Romulus and Remus. They visited the Hut of Romulus, which even the boy could see was too new to be the actual hut where the founder had lived; the civic landmark had been rebuilt many times over the centuries.
They descended to the Forum, which in recent years had become even more crowded with monuments and temples.
“Once upon a time, all of this was a lake, or so they say,” remarked Lucius. “Hard to believe, isn’t it? The first temples were made of wood.”
“Everything I can see is made of marble,” said the boy.
Lucius nodded. “The emperor’s proud boast: ‘I found Roma a city of bricks, but I shall leave it a city of marble.’ During his reign, a great many buildings have been restored, refurbished, even rebuilt from the foundations up. The quaint shrines have been dusted, the ancient glories have been burnished; everything has been made bigger and more beautiful than before. The emperor has given us peace and prosperity. The emperor has made Roma the most resplendent of all the cities that ever existed, the undisputed center of the world.”
They came to a statue of the emperor, one of many in the city. This one depicted him as a young warrior, handsome and virile and armed for battle. The inscription referred to his great victory at Philippi, in Macedonia, when he was only twenty-one years old: “I sent into exile the murderers of my father, and when they made war on the Republic, I defeated them in battle.” It seemed to Lucius that the statue flattered his cousin. Octavius had never been quite that handsome, and he certainly had not been that muscular and broad-shouldered.
The boy gazed up at the statue with a less critical eye. “Father tells me that you were at Philippi, too, Grandfather, when the assassins Brutus and Cassius were brought to justice. He says you fought right alongside the emperor.”
Lucius raised an eyebrow. “Not exactly.” Octavius, as he recalled, had been sick in bed for most of the battle, except for the time he spent hiding in a marsh after his camp was overrun by Brutus. “I myself inflicted no bloodshed at Philippi. I was in charge of supply lines for the legions led by Marcus Antonius.”
“Antonius?” The boy frowned. “But he was the emperor’s enemy, wasn’t he? He became the willing slave of the Egyptian whore!”
Lucius winced. “That happened later, much later. At Philippi, Octavius and Antonius-”
“Octavius?”
“I misspoke. Octavius was the name that the emperor received at birth. Later, of course, he was adopted by the Divine Julius, and was called Caesar from that time forward. Later he took the majestic title of Augustus, and so we call him Caesar Augustus. But I digress. As I was saying, at Philippi, the emperor and Marcus Antonius were allies. They fought together to avenge the Divine Julius. Cassius and Brutus were defeated, and they killed themselves. But Philippi was only the beginning. Some sixty senators took part in the conspiracy against Caesar; within a few years, every one of them was dead. Some died by shipwreck, some in battle; some took their own lives, using the same dagger with which they had stabbed Caesar. Even some who had not plotted against Caesar were dead, like Cicero; he made an enemy of Antonius, and he lost his head and his hands for it.”
“His hands?”
“Cicero made vile speeches against Antonius, so when Antonius ordered him killed, he commanded that Cicero’s hands should be cut off along with his head, for having written such offensive words. There is no denying that Antonius had a vindictive nature.”
“Was that why the emperor killed Antonius, because he murdered Cicero?”
“No.” Lucius sighed. The truth was so very complicated, especially when large parts of it were not to be spoken aloud. “The two of them remained friends-well, allies-for a number of years. Then Antonius threw in his lot with Cleopatra, and some thought that Antonius and Cleopatra would rule Egypt and the East, and the emperor would rule Roma and the West. But-so philosophers tell us-just as the heavens are one under the rule of Jupiter, so the earth naturally desires to be united under one emperor. Antonius’s dreams came to ruin.”
“Because of the Egyptian whore?”
Again Lucius winced. “Come with me, young man. There’s something else I want you to see.”
They made their way to the Julian Forum. Left unfinished by Caesar, the arcades for courtrooms and offices had been completed by the emperor. Still dominating the open square was the magnificent statue of Caesar sitting atop a charger. How much more at home in his armor the Divine Julius looked than did his successor, thought Lucius.
The square was crowded with men going to and fro, talking to one another and carrying documents. Under the emperor, the legal codes had grown more complicated than ever, and lawyers were kept even busier than they had been under the Republic, settling private disputes, adjudicating bankruptcies, and negotiating contracts.
Lucius and the boy walked past the splashing fountain and into the Temple of Venus. Lucius still considered it the most beautiful interior in all of Roma, unsurpassed even by the emperor’s most lavish projects. Here were the famous paintings of Ajax and Medea by Timomachus; here were the cabinets containing the fabulous jewels and gemstones that Caesar had collected in his travels.
Holding the boy’s hand, Lucius strode before the two statues at the far end of the sanctuary. The Venus of Arcesilaus remained unsurpassed. And beside the Venus, despite the misfortunes that had befallen the flesh-and- blood original, stood the gilded statue of Queen Cleopatra, last of the long line of the Ptolemies who had ruled Egypt since the time of Alexander the Great. Some had thought that the emperor would remove the statue, but here it remained, where Julius Caesar himself had installed it.
“Despite what you may have heard, she was not a whore,” said Lucius quietly. “As far as I know, she slept with only two men in her entire life: the Divine Julius and Marcus Antonius. To both she gave children. The emperor in his wisdom saw fit to execute Caesarion, but he spared her children by Antonius.”
“But everyone says that she-”
“What everyone says is not always the truth. It served the emperor’s purposes to call her a whore and a seducer, but she was far more than that. She considered herself a goddess. For better or for worse, she behaved like one.”
The boy frowned. “And when she lured Antonius to join her, you sided with the emperor to fight against them?”
“No. Not in the beginning. At the start of the war between them, I fought for Antonius.”
“For Antonius?
“Antonius was my friend. He was my protector when I was very young, in the perilous days after Caesar was murdered. He had always been loyal to Caesar; I felt obliged to be loyal to him. So I served under him at Philippi, and I remained in his service afterward, even when another civil war broke out and the emperor declared him the enemy of Roma. Antonius posted me to the city of Cyrene, to watch his west flank. Do you know where Cyrene is?”
The boy frowned. “Not exactly.”
“It’s on the Libyan coast, west of Alexandria, which was Cleopatra’s capital. If she and Antonius had won, my boy, Alexandria-not Roma-would have become the capital of the world. Roma might have become nothing more than a provincial backwater.”
“Impossible!”
“Yes, you’re right. I once heard the Divine Julius himself declare that the gods chose Roma to rule the world; how could I forget? But back in those heady days, when I was young and Antonius and Cleopatra were riding the serpent’s tail, anything seemed possible. Anything!” He sighed. “At any event, there I was in Cyrene. I was to be Antonius’s watchdog should his enemies attempt to sail toward Egypt hugging the Libyan coastline. In the meantime, while I watched and waited and drilled my soldiers, I minted coins for Antonius to pay his debts. War is expensive! That reminds me, I have a silver denarius for you, one of the coins I minted for Antonius.” Lucius reached into his toga. “They’re rather rare these days. Many of them were melted down and recast with the image of the emperor.”
The boy accepted the heavy coin and gazed at it with great interest. “I recognize Victory, bare-breasted in profile with her wings behind her and carrying a wreath…but there’s something else I can’t make out…”
“A palm frond,” says Lucius. “Palms grow wild along the Nile.”
The boy turned the coin over. “But who is this fellow, with the flowing beard?”
“None other than the king of gods, Jupiter.”
“But he has ram’s horns!”
