys’s house opened, and Marcus came out, followed by Philologus. “Stachys, old man! Were you just coming in?”

  The Three Fora

  The Roman forum (the plural of forum is fora) was the public square, originally the center of town and the central place of business, commerce, and religion. Eventually, though, more and more fora grew up until there was one for every possible type of business, shopping, and cult. At the time of our story, the three most important fora were all more or less connected to one another in a growing city center. Th
e Old Forum was the forum of republican Rome, and it included the senate house (the curia) as well as the law courts (the Basilica Aemila and Basilica Julia). Julius Caesar built his own forum adjacent to the Old Forum, and he rebuilt and reoriented the Senate house to send the architectural message that power was shifting from the old republic to the family of the Julio-Claudians. The Forum of Caesar included a temple dedicated to Venus, which was a bit of propaganda meant to convey the belief that Julius Caesar’s family was directly descended from the goddess.

  Figure 4.4. The “Old Forum”—the forum of the Roman republic

  Figure 4.5. The Forum of Augustus, with remains of the Temple of Mars

  The first true emperor, Augustus, followed suit and built his forum next to the Forum of Caesar. The Forum of Augustus included a temple dedicated to Mars and was decorated with marble from all over the world. That was meant to send the message that under Augustus, the Roman Empire was the conqueror of the world.

  Figure 4.6. Statue of Mars, the god of war. A statue such as this would have been in the Temple of Mars.

  “Actually, just going to lunch with my patron. Urbanus, you know my stepson, Marcus. Marcus, my patron, Urbanus.”

  Marcus shook Urbanus’s hand. “Salve. This is our friend Philologus. He’s without work right now, and he was just taking a break from the job search to come and pray with me. I was about to take him to lunch. May we join you?”

  Normally, Urbanus would have been offended by the idea of a poor Judean inviting himself to lunch with an equestrian. But there was something so likable about Marcus, and Urbanus felt open to the idea of new conversation partners and taking a break from thinking about his pending appointment and his enemy, Geta. So he replied, “Of course, please join us—but you must let me pay for lunch. In exchange, I expect to choose the location. We’re going to the Caupona Solis—the Inn of the Sun.”

  The men nodded, and they all walked off in the direction of the Theater of Pompey. It should have been a short walk, but they got held up by the circus parade as it came down the Capitoline Hill and turned toward the Old Forum and the Sacred Way. Eventually they made their way north into the Field of Mars, and soon they walked through the new Arch of Tiberius, to the inn, which faced the theater.

  Inside the inn it was quiet and cool. A large mosaic covered one wall, with images of chariot racing and the emblem of the green team. Portraits of famous charioteers were painted into the plaster of another wall. There weren’t very many people in the dining hall, and the men were able to push two small tables together, giving them plenty of room to relax. Urbanus ordered bread, cheese, cold meats, and four large cups of wine. Once they got their wine, the conversation became comfortable.

  Urbanus was becoming jovial. He held up his wooden wine cup, with an image of a famous charioteer carved into it. “Who’s going to the circus today? I’m a fan of the red team—though I suppose if I want the emperor’s favor I should cheer for the blue, eh? If you want, you can come with me to the Lateran stables to check out the horses and talk to the trainers and groomers, so you know how to place your bets.”

  Marcus and Philologus looked at each other. Marcus said, “I suppose it’s not a sin to go to the races.” He turned to Philologus. “With work shut down for three days, it’s going to be hard for you to find a job anyway. Might as well give yourself a break.” There was a pause, so he continued. “We just, uh, have to go later. You know, after the executions, and the sacrifices.”

  Urbanus gave him a puzzled look, but he didn’t look offended, so Marcus went on. “Because we’re Way-followers, you see. We believe it offends our Lord if we participate in any worship of the Greek or Roman gods.”

  “Really? You don’t take part in any of the sacrifices? Not even to do your patriotic duty?” Urbanus looked at Stachys.

  “That’s right,” Marcus explained. “The games always begin with rituals to honor the gods of your tradition. But to us, that’s a dishonor to our Lord, because to acknowledge the existence of your gods is to show a lack of faith in the one true God, who is all-powerful.”

  “Stachys, you never told me all this,” Urbanus said. “But I don’t know how you’ll find a seat if you come in late. People have been sleeping on the bleachers since last night to get the best seats.”

  Marcus replied, “It’s a small price to pay, to practice our devotion.”

  Stachys remained mostly silent. His words to Geta kept repeating in his head. No. No . . . I am not. But, he thought, what else could he have said? And it’s not as though he was already initiated. He was only in the school, and wouldn’t that mean his words were true, in a way? So why, he wondered, did he feel so guilty?

  The Circus

  The Roman “circus” was actually an oval horseracing track. The chariot races were the main event, although one would have seen other types of entertainment at the circus, including animal acts, acrobatics, trick riding, and many of the kinds of things we might expect to see at a modern three-ring circus—as well as some things we would not expect to see, such as public executions.

  The largest and most famous circus in Rome was the Circus Maximus, which held 250,000 spectators. There the horses started from twelve stalls named after the signs of the zodiac and ran in seven tracks named after the seven “planets” (the same known heavenly bodies that the days of the week were named after). Each race was seven laps, meant to represent the orbits of the seven planets. There were twenty-four races in a day. Most of these were races of chariots pulled by two, three, or four horses, although sometimes more, and if they really wanted to show off, on rare occasions a chariot could be pulled by as many as ten horses.

  Figure 4.7. The site of the Circus Maximus, with remains of a seating structure in the background

  Unlike the gladiatorial arena, seating at the circus was general seating, first come, first served. That meant that families could sit together, but it also meant a lot of chaos and people coming in early, even sleeping on the wooden bleachers the night before, to save their seats. There were, of course, box seats for the imperial family and for the senators. The emperor Claudius remodeled the senators’ box by having the senators’ seats covered in marble.

  Figure 4.8. Remains of the structure of the Circus Maximus

  There were four teams of charioteers, each with its own loyal fans and its particular political affiliations. The white and green teams were allies, and the blue and red teams were allies. Each team had its own stables, supported by horse trainers, veterinarians, stable hands, equipment handlers, and even cheerleaders. The charioteers could be slaves or freedmen, and like the gladiators, some of them became very famous, and their portraits were reproduced on cups, mugs, jugs, lamps, and tavern walls. The names of charioteers, and of their horses, have been found in mosaics and on curse tablets.

  In addition to the Circus Maximus, there were at least two other circuses in Rome at the time of our story: the Circus Flaminius in the Field of Mars and the Circus of Caligula (later called the Circus of Nero) on the Vatican Hill. In the center of the Circus Maximus and the Circus of Caligula, the emperors set up massive Egyptian obelisks, which symbolized Rome’s triumph over Egypt and in general its power over the known world. The obelisk in the Circus Maximus was from the reign of Rameses II and is now in Piazza del Popolo on the north end of Rome. The obelisk from the Circus of Caligula is now in the center of St. Peter’s Square.

  Philologus took a long drink of wine. “Do you think we’ll see the emperor at the circus today?”

  Urbanus smiled. “I’ve already seen him once today.”

  “You have? Where?” As everyone knew, Claudius was so afraid of conspiracies against him that he rarely left the palace.

  “In his throne room,” Urbanus said matter-of-factly, as if he went to the palace all the time. “I had an audience with Claudius. I’m expecting an important appointment.”

  “Really?” Marcus seemed interested. “What kind of man is he? I’ve heard so many conflicting things.”


  “Well . . .” Urbanus thought for a while, trying to imagine what he could say about the emperor that would be generally true without letting on that he didn’t really know the man personally. “He’s a scholar, that’s for sure. Kept mostly to himself before becoming emperor. And I hear he only likes to have sex with women, which is unusual for an emperor, I suppose.” Marcus and Philologus exchanged another glance.

  But Marcus seemed intrigued. “When he succeeded Caligula, it was a great relief to us Judeans. Not that we would wish for any man’s death, but Caligula was planning to put a statue of himself in our temple in Jerusalem. But then Claudius appointed Herod Agrippa as king over us, and Herod immediately tried to demonstrate his power and his enthusiasm for our traditions by executing our friend James and arresting our friend Peter. When Peter escaped from the prison, he showed up at my mother’s house, and that’s when we came here to Rome.”

  Urbanus found Marcus to be an interesting conversation partner. “You know,” he said, “when Caligula was assassinated, the Senate debated restoring the republic, rather than having another emperor. But it had already been three generations since the death of Caesar and the civil war. There was no going back. And besides, the Praetorians proclaimed Claudius emperor, so what could the senators do? They couldn’t go against the Praetorians.”

  “Well,” Marcus said, “someone thinks they can, since there seems to be an attempt on his life every couple of years.”

  Philologus joined in. “I don’t understand that. If Caligula was so bad, why would anyone want to kill Claudius? The next emperor could be another Caligula, or worse.”