Almost forgotten amid the chaos, Verginius lowered the body of his daughter to the ground and knelt over her, joined by Lucius. Father and lover wept uncontrollably, adding their tears to the blood that stained Verginia’s breast.
449 B.C.
By the time Icilia’s pregnancy began to show, many things had changed in Roma.
The change that most intimately affected her was the death of her father. Walking through the Forum one day, Icilius had clutched his chest and fallen. By the time he arrived home, carried on a litter, his heart had stopped beating.
Upon their father’s death, Icilia’s brother Lucius became paterfamilias. It was Lucius who would decide Icilia’s fate, and the fate of her unborn child.
Great changes had also taken place in the city.
The tragic end of Verginia had shaken Roma to its foundations. Had Appius Claudius possessed any idea of the forces his mad scheme would unleash? It was hard to imagine how any man, however blinded by lust or arrogance, could have proceeded on such a reckless course. For generations to come, his name would be a synonym for that which the Greeks called hubris—a pride so overbearing that the gods themselves are compelled to annihilate the offender.
Did Appius Claudius anticipate Verginius’s intention to kill his daughter? Did he deliberately allow it to happen, having cold-bloodedly determined that this was his best course of action? In the aftermath of the upheaval, some put forth this opinion. They argued that Appius Claudius had already had his way with the girl, and thus had no further use for her. She had become a liability to him; her death would relieve him of the responsibility to determine her identity, and what better solution than to goad her father into committing the act? Appius Claudius thought he had found a way to take what he wanted without paying a price. If a man had power, and was clever, and was brazen enough to follow through on a ruthless scheme, then even for the most terrible crime he might hope to avoid punishment.
Others said that even Appius Claudius could not be that cold and calculating. Having desired Verginia so desperately that he would carry out such a dangerous plot, surely a single night and day had not exhausted his appetite for her. The fact that his face showed no reaction to her death was because he was utterly stunned by what Verginius had done.
Whatever his intentions, the Decemvir’s desire for Verginia had nothing to do with politics, yet the girl’s father and betrothed managed to convince their fellow plebeians otherwise. A merciless patrician had despoiled a plebeian virgin, beaten and humiliated her outraged plebeian suitor, and driven her distraught plebeian father to an act of uttermost shame and desperation.
All the discontent sewn by the Decemvirs’ tyranny came to a head over the outrage committed against Verginia. For the first time in a generation, the plebeians staged a secession, such as the one which had won them the right to elect tribunes. Plebeian city-dwellers withdrew from the city; plebeian farmers put aside their plows; plebeian soldiers refused to fight. Their demand was the end of the Decemvirs, and in particular, the arrest, trial, and punishment of Appius Claudius.
In the end, after much bombast and negotiation, all ten Decemvirs resigned. Some managed to escape trial. Others were charged with misconduct and forbidden to leave the city, including Appius Claudius, who barricaded himself in his well-guarded house and refused to come out. His abuses were the most egregious of the Decemvirs, yet he seemed to be the least repentant.
Bitter and unwavering to the end, Appius Claudius hanged himself rather than face the judgment of the court.
Marcus Claudius, the accomplice of the Decemvir, was too cowardly to follow his master’s example; he was brought to trial and condemned. Verginius himself requested that the villain be spared the penalty of death, and Marcus was allowed to flee into exile. It was said that on the day he left Roma, the ghost of Verginia, which for months had wandered from house to house across the Seven Hills, weeping and moaning in the night, terrifying children and rending the hearts of their parents, at last found peace and ceased to haunt the city.
The Senate reassembled. New magistrates were elected. Among the new tribunes of the plebs were Verginius and young Lucius Icilius.
The bitterness felt toward the Decemvirs as men and as tyrants was almost universal, but their labor as lawmakers was widely respected. The Twelve Tables were accepted by a consensus of both patricians and plebeians, and became the law of the land.
The new laws were cast in tablets of bronze, which were posted in the Forum, where any citizen could read them, or have them read aloud to him. No longer would Roman law be a matter of oral tradition—an accretion of moldering precedents, momentary whims, hazy surmises, and recondite deductions—known only to experienced senators and jurists; instead, the Twelve Tables were there for all to see. Virtually every citizen had a quibble or two with some provision of the new laws, but these objections were swept aside by the overwhelming value of the Twelve Tables as a whole. Once the spoken word of kings had been the highest authority, then that of the elected consuls; now the written word was king, to which each citizen had access.
On the day the bronze tablets were posted, Icilia dressed in the plain tunica of one of her slave girls and slipped away from her house. She waited in the secluded place near the market where her child had been conceived. Titus was to meet her there. He did not yet know of the child’s existence.
Titus arrived late. As he slipped past the dense foliage of the cypress tree, he managed to smile. He kissed her. When he drew back, the smile had vanished. The grimness on his face mirrored her own.
“I came from the Forum,” he said. “They’ve posted the Twelve Tables.”
“You’ve read them?”
“Not all. But I read the part about marriage.” He lowered his eyes. “It’s just as we feared. There can be no marriage between a patrician and a plebeian.”
Icilia drew a sharp breath. She had been hoping against hope that, somehow, a marriage to Titus might still be possible. She had clung desperately to this fantasy for as long as she could; now it was gone. She felt frightened and utterly alone, despite the arms that encircled her.
“Titus, there’s something I must tell you.”
He brushed a strand of hair from her cheek, and felt warm tears on this fingertips. “What must you tell me, Icilia? Whatever it is, it can’t be as bad as what I’ve just told you.”
“Titus, there’s a child growing inside me. Your child.”
His arms stiffened. After a moment, he hugged her fiercely, and then, just as abruptly, drew back, as if afraid he might harm her. On his face was an expression she had never seen on anyone before, joyful and despairing at the same time.
“Your brother?”
“Lucius doesn’t know yet. No one knows—except you. I’ve hidden it from everyone. But I can’t hide it much longer.”
“When? How soon?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t know about such things…and there’s no one I can ask!” Fresh tears streamed down her cheeks.
“Icilia, Icilia! What are we to do? You’ll have to tell Lucius. The two of you have always been close. Perhaps—”
“Not anymore! I’m afraid of him now. Ever since Verginia died, he’s a different person. He suffers from the beatings he took from the lictors; one of his eyes will never be the same. There’s so much anger in him, so much bitterness. He never used to hate patricians; now he’s more vengeful than Father ever was. He talks of nothing but harming those he hates. We can’t look to him for help, Titus.”
“But he’ll have to know, sooner or later. The decision will be his to make.”
“Decision?” She was not sure what he meant.
He drew back from her, just enough to reach up and lift the necklace over his head. A bit of sunlight glittered on the golden talisman he called Fascinus.
“For our child,” he said, placing it over her neck.
“But Titus, this belongs to your family. It’s your birthright!”
“Yes, passed from generation to gener
ation, since the beginning of time. The child inside you is mine, Icilia. I give this talisman to my child. The law prevents our marriage. Even if the law allowed it, your brother would forbid it. But no law, no man—not even the gods—can stop us from loving one another. The life inside you is the proof of that. I give Fascinus to you, and you will give it to the child you bear.”
The pendant was cold against her flesh, and surprisingly heavy. Titus had claimed it brought good fortune, but Icilia remembered her doubts.
“Oh, Titus, what’s to become of us?”
“I don’t know. I only know I love you,” he whispered. He thought she meant the two of them, but Icilia was thinking of herself and the helpless life within her. At that moment, she felt the baby stir and give a kick, as if pricked by its mother’s fear.
The midwives, when Lucius angrily consulted them, all agreed: while there existed means by which a pregnancy could be ended—the insertion of a slender willow branch, or the ingestion of the poison called ergot—it was much too late to do so without gravely endangering Icilia herself. Unless he cared nothing for his sister’s life, she must be allowed to bear the child.
The news clearly displeased Lucius. The oldest and most wizened of the midwives, who had witnessed every possible circumstance attending the birth of child, drew him aside. “Calm yourself, Tribune. Once the baby is delivered, it can easily be disposed of. If you wish to save your sister and avoid gossip, this is what I advise…”
Icilia was sent away from Roma, to stay with a relative of the midwife who lived in a fishing camp outside Ostia. There was no need for Lucius to invent excuses for his sister’s absence. A young, unmarried woman had little public life; few people missed Icilia, and those who did readily accepted the explanation that she was in seclusion, still mourning her father.
Icilia’s labor was long and difficult. The ordeal stretched over a day and a night—time for word to reach her brother in Roma, and time for him to arrive in the fishing camp even as the baby was being born.
Afterward, when Icilia came to her senses, the first thing she saw was Lucius standing over her in the darkened room. Her heart leaped with sudden hope. Surely he would not have come all the way from Roma if he simply intended to have the baby drowned in the Tiber, or cast into the sea.
“Brother! I was in such pain…”
He nodded. “I saw the sheets. The blood.”
“The baby—”
“A boy. Strong and healthy.” His voice was flat. It was hard to read any expression on his face. He no longer ever smiled, and the upper lid of his bad eye drooped.
“Please, brother, bring him to me!” Icilia reached up with her arms.
Lucius shook his head. “It’s best if you never see the child again.”
“What are you saying?”
“Titus Potitius came to me a few days ago. He asked me—no, begged me—to allow him to adopt your child. ‘No one need know where it came from,’ he said. ‘I’ll say it was an orphan from the wars, or the child of a distant cousin. I’ve asked my father to let me do this thing, and he gave his permission.’” Lucius shook his head. “I told Titus Potitius, ‘It will still be a bastard.’ ‘That doesn’t matter,’ he said. ‘If it’s a boy, he shall have my name and I shall raise him as my son.’ That’s why I came today, sister.”
“So that you can give the boy to Titus?” Icilia sobbed, partly from relief, partly from sadness.
Lucius grunted. “To the contrary! I told the patrician scum that under no circumstances would he ever come into possession of the child. That’s why I’m here. I feared Potitius might discover your whereabouts and try to lay his hands on the baby. I will make sure that doesn’t happen.”
Icilia clutched his arm. “No, brother—you mustn’t kill him!”
Lucius raised an eyebrow, causing the other to droop even more. “That was my intention. But now that I’ve seen the child, I have an even better idea. I shall take him with me back to Roma, where I shall raise him as a slave, to serve me and my household. Imagine that! A patrician’s bastard, serving as a whipping boy in a plebeian household!” He smiled grimly, pleased at the idea.
“But Lucius, the child is your nephew.”
“No! The child is my slave.”
“And what of me, brother?”
“I know a Greek trader from Croton, at the furthest ends of Magna Graecia. He’s agreed to take you for his wife. You set sail from Ostia tomorrow. You must never speak of the child. You must never return to Roma. Your life will be whatever you make of it. You and I shall not speak again.”
“Lucius! Such cruelty—”
“The Fates are cruel, Icilia. Fortuna is cruel. They robbed me of Verginia—”
“So now you rob me of my child?”
“The child is a bastard and doesn’t deserve to live. This is an act of clemency, sister.”
“Let me see him!”
“No.”
Icilia saw that he would not be swayed. “Do one thing for me, brother. I ask only one thing! Give him this, from me.” With trembling hands, she raised the necklace over her head.
Lucius snatched it from her and studied at it angrily. “What is this? Some sort of talisman? It didn’t come from anyone in our family. Titus Potitius gave it to you, didn’t he?”
“Yes.”
Lucius stared at it for a long moment, then slowly nodded. “Why not? It seems to be made of gold; I could just as easily take it for myself and melt it down for the value, but I’ll do as you ask. I shall let the slave boy have it, as a gaudy trinket to decorate his neck. It will serve to remind me of his origin. Let the ancient bloodline of the Potitii continue in the veins of a slave, and let the slave wear this talisman as a mark of shame!”
THE VESTAL
393 B.C.
On the eve of the greatest catastrophe yet to befall the city, the unsuspecting people of Roma celebrated their greatest triumph. One of the city’s oldest rivals had at last been vanquished.
The city of Veii was scarcely twenty miles from Roma. A man with strong legs could walk the distance in a single day. A rider on horseback could journey there and back in a matter of hours. Yet, for generation after generation, even as Roma conquered more distant enemies, Veii remained proudly independent, sometimes at peace with Roma, sometimes at war with her. In recent generations, Veii had grown immensely wealthy. Her alliances with other cities in the region began to threaten Roma’s dominance of the salt route and traffic on the Tiber.
For ten summers in a row, Roma’s armies laid siege to Veii, yet with the coming of each winter and the cessation of warfare, Veii remained unconquered. It would take a very great general to put an end to Veii, men said. At last such a general appeared. His name was Marcus Furius Camillus.
No one who witnessed it would ever forget the triumphal parade of Camillus. All agreed that it was by far the grandest triumph in memory; the number of captives, the sheer magnificence of the booty displayed (thanks to the opulence of Veii), and the joyous spirit of the event outstripped all previous triumphs. But, impressive as they were, it was not these details that made the event unforgettable; it was the sight of Camillus in a chariot pulled by four white horses.
Standing on the viewing platform reserved for religious dignitaries, the Vestal Pinaria let out a gasp. She whispered to the Vestal standing next to her, “Foslia, have you ever seen such a thing?”
“I should think not. No one has seen such a thing! Four white horses!”
Pinaria shook her head in wonder. “Just like the quadriga of Jupiter atop the temple on the Capitoline.”
“No general has ever done such a thing before,” declared Foslia. At seventeen, Pinaria was the youngest of the six Vestals. Foslia was only five years older, but was very studious, and something of a know-it-all. She was especially well versed in the history of religious observances, and, like every public act in Roma, a triumph was a religious rite. “Romulus walked on foot for his triumphs. Tarquinius the Elder was the first to ride in a quadriga. But
no general has ever dared to emulate Jupiter and hitch four white horses to his chariot!”
“Do you think it’s an impious act?” asked Pinaria.
“That would not be for me to judge,” said Foslia, primly.
“Still, it’s quite a sight.”
“It is, indeed.” Foslia smiled. “And the general is so handsome—even with his face painted red!”
The two young women looked at one another and laughed. The Virgo Maxima did not approve of such talk, but all the Vestals indulged in it. It seemed to Pinaria that when they were not discussing religious matters, they were usually talking about men, and as often as not, about Camillus. In his fifties, the general was more robust than many a man in his thirties, with a magnificent mane of white hair, a broad chest, and powerful limbs.
“Do you think he knows how strikingly the white horses set off his white hair?” asked Foslia.
“Surely the man who conquered Veii has no time for vanity,” said Pinaria.
“Nonsense! Who is vainer than a general, especially on the day of his triumph? But look there, coming up behind him—it’s the statue of Juno Regina!”
Of all the objects taken from Veii, this was the most prized: the massive statue of the city’s divine patroness, the queen-mother of the gods, Juno, in whose honor the grandest temple in all Veii had been built. For generations, Juno Regina had protected the Veiians. On the eve of the final battle, Camillus had vowed that if Veii fell, he would bring Juno Regina to Roma and built an even grander temple for her. Now he was making good on the first part of his pledge.
Men who had grown hoarse cheering Camillus raised their voices even louder at the sight of the statue. It was transported on a massive cart pulled by Veiian captives, among them the former priests of Juno, who had been stripped of their robes and put in shackles. The statue was made of wood, but no joinery was visible; the surface had been carved and smoothed by the finest Etruscan sculptors, and covered with bright paint and precious gilt. Juno Regina sat upon a throne, grasping a scepter in one hand and holding a libation bowl in the other, with a peacock at her feet.
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