by Mark Latham
AD
6 Judaea becomes a Roman province. The sicarii travel to Rome to establish a temple of assassins from which to fight Roman oppression.
9 Battle of the Teutoburg Forest. Germanic rebels led by the traitor Arminius waylay and wipe out three legions, assisted by the Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath.
10 Simon of Gitta is born.
14 Using his waning popularity as a springboard, the priesthood does away with Octavian. Upon his death, the more malleable Tiberius becomes Emperor. The priesthood sees to it that its augurs are always consulted prior to any future coronation.
18–28 Revolts in Africa and Gaul. It is suspected that several Roman soldiers and frumentarii are captured by tribesmen and sacrificed to Tsathoggua.
30 Jesus of Nazareth is executed. The priesthood underestimates his following, and is forever after plagued by the rise of Christianity, which is anathema to the Great Old Ones.
31 After three Herodians are put to death in Rome for the crime of malevolent sorcery, a Gug goes on the rampage in the Aventine, slaying 20 vigiles and ransacking a temple to Jupiter.
36 The Jews are expelled from Rome, although the sicarii still operate in secret enclaves.
37 The Emperor Tiberius acquires the Serpent Ring of Set through one of his nobles.
c.37–41 Tiberius dies in mysterious circumstances, possibly involving Simon Magus; the people rejoice at the news that Caligula was responsible for his death. Caligula becomes Emperor.
The Emperor Tiberius, who died mysteriously on March 15, 37 AD at the age of 78. Rumour had it that he had recently acquired the cursed Ring of Set with which to destroy his enemy Caligula. Such was his unpopularity that a baying crowd rejoiced at his passing, and Caligula publicly accepted responsibility for the murder, despite suspecting Simon Magus of the deed.
41 Caligula is assassinated and succeeded by Claudius.
43 Southernmost portions of Britannia are conquered, giving Rome a secure foothold.
54 Claudius is poisoned by his wife and succeeded by Nero.
58 Quintus Veranius dies in Britannia, believed to be as the result of a druidic plot. Gaius Suetonius Paulinus replaces him as governor.
60–61 Following the slaughter of the druids at Mona, the Boudiccan Revolt almost succeeds in driving the Romans from Britannia. Boudicca’s mother is widely believed to have been a Ban’shee, thought to have been destroyed on Mona.
64 The Great Fire ravages Rome. The priesthood sees this as a sign that Cthulhu is displeased with Nero’s rule.
65 Nero becomes increasingly desperate to deflect attention from his misrule, instigating the mass execution of Christians to deflect blame over the Great Fire.
68 During a reaffirmation ceremony into the order of Cthulhu, Nero is shown a vision that drives him insane. No one knows for sure what he sees, but soon after he commits suicide, engulfing the Empire in another civil war as several claimants to the throne step forward.
69 The priesthood conducts a great ritual, and Cthulhu chooses Trajan, a general of the legions, to become Emperor. Trajan promptly sweeps aside all opposition and assumes rulership of Rome. Seeing one of their own declare for Cthulhu galvanizes the enclaves of Mithras, leading to fractious relations between the legions.
79 Herculaneum and Pompeii are destroyed as Mount Vesuvius erupts. The priesthood suppresses rumours of physical aberrations and unnatural practices among the populations of those cities, which appear to have led to divine retribution.
98 Human sacrifice is outlawed across the Empire. Sacrifices to Cthulhu continue, however, most often disguised as gladiatorial contests in the recently completed Colosseum.
102 The Roman general Marius wipes out three of the elder Germanic tribes, the Cimbri, Teutones, and Ambrones.
106 Trajan conquers Dacia and brings it into the Roman Empire.
108 The Legio IX Hispana marches to Caledonia, north of Britannia, in pursuit of a marauding band of Brigantes. It is never seen again, in any normal sense.
113–117 Rome conducts campaigns against the Parthians, conquering Assyria, Mesopotamia, and Armenia. Many former temples to the old gods are plundered, resulting in ancient demons being unleashed upon the land. The Magi leave their temples and begin a sacred quest to end Rome’s campaign of ignorance and destruction.
115–117 Jews in Cyprus, Egypt, and Cyrene revolt against Roman rule. Simultaneously, the sicarii claim several notable scalps throughout the Empire.
c.120–130 Hadrian formalizes the order of frumentarii, officially recognizing them as spies and messengers, and making them a feared and respected order of the Empire.
122 Construction on Hadrian’s Wall begins, cutting off Caledonia from Britannia.
160 Quintus Lollius Urbicus, former governor of Britannia and celebrated prefect of Rome, is murdered after trying to quash a Herodian cult in the Emporium.
165 The dread book Occultus is written by Hieriarchus.
166–180 Marcomannic Wars.
173 In a battle against the Germanic Quadi peoples, the Legio XII Fulminata is assisted by the fabled ‘lightning miracle’ after the priesthood makes a pact with Nyarlathotep in exchange for his aid.
212 The Antonine Constitution grants Roman citizenship to all free men in the Empire, regardless of their place of birth.
244 The King of Persia, Shapur, begins a war with Rome in the east. On campaign, the Roman Emperor Gordian is assassinated by Mithraic veterans amongst his own troops after they witness his attempts at dark sorcery.
c.250 The Ghassanids arrive in the province of Syria, and from them the Romans learn of the existence of the Nameless City.
324 Founding of Constantinople by Constantine the Great, and the formation of the Eastern Roman Empire.
378 Battle of Adrianople between Eastern Romans and Goths.
410 The last troops stationed in Britannia are ordered to return home. Alaric the Goth sacks Rome and the priesthood’s power is dissipated.
THE FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE
When the end of the Roman Empire came, it was not with a sudden explosion of war, but with the slow erosion of its power. By the end of the third century AD, the cracks were beginning to show. Economic, military and, naturally, religious failings severely weakened the vast Empire. The priesthood, as ever, stood at the heart of Rome’s greatest failure just as it had guided it to glory for centuries past.
The vaults of the quindecimviri sacris were filled with magical treasures, from ancient scrolls and tablets to dark and terrible idols, enchanted weapons, and diadems of great power. And yet the priesthood, for all of its dreams of a world with only one god – the great Cthulhu – lacked true ambition. It had sought for so long merely to deny power to the followers of other paths, that it lacked the will to take power for itself. Over the centuries, the priesthood guarded the sibylline texts ever more jealously, until the words became dogma, learned by rote by priests elect. The mythical artefacts that the priesthood had acquired by dint of war and sacrifice lay locked away, gathering dust, with not a single Roman priest having the intellect or desire to use them, for the glory of Rome or for any other reason.
The enemies of the priesthood, however, had not been so remiss in their duties. Warrior-brotherhoods of Mithras had slowly gained in popularity over decades and centuries, so that the loyal brethren of the legions could not always be counted upon to do the bidding of Cthulhu. Countless valuable relics and precious scrolls were mysteriously ‘lost’ while being marched back to Rome by commanders deeply opposed to the priesthood’s plans. Political manoeuvring and back-stabbing – always an occupational hazard amongst Rome’s elite – took on a new aspect, as inductees of Mithras suddenly turned upon their patriarchs, who had long worshipped Cthulhu in depraved ceremonies behind closed doors. These hot-blooded nobles, now followers of an honourable warrior-cult, cut down their own fathers and mothers – governors, priests, orators, and senators – and took their places within the higher strata of society, weakening the priesthood’s grip on the poli
tical elite one seat at a time.
In the fourth and fifth centuries AD, the power of the Western Roman Empire – and with it, that of Cthulhu himself – crumbled.
The secret cults that had been allowed to fester across the Empire, and even within Rome itself, worked tirelessly not only to bring glory to their own deities, but to subsume the weak ‘official’ religion of Rome. Offerings to Hades, Mercury, Venus, and Mars were no longer carefully disguised prayers to Cthulhu, but also to Dagon, Hastur, Shub-Niggurath, and Tulzscha, among others. Foreign cults had fully taken root across the Empire, too – shrines to Bast, Isis, Pan, and Mithras were commonplace even in the villas of great nobles, where they were honoured alongside the household spirits. Herodians, Argonauts, and Priests of Iram worked tirelessly to weaken the priesthood’s magic and turn the people of Rome from the one thing that would empower Cthulhu more than any other: belief.
More directly, the Magi did not rest while the priesthood lapsed into dogma and apathy. Their black-robed emissaries were sighted in dozens of provinces, treating with scattered bands of druids in Germania, Gaul, and even Caledonia, the priests of Egypt, and the sorcerers of the Far East. The Magi brought not magic, but truth and enlightenment, dragging the priesthood’s plans into the light where all of Rome’s enemies could see the plot that had been unfolding since the time of Romulus. Though the common citizen could not be trusted with the cosmic knowledge of the forces arrayed against humanity, the greatest commanders of the known world were brought into the fold and galvanized to a common cause for the first time in history. Chief among these was Alaric of the Visigoths, who had already begun to vie with Rome on the old frontiers. Now, with the Magi’s involvement assuring him the support of his neighbours and causing civil unrest across the empire, Alaric decided it was time to escalate his campaign against the Romans. Assisted by druids and shamans calling powerful entreaties to Shub-Niggurath and Nodens, Alaric was almost immune to the spells of the now-toothless Roman priesthood. Alaric’s campaign culminated in the unthinkable – the successful sacking of Rome in 410 AD.
The Empire was not destroyed in that one day, but the writing was on the wall. Thousands of relics from across the known world were snatched from the priesthood’s vaults. Some were lost in the confusion; some were seized by the Argonauts; others were restored to their rightful owners; while others still were deliberately sought out and destroyed, having been identified by the Magi as too dangerous to be controlled by man. Seven of the 15 priests of the quindecimviri sacris were executed for the crimes of their forebears: the German druids chanted songs of Mona as the priests burned, in honour of their brothers and sisters across the sea. As Rome burned, the Magi felt the power of the old gods flow into the land, and the reverberations of Cthulhu’s roar of hate and anger through the Dreamlands.
When the Visigoths left, the Roman emperors-elect scrabbled for power, squabbling amongst themselves and directionless without the power and wisdom of the priesthood to guide them. Rome would be attacked several times over the next hundred years, its succession of emperors too weak to hold the crumbling Empire together. Ultimately, the Western Empire fell to ruin, changing the world forever. The Eastern, Byzantine Empire thrived, however; renouncing its oaths to alien gods and multifarious pantheons and instead embracing Christianity, it ushered in a new age of relative peace that would, through fair means and foul, ultimately end the age of gods and monsters.
Their sacred quest completed, the Magi returned to Parthia, never to be seen outside their homeland again. The Dragon Sorcerers of the east woke from their trances and breathed their last, having expended their immortal energy to safeguard the world from Cthulhu’s rising. The mighty legions of Rome were finally broken, having been over-reliant on auxiliary forces and Germanic recruits, who now left in their droves, or turned on their weakened overlords.
With the fall of the eagles of Rome, Cthulhu was thwarted, but not forever: for time is immaterial to the slumbering god. As the last page of the Liber Ivonis proclaims in the forbidden language of the ancients:
‘In his house at R’lyeh, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.’
RECOMMENDED READING & VIEWING
While researching this book, I found the following books and other media invaluable, both for informative and inspirational purposes.
Books, Non-Fiction
•Fox, Robin Lane, Pagans and Christians (London, Penguin, 1988)
•Gibbon, Edward, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, (London, Wordsworth New Editions, 1988)
•Kiley, Kevin F., The Uniforms of the Roman World, An Illustrated Encyclopaedia, Leicester, Lorenz, 2013
•Powell, Lindsay, Roman Soldier versus Germanic Warrior, (Oxford, Osprey – Combat 6)
•Wilcox, Peter, Rome’s Enemies 1: Germanics and Dacians, (Oxford, Osprey – Men-at-Arms 129)
•Wilcox, Peter, Rome’s Enemies 2: Gallic and British Celts, (Oxford, Osprey – Men-at-Arms 158)
Books, Fiction
•Lovecraft, H. P., & Stephen Jones (ed), Necronomicon: The Best Weird Tales, (London, Gollancz, 2008)
•Scarrow, Simon, Under the Eagle, (London, Headline, 2008)
•Sutcliff, Rosemary, The Eagle of the Ninth, (Oxford, OUP, 1954)
•Tyson, Donald, Necronomicon: The Wanderings of Alhazred, (Woodbury, MN, Llewellyn, 2008)
Film & TV
•Centurion, Dir. Neil Marshall. Pathé, 2010. Film.
•Rome, Creators: John Milius, William J. MacDonald, and Bruno Heller. HBO, 2005-7. TV series.
•Spartacus: Blood and Sand, Creator: Steven S. DeKnight. Starz, 2010. TV series.
Authors
Mark Latham is a writer, editor, and games designer from Staffordshire, UK. Formerly the editor of Games Workshop’s White Dwarf magazine, Mark has since become an author of speculative fiction, writing novels and short stories in the SF, fantasy, and horror genres. His first novel of Victorian science fiction, The Lazarus Gate, was published in Autumn 2015 by Titan Books. Mark was responsible for several historical tabletop games, notably Legends of the Old West and Waterloo, and still turns his hand to games design when time permits.
Follow Mark on Twitter! @aLostVictorian
Illustrator
aRU-MOR studied Fine Arts at the University of Seville, Spain specializing and working on artwork restoration. These days she combines her work as a miniaturist with her work as a freelance illustrator.
EXPLORING THE BLURRY LINE WHERE FACT AND FICTION MEET!
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