Arthur Britannicus

by Paul Bannister

  Carausius had considered his options. Popularity was not one of his priorities. He knew his soldiers admired and even liked him, and he had an affection for them, having lived life as a walkalot when he was younger. He had no fears of losing the loyalty of his men, but he was unsure about handling civilians. Better, he felt, to be feared than to lose his grip now he was here in his new command. He would follow the crucifixioner’s principle and scourge the bandits. Law-abiding citizens need fear nothing from him, but he resolved to go on to make a terrible example of lawbreakers.

  In the tavern where he was dodging the column, unaware of how his offhand remarks had affected his commander, Davius faced the mariners’ questions about what it was like to be crucified. “Well, it’s probably better than being hung upside down and sawn in half. That hurts a lot, because the brain gets enough blood to keep you alive until the saw finally gets well into your chest,” he declared. “It’s a lot slower than being burned to death, but that hurts quite a bit, too. If you keep the fire down around the perp’s legs and feet, it can take a good while before the flames get to the head. You’d be surprised how much blood comes out, it hisses in the flames. A good carnifex can keep them alive a long time. You make the fire take the perp’s calves, thighs and hands first, then the torso and finally the face goes up before they die of shock or blood loss. You don’t want the fire to be too high too soon or they just suffocate. Do it right and being burned at the stake can take a couple of hours.”

  The old executioners, he said, put a flammable tunic on the condemned, and lit it. The good emperor Hadrian had ordered a rabbi who defied his edicts to be burned with a pad of wet wool on his chest, to prolong his punishment. “Some old Greek had a brass bull made so he could put the perp inside it, on the fire,” the executioner recalled. “It was fitted out so the screams came through the bull’s mouth and sounded like the beast was roaring. The fellow who made it asked the tyrant for his pay, and got more than he wanted. He became the bull’s first occupant.”

  But crucifixion, that’s what you do, isn’t it? asked the sailors, refilling Davius’ wooden wine cup. “Now, that’s an art,” he said. “It’s really all about humiliation. You want to shame them. Even old Cicero called it the most cruel and disgusting death, and it’s really for slaves, rebels, people like that, enemies of the state. You flog them first, to get the blood flowing. I use a scourge that has bits of metal in the thongs, to strip off the flesh. It weakens them. Then you fasten them to the crosspiece and make them carry it to where they’re going to hang around. We have some permanent uprights here, down by the docks, and in Rome they have quite a few outside the Esquiline Gate, near Nero’s house. Old Nero, he liked to have the Jesus followers crucified, did for thousands of them and at night he had their bodies set on fire to provide illumination.”

  “Anyway,” Davius continued, “You fasten them to the crosspiece, nailing is better than tying, though nails cost money. Then you march them to the uprights and hoist the crosspiece into place. The executioner paused. “Remember, keep the nails straight so you can use them again later. If you’re not tying the perp’s arms to the crosspiece, but want to nail him up, you get long spikes, about seven inches, and angle each in through the crease under the fat part of the thumb and up through the wrist where there’s a little tunnel. Then you haul the crosspiece up the vertical and fix it. You can also nail the perps through the forearms; that works, too. As for fastening the feet, mostly, I nail their heels to the sides of the post. Don’t forget first to run the nail through a little piece of wood before you knock it through the heel, so they can’t tear the foot free.”

  “I sometimes put a little shelf as a footrest on the upright, to take the weight and keep them alive longer, but some people prefer a small seat about halfway. If you do that, you can put a spike on it; it sticks up their rectum or vagina and adds to their fun. As a kindness, I sometimes make women condemned face the upright so they get full pleasure from that spike. After all, it’s their last screw.” He paused again for a swig of his drink, then resumed, enjoying the familiar, horrified attention.

  Crucifixes, he explained, came in various styles, the most commonly used being the Tau, which was shaped like a capital T and had no vertical above the crosspiece, as the so-called Latin crucifix did. There were X and Y shaped crucifixes, or sometimes the executioner’s team would simply use a tree. The upright of the Tau had a squared end that slotted into a matching hole on the underside of the crosspiece, and after the condemned had been fastened to it, it was a simple matter to hoist man and crosspiece up as a unit onto the stake.

  “It just makes sense, it’s efficient. Fastening a perp to the complete crucifix and then having to haul the whole thing upright and drop it into a post hole with him nailed in place is heavy work,” said the executioner, musing “I’ve never favoured those Latin crosses.” He paused again, eyeing his rapt audience who, open-mouthed, were soaking in the gory details.

  The most efficient way to carry out a swift execution, Davius said, was to fasten the perp’s arms above his head, then nail down the feet so he couldn’t raise himself up to breathe. Fastened in that way, the condemned usually died within an hour or so, suffocated. It was not, he said, a technique he used often because the whole point was to inflict suffering and shame, and an hour’s worth was not much punishment, eh?

  One of the sailors got up and left the table, looking pale. Davius, unconcerned, took another draft of wine. “You strip them naked, of course, because they lose their bowels on that spike and that brings insects to add to their enjoyment. How long do they last? I’ve had them die in a few hours, or take as long as three days. It all depends on how strong they are, how much the flogging took out of them, blood loss, all that. If the relatives see you right, and you know what effect a piece of gold can have on your attitude, you can speed things up by breaking their legs.

  “I use an iron club. With no way to take weight on their heels, the hangers get it all on their arms. It compresses the lungs and they suffocate. But you know, don’t rush things. You want people to see them suffering, because that makes the punters think twice about staying on the right side of the law. I see this stuff all the time, and I tell you, I pay my taxes and I follow what the boss tells me to do. I’ve no intention of being fastened up there myself.”

  The executioner took a last pull at his wine, wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and mused: “Funny thing, really. We’re the civilizing influence, but barbarians like the Picts treat their perps kinder. They toss convicted felons into deep water, hands and feet tied. Simple, no blood, and food for the fish, eh? What’s wrong with that is that with their way nobody gets a stern lesson, so I suppose they get more criminals than we do.”

  He laughed and eased himself up from the table. “I’ve got to see a smith about making some more nails since we did all these rebels. People buy the spikes as amulets, after they’ve been used on the condemned. They say they bring good health to the wearer.” He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and laughed. “They don’t bring the perps much luck, do they? Well, it’s a nice little earner for me, but it does deplete the ironmongery stocks.”

  XIII. Margus

  Word came to the emperor Carinus of his brother’s death and of the upstart general who had assumed the imperial purple. Diocletian, he raged, must die. He’d probably poisoned Numerian himself to steal the throne. The courtiers shrank away from their tyrant lord; a cruel, arrogant spendthrift who courted the mob with bread and circuses. Games, theatre, chariot races, naval battles in the Colosseum, parades, free bread and wine were extravagantly put before the common people. The nobles were treated to sumptuous feasts and debauches but few attended willingly, as Carinus was a vicious sadist who delighted in forcing himself on other men’s wives and young sons. His palaces were crowded with dyed-blonde prostitutes and actors, pimps and singers; the vast public spaces were bedecked with Milanese roses and violets from Parma, and the rooms were filled with gilded columns and pornographic
frescoes. He maintained a warm water swimming pool in which he liked to swim naked among floating flowers, melons and apples while flutists and lyre players serenaded him. Rumour said he enjoyed an incestuous relationship with his sister, although he had one long-serving wife, as well as having had eight others whom he’d murdered or divorced when they became pregnant. The boldest courtiers whispered to each other about his heir, wondering and snickering if he came from Carinus’ wife or his sister Paulina.

  Vain and arrogant, Carinus wore jewels on every part of his person. A great ruby clasped his cloak, emeralds adorned his shoes, and pearls, sapphires and other gems studded his belt. He painted his face, gilded his fingernails with gold leaf and was everywhere trailed by an entourage of masseuses, hairdressers and wardrobe mistresses. His first delight was to force married noblewomen into humiliating sex with him, his second was to host sumptuous banquets when the wine flowed from fountains and a squadron of slaves stood by to dilute it to taste with spices or honey.

  At one legendary feast, Carinus’ cooks served more than a thousand pounds of meats that ranged from giraffe to ibex, plus a hundred pounds each of fish and birds as varied as peacock and lark. To demonstrate his power, the tyrant had his former schoolfellows tortured and executed for remembered or imagined insults. He had wealthy men imprisoned for their riches and ordered the murders of men whose wives he coveted. “He was a good soldier once, on the Rhine, but he’s become a monster since he returned to Rome,” was the consensus spoken only in private and after a careful check for eavesdroppers.

  The time came when Carinus needed his military skills, and urgently. Soon after news came of Diocletian’s revolt, word arrived from Venezia, where the governor had also risen against the tyrant’s rule. Carinus moved fast, and marched north with his legions. At Verona, he swiftly defeated and executed the rebel governor. Then he moved on again to face Diocletian, who had ended his long march back from Persia and was on the frontier, at the River Danube.

  The rival generals met on the plains of Margus, near the great river, and matters did not go well at first for the usurper. Diocletian’s troops were reduced in numbers from their months of travel and were in generally poor health after an outbreak of dysentery. Carinus threw his fresh troops at them with conviction and broke the ranks of Diocletian’s legions. The slaughter was about to begin, and victory seemed assured for the Roman tyrant, but the Fates stepped in and snipped the threads of his life.

  Carinus’ own officers, led by a tribune whose wife Carinus had raped, turned on him right there on the battlefield. The tribune and a few accomplices hacked down the despised tyrant, the other officers called off their men and both armies halted, the fighting put aside. In the matter of an hour Diocletian went from facing defeat and execution to being acclaimed emperor by both armies. His parade into Rome was a triumph. He’d left the Eternal City as the son of a senator’s household slaves. Then his tide of fortune flowed full. He became military governor of Moesia, took the curule chair of a consul, and next became commander of the palace guard. An oracle had forecast great fame for him, “after he killed the boar.” With the murder of Aper the Boar, his men knew he was in the protecting hands of the gods. They bowed to the heavens, and acclaimed him. Now he was returning with his legion, clad in imperial purple and bringing an impedimenta train groaning with loot and slaves. Life, he reflected, had been good to him.

  Some of it he had earned, for Diocletian was a highly competent soldier and not just a reckless warrior. Instead, he was a manipulator and an artful politician whose skill at misleading opponents about his true motives carried him a long way. After seeing victory snatched away from Carinus when he was assassinated by his own officers, Diocletian had absorbed the lesson. Popularity mattered. Because he’d evaded a civil war, he was shrewd enough to keep many of his predecessor’s civil servants in their old offices and transited them into his own administration. He knew how easily a barracks emperor could seize power, and was uncomfortably aware, too, of the number of short-lived emperors who had lived and died by sword or dagger thrust from a onetime friend. He needed, he knew, a wider base of power.

  Diocletian saw clearly how this could be attained. For a century, the legions had made and unmade the emperors, electing or selling the imperial crown to any general they favoured. About 40 such ‘barracks emperors’ had taken the purple, some lasting only months before being deposed in a pool of their own lifeblood. Diocletian’s plan was to recruit several co-emperors, to parcel out the empire between them and to rule jointly, each emperor having his own autonomy and army. The checks and balances of such a system would rein in the legions’ power and control their insubordination and would remove the monopoly of influence from Rome’s corrupt administrators, all to the benefit of the empire as a whole. And, it would keep this barracks emperor in office for much, much longer.

  Diocletian had to deal with the pressing business of holding the eastern frontier and he needed to reduce the terrible drain of maintaining it under arms. His first steps were to draw back some troops from the Rhine and Danube to act as a rapid deployment force. Instead of massing troops along the entire frontier, he’d keep them behind the frontiers, use outlying garrisons to warn him of invaders and respond to their attacks by moving troops to meet them.

  The need to revamp the military structure made him look for a suitable deputy to be the first of his co-emperors. His fellow countryman, the brutish soldier Maximian, caught his eye. Diocletian knew Maximian would remain loyal because he could not survive without the support of the senior emperor’s political skills. “You will be my fellow Augustus,” Diocletian told him, after greeting him in the old way, each man grasping the other’s right wrist. “Your military brawn and your legions will complement my political power. We will rule the empire together. Do your work in Germania and Gaul, then come to Rome to be formally appointed.”

  His mutual assistance pact sealed, Diocletian returned to his palace in Nicomedia, near the Bosphorus, where he lived and ruled in Oriental splendour as a god, demanding that those admitted to his glorious presence kneel and kiss the hem of his robe and not look at his face, on pain of death. Maximian, the junior emperor in waiting, obediently marched his troops to Milan and turned his eyes to the Rhine. There were battles to be fought, an empire to keep subjugated and barbarians to kill. He had Spain, Africa, Italy and Gaul to rule. He would be busy.

  XIV. Seine

  Carausius was pondering over his maps of Gaul. He’d been stamping out the fires of revolution for several years now, but matters kept getting worse. Greedy absentee landowners, clerics and lawmakers in distant Rome had sorely gouged the colonials, and the tenants were passing matters on to the peasants. The legate considered the problem: punishing taxation meant that crops and livestock were forfeited when the taxes were unpaid. It had ruined many smallholders, and they had been driven from their homes to become wandering bandits desperate merely to survive. You couldn’t blame them for rebelling, he thought, but he wasn’t in a position to sympathise. His job was to bring the rebels to heel.

  The Bagaudae, a Gallic term for ‘aggressors’ who already infested the remoter areas of the empire, were runaway slaves, military deserters, highwaymen and brigands, and they had been joined by dispossessed peasants to form sizeable bands who preyed upon travellers, peasants who were still working the land, and even small settlements where there was insufficient force to drive them away. In several cases the bandits had overwhelmed the military forces sent to suppress them, and had sacked un-walled towns. What had started in Brittany had spread down the coast of the Atlanticus, across the wine country of the Loire and almost to the great southern city of Narbonne. Now came news that faraway Spain was in flames, too. It was a major headache for Rome, and for the legate to whom the problem had been handed, but it was only one of several pressing issues that faced Carausius.

  While he was tasked with restoring the Roman Peace, he had to consider not just the brigandage on the land, but also the piracy on the sea
s off northern Gaul. Saxons from Denmark and Germania ruled the sea from the Baltic to the Gallic Strait. Picts and Hibernians from the western islands were raiding Britain, as Carausius knew from bitter personal experience, and Frankish pirates infested the waters all around the Gallic coast. Almost daily, cargoes were being taken, ships’ crews and passengers captured and sold into slavery and the trading fleet itself was being hijacked and turned into yet more pirate ships.

  “We have to build and man a fleet, we have to increase the size of our legions and we have to find the money to do it,” Carausius told his aide, Lycaon. “Then we can clean up the pirates, and send an expedition across Gaul and into Hispania, crucify a few and get some forts built and garrisoned so we can keep these bastards in line. But we need money to do it.”

  He was still fretting over funding as he watched the Minerva, one of the fleet’s few triremes, negotiate the narrow entrance into the harbour, and wondered sourly if theirs had been yet another fruitless patrol. It had not, and he brightened at the sight of several strange vessels that were trailing in, following the trireme, obvious captives. The Minerva’s young captain was soon standing before his commander, glowing with pride. This, he thought, would please old Car the Bear. “We took five pirate vessels, sir,” he reported, “and we have 38 captives; we had to kill a few, but the good news is what we took from them.” The officer fished under his blue naval cloak for his purse and pulled out five gold coins. “Aureii,” he said proudly. “We have a whole chest of coin and silver bullion under guard on Minerva.”

  The tale came out quickly. After two routine stop-and-searches that had yielded some profit, the trireme had trapped three pirate vessels in a bay where they could not out sail the Romans’ oared galleys. After a brief fight with each, the warship had hooked on and boarded the corsairs. “They’d been raiding and had looted several coastal settlements. We just liberated the loot and the captives for ourselves. We burned two of their ships, which were holed and sinking anyway.”