As they made their way through the first tunnels, what they saw were empty shelves, a few small Roman frescoes plastered and painted over stone or brick, a few empty rooms built as crypts. There were shrines, chambers that were painted, but most of the burial places were unadorned, shiny tufa stone. As they went on, they saw more and more spaces that were still occupied. Now there were large stones to seal the tomb niches. Albrecht began to deliver lessons. “In this section we can relax a bit. The tombs are from the period around 550 to 600 C.E., long after Attila was buried. He can’t be in a tunnel that hadn’t been dug when he died. We want the sections with tombs that were dug before the year 453. You will notice that none of the seal stones gives the date as a number. During that era, the Romans used the Julian calendar, which began in 45 B.C.E. Years were not numbered. Instead they were given the names of the two consuls who took office on January first. The year Attila died, the consuls were Flavius Opilio and Johannes Vincomalus. Remember those names. Attila was still encamped at his stronghold by the Tisza River when he died, meaning it was too early in the year to go off to war. That means he probably died in Januarius, Februarius, or Martius.”
Remi said, “Will it give his name?”
“Almost certainly not, unless it’s disguised in some way. He was cunning, clever. He would not want a Roman to find his tomb. But I think he wanted it to be found some day.”
“Certainly he gave us all the clues,” said Remi.
“He made us work backward, from his most recent treasure to his very first. I believe he wanted a Hun to find the treasures and then use the wealth to do something in the world—but first to conquer it. Perhaps he wanted a descendant to find it. Apparently none of his three sons was up to the task of ruling the world and he undoubtedly knew it.”
“Now that we’re here, I feel as though I must have missed something along the way, some way of distinguishing his tombstone from the others,” Remi said.
“Finding the tomb is part of his test too. We’ll use what we’ve got—date and age—and see what else there is. The catacomb was used between the second and the seventh centuries. His will be somewhere in the earlier ones. And I’m guessing that there will be something that outsiders wouldn’t recognize—maybe a linguistic signal, something that’s not in Latin.”
“I hope he didn’t make it too hard for us non-Huns.”
“I have faith that he didn’t. Think about what you and Sam have just been through. He’s been teaching you about himself. He’s been forcing you to go and stand in each of the places where his life was changed. He’s taken you from the final days, when he was at the height of his power, marrying the beautiful Gothic princess Ildico in his stronghold on the Hungarian Plain surrounded by his hundreds of thousands of fanatical followers, all the way back to the very first moment of his career. Now we know that the start wasn’t a triumph. It was the moment when an orphaned twelve-year-old stood in his father’s grave, about to be sent away as a hostage. And what he did was vow to conquer Rome and be buried here.”
“But he didn’t conquer Rome.”
“He reached the point where it was in his power to do that but chose instead to preserve his overpowering army for another day.”
“And he died before he could come back.”
“True,” said Albrecht. “His death was a complete surprise to everyone. During the long period while he was burying his hoards of pillaged treasure and leaving messages, I’m sure there was never a doubt in his mind that he would take Rome and declare himself emperor. When he turned back at the Po River in 452, he was aware that there was nobody left who could stop him. Flavius Aëtius, who had prevented him from extending his kingdom to the Atlantic coast, no longer had an army that could stand against him. It turned out that Aëtius’s nominal victory at Châlons-en-Champagne was the last victory by any Western Roman army anywhere, and I believe Attila was astute enough to see it that way. I think that in 453, in late spring or early summer when campaigning season began, he would have gone back to attack Rome. Instead he died.”
They walked along the dark catacomb, the lights from their foreheads the only illumination except when one of them shone a flashlight on an inscription or there was a flash when someone took a picture. From the rear of the group Sam called out, “Keep reading every seal stone you come to. Take pictures to help record our route.”
They walked on, along gallery after gallery. At one point, Tibor and János turned to look at an offshoot of the corridor they were in, then scurried to rejoin the group as the light moved on ahead.
Sam stopped and whispered to them. “Did you hear something too?”
Tibor said, “It sounded like footsteps somewhere in the dark behind us. You heard it?”
Remi said, “You think that Attila’s men came down here and took over an earlier burial?”
“Exactly,” said Albrecht. “We think they found a tunnel, or even a district of the catacomb, that was old enough so nobody ever visited it anymore. Then they probably removed a sealing stone and whatever human remains were behind it. Next they did what some Roman families did—dug much deeper and wider into the stone to make a chamber. They would have made a very small, narrow opening so the tomb looked like the thousands around it. But if the treasure is anything like what we’ve read, the chamber would be much larger than any of the crypts we’ve seen so far.”
“We’ve got to think more about recognizing it,” said Remi. “Is there a family symbol, or a pun on Attila’s name, or a nickname?”
“Even the name itself is a controversy,” said Albrecht. “Some people think Attila is derived from Gothic and meant ‘little father,’ atil meaning ‘father’ and la being a diminutive. The idea is that the Huns were Asiatic and a bit smaller than the Gothic peoples of the future Germany. We also have Priscus’s account, which says Attila was on the short side.”
“Do you accept that?” asked Tibor.
“No. I think it contradicts much of what we know about him. He was a charismatic leader and an absolute ruler—a tyrant, if you will—and a ruthless warrior. At times he pursued strategies that would preserve his armies, but at other times, if it suited his purpose, he hurled his cavalry at fortified positions and accepted huge casualties as the price of victory. He wasn’t the sort of person who is called ‘little father,’ and certainly not the sort who would use that name.”
“So what is your favorite theory?”
“I think that the Hunnic language was closest to that of the Danube Bulgarians, a more recently extinct Turkic language. In Danube Bulgarian, attila means, literally, ‘great ocean’ or ‘universal ruler.’ It fits the role of a king of the Huns, whose job was to bring victory, and therefore prosperity, to the people. It also has no hint of an origin in a distantly related language or a Western point of view.”
The group walked to the first three galleries that were candidates for Attila’s grave. They had all been dug and filled before the year 400. There were carved inscriptions, but none that contained all three necessary elements—the right names of consuls for the year 453, the age forty-seven, and a date of death during the first three or four months of the year.
Captain Boiardi asked, “Why do we assume Attila would tell the truth about anything? Why not put a fake name, year, and day?”
Albrecht said, “Because it doesn’t fit with what we think his purpose was. We think he wanted the tomb to be possible for the right person to find—one with determination and cunning and persistence. We think he wanted the wealth he buried here and elsewhere to be used by a future leader of the Huns to rule the world.”
They went to the fourth district on Albrecht and Selma’s list, a place of intersecting galleries like the streets of an underground city. All turns were right angles at the ends of blocks. The explorers read inscriptions and took photographs, as they had for many hours, and then, without any audible surprise, came Remi’s voice out of the near dark. “I think we’ve found him.”
Albrecht stopped. “What?” He pivote
d to face her.
Remi was standing beside a space where there were several openings covered with seal stones. She pointed at one and repeated, “I think this is Attila.”
Albrecht moved closer to the big stone she was examining. His single headlight added to hers and lit it brighter. The others gathered around. Albrecht read aloud to them. “‘Fidelis Miles,’ meaning ‘Loyal Warrior,’” he said. “‘Obit die annus Flavius Opilio et Iohannes Vincomalus vicesimo quinto Ianuarii. XLVII.’” He laughed loudly and put his arm around Remi. “I think you’re right. I think that behind this stone is the man we’re searching for.”
There was a general round of handshaking, backslapping, and hugging. Sam said, “Let’s all stand back a little so the seal can be photographed. From this moment on, everything gets documented, measured, and photographed as it is before it gets touched. Albrecht will be in charge.”
The next two hours were spent on documenting the seal stone and removing it successfully. In the carved shelf space was the skeleton of a Hun warrior of the fifth century, much like the ones Albrecht had found in the field in Szeged, Hungary, early in the summer. “Presumably this man is the loyal soldier.” The man, who was now a skeleton, wore leather pants and a tunic. He also carried a dagger and a long, straight sword.
Sam and Albrecht placed a board under the skeleton and the textiles and weapons, then carefully slid it outward so it could be placed in a rigid airtight plastic container like a flat coffin that was held by Tibor and János. They moved it out of the way.
Now Albrecht and Sam began to examine the back wall of the man’s narrow berth carved into the rock. Sam took out his pocketknife. “Can I test it?”
“By all means,” Albrecht said. “I think it should be a false wall made of plaster.”
Sam prodded and scraped at the wall for a few seconds and then brought out a chunk about an inch thick. “It’s a layer of plaster that hides a second stone.”
“Let’s photograph it before we remove it.” Sam and Albrecht stepped back while Remi photographed the plaster. Then they carefully removed pieces, examining them for paint or scratches.
Albrecht leaned into the opening and stared at the piece of tufa fitted into the back beyond the plaster. “It’s a second seal stone. Oh, yes. This is it!” he said. “‘Sepulcrum Summi Regis.’ The Tomb of the High King. ‘Magnus Oceanus.’ The Great Ocean. ‘Rex Hunnorum.’ Ruler of the Huns.”
The others applauded, probably the loudest sound heard in this spot in over a thousand years. As it died down and stopped, Sam leaned close to Captain Boiardi. “Was that an echo?”
Boiardi listened for a few seconds, then nodded. “Let’s go see.” He turned off his headlamp.
The two stepped away from the side of the tomb and went back the way they had come, their flashlights turned off. As they quietly walked back, from time to time one of them would stop and they would wait and listen for a few seconds, then continue. As they came to the second turning, there was a larger opening that had been dug for a family crypt. Sam and Boiardi made the turn, Boiardi flicking on his light to see where they were.
Caught in the light were four men who leapt out of the blind corner and grappled with them, trying to overpower them and bring them to the floor of the crypt. Sam, who had been training in judo for most of his life, put the first man down in his initial moment of surprise and delivered a debilitating punch to his chest. The second man had thrown himself on Sam’s back and clung to it. Sam ran hard at the wall, pivoted and hurled himself into it. The man slumped down the wall to the floor.
Captain Boiardi was a police officer trained in hand-to-hand combat and a tall man who was stronger than either of his attackers. He put the first one down with combination punches to the jaw and belly, then put the second out with a choke hold.
As Sam squatted to pick up the flashlight Boiardi had dropped, he saw that two women were crouching in a shadowy corner of the crypt.
Boiardi shouted something in Italian and they looked frightened. Both held their hands up. “We don’t understand you.”
“Don’t shoot just yet,” said Sam. “I know who they are.”
“Who?”
“They work for a company called Consolidated Enterprises, based in New York.”
“How do you know them?” asked Boiardi.
“They seem to be following Remi and me around. They’re supposed to be commercial treasure hunters, but I don’t know if they are or not.”
“Why would they assault a captain of the Carabinieri?”
“You’ll have to ask them. They were following us when we were diving off Louisiana and then again in Berlin. They got arrested in Berlin and then Hungary. I don’t know how those arrests were resolved, but we can call Captain Klein of the Berlin police.”
“You framed us,” said the young woman with the short blond hair who had followed Sam and Remi in Berlin. “Of course the charges were dropped.”
The tall man with the shaved head said, “They held us for two weeks!”
One of the other men said, “Don’t say anything else until we have a lawyer.”
“What’s wrong with you Americans?” Boiardi said. “Do you watch only American movies? The whole world doesn’t require a Miranda warning. And if you want legal advice, I’ll give you the best. Don’t attack any police officers.”
Sam nodded. “I’ve found that to be excellent advice. How did you people even get into the catacomb?”
The brown-haired woman said, “We followed you. We went into the church as soon as we were sure you’d be in the catacomb. When that monk saw us, we said we were part of your group and we were late. He was really nice and showed us which way you’d gone.”
“Very clever,” said Boiardi. “Trespassing for the theft of national treasures, but still pretty good.”
“What are you going to do?” asked the man with the shaved head.
Boiardi waved the six prisoners over and said, “Come this way if you like treasure. You’ll get to see the biggest find of your life.”
Sam and Boiardi walked behind the six American interlopers so they wouldn’t try to run away, directing them to turn one way or another to get back to Attila’s tomb.
When they made the final turn and reached the opening, János, Tibor, and the two policemen set the second stone a few feet from the opening.
Sam looked through the opening. Beyond was a much larger space, a whole room carved out of the tufa. The ceiling was about eight feet high and five feet wide. He could see that the left side of the room had been opened and then bricked up to close it off again. He could see it was Attila’s burial chamber. There, in the middle of the room, surrounded by randomly strewn piles of gold coins that had once sat in baskets or leather sacks that had rotted away, as well as jeweled swords, belts, daggers, and ornaments, was a seven-by-four-foot iron casket.
The two Carabinieri guarded the prisoners while, one by one, Remi, Sam, Albrecht, and Boiardi all climbed in through the narrow passage and began to photograph and chart every inch of the tomb, making the original location of each item clear. After three hours, they began to remove the items around the coffin. They were boxed, listed, and loaded on the eight carts.
Boiardi stepped close to his prisoners, who were sitting on the floor of the tunnel, looking glum. “Well? What do you think of this?”
The blond girl shrugged. “I’m glad I got to see it.”
Boiardi said, “So you have curiosity and an adventurous soul. So do I. How about the rest of you?”
The other five nodded and mumbled various forms of assent.
“Good,” Boiardi said. “Because I’m going to give you a job. It’ll give you a chance to begin working off your debt to the people of Italia. You can help us carry these priceless artifacts up to the surface.”
“That can’t be legal,” said the man with the shaved head. “You can’t make prisoners work unless they’re convicted.”
“Okay,” Boiardi said. “This gentleman is excused from work. Th
e prosecutor will be told he didn’t want to make up for his crimes. He’s not sorry yet. Sergeant Baldare, handcuff him. What would the rest of you like me to tell the prosecutor?”
The others all said, “I’ll work,” or, “Okay,” or, “Tell him I helped.” The man with the shaved head said, “Wait a minute. I’ll help.”
Boiardi nodded at Sergeant Baldare, who removed the handcuffs. “One warning, of course. My men are not fools. You will be thoroughly searched at the top and the contents of all the boxes will eventually be compared with the photographs we’ve taken. If anything has stuck to you or in you, there will be a very picturesque and ancient prison in your future. Understood?”
“Yes,” said each of the six in turn.
An hour later, the first carts of gold, precious gems, and jewel-studded weapons that once belonged to conquered kings began to make their way on the long corridors and up the long stairways toward the upper world, where they had not been since the year 453.
It took five days of careful yet grueling labor to complete the exhumation of Attila’s treasure. At the top, where Selma, Wendy, Pete, and three Carabinieri worked to verify and load the artifacts, things worked smoothly. The first truck left for the National Archaeological Museum at Naples at three a.m. on the first night, accompanied by two unmarked police cars, and a new truck was moved into its place.
The Divine Word Missionaries lived up to their name by issuing the true story only, that the Catacomb of Domitilla was the site of some archaeological investigation and would be closed to the pubic temporarily.
On the sixth day the team brought in four chain hoists and lifted the lid of the iron coffin. Inside was a coffin of pure silver surrounded by more of Attila’s treasures. There were the crowns, scepters, daggers, and personal ornaments of a hundred kings, princes, chieftains, sultans, and khans. It took a whole day to empty and catalog the artifacts.
On the eighth day the team lifted the lid of the silver coffin. They found the old accounts were true. The last one was made of gold. It was surrounded by colored gem stones—emeralds, rubies, sapphires, garnets, jade, coral, lapis lazuli, jasper, opal, amber—stones from everywhere in the ancient world.
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