The Tiger Warrior

by David Gibbins

  “So where’s the image of Rama in all this?” Costas said, looking around. “I mean, isn’t this supposed to be his shrine?”

  Pradesh paused. “In Hindu belief, Rama was the descendent of an ancient solar dynasty. He could be represented by that image of Vishnu, or by a sun carving. Maybe we just need to look more closely.”

  Jack was staring at the chisel work on the neck of the Kubera god, seeing techniques that seemed remarkably familiar. He stepped back, sweeping his flashlight around the room, finding details, lingering on them, seeing what all his education made him want to deny, yet which years of incredible discoveries as an archaeologist made him know lay within the realm of possibility. His mind raced back to Egypt, to Hiebermeyer’s discovery of the Periplus, to the first glimmerings of this trail they were on. An extraordinary discovery was beginning to take shape before his eyes, an imprint from the past that was becoming more real with every second.

  “What’s the date of all this?” Costas said.

  “The yakśas and yakśīs, like the naga, the serpent, are idols to earth spirits, survivors of the early religion in India before Hinduism and Buddhism took over,” Pradesh replied. “The earliest yakśas sculptures date from the third century BC, but these ones here could be first century BC, possibly first century AD. That was when the gods of early Hinduism, the ones you see here, started to make an appearance. After that, the Hindu gods rule supreme over the native cults, absorbing or extinguishing them. And there are no images of Buddha here, but there are Buddhist symbols, the bull on the pillar, the spoked wheel. It’s a little like early Christianity, where symbols were used before Christ was represented anthropomorphically.”

  “So this could be, say, late first century BC,” Costas said.

  “That would fit with the sculptural style, if we were looking at Graeco-Roman influence,” Jack said. “There are stylistic and technical details I’d put in the late Republican period, if this were Rome.”

  “We’ve got to eliminate the obvious,” Pradesh said. “The Roman site at Arikamedu’s only four hundred miles south of here. No Roman from Arikamedu would ever have come into the jungle without a very good reason, but we have to consider the possibility.”

  Jack shook his head. “I don’t see a sculptor at Arikamedu. Mud-brick buildings, wooden, purely utilitarian. Even at Berenikê on the Red Sea there was hardly anything made of stone. There was nothing for a sculptor to do.”

  “Maybe someone who’d been a sculptor, but changed careers, became a sailor or a trader,” Costas said. “Maybe he came to India and then went native, found a bolthole in the jungle, rediscovered an old passion for carving. You always say it, Jack. Anything’s possible.”

  Jack hesitated, thinking hard. “Sculpting, stonemasonry, was a hereditary profession, and you didn’t move between trades that easily in the ancient world. And if we’re talking Rome about the time of Augustus, it would have been madness to leave. Augustus rebuilt the city in stone. It was one of the biggest building programs in history.” He paused, then voiced a suspicion that had dawned on him only moments before. “But you may have hit on something. There was one walk of Roman life that took men with all manner of skills, from every profession.”

  “The army,” Pradesh said.

  “Citizen-soldiers,” Jack murmured. “But we need to think carefully about the date. At the time of Augustus, the army was becoming professional, recruiting eighteen-year-olds for twenty years’ service. For the real citizen-soldier, we need to look back to the time of the civil wars, and before that to the Roman Republic, when fit men of any age would volunteer for a shorter period, usually no more than six years. I’m talking mid-first century BC or earlier. That’s several decades before the main Roman period at Arikamedu. And there’s another problem. There’s no evidence whatsoever that the Romans ever sent legionaries to India.”

  “Maybe a mercenary?” Costas said. “Or a deserter? You told me about those maverick British and French officers in eighteenth century India, running native armies and setting themselves up as princes. Maybe the same thing happened in the Roman period?”

  Jack panned the light over the walls. “It’s possible. The Periplus mentions armed guards on ships, as defense against pirates.” But Jack already knew what they were looking at, with utter certainty. His voice was tight with excitement. “Or something else. An escaped prisoner of war.”

  Costas edged around the far side of the chamber, inspecting the deep shadows around the boulders beside the sculpture of Kubera. He peered into one, his hand remaining on the belly of the god. “I was right. There’s another tunnel here. It looks like another chamber beyond.”

  A muffled shout came down the entrance passageway in the opposite direction, a few urgent words in Hindi. Pradesh barked something back and then looked beyond Costas. He glanced at his watch, and shook his head in frustration. “I’ve got to go. Sergeant Amratavalli’s returned from his recce. I need to confer with him. I’ll leave you in here as long as I can, but we’ve got no more than an hour. The chopper pilot won’t linger. He’s an ex-army friend, but he’s not going to want his machine to get shot up again. We’ll need to leave before any more of the Maoists arrive. Good luck.” Pradesh un-holstered his revolver and disappeared back toward the entrance. Jack went ahead of Costas into the crack between the boulders, and Costas wedged himself in behind. The slick of damp on the rock acted as a lubricant, and he forced his ample frame through. Jack shone the flashlight back for him, illuminating the thick brown smear on what was left of his shirt. “Ruined,” Costas muttered mournfully. “Completely ruined.”

  Jack swung the light around. The chamber was about the same size as the first, but the walls were different. Someone had gone to huge efforts to chip away and smooth the boulders to create flat surfaces, like sculptural canvases. Jack was aware of shapes behind him, but kept his light focused on the wall he had seen when he first entered the chamber. His mind was still attuned to the images they had seen before, Indian gods and demons, bold sculptures almost in the round. The wall ahead was the side of one massive boulder at least five meters long and three meters high. He stared in astonishment. The images were utterly unlike those of the previous chamber. Subtle relief carving covered almost the entire wall. He could see soldiers, weapons. It was a continuous scene, a narrative. And these images had nothing to do with Indian mythology. It was as if they had walked into a museum of Roman art. Into a room created in the heart of Rome itself. “My God,” he whispered. “It looks just like the Battle of Issus. One of Alexander the Great’s most famous battles, against the Persians.”

  Costas came alongside. “That’s fourth century BC, right? You mentioned prisoners of war, Jack. I’m thinking Battle of Carrhae, first century BC. Is that where all this is leading us?”

  Jack’s mind was racing. “Alexander would have been much on the mind of the legionaries as they marched to Carrhae: Crassus probably saw himself as a born-again Alexander, and may have used Issus as a rallying cry. And when the Romans lost at Carrhae, Alexander’s victory against the Persians would have attained mystical status. Add to that the evidence of Alexander’s eastern expedition seen by the escaped Roman prisoners, the altars described in that fragment of the Periplus. Alexander would have been a constant backdrop to what might have happened. An adventure that might have taken a citizen-soldier, a sculptor by trade, from Rome to Carrhae, then to imprisonment at Merv and then east into central Asia, on the route taken by Alexander and his Macedonians three centuries before. And then down here to the jungle of southern India.”

  “So how do you know this image is Alexander’s battle?”

  “The Battle of Issus is on the Alexander mosaic, from Pompeii,” Jack said. “It was probably the way the battle was usually depicted. On the left is Alexander, with wavy hair, sweeping into battle on his horse, Bucephalus, wearing a breastplate depicting Medusa. He’s placed lower than his opponent, Darius, who towers above his Persian soldiers, looking down on Alexander. There are lots of Per
sian troops, fewer Macedonians. It’s a way of emphasizing the greatness of Alexander’s victory, showing him riding against the seemingly invincible army of the god-king himself And Darius is on the run, ordering his charioteer to whip his horses as he tries to escape, looking around at Alexander with fear in his eyes. His right arm is extended toward Alexander as if he’s just thrown a spear, or maybe as a gesture of obeisance. He’s acknowledging the victor.”

  “So how come a mosaic from Pompeii gets copied by a sculptor in the heart of darkness in central India?”

  “Here’s my theory,” Jack murmured. “The guy who carved this was a soldier who’d been a sculptor in his former life. There’s a lot of technique here that comes straight out of the school of Roman funerary sculpture of the first century BC. I’m talking about stock sculpture for clients of modest means, relief slabs to put in front of cremation urns, the occasional larger scene on a sarcophagus. But even a small-time sculptor would have been familiar with the great works of art. Rome was awash with art looted after the conquest of Greece in the second century BC. The Alexander mosaic was made about that time for a wealthy client in Pompeii. But even that was a copy of a famous painting, by the Greek artist Apelles or Philoxenos of Eretria. Pliny the Elder mentions it in his Natural History. The painting must have been on public display in Rome, and whoever sculpted this must have studied it during his apprenticeship.”

  Costas traced his hand over the sculpture. “But these soldiers don’t look like Greeks to me. Or Persians.”

  Jack swept the torch over the wall. “You’re right. The soldiers to the left are Roman, not Greek. They’ve got chain mail, and early style helmets. They’re carrying the pilum, the Roman spear, and the gladius, the thrusting sword. They’re Roman legionaries of the first century BC, the time of Crassus.”

  “I can see Roman numerals.” Costas peered closely at a standard carried above the soldiers. “The symbols XV, and the letters AP.”

  “Fifteenth Apollinaris,” Jack exclaimed. “That’s the legion mentioned on the cave inscription from Uzbekistan, the one Katya’s uncle identified. The sculptor has replicated the Battle of Issus scene, but has substituted Romans for Greeks. This must be the Roman army marching into battle at Carrhae.”

  “And the tall guy in the center? Where Alexander should be? Is that Crassus, the Roman general?”

  Jack shook his head. “No way. The legionaries who survived Carrhae, who survived imprisonment, who escaped east, would have been the toughest of the tough, probably including veterans of Caesar’s campaigns in Gaul and Britain a few years before. But Crassus was an incompetent leader by comparison with the revered Caesar, and the soldiers would have been contemptuous of him. A veteran of Carrhae would never put Crassus in the position of Alexander. And I doubt whether it’s a self-portrait, the sculptor himself That wasn’t the way of a Roman legionary. Your identity was with your section, your contubernium. But because of that bonding, close friends could be revered. That’s what I think this is. The members of a contubernium called themselves brother, frater. That character’s not dressed as a general. Maybe he’s an optio, a section leader, or a centurion, but no more. He’s shown as primus inter pares, a leader certainly, but definitely one of the men.”

  “But he’s larger than life,” Costas said.

  Jack put the torch close to the carving. “No. Look again. Not larger than life, just tall. The anatomical proportions are the same as the others, he’s just longer-limbed. And look at his face. Roman funerary sculptors churned out stock images, but when it came to the face they always carved actual portraits. Look at these soldiers. I can see faces from central Italy, men from Campania, Latium, Etruria, hard men, grizzled mountain men, farmers, fishermen. These are portraits, real individuals known to the sculptor. You can see it in the quirky features, the humanity. Then look at the taller man. His face is longer, leaner, with higher cheekbones. His hair’s tied back under his helmet in a ponytail, and he’s got a beard. You don’t see that in any of the other legionaries. He’s a Gaul, maybe from the Alps, maybe one of the former enemies recruited by Caesar. And look at his expression, the toughness, the fortitude, even the hint of humor in those eyes, the black humor of the soldier. There’s a lot to admire in that face. He must have been a close friend of the sculptor, his frater.”

  “It looks as if the sculptor knew something about perspective, anyway,” Costas said. “I count a dozen legionaries down here around the tall man, but above them it looks like a whole legion in low relief, a separate body of men in midair.”

  “That’s what clinched it for me,” Jack said. “Even before I looked at their enemy to the right.”

  “Explain.”

  “That crowd of soldiers above. It isn’t a distant scene, a crude way of showing perspective. It’s a scene in another dimension. It’s a ghost legion.”

  “A ghost legion?”

  “That standard you spotted, the Fifteenth Legion? It’s not being carried by the soldiers below, the real-life soldiers. It’s being carried by the ghost legion. And look at the carving at the top of the standard. It’s the aquila, the sacred eagle. Then look again at the real-life soldiers below, the dozen. They don’t have a standard at all. Now that’s bizarre. A Roman sculptor brought up with all the rules and conventions of iconography would never have done it. A legion in battle always has its eagle. For a sculptor who’d also been a soldier, not depicting it is almost unimaginable.”

  “These were the legionaries who lost their eagles at Carrhae,” Costas murmured.

  “Precisely. And that’s why this isn’t a depiction of Carrhae. It’s another battle. A later battle. The iconography is perfect. The soldiers above, the ghost legion, are the men who fell at Carrhae, with their eagle. The men below are the survivors. Here’s what I think. These are the escaped prisoners from Merv, fighting another battle of their own, far to the east, in a place where the legend of Alexander’s conquests must have been on their minds, something that persuaded the sculptor to use the Battle of Issus as his template.”

  “But they’re dressed in full legionary gear,” Costas pointed out. “How on earth could they have retained all that from Carrhae, after years of imprisonment?”

  “After escaping, they would have had to arm themselves on the way, pick up whatever they could find. But in their minds, they were still Roman legionaries. When they went into battle, they saw themselves this way. So that’s how the sculptor depicted them.”

  “Okay. Now for the other warriors. The enemy.”

  Jack swung the flashlight to the right. It was an image that seemed impossibly at odds with Roman legionaries. Jack had a sudden flashback to standing with Rebecca in front of nearly identical images in the British Museum, the traveling exhibit he had taken her to see shortly after they had first met in New York. He trailed the beam over the entire image, coming back to linger on the central character, the one opposing the tall legionary. He stared hard. There was no doubt about it.

  “I may be wrong about this,” Costas murmured. “But are we looking at the terracotta warriors?”

  Jack took a deep breath, his heart pounding with excitement. “Look at the armor. It’s segmented, like fish scales. And look at the weapons. Long, straight blades, elaborate halberds, distinctive bows and arrows. In the ancient world, only one army wore armor like that. And this isn’t just generic Chinese armor. The details here are very specific, exactingly observed. The sculptor had been a soldier himself and knew what he was looking at. What we’ve got here is a depiction of first-century-BC Roman soldiers confronting warriors dressed in the armor of the third-century-BC Qin dynasty, the First Emperor of China, a full two centuries before the time of Crassus’ legionaries.”

  “How could Romans have seen the terracotta warriors?”

  “Not terracotta warriors. Real warriors. Remember our Roman sculptor, the portrait tradition. If he can, he’ll show real people as individuals. I saw the terracotta warriors with Rebecca. There are a number of facial types, but they o
nly give the illusion of being individuals. They’re like a CGI army for a film, with enough individuality to give the authenticity needed but not bearing close scrutiny. And the faces are of a fairly uniform central Chinese type, rounded, without much ethnic distinctiveness. Now get a load of these guys.” Jack flashed the light along the row of figures who seemed to be jostling for position in the foreground, their legs wide apart, weapons at the ready, staring out at them. The faces were hard, scowling, with intense eyes and long moustaches, their hair braided high in topknots.

  “They look like Katya’s father did. A face that’s burned into my memory,” Costas murmured. “Like Genghis Khan.”

  “Exactly,” Jack said. “These are steppe people, nomads, from the northern fringes of China. These are the First Emperor’s own people. This is what the warriors who accompanied him to victory in China would have looked like. And these are real individuals. But they’re not like the Romans opposite, where you can see affection, humanity. These are faces the sculptor has met in battle. You remember the faces of people who have tried to kill you.”

  “Check out the central figure,” Costas murmured.

  Jack shone the light again at the figure with its head twisted back toward the tall legionary. The figure was riding a horse, a sinewy charger with wide eyes that seemed to stare upward to the heavens. The sculptor had tried to show the horse twisting sideways, just as Darius’ chariot was shown turning away from the Macedonians in the Issus mosaic. The perspective here was clumsy, but the sense of movement was arresting. The horse and the surrounding warriors were speckled in dull red, as if someone had flicked paint over the rock. Costas rubbed a finger against it, then sniffed the moist smudge that came off “A ferrous base, like ochre.”