artist. The trouble was he was never an artist, he was merely artistic. Now for Galba. How much shall I tell him?
Quite a lot, because Galba has always been by way of being a hero of my friend Tacitus. In later years, when we were together in the Senate, I have heard him speak of Galba's nobility and of the great service he did the State before he won the imperial crown. He has even said that, given the chance, and better fortune, Galba would have made a great Emperor, being at heart a Republican and a respecter of the Senate. He was extremely displeased when I remarked that everyone would have thought Galba capable of Empire – if he had never been Emperor.
All the same, though he disliked what I said, he couldn't deny its truth. I even saw him make a note of my words. It will be amusing if he repeats them in his History. Not, of course, that I care how much he steals from me. The more he steals the better his History, and I have no desire for literary renown. What would I do with it here?
Galba then: just the sort of jerk Tacitus would admire. Galba was immensely proud of his ancestry: so proud that he embellished it and, on a public inscription, traced it back to Jupiter on his father's side and to Pasiphae, wife of King Minos of Crete, on his mother's. I have never had patience with such nonsense. His great-grandfather was one of Caesar's murderers, joining the conspiracy because he had been passed over for the consulship… The future Emperor's grandfather wrote a huge unreadable work of history, but I can't recall the subject. And his father was a hunchback. The story went round that when he was first with his future wife – I think her name was Achaica and she was descended from that Lucius Memmius who disgracefully sacked Corinth, destroying much of historical and artistic interest – he stripped to the waist, revealing his hump and declaring that he would never hide anything from her. If he kept this vow he was unique among husbands…
The future Emperor was born some ten years before the death of Augustus. He had an elder brother who became a bankrupt and cut his throat because Tiberius denied him a provincial command which he didn't deserve, but had hoped to use to mend his fortunes by screwing the provincials in the fine old Republican fashion, as practised by that arch-hypocrite Marcus Brutus. Galba liked to put it about that when he was a small boy the Emperor Augustus had prophesied a great future for him, even that he would eventually be Emperor himself. This was fanciful; everyone knows that Augustus was determined to keep the succession in his own family and, in any case, always carefully described himself as Princeps, not Emperor, a title which (he said) had a purely military association.
There were signs that Galba was destined for great things, all the same. When his grandfather, the historian, was sacrificing one day, an eagle swooped down and snatched the entrails from his hands, carrying them off to an oak tree well laden with acorns. The hunchback said this portended great honour for the family. The historian was more sceptical: 'Yes,' he reputedly said, 'on the day a mule foals!' Later Galba let it be known that a mule had foaled the day he heard of the Gallic rebellion led by Vindex, and decided this gave him a chance to aim for Empire himself. This story was widely believed – such is credulity.
Somebody also once told Tiberius that Galba would eventually be Emperor, when an old man. 'That doesn't worry me a bit,' the real Emperor replied.
All this is by the way and I've no doubt Tacitus already knows these stories and will repeat them if it suits him.
One reason why my friend so admires Galba is that he saw him as an exemplar of old-fashioned Republican virtue. For instance, he was delighted to learn that Galba followed the old practice of summoning all his household slaves, morning and evening, to say good-day and good-night to him. A perfectly pointless exercise, if you ask me.
Galba toadied up to the Augusta, Livia, when he was a young man and I believe she left him something in her will. Some say it was to please her that, when he was aedile in charge of the Games, he introduced the novelty of elephants walking a tightrope. That's ridiculous; Livia Augusta was never amused by such nonsenses.
He had a long career of public service, and didn't do badly, but never so well as to arouse the jealousy of emperors. That he survived both Gaius Caligula and Nero is to my mind evidence of his essential mediocrity. But he liked to pose as a disciplinarian of the old school. For instance, when he was Governor in Spain he crucified a Roman citizen who was said to have poisoned his ward, even though the evidence was provided by people who had an interest in the man's conviction. He didn't respond to pleas that it was wrong to crucify a citizen, except by commanding the cross to be taller than other crosses and white-washed to make it still more conspicuous.
Galba married only once. He disliked his wife, who was also named Livia, as I recall, and ignored his sons, showing no emotion when they died young. But, hypocrite that he was, he gave the love he had borne his dead wife as the reason why he never married again. Actually, he had no taste for women, nor indeed for boys, but only for mature men. Since everyone despises the man who, though an adult, takes the part of the woman in bed, he concealed this taste as best he could till he became Emperor. Then he was so excited when news was brought him of Nero's death that he seized hold of his freedman Icelus, a handsome swarthy brute, slobbered kisses over him, and told him to undress at once and pleasure him. I wonder what Tacitus will make of that story. Nothing, I dare say.
IX
It was, all the same, my dear Tacitus, whatever you might like to think, with apprehension that we awaited Galba's arrival in the capital. Word came that his advance was slow and blood-stained. Those suspected of being less than enthusiastic for his elevation were, as the saying went, 'eliminated'. Varro, Consul elect, and Petronius Turpilianus, a man of consular rank, were both put to death, without trial. Or so we heard.
Then the Praetorians were agitated. They already regretted Nero who had treated them so indulgently. Their prefect Nymphidius saw in their mood his opportunity to strike for Empire. He made sure that they learned of Galba's response to their demand for the customary donative: 'I choose my soldiers; I do not buy them.' Domitian said to me: What a fool the old man must be; generals have had to buy their troops since Pompey's day. I know enough history to know that, even if I don't bury my nose in the stuff as you do. Tiberius alone could express such sentiments and survive them. But then Tiberius was a great general, which Galba isn't, and a man of matchless authority.' This wasn't the first time I had heard Domitian speak admiringly of that Emperor, on whom, as you know, he was to brood long and lovingly in years to come. Old-style Republicans (of your stamp, my dear) purred as they approvingly repeated what they termed 'Galba's most noble sentiments', which certainly inspired Nymphidius to promote a mutiny. For a couple of days he was master of the city; Flavius Sabinus told his nephew Domitian that for those hours he went in fear of death, even though Nymphidius was his cousin.
But then word came that Galba's troops were within a day's march of Rome. Those of the Praetorians who had lent an ear to their prefect's seduction now felt panic. For all their reputation, few of them had any recent experience of war, and all disliked its imminent reality. When Nymphidius entered the camp to harangue them, they shouted him down. He withdrew in alarm, followed by a hail of oaths and missiles. I saw him white-faced and trembling, jostled by crowds as he made his way through the Forum towards his own house where he hoped to find refuge. He did not attain it. A troop of cavalry, either Galba's advance-runners or specially commissioned by Republican senators -no one knew which, then or later – forced their way through the mob, which itself parted and then fled in terror, and cut him down. They dragged his body to the Tarpeian Rock and hurled it, already lifeless, over; a purely symbolic enaction of the age-old penalty suffered by traitors. It lay at the foot of the rock till nightfall, no one daring to remove it.
By afternoon the Forum was deserted. It was a grey winter day and fear hung heavy as frost. I was unable to return across the river; detachments of soldiers, under whose command, if any, no one could tell, were to be seen at street corners and also at the bridges. The poor wretches were doubtless as confused as the mass of citizens. But in their confusion they were dangerous. You could not guess what they might take exception to, whom they might turn on in their own fear. I withdrew, hoping merely that my mother had kept to our apartment. So, by narrow lanes and a careful circuitous route, I made my way to the house in the Street of the Pomegranates where Domitian and Domatilla lodged with their aunt. I was happy to find all safe, but, though Domatilla looked on me with eyes of tender love, we did not dare embrace in the presence of others. It was hard, in my agitated mood, to be with her, and forbidden to touch her flesh, hold her in my arms, feel her lips against mine, and be restored in
