The mercenaries, as always, had been kept well out of the way. Only their leaders accompanied the merchants on the dais. As Justus Dion describes it, with characteristic naïveté, “scarcely had Arsaphes laid eyes upon the princess than his heart was pierced with love—not merely the animal desire to embrace and possess her, but the fire that is at once grief and joy, the passion that defies death.”[2] To judge by the coins and miniatures in which she is depicted, Princess Heloise was indeed a very beautiful girl. She was tall, very dark, with long hair down her back and a noble, not to say haughty, demeanor. Her striking carriage set off an exceptionally long neck, and her neck captivated Arsaphes, captain of the Bactrian mercenaries of the High Council of Pomposa. His reaction was to influence the fate of the City and of the Empire.
That evening in the palace of the Porphyries, Arsaphes had no eyes for anyone but the princess. Between dances, Aspasia sang her praises and tried to urge on him the exigencies of the plot. Arsaphes replied shortly that he had made his decision and was ready to serve the Porphyries. Aspasia lost no time in apprising Nephaot and Heloise of the success of her mission. A meeting was arranged at dusk the following day, attended by the prince and his daughter, Arsaphes, three or four nobles of the City, and two or three officers authorized by the High Council to discuss minor questions between the mercenaries and the palace. Arsaphes spoke with a lucidity and calm that impressed the prince. But the captain’s only concern was with the princess. She had a passionate hatred of Pomposa and the merchant princes. She spoke fervently to the soldier, but seemed not to notice him as a man. The preliminaries went on for several days, and Arsaphes finally plucked up courage to face Heloise and assure her, with ardor, of his devotion to her. She replied loftily that devotion to the cause of the City and of the Porphyries was all that was required.
Arsaphes soon saw that although he was the linchpin of the whole military and political operation, he was destined to remain a mere instrument. But it was too late to draw back, and with despair in his heart he carried out his historic coup. Just before the critical moment, unable to keep silent any longer, perhaps fearing to die with his secret untold, probably thinking all he had suddenly come to care for was lost, he told Aspasia of his love for Heloise. The confession nearly wrecked the whole plot and cost Prince Nephaot his life. Aspasia had thought Arsaphes was doing everything for her sake, and his revelation of the truth drove her immediately into the other camp. Consumed with jealousy, she wanted only to destroy Arsaphes and his guilty passion, even if it meant bringing about the failure of the insurrection she had so much hoped for and in which she had played so great a part. The procurator of the High Council, secretly informed by Aspasia of what was in the wind, had the leader of the Porphyries accused of treason, arrested, and summarily put to death. Princess Heloise escaped only by a miracle. Arsaphes stabbed Aspasia to death.
Readers will already have recognized the main outlines of the tragedy of Arsaphes and Heloise, under which title Polyphilus, Gamier, the elder Corneille, and in our own time Anouilh all wrote plays. At the height of the imbroglio, when Nephaot had already been murdered by mercenaries loyal to the High Council, Arsaphes, still unsure of the issue, sent a messenger to the Princess Heloise to declare his love. The messenger’s speech, as rendered by Garnier, Corneille, and Anouilh, has given rise to countless commentaries and comparisons. What is perhaps less familiar is the fact reported by Justus Dion that after the princess’s indignant rejection—while the warehouses burned, the palace was occupied by rebel troops, and the members of the High Council were in permanent session in the camp of the Syrian mercenaries where they had taken refuge—Arsaphes, disappointed and temporarily discouraged, sent his aide to Heloise a second time. This time, as a token of his master’s love, the messenger brought a handful of earth and a handful of salt, an ancient Bactrian custom that was observed persisting as late as the seventeenth century, according to the accounts of Tavernier and Chardin.[3] But Arsaphes, driven by the obduracy of the princess and feeling victory within his grasp, added to the traditional offering two partridge eggs, one painted blue and the other red. The princess easily saw their significance, mysterious as it may seem to us. The colored eggs meant that though women may not look exactly alike, in the end they all taste alike.
Princess Heloise was worthy of the captain’s admiration. She knew how to answer insolence. She sent back the lieutenant with two flasks which looked as though they contained water, but when Arsaphes tasted them, he found that while the first was indeed full of water, the second held the strongest and headiest rye brandy he had ever drunk. He then realized that while people may no doubt look alike, some are insipid and dull while others burn and intoxicate.
The battle for the City lasted five days and nights, and by dawn on the sixth day Arsaphes’s mercenaries had gained the upper hand. It was a scene of utter desolation, of smoking ruins and ransacked houses. Fire and pillage had destroyed everything. Justus Dion says nearly a hundred thousand people—one out of every three inhabitants—died in the long struggle that had not really concerned them. When the survivors of the delegation of the High Council, who had taken refuge on a ship, sent to ask Arsaphes for peace terms and to spare the lives of prisoners, the City had ceased to exist. Its splendor, its prosperity in servitude, the monuments it was so proud of, the harbor buildings, the temples, the theaters, the palaces of the Porphyries —all were bespattered with blood, scorched, devastated, fallen. And so, in defeat, the merchant warriors of Pomposa found a bitter consolation.
It is not hard to see the reason for the violence of the fighting: it was not in anyone’s interest to give quarter. For the merchant warriors it was a question of losing or keeping all; for the rebel mercenaries a question of losing or winning all. Neither side cared for buildings, works of art, ornaments, or ingenious devices which would never be of any use to them, and which, if they themselves were conquered and had their eyes put out, they would never even see. Their only interest in the City was either to get still more wealth out of it, or, having vanquished it, to exploit its riches. For both sides all these treasures were booty rather than heritage, and they preferred to destroy them rather than let them fall into the hands of the enemy.
As for the inhabitants of the City, their original attitude was one of indifference. For them it could only be a question of whether they kept their old masters or exchanged them for new. But it was difficult to remain neutral when battle was raging, arrows flying, and fire threatening at every moment. In taking sides, some were influenced by their hatred of the merchant warriors, others by fear of disorder. The City was the prize in a battle it only dimly understood, and it divided and destroyed itself in the service of interests that could never coincide with its own.
Perhaps the only person who saw in his victory a significance beyond pillage and loot was the victor himself, Arsaphes. For this attitude, which immediately gave him a distinctive place in the history of the City, there were several reasons. First, he was a man of vision, who saw further than the immediate satisfaction of minor desires. Second, he had come to appreciate the City, its civilization and culture, and even the love of pleasure that was also a love of beauty. The third reason was that he loved the Princess Heloise. History offers several examples of famous couples in which the woman is worthy of the man and vies with him in nobility: Ahasuerus and Esther, Alexis and Theodora, Hero and Leander, the other Heloise and Abelard, Justinian and the other Theodora. But none of their stories outdoes that of Arsaphes and Heloise.
Arsaphes put his life and career at stake out of sheer love for Princess Heloise. Naturally, some historians have denied the emotional and anecdotal aspect and advanced various other reasons connected with various philosophies of history. Some, like Robert Weill-Pichon, adduce religious motives, while Marxists see Arsaphes as the instrument of a popular revolt against the ruling caste of Pomposan merchants. But it now seems clear that the origin of what happened is to be found in Arsaphes’s passion for Nephaot’s daughter. Of cour
se, it is also clear that the Porphyries made use of this passion to further their own ends. It is even fairly probable that Nephaot thought of getting rid of Arsaphes once he had served his purpose. But the rebel leader’s momentary discouragement, his confession of love, and Aspasia’s betrayal all paradoxically led to the murder of Nephaot and the victory of Arsaphes alone. And it was to love that the captain of the mercenaries owed his decision to act and, indirectly, his ability to use the advantages of victory for himself. The intermingling of politics, love, and victory made the story of Arsaphes and Heloise a matchless subject for the theater and romance. And for centuries, right down to our own day, historical sensibility and popular imagination were to be stirred by the famous triple interview after the battle, in the ruins of the Porphyries’ palace.
Even with victory his, Arsaphes thought of nothing but his love. Justus Dion writes: “For the barbarian, the victory that gave him an empire was as nought. He had sought fame only to make himself loved.” For another two days he hesitated. On the pretext of having to organize the situation and to negotiate with what remained of the High Council, he avoided the issue. Then on the third day, like a general naturally anxious about the fate of important citizens, he asked whether the Princess Heloise had escaped the fire and slaughter. No one could say. There was no news of her. Unable to restrain himself any longer, the captain commanded the princess to be brought to him at once, dead or alive. Let them send out patrols and search parties if necessary. Let horsemen scour the ruins of the City and the surrounding country. Rewards were offered. The person of the princess was declared sacrosanct under pain of indescribable tortures. Before night had fallen on the following day the princess was found in a house on the outskirts by the river. Arsaphes had her looked after with all possible attention and respect, and kept her waiting another three days. The delay was not so much designed to shake the courage of the prisoner as to strengthen that of the victor, suddenly terrified of the fruits of his victory. When the princess came to him at last, followed by her guards, the captain arose and went to meet her, bowed, and asked her to declare her wishes. Her answer was brief: she wanted either the throne or death.
The famous exchange between them, as reported by Justus Dion and endlessly reworked from Polyphilus down to Anouilh, tells us probably less about the mentality and manners of the City at the end of the Pomposan ascendancy than about the preoccupations of the dramatists and their audiences: in Polyphilus, the role of fate and the gods; in Corneille, the struggle between honor and passion; in Anouilh, the dignity of rejection. Somewhat paradoxically, Justus Dion’s account suggests attitudes not so very far removed from the version we today might consider the most literary and artificial. The elder Corneille’s Arsaphes and Heloise conveys much the same wild yet baroque grandeur as emanates from Justus Dion. We know that in its own day the play marked the final fall from favor of the aging poet. Madame de Sévigné and Saint-Simon, the one with emotion, the other with cold disdain, both refer to the play’s hopeless failure. The marquise writes: “I am in despair and have been weeping like a fool since yesterday. What baseness! I could rail against God for having made our countrymen so feather-brained. . . . Indulgence toward friends is not, let me tell you, a weakness of which I am often accused. As Monsieur de Bouillon says, I have plenty of others. But I am enamoured of Arsaphes and Heloise and want everything to yield to the genius of Corneille.” The duke says: “M. le Prince told Monseigneur, who again told Mme. de Saint-Simon, in the presence of a number of lawyers and authors, that most people, that is to say the fools, had condemned the play, judging it sometimes so unbridled as to be slightly mad, sometimes sickeningly sweet and insipid; and that poor Corneille, ill with shame and disappointment to see Arsaphes and Heloise plunged suddenly into the void after so brief a career, and himself used to praise and honor far beyond his rank and worth, declared that he knew the faults of the work but neither could nor would avoid them, carried away as he was by the grandeur and truth of his subject; and further, that his style had never more widely or deeply represented the human soul, the manners of the age, and the genius of monarchs.” With Brasillach and Thierry Maulnier, posterity finally ranged itself against the cabal that opposed the poet and with the authors of the Letters and the Memoirs. And Corneille is saved not only by his style and imagery, but also, beneath the wigs and formality, by his historical accuracy. All doubt on the matter was removed when Professor Ritter, in 1953, discovered a fourteenth-century Arabic manuscript in the archives of the Sublime Porte. Justus Dion’s account was discovered, almost simultaneously, by Robert Estienne and by Amyot in two monasteries in Flanders and Lower Saxony, in 1552 and 1557 respectively. So the Ritter manuscript represents a completely different tradition. And yet it has astounding parallels with Corneille.
Princess Heloise had lost everything, but she ruled the victor. All yielded to Arsaphes; Arsaphes thought only of Heloise. Nothing would have been easier than for the barbarian to seize his helpless prisoner by force; but the very love she inspired in him held him back. It was a marvelously simple situation that could easily be resolved by an agreement between the victorious mercenary and the fallen princess. But a moral obstacle prevented any simple solution of either the love story or the historical conflict. The princess was now powerless in the hands of the barbarian, and honor forbade her to give herself to him now she was brought low, after having scorned him at the height of her power. Could she who had scarcely glanced at him in her splendor contemplate changing in her distress? Or could she forget it was the rebel captain’s confession of his insane passion that had been the indirect cause of Nephaot’s death? Of course, her father had taken a risk in unleashing the revolt, but had it not been for Arsaphes’s confession to Aspasia, Nephaot, instead of the barbarian, might have been the victor. Naturally, there was no lack of counselors to insinuate to the princess that Arsaphes’s indiscretion was skillfully planned to rid himself of a master and a rival. Even if it was only through weakness, not guile, that he was responsible for her father’s death, how could she now throw herself into his arms? The dilemma was all the more cruel in that—in Justus Dion, as in Corneille and in the Istanbul manuscript—through the surge of battle and the brilliance of victory, Heloise’s heart gradually came to be touched. As danger mounted, so there was born and grew in her a love that she recognized at first with joy, then with horror. But when it had become so great she could no longer hide it from herself, it was too late. The trap had closed about her, victory was won, and the princess was no more than the prey of one whom rank, dignity, and honor all commanded her to refuse.
The story of Heloise and Arsaphes reaches its climax in the three interviews in which the princess struggles to get the better of her passion and the mercenary struggles to get the better of his victory. As we have seen, the first encounter—in which the princess claimed death or her throne—enabled her to keep her secret. She says she wishes to be spared seeing her conqueror again. But Arsaphes cannot bear not to hear the words that drive him to despair. Perhaps suffering only increases his love. Perhaps, too, he senses that beneath the cruel words the princess’s will, struggling against itself, is weakening. The second meeting takes place the following day, and in it the feelings too long constrained by appearances burst forth at last. When the scene opens, both the barbarian and the princess still try to conceal their real sentiments. Arsaphes again assures Heloise of his desire to do all she wishes. Heloise answers with her usual haughtiness: if she cannot have either death or her rights, at least let her have less ceremony and fewer guards. Arsaphes, convinced that she hates and despises him, sees a victory that no longer holds any meaning for him snatched away. Unable to contain himself, he reveals his love and lays his newly won power at his prisoner’s feet. She has only to speak and the City will be given back to her. She refuses all the more vehemently because she feels her resistance weakening. She will owe nothing to a conqueror she is forcing herself to hate. But when Arsaphes makes use of his last weapon and threatens to reca
ll the merchant princes, surrender to them, and hand power back to the High Council of Pomposa, Heloise has no choice but to avow in her turn her ill-starred passion. Yes, she loves Arsaphes. He must rule the City, but she cannot give herself to him because he is the victor and she is alone and vanquished. But he must not recall the merchants of Pomposa; he must live, and go on fighting against them. He must make the City great. He must sire a new race and take the place of the Porphyries, whose day is over. But he must forget Heloise.
The barbarian captain is overwhelmed both by happiness and by a new despair. For a third and last time he meets the princess to try to win her over. But this time, as a sign of defeat and submission, it is he who goes to seek her out. Genius orders their exchange into a poetic yet real truth that echoes into eternity . . .[4]
These lines merit attention for several reasons. In the first place they, of course, illustrate the seventeenth-century antithesis, which found classical expression in Corneille, between love and honor, passion and duty. They also throw a new light on this opposition. But in addition, for anyone trying to understand the origins of the Empire, they show up clearly the historical position of Arsaphes, between the Porphyries’ submission to Pomposa and the uncertain future he himself offered the City. The victory of the rebel mercenaries constitutes a decisive break. Not merely another family, but another people, another race, succeeds the Porphyries. But by a trick and paradox of history, the rupture, striking as it is, also illustrates a remarkable continuity in the development of the future Empire. The Porphyries had been subservient to Pomposa. No resurrection of what might later be called national feeling could be expected from them. We have already seen that Onessa and the Venostae might, and perhaps should, have filled that role. But they were not ready for so formidable a task. They had not the power; the City hated them too much—as much as, probably more than, the invading merchants. For the Empire to come into being there had to be some foreign element capable of driving out the merchant princes and the solidly entrenched High Council. This was the role played by Arsaphes, and Corneille shows it not only brilliantly but also with a political insight confirmed by the most modern research. We shall see later that Arsaphes’s descendants were not always equal to their task, and justified the bitter doubts expressed by the founder of the new dynasty. But the step had to be taken. History still had more than one twist in reserve before bringing on Alexis, who never failed to claim kinship with the barbarian captain.
The Glory of the Empire Page 5