The Siege of Syracuse

by Dan Armstrong

  In the Greek tradition, Hiero’s corpse was dressed in his ornamental armor and laid out on a bier beside the throne. A soldier in gold-plated armor holding a golden lance stood at each end of the bier, which was draped with a black-and-white-checkered cloth. A white, silk-covered pillow cushioned the king’s head. A gold dekadrachma stamped with Hiero’s profile had been placed on his lips—payment to Charon for ferrying him across the river Styx.

  The corpse would remain in the great hall one full day, before being put on a carriage and drawn by four white horses through the city so the public could view the king’s body. Following this procession, known as the ekphora, the king would be interred in the family tomb at the south end of the agora.

  The royal family was already seated in the first row of the gallery on the left when Archimedes and I tottered into the room. Laius merited the third row of the same gallery. We were directed to the second row, immediately behind the royal family. No one, other than Laius, noticed our arrival. The royal family was immersed in an animated conversation among themselves and could not have cared less that the old mathematician was there.

  Just as we settled into our seats two trumpets sounded. All talk abruptly stopped and everyone stood as a herald announced that King Hieronymus was entering the hall. It was his first official appearance. Four armed soldiers led the procession. Hieronymus followed, holding a golden scepter before him. He wore a jewel-studded diadem and a beautiful crimson robe that trailed on the floor several feet behind him. A long train of attendants paraded in after the king. They were followed by four more soldiers. The entire retinue proceeded the length of the room and stopped before the throne—a throne Hiero had rarely used.

  For the first time I had a close up view of Hieronymus. His long red hair was combed straight back and fell in waves on his shoulders, much like his sister Harmonia’s. His complexion was fair and freckled. A downy, strawberry-blonde beard covered his spotted cheeks. He turned to acknowledge the guests in the gallery on his right and then those on his left. It seemed he looked right at me. He was not a handsome youth. His face was sharp and narrow, with small protruding green eyes set on either side like a lizard’s. When he finally sat down, I heard his aunt Damarata mutter beneath her breath, “What an ass.” They could have been my words for what I knew the boy had done the night before.

  The ceremony began with a series of lengthy eulogies. I didn’t know any of the speakers. Some were from Syracuse, some from other parts of Italy. Though Hiero was being given the highest possible praise, in the highest oratorical style, it was rather boring and monotonous to me. By the time the third speaker stepped forward, Archimedes was clearly elsewhere, probably drawing diagrams in his head. As the speakers droned on, I scanned the gathering, looking for a cheek with a port-wine birthmark. Then I found myself eavesdropping on the royal family, who continued to talk in lowered voices despite the eulogies.

  I caught only snatches of their conversation. Much of it centered on the young king. His sister Harmonia, five years his senior, sat directly in front of me, close enough to smell her perfume of lavender and myrrh. She leaned over to Damarata on her right. “He does whatever he wants, Damarata, with whomever he wants. I once caught him with one of the young stewards.” She scooted up close to her aunt and whispered in her ear. As she went on, Damarata’s mouth opened wider and wider as though she were enacting the incident described. Harmonia sat back. “It’s as though he’s in heat or something.”

  “It’s the crown,” said Damarata dramatically. “It’s the crown and the fool wearing it.” Her appearance was so extreme it was hard not to stare. Her hair was jet black today, teased up, twisted around, and worn high in the shape of a beehive. She had rings on every finger and heavy gold bracelets on her wrists clear up to her elbows. Her necklace held a massive ruby, which at times she massaged between her forefinger and thumb. But it was the sharp, ugly expression on her face, not hidden by her painted lips and white makeup, that told the most about the woman.

  Adranodorus leaned into the conversation with a stage whisper. “He knows he can have whatever he wants. The handmaids and stewards are just the beginning.” He gave Damarata a glance, then narrowed his eyes at his niece. “We just want the opportunity to get into his head, Harmonia. Do you have any influence over your brother?”

  “Hardly,” she said turning up her nose. “He looks at me the same way he looks at the maids. I won’t be in the room alone with him. He disgusts me.”

  Adranodorus ran his tongue across his upper lip and grinned. “Maybe that’s the way to get to him?” His eyes made the suggestion.

  Damarata jammed an elbow into his ribs.

  Harmonia glared at him. Apparently there was some fire to go with her beauty, but I was more fascinated by the color of her hair and the fairness of her skin. She wore a pale green chiton and scarf that matched her eyes. Her tiara sparkled with emeralds. She was as beautiful as her brother was awful.

  Her husband, Themistos, sat to her left. He seemed like a dullard to me. He was older than Harmonia, tall and thick with a big head. He didn’t even react to the insult against his wife.

  “I’ll take care of it, Harmonia,” said Damarata. “There are herbs we can use to unman him.”

  Adranodorus shook his head in disagreement. “Forget that. What he does with the help is of no concern to us. In fact, it might be a good distraction. What’s important is bringing him around to the new politics.”

  Heraclia, Hiero’s other daughter, sat a couple of seats down and did not engage in the conversation. Her husband Zoippos sat on her left, next to Adranodorus. Heraclia was in her finest clothes, but she’d chosen black and covered her face and hair with a matching veil. She wore only one piece of jewelry, a thin gold necklace. She seemed to be taking her father’s death harder than anyone else. She dabbed at her eyes and her nose constantly throughout the ceremony. Her two, very young daughters sat on her right and were also sobbing over the loss of their grandfather.

  Zoippos, a strikingly handsome middle-aged man, leaned across Adranodorus to whisper, “The king is but a boy. He should pose no problem. It’s Thraso who’s in the way.” Zoippos lowered his head. “If we eliminate him, the rest is child’s play.”

  I didn’t know who this Thraso was, but I had no doubt what was being suggested. My father had been murdered for getting in the way. I thought of Hannibal, and how his war was tearing cities and families apart. I wanted to close my ears and hear no more. I wanted all the turmoil to go away. I wanted to know what had happened to my mother and father.

  The funeral followed Greek tradition. After the eulogies, a male singer stood in the center of the room and began the goos, a low lament, accompanied by a woman strumming a kithara. Gradually those in the galleries joined in. Most of the gathering stood, but Archimedes elected to remained seated, as did I. The mourners followed the singer in a procession that circled Hiero’s bier. They walked very slowly, as if in a trance, with everyone singing in a soft, low voice.

  Following the lament, Hieronymus and his retinue paraded from the hall. The guests filed out behind them. A warm, light rain was falling. The royal family mingled with the dignitaries outside the building. I’m sure there was plenty of talk about the new king and the war with Hannibal.

  As I led Archimedes through the crowd, Laius approached us with a powerfully built middle-aged man. “Archimedes, I would like you to meet my friend Thraso.”

  My stomach lurched.

  “Thraso was one of Hiero’s most trusted advisors,” continued Laius. “He’s a close friend of the family—and of Rome. Hiero asked him to advise his grandson in the early years of his reign.”

  Thraso stepped forward and gave Archimedes a bow. They exchanged a few words, mostly Thraso praising Archimedes for the work he’d done on the defenses of the city—something I knew nothing about then but would learn quite a bit about later. Each man acknowledged the loss of their great king, then both parties went their separate ways.

  All the w
ay back to the island, and up the tower stairs, I thought about Zoippos’ threat against Thraso, wondering if I should tell Laius. I didn’t know Zoippos. Was he a man of words, or action, or both? I was afraid of getting involved and never mentioned it to anyone.

  That night, when I went down to the kitchen to collect the evening meal, the regular staff and several of the slaves from the palace were gathered around the hearth. Eurydice’s absence stood out. Hektor was many cups of wine into the day, and he cursed Hieronymus repeatedly.

  Eurydice appeared at an evening shift five days later. None of us had seen her since the morning of the funeral. Her face looked considerably better. Her lip had a small scab on it, and the black eye was just a yellow streak above her right cheek, but she didn’t say anything at all while I was there.

  Afterward, when I came down with Archimedes’ tray, Lavinia approached Eurydice and stroked her shoulder. “How are you, dear?”

  Eurydice’s eyes welled up. It looked like she might speak but she didn’t.

  Lavinia wrapped her arms around her, “What is it, child?”

  “I—I—I ca—can’t ga—ga—get my w—w—words out,” she stammered with tremendous difficulty.

  Lavinia wrapped her tighter in her arms. Eurydice was crying now.

  We wouldn’t see Eurydice as often as we had before the incident, but when we did, she stuttered whenever she spoke. Some times it was worse than others. Clearly she had been broken somewhere deep inside by the actions of the new king.

  I knew of rape. I knew of the sexual abuse of slaves, both male and female. It occurred in Croton as much as it did anywhere else. I’d witnessed it on the slave ship, felt the sailors’ hands on me as they shaved me. But Eurydice’s broken spirit left more of an impression on me than anything I’d ever seen or heard before.

  CHAPTER 15

  I stared out the tower’s east window, watching the seagulls glide on the wind. The blue ocean stretched out before me as far as I could see. In the distance a ship edged out toward the vague line between sky and sea. Ever since Archimedes first called my attention to the way a ship disappears over the horizon, I had watched many other ships vanish from sight, verifying what seemed so contradictory to the senses. The Earth was not flat, but a sphere. More than that, Archimedes claimed that it was moving, even rotating as it circled the Sun. The other planets were doing the same, circling in their own separate orbits, while the Moon, somehow on its own, circled the Earth. Wheels within wheels spun in the heavens like some gigantic timepiece set against a backdrop of stars. But what held it all up? What made the planets rotate? How far away were the stars? It all seemed to swim in my head when I tried to put it together.

  Archimedes’ voice broke my daydream. He called me over to the workbench. I stood before him.

  “Timon, Laius said you know some geometry.”

  I nodded.

  “Then you must know what a right triangle is?”

  “Yes, master.”

  “Can you imagine a right triangle in your mind?”

  “Yes.” My father had taken me through many such mental exercises.

  “What if you rotate that right triangle three hundred and sixty degrees?” asked Archimedes. “Can you imagine that?”

  “Yes.”

  “In three-dimensions.”

  “It’s a cone.”

  Archimedes nodded slightly. “And if you intersect that cone with a plane, what is the shape of their common part?”

  Nothing had given me more pleasure than following along with each abstraction when I’d done this with my father. With Archimedes, there was an extra thrill to excel. “If the plane is parallel to the base of the cone,” I stipulated, “then it’s a circle.”

  “And if it’s tilted somewhat off parallel?” he asked.

  “An ellipse.”

  This brought a thin smile to the old man’s face. He used his hand to wipe away his most recent sketches in the abacus. He sprinkled a few drops of water onto the sand, then rolled it smooth with a wooden dowel. Using his stylus, he drew a cone in the firm surface. “What if the plane slices through the cone so that it also cuts a chord in the cone’s base.” He added this to his drawing. “What shape does their intersection describe?”

  I leaned over the table and peered into the abacus. “A parabola.”

  The mathematician’s right eye sparkled like a sunstruck gem. “And you said your father taught you geometry?”

  “He was trying to reestablish the Pythagorean School in Croton.”

  “But he’s not there anymore?”

  “No,” I said, biting my lower lip. It had been fours months, but the loss of my parents still hurt.

  “And his name?”

  “Nicoledes Leonidas,” trembled from my mouth.

  Archimedes nodded slowly. “I have heard his name mentioned in connection with a school in Croton. How did you become separated from him?”

  I gathered myself. “The war.”

  “A casualty of the war?” he asked.

  “I believe so.”

  “And your mother also?”

  I took a deep breath and let it out. “Possibly.”

  “So that’s how you came to me, Timon?”

  “Yes.”

  Neither of us said anything for a while. Plato appeared from behind the drapes that hung on the walls. I watched him cross the room and hop up onto the window sill. I let out a long sigh.

  Archimedes’ eyes met mine. “I am sorry for the events that brought you to Syracuse, Timon,” he said quietly. “But your arrival could not have been more timely for me. My eyes are failing and I need your help.”

  That was the beginning of it. Archimedes’ eyesight had been deteriorating for quite a while. That was why King Hiero had thought to give him a slave. His mathematical applications involved a lot of detail work, and his eyesight made that difficult now. I was there to be his eyes, and sometimes his hands.

  I believe Archimedes resisted this at first. Perhaps he had thought I would get in the way. But then he realized, during our discussion of the terrella, that I might have some insight into the physical world, and now he knew that I also had a solid foundation in geometry. My ability to conceptualize and name a parabola was the breakthrough. With no formal announcement, I had become Archimedes’ apprentice. How I wished I could have told this to my father!

  In my three years with Archimedes, he would teach me all that I could master. And some that I could not. He proved to be an excellent teacher, but he wasn’t one to talk about personal matters. After those few questions about my parents, my history never came up again—nor did any comment about his.

  He did seem to like me though. And I liked him. In retrospect, I can imagine how pleased Archimedes must have been to receive a slave practiced in three-dimensional conceptualization, including the conic sections. These second order curves were more subtle than simple circles or spheres. They were created by forces at odds with each other. The trajectory of a launched projectile is generated by a force sending it into the air and a force pulling it back to earth. A parabola described that motion more accurately than the Pythagorean Ideal.

  Applying geometric models to practical mechanical problems was the premise of engineering and the cutting edge of modern scientific thinking, of which Archimedes was then the dean. A small group of elite mathematicians were scattered around the Mediterranean, fewer than ten, if my father had it right. They worked on the same problems, shared their solutions, and pushed mathematics and geometry along one proof at a time. In addition to Archimedes, there were Apollonius of Perga, Conon of Samos, Diocles of Arcadia, Pythian the Thasian Geometer, Zenodorus the Astronomer, and a handful of others studying under the guidance of Eratosthenes at the library in Alexandria. These men were the intellectual progeny of Euclid and the vanguard of Greek science.

  Primitive machines—water wheels, gear cases, and catapults—had been a part of civilization for several hundred years, but engineered machines, machines of precision, did not exist a
t all. That is what these men were perfecting—the use of geometry and mathematics for engineering mechanical design. I never mastered it, but I understood what it was. And how powerful it was. Archimedes talked of building machines that could move of their own volition, could fly like a bird, could do anything you could imagine. Using pulleys and levers, he had once towed a warship from the harbor onto land all by himself. He was clearly a genius of the highest order.

  Apollonius had just written a book on conic sections. Archimedes had been its first reader. Much of his correspondence during my time with him was about this book. All the leading mathematicians were studying the conic sections and their application to mechanics. Incredibly, fate had put me at the center of this remarkable work. I couldn’t help thinking about the palm reading I’d had in the chicken cart the day I arrived in Locri. Maybe there really was something noble in my future?

  CHAPTER 16

  Archimedes asked me to deliver a set of drawings to a woodworker in the Tyche district and gave me two coppers to spend on the way. After I’d dropped off the drawings, I headed to the market to buy some figs and continue my search for the man who’d bought Adeon, a quest which had begun to feel quite futile after four months of staring into stranger’s faces. I also hadn’t found any figs equal to the ones I’d been accused of stealing, so I decided to check if the girl who’d caused all the trouble was at her grandfather’s stand. I felt a thick fluttering in my stomach just thinking about the wild girl.

  The market was buzzing as always. Peddlers, buskers, itinerant minstrels, foods and smells of all variety, I loved it all. It was where everything was, where everything happened. Most people passed through the market at least once a day. It was where you learned what vegetables were fresh and what the catch of the day was. There were stories of the war in Italy and rumors about the royal family. Since the new king had taken over, tales of his late night debauchery had become the most popular topic of all. But the laughter these stories elicited was hollow. The actions of the king did not bode well.