BOOK I II III IV

ivica

(c)ivica2007 ISBN 978-0-9783767-0-3

"Set the price!" [FAC PRETIUM.] Cuparius

Rufus to Longinus: Hello. I was in the FORUM

yesterday, really enjoying some "sausages" [HILLAE]
with hot baked plums, making my way through the
afternoon crowds. All of a sudden, a thunderous heavy
late-September shower sent people birding for cover. Old men's
chests pumped for all they were worth. Young women quickly
gathered up their hems. Children squealed. Ladies shrieked, vainly
protecting their carefully-applied hairdos, wigs, or expensive clothes.
Rouged faces started melting. Big heavy drops formed into puddles,
here and there, so that other drops could have a safe place to fall and
make their short-lived little circles. Domestic rain drowned out the
foreign perfumes. Some of these bodies haven't been this intimate
with water for days. Some of these spirits for years! I wondered at the
time about what kinds of rain it would take to rinse a spirit squeaky-
clean and let it start fresh again?

Merchants carried on regardless. Strangers squeezed together for a

little piece of roof. That IUPPITER is quite an equalizer. What if, in the
stormy confusion, these bodies all suddenly found themselves in the
wrong wet clothes? the past just washed away? the present just "a
new and sudden dream" [SOMNIUM NOVUM ET SUBITUM]?

Would that thin slave become a jovial and fat Senator within XII
Epicurean months? Would the former Senator's heart be broken
within a month of plying his trade as a piss-collector? as a "eunuch"
[SPADO] to some eastern goddess? Or would the still-honourable
Senator just carry his new burden stoically? How would that pretty
"little wife" [UXORCULA] pay for her household supplies now---now
that the daughter of a fuller, or a farmer, or "an innkeeper" [CAUPO]
has to actually earn her bread and wine, all by herself? I would bet
that at least half of these ladies would succeed quite admirably, rise
to the challenge with terrible untested resources.
That "suburbanite" [SUBURBANUS] there. How would he ever enjoy
sleeping in the space above his master's tannery? Living and working
in the same room until he was too old to be of any further use to
anyone? How will that former Knight, so easily virtuous, proud, pious,
resolute, and charitable, face his new world as a naked man, "alone"
[SOLUS], "hungry" [IEIUNUS], "sickly" [INFIRMUS], "unknown"
[INCOGNITUS], and "soaked" [ELIXUS]? Would the charity still flow
as easily? Would his patriotism still move him to fine speeches and
generous civic acts? Would he thank the gods every day for one
more sweet breath of life? Would there even be an ounce of virtue
accessible to help him resolutely face the uncaring world, when
morning came, this time?

What would the distinguished matron's spoiled daughter be praying

for now, as she spins wool, day after night after day, in her lonely
desolate work-hut somewhere on a rocky mountain-side. Would that
drenched banker last even one fight as a gladiator against a lion or a
fellow murderer? Would that gladiator evolve into an "honest and
successful" [SINCERUS ET FORTUNATUS] banker? And that loud
old whore: how would she plan the up-coming battle in a far-off
German forest? Would the former Consul's friends still invite the new
freedman, selling his sharp knives, to a
politically-important expensive dinner?

If that loud garlic-dealer were now

passing out promotions in the armies of
the Empire, who would dare to refuse
his merest whim? his inquiring eye? "his
drunken hand" [SUA MANUS EBRIA]?
his warped tastes? Could that former
barber now bear the heavy burdens of
governing the AEGYPTUS of Cleopatra
as a Roman Knight, as the Prefect of
AEGYPTUS, and as a close personal
friend of the Emperor himself? This rain
doesn't care or judge on whom it falls.
Nor does "fate" [SORS]. But I'd bet all of
ROMA---that the barber could do the
job. "Easily." [FACILE.] I sincerely hope
that this answers the doubts in your last letter to me. "Good-bye."
[VALE.]

[date unknown]
"A new friend is a new spring." [AMICUS RECENS VER RECENS.]
A part of anything born in the springtime must be offered back to the
giving gods. Cuparius

"Darius to Clarus: Hello." [DARIUS CLARO SALUTEM

DICIT.] I hope that my yearly letter from the cold
province finds your family well. "It's been a long while."
[TEMPUS LONGUM FUIT.] We're all fine here,
surrounded by frost, snow, ice, and the cold air. I miss ROMA's
"action" [FACINUS] and roaring noises every time it starts to snow
here. In winter, everything here slows down, like the little rivers (and
the people too). But the snow blinds me so; you know my poor eyes.
If old Winter is coming hard, then at least I know that Spring is on its
way also. I do enjoy the melting: ice and snow into water. And
perhaps the people will soften a bit and flow a little bit more than
before.

I'm sorry to write that Petrus died a few months back. He was walking
to visit his son's family early in September when he just disappeared.
He was found dead about a month after he had set out. I think that
his back went out and he got stranded in the woods. He was
complaining about his "bad back" [TERGUM MALUM] viciously just
before his trip. I checked into the story "personally" [CORAM], just in
case. Romans are not loved dearly everywhere, you know, especially
near a border. XXIV years of hard army service! He gives them the
prime of his life, they reward him with a Roman citizenship, "and now
what" [ET NUNC QUID]? I guess that he was one of the few people in
this dusty old world who could stand up proudly and say: "I am a
Roman Citizen." [EGO SUM CIVIS ROMANUS.] Not only proud, but
free and exclusive! I can still hear him as he faced any problem with
that silly grin of his: So, where's the problem---and where's my
sword? May his shadow fade slowly in his holy Hell.
I've been hanging around an old Celt who lives nearby. His name is
Votaretorix and he speaks Latin poorly. I think that RIX is their
version of our REX. He wears "the twisted wire necklace"
[TORQUES]. He must be a hundred with this long long moustache
and his silver-white hair swept back as if he's forever facing into a
secret wind. He lives alone as if he were left there as a beacon. He
claims that he's not just a Druid but "a Prophet" [VATES] which
apparently women weren't allowed to be. He belonged to the same
class as the Druids though. He's hard to understand sometimes and
hard to believe most of the time. He lived quite the life though, he
says---no taxation, no soldiering, no slaving away for someone. The
Druids and Fighters were "The Masters" [DOMINI] and all the rest of
the Celts were "the Slaves" [SERVI] on the bottom. And there were
lots and lots of Slaves "at the bottom" [APUD RADICE].

As we walk around, he kicks the leaves and other dead things so that
they end up underneath a passing tree. He also has this pointed
walking stick and every once in a while he stops under a tree and
pokes as many holes as he can in the ground under the branches
before he moves on. He has vines all over his little house and his
gardens. But the names he uses for the oak, birch, elm, and yew! He
would say: A birch tree loves a good strong wind! "An oak tree"
[QUERCUS] has different names depending on the height, the acorn-
size, the color, the season, or what is being celebrated. I asked him if
the oak was his favourite tree and he answered: No. He said that his
favourite was the big river-willow that cries in the summer and, in the
winter: It's simply the ugliest tree in the world.

He showed me his secret birth-tree. He also showed me a tree that

he said was over eight hundred years old---even older than ROMA
herself. He would put both of his hands around a tree trunk and say
that it was a young man, XX years old, if his hands were full. If the
trunk filled his outstretched arms then it was an old man and LXXX
years old. He makes me his Druid-potions of willow bark, birch
leaves, and other things that I haven't identified yet. He also keeps
bees. I first met him when I tried to buy some of his honey.
He said that we all have our personal animals inside us, like a snake,
sheep, eagle, dog, or cow, but the plants and trees are pure and
unadulterated: pure life and pure magic. He said something odd
about birds knowing some great dark secret. Their feathers are a
clue---I couldn't exactly see what he was aiming for with this idea. He
tries to attract and live among birds, "butterflies" [PAPILIONES], little
"bats" [VESPERTILIONES], and toads. He'd point out his bats to me
as darkness set in: they like to hang upside down, cloak themselves,
and walk upside down along the tree limbs. He didn't like me
explaining MITHRAS to him, although he liked the Sun-idea, the
water-idea, and the soul-idea. He said that any bit of water, to Druids,
is a doorway from the other world and any bit of life is a window to
this world (for the spirits on the other side). Although I couldn't see
how a bush or a fish could be a window. He believes in an eternal
soul too. His eyes stared at mine coldly when I described the ultimate
goal: "the star trip" [ITER STELLAE].

A barbarian-poet who never knew an alphabet and he thinks that he

can teach me about the real world! I tried to look deep into him once,
into his good eye, to try and tell if he had ever tasted human flesh, but
he was beyond my skills. He washes with soap and water! He makes
this soap out of beech ashes and goat fat. He sells that to the locals
and also the best candles in the region.

He wears a short tunic and "trousers" [BRACAE]! Actually, in the

winter so do I. After so many of my roots and onions, his acorn-
squirrel soup isn't that bad or his fried oak-grubs. Just like in the
army, salt will improve anything. His smoked and salted ham goes so
well with his powerful barley-beer. He even burns barley in a horn---
also laurel and moss and other things. "Mistletoe" [VISCUM] cures
everything apparently, but not a "hang-over" [CRAPULA]! It's a
strange plant, without roots in the ground---Like us mortals. :he said.
He told me that plants and trees sense that their god is green and
that's why they prefer that color. He calls this green: GLOS. Or
perhaps it's GLAS.

He celebrates IV times a year but instead of on the solstices and

equinoxes (like we do), he celebrates "exactly" [ACCURATE] in
between those four days---for his own special four days! "Imagine
that!" [FINGE ILLUD.] On one of these IV sacred days, late in the
evening, precisely between the winter solstice and the autumn
equinox, he took me along to celebrate with his "dead" [MANES],
"ghosts" [LARVAE], and "shadows" [UMBRAE]. He extinguished all
the fires in his little thatched round hut on a hill, built around the trunk
of an ancient huge oak tree, and we went to a piece of wooded
lowland where he built this huge fire in the open as if he were afraid
of something. The crackling fire was somehow his sun in the
darkness.
He built everything here himself. He has a maze of stoned walls and
shrubbery spreading around his hut. He bricked. He stuccoed the
walls. The steep roof is "thatch" [STRAMINA]. He laid the tree-trunks
over his dirt floor. His hut has three rooms, but they're only accessible
by outside doors. One is for sleeping, another is for storage, and the
last is for eating. There is a northern windbreak of tall firs for the
winter wind. There are also two wooden platforms above in the tree---
one just over his hut and a smaller one high up, near the top of his
oak tree. He calls his round white hut, with a slight yellow tinge to it,
his egg. I think that he also has a secret word-code for things and
ideas like we do, so that when he says tree, star, water, bat, or egg,
he has a secret ritual meaning as well as the ordinary meaning to
these special words.

"An ancient screech owl" [STRIX PRISCA] was watching us for the
longest time. It reminded me of those scary children's tales about "the
owl-headed creatures" [STRIGAE] who attack children in their sleep
and drink their blood. Which reminded me of stories about men
turning into wolves or myths about half-creatures-half-men. Which
reminded me of an old statue of a god with two horns on his head,
back in the Druid's dark hut. He keeps mentioning a Mother-Goddess
of the Underworld quite often. This was the end of his year at
sundown, but the new year didn't begin until sunrise. Meanwhile, for
this special evening, we were in no-time. He'd step into the
tremendous fire every so often to rearrange the huge logs: a sight to
behold as he emerged out of the fire with his head hooded, like some
unearthly creature that fire couldn't even touch! I pointed out the
constellations PERSEUS and TAURUS above us in the middle of the
night and tried to explain their importance. He would point out some
constellation of his.

Sometimes we would fight about where the center of our feelings is:
he would then point
stubbornly to the head
and I would point
logically to the heart. I
can still hear the little
bells stitched to his
cloak of many shapes
and colors. I asked
once if the bells were to
keep away the dead
and he whispered out a
no. They were there to remind him that he was still alive and well, and
still in this world. I'm sending your dear wife some amber beads,
which better arrive with this letter "or else" [AUT]! Where are the
youthful days, my friend, when we used to take up the whole sidewalk
just as some rich old pudgy wined-up Senator came rolling by within
accidental striking distance? Once a centurion, always a centurion.
Legion XIII GEMINA is as strong as ever. Their IUPPITER and lion
emblems are comforting to behold. But not all of us got out on X
years service like you did. "Too bad" [MALE] my brother wasn't smart
enough to become a consul like yours. "Anyhow" [QUOQUOMODO],
I'm sure that an old soldier like you is still fighting for his place in line
and for a better life. The 25th of December will soon be here once
more: "The Unconquered Sun!" [SOL INVICTUS.] This "Persian"
[PERSES] wishes you: "Peace!" [PAX.] And "stay away from
redheads" [VITA RUFAE]! "Good-bye." [VALE.] On the 18th day of
December. In 4 A.D.. MURSA, PANNONIA.
"He lived by handfuls and mouthfuls of time."
[BUCCELLIS MANIPULISQUE TEMPORIS VIXIT.] Cuparius

Gemellus to Appollonius: Hello. They say that when

pirates captured him near CILICIA, they tried to ransom
him for XX TALENTA. Insulted, he suggested that they
ask for L and then promised to come back and hunt
them down like wild animals. He was only about XX years old then,
but he did come back after they got their money, in force, tracked
them down to the island of PHARMECUSA, crucified them and, some
say, cut a few of their throats himself. "I believe it." [ID CREDO.] This
man never accepted any injury to his "honourable rank" [DIGNITAS].

"He borrowed freely and he spent freely." [THIS PART IN GREEK]

When he left for HISPANIA to be Propraetor, he was in debt, owing
twenty-five million SESTERTII. He came back after his tour of duty
and easily paid all his debts off, somehow. But I doubt if he borrowed
any money while there. He can't be trusted with your wife or with what
he writes. His purple toga surely reminded people of kingship. They
were strange bedfellows: Pompeius, a Pleb siding with the Patricians,
and Caesar, a Patrician siding with "the masses" [PLEBES]. Shall we
be governed by ability or by birth? Shall we be governed by laws
everyone votes for or by men nobody votes for? Democracy or the
Republic? Caesar or the Senators? the filthy mob or the filthy rich
man? ROMA's constant and eternal dilemma!

The widespread rumour was that, on the 15th day, the Senate would
be asked to make Caesar king. He was already dictator-for-life. On
the 18th day, Caesar was to leave for PARTHIA to conquer her and
put more provinces under the power of ROMA. The assassins waited
with daggers, little swords, razors, and hidden knives. He entered the
Theater of Pompeius escorted by their man, Decimus Brutus, to
attend the Senate and they flocked around him as the statue of his
dead enemy Pompeius looked on and on. Pompeius had had the
misfortune to be assassinated V years earlier on a foreign shore.
Caesar must have been shocked to recognize Marcus Brutus and
Gaius Cassius, as he fell to the ground. There were rumours that
Marcus Brutus was really Caesar's son, but neither one of them ever
stepped forward and said anything in public. They say that Casca
struck the first of XL blows. He says so "proudly" [SUPERBE]
anyway. They say that LX of the Senators were originally in the plot.

All the Senators then scurried to the safety of their homes "like rats"
[UT MURES], too scared to declare for Democrats or Patricians,
overwhelmed by the assassination. It looked like civil war, again. An
amnesty was declared on the 17th day, but "mobs" [VULGI] were
forming and rioting. "He was very popular." [VALDE POPULARIS
ERAT.]
Maybe you're right: the Republic was a combination of monarchy,
democracy, and aristocracy that worked. The consuls and dictators
were kings, the upper-class were senators in power, and the other
people were democrats with their elected tribunes and their little
votes. The Republic as a three-way balance! But there seems to be a
natural progression there: one man-king to a group of senators to all
the democrats. And without violent force, it's hard to get a king or a
senator to share the wealth and power. Although like Titus says: Most
people in a democracy are not virtuous. What would happen if
everyone got an equal vote? Murderers and thieves voting equally
with bakers and philosophers! Drunks and pimps deciding who
should run the city! Petty criminals and mixed-up liars weighing the
issues carefully and with intent!

In his will, he had left every Roman citizen CCC SESTERTII. Always
a politician that man, even in death. When it was declared that his
adopted son and heir was to be his eighteen-year old grandnephew if
Caesar didn't have a legitimate son of his own by then, I think that
Antonius became embittered---after his initial rage wore off. The will
was made back in September, last year. Decimus Brutus was the
back-up heir---Caesar must have been a little surprised to see his
knife among the assassins. Marcus Antonius was the trustee of the
will. In the middle of April, Cleopatra packed up and left ROMA as
quickly "as an Egyptian in the night" [UT AEGYPTUS NOCTE]. I'll
miss those red fingernails. And those blue-and-green eyes. And her
royal stiff insolent manner.

What would the soldiers say? Caesar's elite Tenth Legion? A huge
crowd of people wouldn't leave his burning funeral bier in the FORUM
throughout the night of the 20th day. Gradually they threw everything
moveable in the FORUM onto the angry fire. It was very ugly: a slow
wild fury. Helvius Cinna was in the crowd when someone started
attacking him, yelling: "Assassin!" [SICARIE.] It was the wrong Cinna
however! Cornelius Cinna was the one that they wanted in their
righteous hands. Murdered for another man's crime! The innocent
guy was a poet, wasn't he? They literally tore him apart. I stayed
there watching and thinking throughout the night. We were
overwhelmed by the funeral incense and spices in the air. The
FORUM used to be an ancient cemetery long ago in our historical
past, didn't it? Someone was making a political point, now. The mob,
the next day, erected a XX-foot column of Numidian marble on his
funeral spot inscribed neatly with: "To The Father of The Country"
[PARENTI PATRIAE]. Someone had been well prepared.
After the civil war, Caesar had only really ruled for about a year
without a major war on his hands somewhere. All governments are
run by the few: army, heredity, wealth, priests, race, or business.
Caesar was more democratic, more cosmopolitan though. More
citizens were admitted and also more citizens were created from
barbarians, soldiers, and slaves. Roman colonies were integrated,
new colonies were set up, and even new-citizen Gauls were installed
into the Senate. More barbarians were made gladiators. Land was
given to soldiers and to proletarians. The recolonizing of CARTHAGO
and CORINTHUS was a personal political symbol. Everything he did
and said was a political declaration of war. He had "the daily records"
[ACTA DIURNA] put out in the FORUM for all to see and sent to the
legions and provinces: a remarkably open precedent.

ROMA was his home and he was her father now; only a god was
higher, more dignified. He beat the nobility politically and militarily, but
he was lenient. He'd lie treacherously to a Celtic or German tribe and
then massacre them down to their last woman and child. He always
travelled with bodyguards in foreign lands, but not in ROMA. He was
always lenient to a fellow Roman and his fellow Romans were the
ones who got him in the end. But then, even the wise Socrates wasn't
killed by strangers.

Perhaps it wasn't really a choice of democracy or republic, but of

army or aristocracy: the war of the soldiers against the SESTERTII. In
the end, the Senate, ROMA, the barbarians, and the world only had
respect for Caesar if there was an army to back his speeches. I
wonder if you'd listen to my opinions and thoughts obediently, with
Caesar's army to back me up? If it could happen like this to Caesar,
then it can happen to anyone of us. We all have our Brutus, or some
Ides out there waiting for us. I would claim that a million people (that's
a lot of ones) died in Caesar's wake as he passed his way through
this world. Quite a legacy! Maybe that's the only real summation of
any man: How many dead ghosts are silently pointing their fingers
directly at you as you still walk the human streets? Maybe you're right
that it never really was a Republic in the first instance, but it surely
was evolving into one before all the Caesars showed up.
One side accuses the other of tyranny and claims loyalty to the
Republic while the other side cries out against anarchy and claims
loyalty to the Republic. And they all cry: "Liberty." [LIBERTAS.] But
Liberty is a step above anarchy and Liberty is also a step above
tyranny. Their concept of Liberty is too childish, too limited, too
selfish, too dead. Liberty has to be defended by the sword, but she
cannot profit by the sword. Or as you would say it in your practical
business way: Liberty can profit by the sword, but she cannot
profiteer by the sword.

Old "Ninety-Nine" [IC] married "five times" [QUINQUIES], but his only
legal son died early and his only legal daughter died a young woman:
that would be a kinder summation of the man. When he stood up too
quickly he was grabbed by dizziness, so he was mortal and
vulnerable like any other man. His dreams scared him to death. He
was bald and vain about it. He loved himself and he loved ROMA. His
chair of gold at his Temple of VENUS is empty now. A spectacular
"Julian comet" [SIDUS IULIUM] is seen in the skies for VII nights and
people cry: It's an omen of Caesar! As if he were still in the city!
Some, whose eyes are better than mine, see a bloody-red comet. I
just nod my head.

His birthday on the 12th day of

QUINTILIS is celebrated like a god's
festival. The Caesar "Games" [LUDI] are
celebrated with extra care and sanctity
this year. People believe what they
want, as usual. I believe that he was just
another penny drowning "in a sea of
wax" [IN MARI CERAE]. "It's turning into
morning" [IN MANE MUTATUR] as I
write and what will our precious Republic
turn into? What will the laughing gods
give us in the years to come? "What we
were, we shall be!" [QUID ERAMUS
ERIMUS.] On the 30th day of "July"
[QUINTILIS]. ROMA. He even knew
when to laugh at the right time.

[44 B.C.]
"The more cats, the more mischief."
[PLUS FELIUM PLUS MALEFICII.] Cuparius

Flaccus to Priscus: Hello. Tourists! They should all be

crucified! Their "graffiti" [INSCRIPTIONES] is polluting
my city. They scratch names and opinions everywhere.
As if they were dogs passing by. As if the whole city
should care deeply about what they have to say:

"Aristocles was here" [ARISTOCLES HIC FUIT]

"IUPPITER is dead" [IUPPITER MORTUUS]
"eat my shorts" [COMEDE SUBLIGACULUM MEUM]
"the Germans are coming" [GERMANI VENIUNT]
"real men don't wear togas" [VIRI TOGAS NON GERUNT]
"ROMA is love" [ROMA AMOR]
"for a good time come see Iulia in the FORUM"
[OB TEMPUS BONUM VENI IULIAM IN FORO VIDERE]
"I came, I saw, I laughed." [VENI.VIDI.RISI.]
"drink and then think" [POTA DEINDE PUTA]
"think and then drink" [PUTA DEINDE POTA]
"vote for Valernius, he'll set you free"
[SUFFRAGARE VALERNIUM.TE LIBERABIT]
"what, me, to worry? [QUID EGO CURARE]
"poor lions" [LEONES MISERI]
"animals are not slaves"[BESTIAE SERVAE NON SUNT]
"Claude and Portia" [CLAUDIUS ET PORCIA]
"Hannibal slept here" [HANNIBAL HIC DORMIVIT]
"Roman bitchs do it for a penny"
[CANES ROMAE OB ASSEM ID AGUNT]
"cry and then cry again" [LACRIMA ATQUE LACRIMA ITERUM]
"Celts rule" [CELTAE REGUNT]
"go to school" [I IN LUDUM]
"go to hell" [I IN MALAM REM]
"ROMA doesn't hold me" [ME ROMA NON TENET]
"she holds no love" [TENET NON AMOREM]
"have your penny ready" [PARA ASSEM]
"the Arab Emperor" [AUGUSTUS ARABICUS]
"just say no" [DENIQUE DIC NON]
"show me" [MONE ME]
"little ants everywhere" [PARVAE FORMICAE UBIQUE]
"what did I do?" [QUID EGO EGI]
"I serve the same to everyone" [EADEM OMNIBUS PONO]
"go home" [I DOMUM]
"no time" [NIHIL TEMPORIS]
"file it" [CONDE ID IN SCAPO]
"sh! sleepyheads!" [ST. DORMIENTES]
Just because you speak Latin however, doesn't necessarily make you
a Roman. Just because you read and write, does not mean that you
are literate and well-mannered. These temporary invaders don't work
in the city, or supply it with any lasting trade. These parasites don't
give. They only take and run. These ghosts can't respect a living
breathing city. They aren't at home now and they'll never value
someone else's home. Why are they here? Is it that bad in their own
homes? Do they dress and act this way in their own towns and
villages and farms?

Just because they kiss the family cow

before they go to sleep or relieve
themselves in any old lane when they're
at home, they figure that they can do it
here too! Thank the gods, this
anniversary only comes around once!
But there’s always another anniversary,
another birthday, another death-day,
another fabricated artificial reason to
bring people together so that they’re not
alone in their same old garbage. New
garbage is a diversion from the real
garbage. And the real garbage is their
old garbage. These staring questioning
people think that there's gold in these
mean streets. And at least fifty thousand
prostitutes agree with them. Not to
mention the part-time ones! I guess that
there's always a certain price to pay, when you're the center of the
world. VALE.

[248 A.D.]
Don't let "what-they-say-you-are" [QUOD DICUNT TU ES] become
"what-you-are" [QUOD TU ES]. Cuparius

Marcus to his beloved mother: The Warmest Hello. I

hope that brother or sister reads this to you faithfully, as
they always have before. I pray that my dear father,
brother, and sister are healthy and happy. Your brother's
ship, LARA, sailed into ALEXANDRIA on the 22nd day of May. We
talked about business and I got so carried away with our plans that I
decided to see the rest of AEGYPTUS and then ARABIA. Uncle was
very interested that I report back everything to him. He especially
wanted to know about ARABIA and rare "spices" [CONDIMENTA].
The people here talk of its riches and wonders.

Uncle will have to look after the books and accounts himself, while I'm
away. He and I met with the new Roman administrators. Octavianus
is still here getting ready finally to return to ROMA. He wears a ring
with the head of a SPHINX on it. He seems like a simple sort of man.
It's a good thing that busts don't show height (or the lack of it). They
say that they can hold AEGYPTUS with III Roman legions. The plan
is definitely not to include any Egyptians in the armies. The Egyptians
may not be surprised to see all the soldiers, but they will be stunned
when they see all the legions of tax collectors that follow behind the
soldiers! There must be well over a half million taxable-people in
ALEXANDRIA. But then again, maybe they're used to it by now after
centuries of over-taxation. C.Cornelius Gallus will certainly command
AEGYPTUS well. He is famous both as a poet and as a soldier.
That's different anyway! He gave me a copy of his book "Loves"
[AMORES]. His elegies are powerful, although it's not my favourite
style of writing.

The PHARUS Lighthouse is here: CCCC feet high. I managed to get

inside once. Wonderful and titanic! It rises first in a square shape,
then the middle becomes a hexagon shape, and the final part on top
is round. A ship can see it from a full day's sail away. I guess that it
was made to impress the visitors, both new and old. It sure stays in
the mind while you're in the city. I used my measuring-stick to guess
its height. Cleopatra is spoken of as if she were a goddess. When
she had lost her wars, she tried to make a run for it to INDIA with her
family-treasury to start a new dynasty, but they outmaneuvered her
and cornered her. They say that Octavianus became the richest man
in the world when he seized her three hundred-year old treasury. She
still has a hold on this city even though she killed herself last year at
the age of XXXVIIII. My guess is that the Egyptians are still more
impressed with her and her lovely image than with a simple Roman
soldier like Octavianus.
ALEXANDRIA, the City of Alexander (or the City of Dinocrates,
Alexander's city-planner) is a truly cosmopolitan city, second only of
course to your ROMA, with a hundred-foot-wide main street and
classic heavy columns everywhere. Although, there are many who
would call her the greatest city of all time. There are mainly
Egyptians, Jews, and Greeks here, but also some Italians, Persians,
Arabs, Libyans, Ethiopians, Bactrians, and of course Syrians. They all
like to stay on their own streets. It's more like a little world, all to its
own. They all treat the Egyptians as the lowest class. The Greeks
and Jews appear to be at each other's throats! With all these people
crammed in here, misunderstandings are bound to happen. So exotic
and yet unlike ROMA.

Near the middle is the temple of ISIS. Her priests are bald, chaste,
and bare-foot. They worship the cow, but refuse to eat sheep or pig.
The luxurious temple of SERAPIS, an underworld bull-man-god, is
magical. It is full of wonderful paintings, great columns, and huge
majestic statues. There is also a Sanctuary to PAN. There is a small
wild statue there with two horns on its head, two goat ears, two goat
legs and goat feet, and a huge Star on its chest: a fear-inspiring PAN
and yet a thoughtful silly PAN. Maybe it's that we feel odd about our
animal parts and our animal parts feel very odd about our non-animal
parts. I'm not sure if he appears very old to me or very young. I could
have stayed for years in the Library and the Museum with its lectures,
gardens, theater, zoo, and observatories. Ever since I first read
Euclides, I've been in love with ALEXANDRIA and "numbers"
[NUMERI].

Euclides led me to Pythagoras: "One" [UNUS] is a point, "two" [DUO]

is a line, "three" [TRES] is a surface, and "four" [QUATTUOR] is a
solid, a real thing. That ordered idea has always stayed with me.
Pythagoras and his music led me to Plato. Unless you knew
geometry, he wouldn't even talk to you. Why does IUPPITER take
exactly one year to travel through each of the twelve signs of the
zodiac? What is the square root of II? Why is Pi so imperfect and yet
the circle so perfect? Why did the ancients love the number LX? Why
are musical harmonies related mathematically? Why do prime
numbers not occur in a pattern? (Or do they)? "I love Mysteries!"
[MYSTERIA AMO.] Where I bumped into Archimedes and why I
started reading him, I don't remember, but I like the way he thinks; it's
so different from the people I normally meet. He's a god that I can
understand. These particular books that I have collected are my
oracles. The Egyptians even say that writing is a gift from the gods---
the language of the gods.
Oh yes---Pythagoras also taught me to privately confront my
conscience, every single day, "fearlessly" [IMPAVIDE], "truthfully"
[VERE], and "hopelessly" [DESPERANTER]. I suppose that here, as
in ROMA, we all have our gods. Are the gods real or are they
symbols, like numbers are symbols? People speak in myths wherever
I go. But we, Romans, don't have all these half-animal half-human
types of gods that Egyptians do. The Roman wolf and eagle are
simply symbols. That's Roman progress, I suppose. Although we do
still have our PAN lurking around our ROMA.

They love to eat their bread, lentils, and beans here. Also onions,
cucumbers, pomegranates, grapes, watermelons, figs, dates, and
olives. They also eat things like crane, "pigeon" [COLUMBA], hippo,
ostrich, gazelle, and all kinds of seafood. Usually, I have coarse
Egyptian bread with some sesame or poppy seed in it and Egyptian
beer. But to eat one of their huge lobsters with some terrible Egyptian
wine: that's my lingering memory of ALEXANDRIA. Cleopatra doesn't
need it anymore! I don't think that she'll ever get a pyramid of her
own, now. Cleopatra liked to dress up and call herself ISIS and
parade through the streets or on the NILUS. Alexander is buried here
but others say that he's really buried in BABYLON, MACEDONIA,
OASIS, or even in MEMPHIS. They're hiding his body somewhere. I
would bet on where he actually died, myself. His gold sarcophagus is
long gone: "Times are tough all over." [TEMPORA UNDIQUE SUNT
DURA.]. Was he Macedonian, Greek, or eventually Persian? They
tell me that he was a god. They tell me that his body was mummified
in white honey! People say a lot of things. There's what-they-say and
there's what-they-think. And there's always also what-is-real-and-true:
the Source of the other two!

In ALEXANDRIA, Uncle picked up linen, papyrus, pepper, cinnamon,

silks, jewellery, incense, and ivory for their trips back. Life tastes
better "with pepper" [PIPERE] and everything we do just goes better
"with incense" [THURE]. Visitors, here, will buy anything with a
crocodile, cat, or bull shape, or insignia.
I like the little glass pyramids that they
sell in the happy shape of a fat cat,
myself. Your Latin is not as useful here
as the Greek you taught me. My poor
Egyptian tongue has introduced me to
some unexpected friends. I am taking
their ship tomorrow on the 10th day of
"June" [IUNIUS] to start on my long way
to ARABIA. We'll sail up the NILUS for
XIV or XV days and here I am, thinking
of the thousands of years of history here
on this river! The Egyptians must be the
oldest people in history. What will people
see of us thousands of years from now.
And what will they say? "Take care of
yourself." [CURA UT VALEAS.]

[29 B.C.]
He said: "Don't eat your heart!" [NOLI EDERE COR.] And I knew then
that I wasn't alone. At the end of the day, you can add up, for
yourself, all the people who might have whispered your name today
for some reason or other---but you'd be wrong---it was many more
people than that. Cuparius

Marcus to his beloved mother: The Warmest Hello. That

ALEXANDRIA like that ROMA is only a memory now.
After old MEMPHIS we entered the NILUS Canyon, no
more flat open delta! Plato spent XIII years in MEMPHIS,
learning Egyptian secrets and history. Pythagoras, himself, spent
XXII years in Egyptian temples and schools. They discovered, I
suppose, the sacred secret knowledge and the eternal fact of death:
"Mathematics and medicine!" [NUMERI ET MEDICINA.] Meanwhile,
ivory enough to fill ROMA comes floating down the NILUS along with
wild animals and slaves. They pointed at the famous "Pyramids"
[PYRAMIDES] up high, as we sailed by on the river. Some days, it's
such an exciting mysterious world! We were simply sailing along and
then suddenly: "Wham! Bang!" [TUXTAX.] "It's a whole, new World!"
[EST MUNDUS TOTUS ET NOVUS.] They are huge and eternal and
unbelievable. They sure don't move much, just slowly rotate.

"They might in the end have been nothing more than a project to
keep all the poor people occupied. Some pharaohs built pyramids
and some built wars. They say that there are a hundred pyramids in
all, but no one has bothered to count all the wars up. The Egyptian
stones are marvellous: limestone, granite, sandstone, and marble.
But they're for the city-people. The other people use mud-bricks.
Even their homes come from the River. They take the mud out of
their River and throw in some straw before they give it a quick bake.
Why straw? They don't know why, or so they tell me. They lay a wall
with these dull bricks, then thatch or tile it for a nice flat roof. It never
rains here so they are free to enjoy the outside world. The straw-part
still has me wondering. The straw is such weak stuff---unless you
push on the end of it---ouch!" [THIS WHOLE PART IN GREEK]
Mud-bricks are good enough for me anyway. The poor man’s barley-
beer is good enough for me too. Unlike ALEXANDRIA, mainly, I see
farms and villages. Oh, yes, lots of mosquitoes and flies. They have
these stone gauges that measure the height of the floods---whether
there will be a famine that year. They measure here in cubits, palms,
and digits. My friends chew "the papyrus" [PAPYRUS] and then spit
out the pulp. "Strange customs" [MORES MIRI] in strange lands!
They have three seasons: Spring, Summer, and Flood. They even
start their New Year with the flood, just after the Ides of July, when
the star SIRIUS, which they call SOTHIS, first rises. Their four-
thousand-year-old calendar is simple: XII months of XXX days, plus V
feast-days, plus one-quarter day.

The dark land along the river, as it snakes through AEGYPTUS, is

like a long wonderful garden or oasis but the rest is boring desert.
The NILUS is their greatest god, whatever myths they may tell me. If
it wasn't for the flooding, it would all be death and desert. It must rain
heavily way up high where the NILUS starts, in whatever mountains
that must lie up there somewhere. We sail at our leisure by crocodiles
and palm trees, by hippos and farmers, by swallows and storks. I
remember sailing on the MARE INTERNUM once when a cloud of
storks flew by us. They love to fly really low to the water. Hundreds of
storks stormed by---but they respectfully avoided our ship. They're
born up north somewhere and then they travel southwards for the
winter-food. But they always try to return home again. I wondered at
the time if these birds might have half-stork half-man gods?

To manage the precious liquid, there are canals and dikes all along
the river. Whoever controls the water, controls the people. Just before
THEBAE we took a canal to COPTUS, then a camel-caravan for XIII
nights of torture. You can notice hyenas, jackals, and vultures on the
edges, waiting for a camel to fall. The days are so hot and the nights
cold. Sleep and rest were all we can barely endure at some well-
placed station on this ancient route. The wind in "the desert"
[ARENAE] blows constantly against you---you're always fighting it---
which is an odd complaint from a sailor. One tremendous sandstorm
was a deadly disaster. The air became hotter and hotter just before
the sandstorm hit. The flying sand is so hot that you have to hug a
nearby camel for protection and shelter. Drowning in the sand, I felt
so helpless. This world may struggle against terrible floods and
earthquakes and plagues, but it will surely someday finally end by
drought. And then, there will be no more sailors.
They told me that some poor tribes live out here all the time, in the
hill-caves. XXXXVIII camels and me, soberly moving through the
Egyptian desert-night---not exactly the stuff of poetry, I know, but
there we were! They told me to watch out for snakes and scorpions.
The sand-fleas are everywhere. The smell of camels is something
that I will never forget, though I've tried! These animals are not just
horses with a hump. They're one-humped monsters! They can carry
five hundred pounds easily, so they have their value. They go for XX
to XXV miles a night. The front feet of the camels are tied loosely
when they're not loaded down by business. There are II or III camels
to each human-handler. My friends insisted that I ride on a camel, so
I obliged at times, but I preferred walking because it seemed more
real to me.

They milk them, burn their dung, and eat them. Camel-meat is too
tough for me and the smoked hump---I didn't even want to look at it. I
liked the camel-liver. They told me: You haven't lived until you've had
"camel-heel soup" [IUS CALCIS CAMELI]. Well, they're wrong! My
friend said that if we're lucky, we'll taste some hyena. But it doesn't
sound too lucky to me, never mind for the hyena and his family. Let
me tell you though, if ever a male camel is frothing at the mouth,
then, well, just stay out of its way! Move quickly and calmly in the
opposite direction! Their milk is whitish. These animals drink and
drink rivers of water if you let them and nothing if they can't find
water! Fresh water is constantly a problem in my life, whether I'm at
sea or in the desert.

The tents are of camel-hair. The camels are like super-mules, or like
dragons that some dragon-goddess somewhere had personally
created...but she forgot the wings and claws, had a hump added, and
had the legs stretched, in a drunken fit of humour. The proof they
offered me was that camels (and cats) move their feet the same way
as dragons when they walk: they move the back leg just before the
front leg on the same side, then the same pattern on the other side,
and so on. Did I mention that a camel's stink could kill? Flies have
been known to drop dead if they innocently passed too close to a
camel's breath!

We arrived in BERENICE on the 5th day of July, according to my

diary. More Arabs and Indians are to be found here. My Egyptian
friend here told me that an Egyptian ship sailed from here to
AETHIOPIA once and then further south, around the land's end, back
northwards to HISPANIA and onward to ALEXANDRIA. His friend
jumped in and claimed that they went past ALEXANDRIA by canal to
BERENICE again to complete the circuit. I spent XXXX days meeting
different Indian and Arab traders. I had to pick the most trustworthy
one. "Trust" [FIDES] is a funny word, a funny string, and a funny
goddess. There were V good Arabian cities for me to pick from.
I arrived a month later in OCELIS, ARABIA, on an experienced
Egyptian trading ship instead. She loaded up with incense, myrrh,
cinnamon, ginger, gums, "laudanum" [LADANUM], a lot of precious
stones, and jewellery. Just like in ROMA, I try to earn more than I
spend. The people are so strange and wonderful. "I live and walk in a
dream." [IN SOMNIO VIVO ET AMBULO.] Would they be as
impressed with ROMA? Words fail me, like they do a child, until I can
get more experienced with the exotic people and things here. There
are even some stars that I've never seen before. The star Polaris is
very, very low in the sky here! And the sun is so high in the burning
sky. The moon also! The stars, planets, moon, and sun seem to be in
a secret ancient harmony. I can almost hear it, when I'm not
distracted by something down here, where we are. The stars are
surely the oldest gods. But, in the end, they don't seem to care. They
give us life as a present and then they cruelly take it back again, for
themselves.

On your birthday, I offered some salt, wine, and incense as my

celebration-sacrifice for my Sunshine. But I finally decided to keep on
going: INDIA is "on my mind" [IN ANIMO MEO]. The trade comes
from there! They told me that there are thousands of cities, thousands
of tribes and languages, and thousands of gods. BACCHUS was
supposedly born in NYSA, somewhere in INDIA. And there are "the
Chinese" [SERES] still further on and the-gods-know-what-else past
them. I keep writing in my little diary and taking my sundial
measurements for my
map-drawing. I have my
little bag of gold coins
and I have your words of
experience. I also have
my thin gold necklace in
case of any real
disaster. I sent this letter
back with the Egyptians
from OCELIS along with
a sack of incense for
you and a whole load of "bananas" [ARIENAE] for my Egyptian
friends as my personal gift to them. On the 11th day of "August"
[SEXTILIS]. In 29 B.C.. "Take care of yourself." [CURA UT VALEAS.]

[29 B.C.]
"She listened gently to his stories and he listened respectfully to hers
---a kindness in return for a kindness."
[EA CLEMENTER FABULAS EIUS AUDIVIT ET IS REVERENTER
FABULAS EIUS AUDIVIT.GRATIA PRO GRATIA.] Cuparius

Amanda to Flavius: Hello, again.

"If I had a million" [SI EGO M HABUI] words
I'd buy "your love" [AMOR TUUS]
"with visions" [VISIBUS] and "with stories" [FABULIS]
and with days spent only on adjectives.

If I had a merchant-ship filled with kisses

I'd buy from you your love
with sweet feelings and quick touches.

If I had "a city full of wishes" [URBS PLENA OPTATORUM]

I'd buy your love with all the things
I really want in this world
and I'd wish for your every desire.

If I had a million days

I'd spend them on you, "hopefully" [CUM SPE]
(not to mention a million nights).
I'd borrow every hour I could
to buy your love.

Now if I had "a river of ducks" [FLUMEN

ANATUM], hmmm...
or "a war of slaves" [BELLUM
SERVORUM]
or "an army of hands" [AGMEN
MANUUM]..."yes, hands" [IMMO
MANUS]
or maybe perhaps, a CIRCUS of smiles
I would love to buy your love.

"If only" [SI SOLUM]

you had something
to buy "my love" [AMOR MEUS] with....

On the 1st day of January. In 218 A.D..

CAPUA.
If they ever ask you any funny questions, you just go ahead and
answer them with "a funny question" [INTERROGATIO INSOLITA],
"right back" [RURSUS]. Cuparius

Alfius to Quintilius Mutilus: Hello. I hope that this letter

stirs up some of the Roman fire still in you, in that
wilderness you now call home, and makes you miss
ROMA. I know that she misses you. I also hope that you
enjoyed my last letter, touring around the CAMPUS MARTIUS. So do
that "Roman Thing" [RES ROMANA]: put some incense on, maybe a
few flowers like painted roses or fresh blossoms nearby, some laurel
burning, some rosemary in sight, some basil and pepper on your
breath, some hot wine within easy reach....and read on. My dear old
mother told me constantly to be careful with the company I keep:
Friends share their troubles but hoard their profits. My father was a
little more practical: Believe the best of friends and the worst of
enemies. (And don't believe anyone else!) But I think that you
logically buy a lot of hidden and implied "luggage" [SARCINAE] when
you buy into a friendship. I strolled between "the Colosseum"
[AMPHITHEATRUM FLAVIUM] and the CIRCUS MAXIMUS as I
watched these people of ROMA. It must be almost 500 easy paces in
one direction. It's just another street in ROMA.

It's about the seventh hour; my lunch was superb but a bit too much! I
never buy any meat on the streets, just a drink now and then. Just
because they call it chicken or pig doesn't mean that it hasn't been
called rotting pigeon or alley-cat previously. People are funny with
their words: Of course, I was in the CIRCUS all day, honey! And
inwardly: After all, life is a CIRCUS and an hour does seem like a day
sometimes (and honey does come from stinging bees, you nosey
old....).

"Filthy little children" [LIBERI SORDIDI ET PARVI] are playing

around the Colosseum. The older ones are charged with watching
over the younger ones. But we all get lost a little in "the passion of
playing" [FERVOR LUDI]. Have children always played like this: with
meagre toys, balls, sticks, earth, rocks, nuts, large beans, each other,
the nearby wall, some ants, watching the clouds, ignoring passing
adults, chasing each other, hiding, crying, laughing? "A teacher"
[LITTERATOR] is drilling some young students in the alphabet and
syllables, loudly! Every once in a while, a roar is heard from inside the
amphitheater. I wonder if the kids realize what the yelling means? Of
course, as usual, they know perfectly well about what's going on
around them. They're so accepting---if we all happened to walk
sideways and to run around screaming every second word wearing
only blue hats, well, it would be fine with the little people. They don't
care what the rules are; they just want to get on with the game and
start playing.
A child's love must be ideal. They love unreservedly. They haven't
even seen their parents yet, but they come into the world ready to
love them whether they're young or old or stupid or cute or rich or
barbarians or murderers or slaves. Then again, the poor parents are
equally ready to start loving, so maybe there is a trade-off of sorts.
And most babies are born so dirt-ugly that I'm sure that the gods are
trying to tell us something. It's strange how as we grow up and away
from our parents, we naturally start looking for a mate to restart that
family-feeling. Some teenaged boys are horsing around, semi-
violently, trying to impress some girls nearby. The giggling girls,
meanwhile, are strutting around and chattering excitedly about
nothing at all, trying to impress the boys. It seems so obvious and
silly when someone else is doing it.

I spot Quadratus heading my way. I haven't spoken to him in years. I

look past him and ignore him, even though he does still owe me C
SESTERTII. He does the same. I think it was him; my eyes seem to
be getting weaker this year. Yes, that was his silly hunched style of
walking, I'm so sure of it, "the dirty rat" [MUS SORDIDUS]! His
"girlfriend" [AMICULA], the Giraffe, never did return that book of mine
that she had begged and begged to borrow for just one little month. I
hate lending my books out. An old lady coughs, spits, and snorts past
me, not caring whom she might offend, as if she were the only real
person in the rude inhuman city full of young idiots. After her display, I
begin to notice a lot of other people with their own particular sneezes,
yawns, scratches, hums, drools, wheezes, spits, licks, sweat. Some
people are sensitive to the city around them and to what other people
may think of them, and some are sensitive only to their inner selves.
Some old men are correcting each other's birdcalls on the corner:
That doesn't sound like a dove, it's more like a crow.
A crow?
Yes, a crow...a crow dying...slowly!
The old men cackle, and criticize and smile at each other as they
pass their time away.
I go through the crowd playing that old children's game in my mind: "I-
like-it/I-don't-like-it." [MIHI PLACET.MIHI DISPLICET.] A mother,
dressed in her finest colours, hurries quickly by with her curly-headed
daughter in her pretty clean TUNICA, probably visiting relatives and
shopping for dinner. Their matching "hairpins" [CRINALIA] are a nice
touch. A boy in a goat-drawn chariot disappears into an alley of
shadows. There's the old salesman's trick of sizing people up by their
"transportation" [VECTURA]: horse or walking, donkey or stallion,
litter or cart, slaves or not, expensive shoes or barely-hanging-on
sandals. They might as well carry signs on their backs, written with
their worth in SESTERTII!

I could set up a booth here and tell them their fortunes: You were
injured in the war, have XII SESTERTII in your pocket and have no
future prospects.
You're worth sixty thousand SESTERTII and your wife is unfaithful
(what are the odds!).
Your back is very sore.
You just lost your best friend.
You think you've got happiness by the privates.
And: You over there, you love to eat.
You stand ready to die for love.
You live for your children.
I could talk away nonchalantly about their health, luck, love, virtue,
money---and make them all a little bit happier.

A chubby slave-girl walks away from me in her bare feet---her dirty

cracked heels off to their next assignment. I'd bet that she's taken
"the long way home" [VIA LONGA DOMUM] quite often in her life-
time. Her dark dark TUNICA hides any food or stain or other dirty
accident. A cloud of perfume rolls by with her pet weasel; "why is she
hiding" [CUR LATET] in that sweet imported smell? Sometimes, we
should just be grateful and not inquire too much! Children love their
pets: dogs, birds, weasels, cats, hares, snakes, turtles. Some adults
love them too, but it must be a childish "obsession" [STUDIUM]:
playing at parenting! And the youngest pets are the favourites. There
is a certain type of short-man, who walks with his legs far apart, his
arms swinging just a little wider than normal, his torso swaying
sideways as he tries to claim more than his fair share of the city-
street. I suppose that we all compensate for something physical that
we feel we have too little or too much of.
Among the unwashed and unlettered comes a big fat swine in his
Senator-TOGA with its "wide crimson stripe" [CLAVUS], protecting
his wealth with overt and covert violence: covering the city in
weapons, guards, police, lawyers, soldiers, judges, slaves, laws,
wills, walls. Adrift in a sea of would-be robbers, poor baby! All the
other rich and the want-to-be rich are after him relentlessly. The
crimson border on his TOGA must be a proud symbol of his blood (or
somebody's blood). He moves at the center of bodyguards, slaves,
flunkies, relatives, hangers-on. They all want jobs, money, and dinner
invitations. Off to the FORUM for some entertainment and laughs! A
chubby ancient beggar gives the noble Senator the famous "finger"
[DIGITUS] as he's ignored and passed over. The beggar gives the
back of someone else's TOGA "the horn" [CORNU]. "I didn't look
back" [NON RESPEXI] after I passed him by.

A scream catches my attention, as a barber butchers his vain victim

at a fountain decorated with stone cupids and eternal birds. A little old
lady plods by trying to keep her head up as high as possible today,
her too few teeth trying to avoid each other. A loud idiot rants on the
corner at the uncaring world. People love giving away their well-
considered opinions. Poor stinking beggars are on every second
corner. One ranter catches my ear and eye with his yelling. The
phrase that grabs me at first is: Walking Bellies! He moans that we
were all innocent children of some great father-god until the evil came
into our "garden" [HORTUS]---and that evil was the discovery that
some of us creatures could be eaten. He screams out: "You
animals!" [VOS BESTIAE.] "Cannibals!" [ANTHROPOPHAGI.] "Do
not murder!" [NON OCCIDES.] "You!" [TU.] He seems sincere and
ominous and also a little bit scared.

I pass a pregnant girl, with face bloated and feet splayed out for a
better balance in an unsure world. They say that a pregnant woman
has a certain glow. Well, the mystery of motherhood does have a
wonderful glow to it, but her fragile body is sure taking a beating. This
one seems to be walking, breathing, and eating for two! Perhaps
she'll find some time in her busy schedule to smile for two. A mean
little adolescent deliberately goes out of his way to step on a wayward
beetle as it tries to cross the hot littered sidewalk. He'll make for a
good soldier someday. Wherever he's headed to, he doesn't want to
go there. But he's going anyway because somebody gave him an
order. And orders make life easier for him. I avoid a couple of
begging Egyptian priests with their little cymbals and also step around
a dead little carcass in my way (probably a squirrel).

A charioteer steps through the gathering crowd like a HERCULES,

smiling and raising his hands up to his sweet heaven. The crowd
goes into a controlled "orgy" [COMISSATIO]! Too bad they couldn't
get that excited about liberty, honour, or goodness. His silk hem has
some gold-coloured material and glass sewn in. As if it were he,
himself, who pulled that heavy chariot, with all four horses in it,
across the finish-line. Ah well, some get "the credit" [FAMA] and
some get "the sweat" [SUDOR]. Some drunks dressed as Greeks
dance by chanting what sounds like: "Win! Win! Win!" [NICA.NICA.
NICA.]
You know, I hate "the lower-class" [INFAMI]. They stink worse than
animals. But they don't want to change. They don't know any better,
but they don't want to learn. They have better things to do,
apparently. They bore you to sleep within moments of any so-called
conversation. And they speak "in Latin" [LATINE], but I don't
understand half of what they say. No, the AVENTINUS Hill is not my
home. But "the upper-class" [SUMMI], well, I hate them even more.
The PALATINUS Hill is not my home either. I am neither ROMULUS
nor REMUS. How much meat can one man eat? How many slaves
does he need to dress himself properly? How much must his thieving
ancestors have amassed, so that today he is better, more cultured,
and of better race and character than all the other people with their
non-thieving ancestors? Who does he think he is, anyway? And those
two groups pale in comparison with the brainless and heartless
"middle-class" [MEDII]! If money is the primary way you relate to the
world, then why are you so, so offended by a little word like "whore"
[SCORTUM]?

Where are the truly classless people? There are millions of citizens
throughout the Empire and who knows how many other slaves,
barbarians, and foreigners! Where are the ones like me? "I really
need the company." [PROFECTO SOCIETATIS EGEO.] Sometimes,
I feel like "I'm hanging by a thread" [PENDEO FILO]. Once in a while
though, you meet someone who is not weighted down by his wealth
or his poverty and who is not blinded by his birth or position. I don't
much like the god I picked this year. Next year I think that I'll live "à la
BACCHUS" [AD BACCHUM]. "Women and wine!" [VENUS ET
VINUM.] Those are the two streets that you'll find me on, my friend,
for all of next year!

Is it my impression only or are there a lot of old people out and about,
lately? I like being polite in public: "Ladies first" [PRIMUM DOMINAE],
and all that. But these old people! You try to act "deferentially"
[REVERENTER]. But there comes a point where you treat them all
the same---male or female has no consequence. They even start
looking alike. They're almost a third sex. You're forced to treat them
with a strict politeness (until they mouth off too much and then "all's
fair in self-defence" [IN DEFENSIONE OMNIA AEQUA]).

A squad of dangerous-looking Germans plows through. Wild red hair

surrounding their quiet blue eyes. But that's not wonder that I notice
in their clear bold barbarian eyes. A couple of Syrian street-musicians
play their flutes and drums. Some music just tugs at your insides and
helps you think of eternity and lost loves. But it's never been a crime
to be lonely in ROMA. Do you remember Catta from AQUILEIA? I
wonder what ever happened to her? One of us should have married
that pretty face, you know that's true! This odd foreign woman walks
by. She has that half-pretty look. There's something just plain ugly
about her. But her attitude, or her walk, or maybe it's her will, is so
striking and attractive. "A loudmouth" [LOQUAX] passes by her with
some obscenities. She's been in that city before though---no reaction
from her. She walks steadily at her own pace, through the bread-
soaked air. He shuts up and moves on. Yes, a very attractive woman!
Yes, she has something. "But I don't know what." [SED QUID
NESCIO.]
This old old lady stops me abruptly and says: As a matter of interest, I
was born just over that hill, but the farm is part of the city now. Purely
as a matter of interest, you know! A laugh seizes me. There is
something friendly about her lonely manner and her fragile human
frankness. I joke about how things change and then let her go on her
way. It's a quick polite moment in the busy noisy storm of quick-
talking people.

Now's a good time for a pause from all my sketching and for some
"hot wine, watered-down and spiced-up" [CALIDUM]. Sometimes I
dress up and sometimes I dress down, carry a bag full of money or
go about without a coin in my pocket. I like to feel what it's like for all
these different people, to see a little of what they might see.
Sometimes we feel that a bucketful of coins is necessary for a strong
sense of security and at other times we feel independently poor---
truly a feeling of real freedom. Today, I have a few small coins with
me. Just another poor man in the big city. ROMA offers many
different perspectives, if we care to grab a taste. She has many
wonderful buildings and people and many terrible "temptations"
[PROBRIPERLECEBRAE]. But no dinner for me today. I've been
over-indulging lately. Most people fast only one day per month, but I
fast twice per month. I have to lose a little weight; I've made up my
mind. It seems to be getting harder to keep the weight off as we get
older, though. This "over-stuffed belly" [SAGINA] has been too
faithful and constant a companion; I've made up my mind!

At an intersection near the CIRCUS, a wagon full of roofing tiles

plows into a pedestrian, a big pedestrian. The mule stops, is urged
on, and nudges the pedestrian again. The two men start yelling, back
and forth, and then together. The driver plainly didn't see the
pedestrian and seems surprised and very defensive. Then the
confused driver runs his mule into the poor guy, again! The big one
attacks now and they start "to eat fists" [PUGNOS EDERE]: "Eat
this!" [EDE HIC.] The mule doesn't budge. They wrestle over a wet
dirty rag and some rotting eggs that someone had dropped. People
are staring and starting to notice the turn of events. The driver is
taking a real pounding now. I seem to have more in sympathy with
the mule than with the fighters or the audience.

If we want to judge people rightly, we have to ask ourselves which of

these two are acting in justifiable self-defence? And which one of
these two do we want our city to be full of---as our close dear
neighbours and as our fellow-soldiers? But in this case, I have to say
that their justice is too unimportant and trivial to bother judging
rightfully. The city will survive in either case. The dopey driver ends
up in a fountain, headfirst. The pedestrian walks away, his dignity
intact---but he should have been looking down instead of up to the
sunny sky. He steps in some half-solid horse "manure" [MERDA],
wheels around, and drops partly into a sewer-hole. From the
shrieking, I think that he broke some bone in his foot or badly scraped
his "shin" [TIBIA], "but I move on" [SED EGO PROGREDIOR]. The
mule doesn't seem to care about this man's tears either.
It's getting late; all sorts of vehicles are rushing into the streets now.
Those damn mule-drivers! They must have an idiot-test for any new
recruits: Are you too young? Do your dumb friends call you stupid?
Do you like to get drunk? Can you shout louder than any squeaking
wheel? Can you see anything more than five feet away from you? Do
you have the soul of a mule? the smell? the look? Well!
Congratulations, boy, you start at sunset! Why don't they just hire
some women as drivers and have done with the whole damn city! I
love my walks around ROMA, but not when these stupid lazy drivers
are on the streets. The sight of the Aquaduct again, reminds me that
it's time to go back up the street to "the Hot-Baths of Titus"
[THERMAE TITI] where I can put my sketches together into a
readable letter for you. "I love my water hot and my oil warm." [MEAM
AQUAM FERVENTEM ET MEUM OLEUM CALIDUM AMO.]

I prefer the new parts of the city. The old parts have their charms.
And they have a way of putting the rest of the city into a longer
meaning. But they're generally run-down and the fix-ups are poorly
done. They're such "a mess" [SQUALOR]. Some of the new buildings
are even a worse mess. Buildings have a life-span like people and
words. Then they just don't work well anymore. Some of them never
did work right or well in the first place. But some go on and on. Some
buildings seem shy and some seem bold, just like people. But
shyness in a person, to me is so boring, just a sign of their self-
centered preoccupation. And boldness is also a boring sign of a
person's extreme selfishness. We have to skilfully rope-dance
between these ugly extremes of ourselves.

A lot of these women are dressed formally, in STOLA, jewellery, and

hair-dos. Then I slowly and seriously remember that "Married-Ladies-
Day" [MATRONALIA] is coming on the 1st day of March. All the
wives and mothers will dress themselves up and receive little
presents, tokens, and flowers in honour of IUNO LUCINA. (If we're
lucky enough to still have a wife or mom.) Her temple on the
ESQUILINUS Hill should be worth the walk to see that special
celebration. That date was of course also New Year's Day in the old
ROMA. It made so much more sense to have it nearer to Spring. I
think that I'll celebrate it there anyway (unless someone has passed a
law that I haven't heard of yet). But I don't think that anyone will come
along on that date to present me with a little broom or a lamp. An old
couple, hand in hand, moves along at their own speed like II wild
ducks out for still another stroll. They probably cursed each other
judiciously all through their youthful years together and now they
barely hang on to each other, grateful for something that's both
familiar and comforting. He has "a staff" [VIRGA] to help him along
and she hangs onto him. A gorgeous Roman beauty struts by, cutting
a path through the crowds---slower and prouder and firmer than the
other mortals out today.
Which reminds me---why are so many of these crazy people rushing
and hurrying themselves into an early grave? If they're an hour late,
what possible difference could it possibly make to the world. Now, if
they were rushing home to some gorgeous blonde intelligent virtuous
lady---why, I would yield the right-of-way and urge them on to quicken
their pace "cheerfully" [LIBENTER]. But this can't be the case for all
of these wild rushing inconsiderate bulls. Or for all the busy cows
either! "Why the rush, you fools?" [FATUI.CUR IMPETUS.] "Where's
the fire?" [UBI EST INCENDIUM.]

When I was younger, I assumed the best. People with more money
worked harder and were smarter than the rest. People in love lived
happier and forever. People with culture and manners were just
better people. But now, "I simply call them as I see them" [MODO
EOS VOCO UT EOS VIDEO]: Greed kills, "love lies" [AMOR
MENTITUR], and learning is sophistry. My old father-in-law used to
tell me: The more educated they become, the ruder they become! If
you assume the best, you're only hurt and surprised when the worst
shows up repeatedly, again and again. But if you assume the worst,
well then you're only pleased and surprised when the best shows up
occasionally, once in a while.

I like to think that I don't assume either anymore: "Show me it!"

[OSTENDE ID MIHI.] Yes, my darling woman, I hear what you're
saying, but can you show me also! Yes, sir, I do hear you, but I also
see what you've done so far in your life. You and I have both been
"around the FORUM"
[CIRCUM FORUM] and
down the battle-line.
We know what kind of
things are happening in
this city, today. We're
just not sure of the
exact houses and their
particular names this
time around. This letter
has helped me too,
because we don't think
often enough about the people around us. We don't ask questions
very often enough. Surrounded by mirrors, we get a better look at
ourselves. So write to me soon about the barbarians you see around
you, where you are now. After all, ROMA is everywhere and we are
everyman. On the 24th day of February. In 96 A.D.. VALE.
"Oh for sure" [O CERTO], "with pepper" [CUM PIPERE] in his rectum
and "a little cheap wine" [PAULUM VAPPA] down his throat, anyone
can sell that tired old horse. Cuparius

Ti.Caelius Quirinius to D.Marcius Nero: Hello. As

Quaestor, since the 24th day of September, I have
looked carefully into this affair for you on behalf of the
Senate. "Luckily" [FAUSTE] I was in NARBO when the
Senator, C.Martius Barbatus, was murdered on that date, sometime
before sunrise. He was neatly killed in a private apartment that he
had rented, with a long thin knife left at the scene. It was left in his
back. He had arrived early the day before. He was here with only two
slaves: a Greek girl and a former gladiator. His personal things and
money bags seemed untouched. I hope that it's not "the secretary"
[SCRIBA] or "bodyguard" [CUSTOS]. They say that he had over CC
slaves in all! I'd hate to see them all slaughtered just because of one
slave's murderous act. I faithfully remembered the first three rules of
any investigation that you taught me way back when we first met.

Number One:
"Everything's a clue (to a certain extant)!"
[OMNIA INDICIUM QUADAM TENUS.]
Number Two:
"Everyone's a liar (to a certain extent)!"
[OMNES MENDAX QUADAM TENUS.]
And Number Three:
"There are no more rules."
[NON SUNT PLURES LEGES.]

So, I went to work. These two slaves spoke innocently and poorly. All
their clues pointed to true conditions and all their lies pointed only to
their private little fears. They feared discovery of their "love affair"
[AMORES], and they feared their probable torture and possible
slaughter as the slaves of a murdered Roman master. They have co-
operated, so far. For some reason, according to the secretary, the
former Senator had deposited his will with the Vestal Virgins in
ROMA. If you could check that out, it might prove interesting. Not for
what's in the will, but for when he last rewrote it. The Senator was
healthy, they all said, and he looked all right to me, considering.
While here, a cohort of soldiers arrived in town with the looting and
spoils of Q.Servilius Caepio, a name I'm sure that your friend Manlius
Maximus would recognize. They had gathered all their many Celtic
treasures at TOLOSA, armied their way to here, and were on their
way to MASSILIA in C ox-carts and on CCC army mules like a huge
"wooden caterpillar" [ERUCA LIGNEA]. It made me wonder if Greeks
were secretly hiding somewhere inside. For some reason, it was very
neatly divided up: gold in the carts and silver on the mules, C and
CCC. "Very neat!" [VALDE MUNDUS.] And only the five hundred
soldiers! They arrived here on the 2nd day of October. At, say, three
hundred pounds per mule and a thousand pounds per cart, that
would work out to roughly one hundred thousand pounds of gold and
the same of silver.

The Legatus was a particularly bureaucratic tight-faced onion-head

by the name of M.Minucius Flaccius. Wasn't his uncle one of the
consuls, a few years back? The Roman soldier must be the best---
with leadership such as this idiot and we still manage somehow to
succeed! I inspected, but informally. I used your name as Praetor to
worm my way in. I can only report seeing boxes and carts and bags.
They refused to show me their treasure. Under orders till they reach
ROMA, apparently! Just before he left NARBO, I told Flaccius, in the
presence of some of his men, that there should be no problem when
he at last arrived triumphantly in ROMA and formally presented the
treasure of the Consul Caepio to the Senate, as long as he himself
had seen exactly what was in each and every box and bag.

They wanted to move on "as soon as possible" [QUAM PRIMUM]. It

sounded as if they had a very definite schedule. From MASSILIA, he
wouldn't tell me, but I think that he intended to sail to ROMA. Or he
might have been meeting someone on the road to MASSILIA. He
couldn't be taking the land route all the way! It being October, I
strongly questioned him. He formally ignored me. He's under orders,
remember? He was willing to take the two slaves of the dead Senator
with him, so I transferred them into his custody with a letter. Since it
was obvious that he intended to sail from somewhere soon, I strongly
suggested that he sail in two ships, along the coast. Sailing with such
a valuable cargo at this time of year! Maybe the gods didn't want him
to ever arrive. I'm surprised that he wasn't jumped by Celts, or even
by Romans, on his long trip getting here. He should reach ROMA in
two or three sailing days, so the earliest he could possibly arrive
would be on the 6th day of October.
One thing about being a Quaestor, I can force anyone in this town to
talk to me, but they don't have to listen to me. I really have met the
most interesting people and situations in this town. There also
seemed to be a lot of former Spanish soldiers in that treasury-guard.
Maybe I should gaze into a pool of Egyptian blood or at a flock of
birds as it divides itself to figure out the truth. The truth is hard work
compared to some quick and easy lies, but things seem to work out
and everyone is satisfied, to a certain extent. Things come together
into a comforting routine.

And that's when I've learned to apply your Rule Number Four:
"There are always more rules (see Rule Number Two)".
[SUNT SEMPER PLURES LEGES.VIDE LEGEM NUMERUM DUO.]

The story? Well, the Senator was here to meet some people. They
killed him. They were very good at what they did. Soldiers or perhaps
politicians. Probably Romans. He was in some dirty business with
them or he found out something about them and he wanted a share.
He wanted more than his fair share, so they killed him. The knife was
left as an obvious clue. It looks like a false clue to me, although it
remains an effective warning to others. And the whole thing was
about money, of course. They weren't desperately fighting over
whose turn it was to feed the many orphans of NARBO---I feel quite
confident on this point. I don't think that we'll ever find out who did it
unless someone from the other side starts talking to us. But I do know
that someone will be hung with this crime because of the Senator's
position and name. There will have to be a person, an assassin, a
name that can be delivered to the Senate.

I know that I've had some success in my career, but this political
world is not for me, my friend. "I'm a simple man" [VIR SIMPLEX
SUM] with very strong honest tastes. This is not what I call living.
"Life is too short." [VITA NIMIUM BREVIS.] Sometimes, now and
then, because of all your hard work, an opportunity presents itself.
You're very good at what you do, and success is forced to give you a
little taste of itself. I want to retire from politics to the brick-business
on my wife's side of the family, on the outskirts of VEII. I feel that an
opportunity waits for me there. It's time that their operations were
expanded anyway. And I'm just the man for the job! XXXI is a ripe
enough age.

Please consider this to be my formal resignation for my term of office

coming due. You've taught me well, my friend. You have to learn from
the best, if you want to be the best. I could never have gone as far or
as quickly as I did, without your encouragement, experience, and
complete confidence. "I'm in your debt." [TIBI DEBEO.]
Which reminds me of your Rule Number "Five" [QUINQUE]:
"I don't know."
[NESCIO.]

It's the only sane answer sometimes! You're stuck with a handful of
hypothetical guesses in a sea of incomplete doubtful information.
You're trying to walk on swampy wet land. You take your best shot,
but you know that it's just not good enough this time. And still, you
have to try to win some little victory or you lose by default!
Unfortunately, you never get the truth, sometimes. There is just not
enough information! And there's nothing you can do about it. A lot like
life itself, no?

That's my report, but knowing you as well as I do, I figure that you
have more rules that you haven't told me about yet in Nero's Jury
School. I should be in
ROMA on the 12th day
of October, if you have
any questions. I have
some unfinished and
personal business here
that's almost wrapped
up. On the 3rd day of
October. In 106 B.C..
NARBO.
And if the horse is nearly dead to this busy little world, well, pepper
and a little cheap wine will still sell "that old horse" [ILLE EQUUS
SENEX]. Cuparius

D.Marcius Nero to Ti.Caelius Quirinius: Hello. I have

delivered this letter to your home here in ROMA
personally. I expect you to report to me on the morning
after you arrive home, early! You and the sun and I, at a
private little meeting! I also expect a complete and final resolution or I
will have to investigate the Barbatus affair, myself. It might pose
enough of a challenge to keep me interested and entertained. Crimes
are not lonely creatures. They hunt in packs and they can use all the
friends that they can find as they travel down their dangerous path.
This particular crime we can both recognize. It is not a totally alien
thing to either one of us. That must mean that it involves other
Romans, fellow-creatures like ourselves. You're too good, my friend. I
can't afford to just let you walk away. I want you on my team. The
question is: Do you want me on yours? I have plans and like my
father, a simple old farmer, I don't like to lose a harvest.

Actually, you're right, there is a Sixth rule:

"Bait the hooks."
[INESCA HAMOS.]

Don't just stand there and wait for it all to come to you! The fish won't
come unless you bait the hooks---and with the right bait. According to
"two stooges" [DUO SCURRAE] of Caepio who arrived yesterday,
that simplistic Legatus, M.Minucius Flaccius, was not given command
of the cohort, but was the second-in-command. Another Legatus,
Castrus, was given the over-all command by Caepio himself. Castrus
and Flaccius apparently had a bitter and argumentative history. The
stooges say that Castrus was also found with a sword through his
back just outside of TOLOSA, so they are here to investigate. My
brother in NARBO sent me a letter. He mentioned a local Celtic tribe
and their odd method of execution: one Celt distracts you in front
while another thrusts a sword into your back, straight through your
heart. They call it the "Hello-And-Good-Bye" [AVE ET AVE].
You might also like my rule Number Seven:
"Who's got the money?"
[QUIS PECUNIAM HABET.]

Money always leaves a trail and money, as you know very well, is
merely the language of power. By the way, we're still waiting for the
treasury to sail into port. It's only a few days late. I say that Caepio's
got the money---and I say that proving it will be very difficult. That
man is plain "dangerous" [PERICULOSUS]---he plans everything:
fighting, loving, eating, talking, breathing. Those two assassin-slaves
of yours, of course, are obviously not here either. I've ordered some
ships to start searching: one backwards to NARBO, two northwards
and one southwards. But if it were me, I would have headed for life
and liberty---and straight for AFRICA.

"But if it were me..."

[SIN EGO ESSET.]
is, of course, Rule Number Eight.

If it were me, I would have offered someone a good portion of the

gold to further muddy up the waters---to talk and to talk and to talk---
and to put ideas into people's heads. Some people are spreading
stories that the soldiers, with or without the Onion-Head, decided to
keep the gold and silver and make a run for it. I, myself, say that
Flaccius never had the gold! I say that your words stirred in the little
mind of Flaccius and in his men. They eventually inspected their
cargo closely---and then they had some difficult decisions to make
while gazing at their dirty old rocks or nails.

They had the choice to show up here and tell their story, trusting in
Roman justice, or to make a run for it. Anyone who resisted would
have been thrown overboard, onion-head or not. They were in too
deep, they were playing with the big-money boys and they didn't even
know that they were playing in a deadly game until it was far too late.
I always feel some pity for innocent people who don't even know what
serious games they're playing in. Every game needs some "pawns"
[LATRONES]. But I may be wrong---they may show up yet.
Rule Number Nine is:
"Who's zooming whom?"
[QUIS QUEM FACIT.]

Take a long look at all the actors and dancers and picture them with
different roles and histories. It was I who placed you in NARBO on
the 1st day of September to bring my brother there some important
letters and supplies, wasn't it? So what do you say? "Are we on the
same team?" [SUMUSNE IN FACTIONE EADEM.] I don't mind
people on my team belonging to other teams as well---that is an
unavoidable fact of life. Ahh, my young friend, one of my many
pleasures in life is watching the young run around joyfully and get
constantly, relentlessly surprised by life. I notice that your lovely wife
has ordered, on credit, some very expensive dresses and also an
emerald necklace to match her eyes.

I'm reminded of a young neighbour of mine. He was invited to a fancy

dinner recently. The host, claiming a bad back, suggested that the
honourable young man come by and use the family-horse anytime he
so desired. All the host asked was that the young man treat the horse
tenderly. Well, the young man was ecstatic; he loved riding. The
friends and family of the host bought the young man "drinks"
[POTUS] whenever they bumped into him in the big city. They were
quite happy to buy since the old host was secretly paying. The host,
of course, had two young not-so-cute marriageable daughters.

And you know the old story of the young

"barbarian" [BARBARUS] arriving in
ROMA and meeting up with some
thieves who treated him as if he were a
distant cousin. He told them that he
could never be "a thief" [FUR] no matter
how poor he was, and they didn't seem
to mind, so he would hang around them
at times in this strange city. One day
they drilled a lot of holes into a particular
tree. And a month later, they chopped it
down. They removed the bark and then
planed it down. And before you knew it,
there it would be in the dirty courtyard,
ready-to-raise: an elegant well-made
"cross" [CRUX]. In both cases, the story
didn't turn out that well but, then again,
this city is full of stories....

Ahh, yes, I almost forgot my last and final rule, Rule Number Ten:
"Be very careful whenever you say yes
---and be very, very careful whenever you say no."
[ES VALDE CAUTUS QUANDOQUE AIS
ET ES VALDE VALDE CAUTUS QUANDOQUE NEGAS.]
On the 11th day of October. In 106 B.C..
"I prefer yours." [MALO TUAM.] Cuparius

Cynthia to Orbia: Hello. Remember that guy that I had a

deep keen crush on? Dalmatius? He was divine. He was
a dream. I couldn't keep my muddy little eyes off him, he
was so pretty. But then one day, I noticed that he was
only ever seen in the company of ugly women. Was it an accident or
did he have a plan of attack for his life. And then I found out that he
ate no meat. He ate "beans" [FABAE] and breads. And vegetables
and sometimes fruit. He drank only water. Imagine the fun that he
would have provided for a real woman like me. "Pleasure"
[GAUDIUM] is a practical skill, like any other. One doesn't become
"an expert" [PERITUS] overnight. He liked to eat soups! He walked
everywhere---no carts, litters, or horses for him. No theater or
CIRCUS races. No amphitheater Games or dinner-shows. Except for
that, he was perfect. What people look like and what they really are---
those are two different wines, let me tell you, "by Castor"
[MECASTOR]!

A good woman never lost a good man. :as our blessed mother used
to repeatedly tell us. Well, two husbands later, I'm thinking of him
again! "My quack-doctor" [PHARMACOPOLA MEUS] tells me that
"my way of life" [VICTUS MEUS] has been killing me slowly. No more
meats for a while and I must exercise more and drink less wine!!!
More "leeches" [HIRUDINES] and less excitement are in my future.
I say to the quack: What about beans?
He quickly nods: Yes.
And lots of water? :I suggest.
He says: "Yes, indeed." [IMMO.]
And maybe some peas with my water? :I joke.
Soups are the best thing for you, my dear. :he says, as serious as an
undertaker.
Doctors have their little ways of acting serious and all-knowing. But if
they really knew it all, they certainly wouldn't tell anybody. I know that
I wouldn't.
So, I think back on Dalmatius. And I go calling on his sister, Crispina,
in BENEVENTUM. They should change the name of this little village
back to MALEVENTUM, as far as I'm concerned. She has plenty of
wrinkles, but still a young girl's big bright eyes. She says that he's
fine. Just became a widower as a matter of fact! (As if I hadn't heard!)
"By Castor!" [ECASTOR.] You know how black and white that witch,
Terra, is about everything, well, "this little honey is even worse"
[HAEC MELLILLA ETIAM PEIOR EST].

So, she suggests a dinner some night for some of my family and
some of hers. "I nod discreetly." [PRUDENTER ANNUO.] I feel like
we're playing this game so well, like experienced gladiators, this
woman and I. I suggest a vegetable-bean combination as part of the
menu.

She says: "Oh no!" [OH MINIME.]

I say: No?
She says something like: No, Dalmaticus wouldn't be pleased with
that beggar-food.
I say: What!
He's into wines, exotic meats, and pastries. :she says!
I repeat: Pastries?
Yes, once he settled into his marriage---well, he slowly and gradually
changed and now he lives high and fat.
And then, she goes into a wide-eyed whisper: You wouldn't recognize
him, my dear.

So, then I ask: Does one toga still fit him?

"He wishes!" [VULT.] :she laughs and goes into a spitting fit.
Her children call him Dalmatia, after the province! She calls him "my
little Dolphin" [MEUS DELPHINULUS]. I sit stunned and wonder if
she means the animal or the constellation! The woman is so stupid,
you know, she thinks a dolphin is a fish. She says that he and I
should get on just fabulously. Well, I don't know what to tell you, my
sister.
But I say quietly to myself: "All bets are off." [PIGNORA OMNIA
SUNT DELETA.]
And to her: Good-bye, my dear, we'll see about the dinner-party.
"A woman has to know her limitations." [SCIRE SUOS FINES
FEMINA DEBET.] I drag my earthly belongings back home to where
they belong. The way back home on the VIA APPIA is all downhill, so
my retreat isn't too taxing, just long and lonely. Imagine that---dieting
for all those years and now he's even worse than the rest of us! Like
that old cook, Barbara, always says: Timing makes the dinner! My
pretty young Dalmatius, our oars were never ever in the water at the
same time! "Ah, shucks, he's history, now." [AH.EI.NUNC EST
HISTORIAE.] As Barbara also says: "Every house has a mouse."
[DOMUS OMNIS MUREM HABET.] That's just the way things go. So,
accept it or get out of the house, "by Castor" [ECASTOR].

Well, my sweet sister Orbia certainly doesn't need that "little bitch"
[CANICULA] for a sister-in-law. You wouldn't like her, I'm sure. Her
hair's burned and twisted, with powder on her face, and she smells of
roses, but I don't think that she was born that way! Her dress is folded
to cover-up, not to honestly advertise. And her underclothes hold her
breasts in such a position that the goddess of breasts herself couldn't
honestly vouch for their authenticity.

Perhaps, I'll just lie low for a few months and let this "diet-and-
exercise" [INEDIA EXERCITATIOQUE] nonsense do its worst. The
gladiator's diet: beans and barley! Barbara now highly recommends
the bath-diet: eat a little and bath a lot. Have we really progressed so
little in all these years---we might as well live on a barbarian farm
eating beans and chasing the sheep all day long. Once I'm down to
my hunting weight, well, then we'll jump back into the Games. I have
my pride and at my age, I know what I want. I'm no "jumper"
[DESULTRIX]. I've never been "an easy woman" [FACILIS]. And I
won't start now.

I realize that marriage is a lot like business: everything's fine until the
tough lean times come scraping along. Or until the rich fat years
come rolling along. Then, in either case, everything is tried and tested
to new limits.
But I like marriage. Marriage is "a chain of pleasures" [CATENA
DELICIARUM]. Passion should be constant: a fire that won't
completely satisfy and a fire that refuses to burn out. "Passion is very
nice." [CUPIDO VALDE EST BELLA.] But the added taste of love
makes everything cook even better. Love is the fruit of life itself. Like
you've always told me: "A fruit's a fruit and everything else is just
another vegetable." [FRUCTUS FRUCTUS EST ET RELIQUUM EST
MODO ALIUD HOLUS.] "So, act accordingly." [AGE IGITUR ITA.]

So, here I am---not very eager or happy to enjoy this diet that I find
myself on. "Please, no more." [SIS NON MAGIS.] Cold baths! All the
water that I could ever desire! Uncooked vegetables sprinkled with a
dash of vinegar! I see beans covering me, drowning me, and laughing
at me in my restless dreams. I walk around all day, as if I had a wolf
by the ears---and so now, what do I do?

I do what everybody else does.

Everybody else does what I do. It’s trite,
but true. We live a pattern. A myth exists
for a reason. We run our course as best
as we can and as best as possible for
the best and highest hours and days we
can possibly squeeze out of it.
Tomorrow is the 4th day of October, a
fast day, sacred to CERES, so the whole
world will be joining me (like I could
possibly care less). My poor stomach
has had "enough" [SATIS] of diets. My
poor little soul has had enough of all
these stupid sacrifices. And I know that
not all of my "bellyaches" [TORMINA]
are due to my food famine. There are
other stupid diets in our lives, my
dearest sister. "By Castor!" [ECASTOR.]
CAPUA. VALE.
The people around you are only right, "if you say so" [SI TU SIC
DICIS]. And by the way, enjoy "your journey" [ITER TUUM]! What
other choice do you have? Cuparius

Gallus to Porcius Iosephus: Hello. I'm sending you some

excerpts of "the debate" [DISCEPTATIO] 9 days ago, in
the Greek library as part of the festival. It's normally
noisy in here, with all their mumbling and hissing as they
read along. My "shorthand"[NOTAE] is earning me quite a number of
orders for copies, even the two speakers wanted their own copies of
themselves speaking. People entered slowly in the afternoon, beside
the hundred-foot marble Column of Traianus---his bronze statue on
top and his ashes in the golden urn in the base. A coloured marble
scroll spreads its story around and up the Column. What was
Traianus trying to tell us? That this scroll-column points to the
heavens? That this is the center of ROMA? That he has a column in
this city but others don't? By the way, I counted the steps inside it
again, and "you're still wrong" [TAMEN ERRAS]: there are CLXXXVII
steps, not CLXXXV steps!

With the barrel vault overhead and the doubled-up Corinthian

columns surrounding us, the Stoic and the Epicurean debated. I'll call
them Zeno and Epicurus, as they insisted that I should. They both
agreed that I was "impartial" [AEQUUS]. After all, I'm a Sceptic like
you and when anyone needs an impartial judge, and they can't sneak
the job to one of their own brothers, then they come running to a
Skeptic as a compromise-candidate!

The rules of the debate were simple and polite:

1. Only two speakers and the judge.
2. No moving around.
3. No weapons, tools, props, or books---only words.
4. No quoting the other speaker.
5. Speak only to the audience---never to each other directly!
6. The judge's decisions are final because he represents the
audience and the audience is the ultimate judge.
Zeno: Surely "happiness" [FELICITAS] is everyone's goal.
Epicurus: Happiness is a universal god.
Zeno: ...and "passions" [FERVORES] lead directly to
unhappiness.
Epicurus: Superstitions lead to unhappiness.
Zeno: Accept your fate bravely.
Epicurus: The fear of death is no way to live---do not fear any man,
any god, or any sky, and you will be a happy man.
Zeno: But we all have a piece of the Divine Spark in us. The
World has a Soul, so tender and bright you can feel it sometimes.
And we are its sparks....
Epicurus: The gods don't care! Don't be a complete fool: the gods
have their own problems! They have no time for each one of you little
people and your strange little requests. Enjoy your life and have done
with it.
Zeno: ...that makes us all brothers...
(Some girl in the crowd: "And sisters!" [ET SORORES.])
(Some gross innuendoes are then passed around the crowd....)
Epicurus: The world is just some "atoms" [ATOMI], indivisible little
things, moving constantly. There are no absolutes. Everything is
atoms! Bread to flesh to ground to plants to bread! All these many
things are all the same simple thing---merely different collections of
atoms. Different constellations.
Zeno: There is of course a Divine Nature, a Divine Law, a Divine
Hand, or why do we live and how do we live?
Epicurus: "I live fine!" [VIVO BELLE.] There is plenty of pleasure all
around you. Pleasure is the only effective god, the only real
understandable reachable god!
(A lot of hoots and whistles and waving of handkerchiefs.)
Epicurus: Desires are low pleasures and the mind has the best
pleasures---for a total complete harmony!
Zeno: "Virtue" [PROBITAS] is the road to happiness and virtue is
a sign of the Divine god. This whole world is just one huge living
Creature, a creation of Reason.
Epicurus: ..."plain living" [VICTUS SIMPLEX], moderation, virtue,
and "friendship" [AMICITIA]...these are the treasures. These are the
pleasures.
Zeno: ..."a natural life" [VITA NATURALIS]... becoming more and
more virtuous...getting as close to the Source as we possibly can...
with practice, effort, and reason! Like smelting down some rocks of
gold and then continually remelting it into purer and purer gold....
Epicurus: Use your senses. They're good guides: what you see, hear,
and taste, and touch! But don't be fooled---that solid marble is just
atoms like you are!
(Some murmuring about wives, husbands, mothers-in-law....)
Zeno: Of course, a column is real and solid! It came from
somewhere! "It has a purpose." [CONSILIUM HABET.] Some of you
are rocks and some columns.
Epicurus: Life is opinion. Death is annihilation. Don't be a "social
prisoner" [CAPTIVUS SOCIALIS] to politics, parties, marriages,
family, friends, games, bankers, landlords.... Rebel and be free! Say:
No! Say no to them and yes---to yourself.
Zeno: Families are to be enjoyed. And friends and nature. In
order to be a complete man! Prayer can't change the world or the
gods, but it will surely change you! Every day!
Epicurus: "This is it!" [HOC EST ID.] There is nothing else. Enjoy your
little soul's ride! Forget that boring porch and enter my wonderful
garden.

Zeno: The more virtue---then the happier, the human spirit. Evil
people are very unhappy.
(Someone in the crowd: They look pretty happy to me!)
Epicurus: Evil people are fearful. They fear death, the gods, witches,
the wife...
Zeno: Evil people are ignorant. They don't know any better.
Reason is all!
Epicurus: Pleasure is all!

Zeno: Ignore all the things you can't control. Submit to Nature and
your beautiful little soul will be free. "With inner peace!" [CUM PACE
INTERIORI.]
Epicurus: My personal constitution does not recognize your laws,
your politicians. Animals are natural. Children are natural. You adults
are not. Don't you remember your youth? Free yourselves, again!
Pleasure is my freedom. The only freedom. Be like little children
again!
Zeno: Virtue is freedom and virtue is the proof of god. Be free
from the outside world that you cannot control and accept your
destiny. Animals are ignorant. Children are too. A real adult man
seeks happiness in virtue. The freedom of a peaceful spirit. A spirit
striving constantly for excellence, while surrounded by vices that can
only destroy your precious freedom and happiness.
Epicurus: The only happy man is a free man. The only beauty is
pleasure!
Zeno: The only healthy man is a wise man. The greatest beauty is
virtue.
Epicurus: Stop wasting your time here! How much time do you think
you have left? What are you idiots doing here? Go have some fun
while you can!
Zeno: Didn't you ever have the feeling that you carried a piece of
the gods deep inside you---deep inside you somewhere, just waiting
to be fed?
Epicurus: Didn't you ever feel "The Emptiness" [VANITAS]. The
Emptiness of this crazy world---and The Emptiness inside you?
Zeno: It's all "destiny" [FATUM].
Epicurus: It's all "an accident" [CASUS].
Zeno: "I take what the world presents." [CAPIO QUOD MUNDUS
DONAT.]
Epicurus: I take what the world presents.

That's the gist of the

debate. It's only about a
quarter of the full edition
of the debate. They tend
to ramble and repeat
themselves a lot. But
you can have a complete
copy if you like. Some
win like Traianus "by the
sword" [ENSE], or like
these two "by the voice"
[VOCE], but I win "by the pen" [STYLO]. I'm thinking of organizing
other debates: a Cynic against a Skeptic, a Diogenes against a
Pyrrho, SINOPA against ELIS. Or ROMA against ATHENAE, a Plato
against a Socrates, a Caesar against a Pompeius, a Druid against a
German, a Cicero against a Seneca. I could use the business, so tell
me what you think about this plan. On the 29th day of April. In 121
A.D..
"It depends" [PENDET] on who owns the jails, "the police" [MILITIA],
the laws. Just because some criminal says "you're guilty" [ES SONS]
doesn't mean that you truly are guilty. Cuparius

Festus to Carbo: Hello. I guess that every age has its

slaves, its servants, and its servers. Aristoteles said that
a slave is a living tool. Slavery is a suspended death
sentence (your life is forfeited in war). A slave is legal
moveable property. Some say that slaves are the children of ROMA.
I'm a "slave of school children" [PAEDAGOGUS] and sometimes I
help out the baker or the cook. I like my life.

I'm not the lowest slave there is: a mining slave without a family life,
sleeping underground, eating food that pigs wouldn't touch, working
hard for as long as he’s awake, wearing a rough worn tunic. Yes, I'm
a slave, but I'm better off than that soldier-slave with his "uniforms"
[SAGA], under constant orders, with his XX to XXX years of
encagement. Or that free woman who is "chained" [CATENATUS] for
life to her tyrant-husband. Or that poor man, heckled and nagged to
an early grave by his over-bearing loud wife and then grateful for the
welcome relief of silence. Or those emperors with their half-year or
two of power before they're butchered by the next slave-to-be. Or that
drunk: "the jug" [CADUS] gives simple elegant "orders" [MANDATA].
Who wouldn't prefer being a rich slave rather than a destitute citizen
or an ignorant barbarian or a hungry animal?

Or that unemployed freeman who can't compete with slave-labour, so

he starves near the end of every month. Cicero said: The very wages
the labourer receives are a badge of slavery. Or that illiterate farm-
boy trying to make sense of the world. Or that slave to his "vices"
[VITIA]. And aren't we all slaves to "death" [MORS]? Slaves have
been flooding into ROMA for over X generations now. Everyone must
have slave-blood in them by now---"and so what" [ET ITA QUID]?
Who is now better than whom?

Yes, there have been chains in all the ages and in all the cities, but
some of us prefer to be blind and maybe
don't like to have a couple of our chains
pointed out to us so harshly. Some
slaves are forceful and violent, but some
of us are forceful and subtle. And some,
like your friend from ATHENAE, don't
mind being slaves as long as they have
a few slaves under their power. In the
end, nobody that I've ever met has ever
been even close to owning complete
freedom. I have never met a free man! I
have never been introduced to a free
woman. We can never shake off all the
masters that we might have. "Everybody
has a master." [OMNES DOMINUM
HABENT.] Some of them are very nice.
It's a lonely dangerous world out there,
Carbo. VALE.

[81 A.D.]
"Half-free is like half-dead."
[SEMILIBER EST QUAM SEMIVIVUS.] Cuparius

Carbo to Festus: Hello. What does he care if the dinner

has to be made "three times" [TER] before it's perfect or
her hair is made up "ten times" [DECIENS] before it's
beautiful? The work is "cheap" [VILIS]. The more slaves
they have, the freer they are. So, I play along, play dumb, escort their
young brat to school, and then wait for him as pretty girls pass by my
world, slowly and deliberately. I won't tell his parents what trouble the
little monster gets into---it's the worst thing I could do to him! I deliver
their letters (through pretty parks and refreshing gardens), suffer the
matron's advances, and Antonia's winks. I'm just waiting for the right
time, when the master's away and the mistress is off to her
boyfriend's. I'll steal my money back and then head for home.

These Romans may have won the war, but new battles always await.
I want to start life over again, a new fresh day, but first I want to go
see what's left of my home, my city. Thankfully, I have your letters to
read and write back to. I've really polished up my Latin here and now
my Greek and Latin are better than anyone's in this whole backward
stinking "household" [FAMILIA].

"This city is cursed." [THIS PART IN GREEK]

That fire last year was a terrible omen. Their holiest temple went to
ruin. I didn't drop a tear. In fact, I slept a little easier. The year before,
VESUVIUS erupted and their Emperor died. Last month the new
Emperor died. I can't stay here, in this accursed prison. "Freedom!"
[LIBERTAS.] These Romans sure value their own freedom. But even
the master whispers that name as some pretty young thing smiles his
way---and how many other daughters sob silently, like Antonia, into
their blankets in the middle of the night: "I want to be free!" [VOLO
LIBERA ESSE.]
Slaves aren't the best workers anyway: a little resistance here and
there, some insubordination, minor sabotage, some well-chosen spit
in the soup, a fly in the wine, theft, laziness, lying, vandalism, playing
dumb, savouring his best wine, pissing on her violets, and so on.
When they buy slaves, they joke: "Yes, she cost MD sesterces" [MD
ETIAM SESTERTIIS CONSTAT], but the elm rods were extra!

It's unbelievable to see these free people: freemen, freedmen,

citizens, and foreigners walking around totally oblivious to the beauty
and power of their precious freedom. They don't value it because they
don't know how to use it. They whine and moan and sigh: I'm poor!
I'm miserable! I'm so, so unhappy! They're not poor! All the really
poor around "the Mediterranean" [MARE MEDIUM] would gladly
switch places with them. All the truly miserable would happily
exchange their chains with them! If they lived like the truly poor,
hungry, imprisoned, or sick for a year, then I think that at least some
of them would never complain or whine again. You can't give an idiot
a gift like that. If you gave an idiot all the gold in the city, he'd
squander it, lose it, waste it, drool on it, trade it for some pretty sand,
and then cry all day: I'm so poor and unlucky!

A slave by law is not even a person. If they don't recognize me as a

man, then why would I act like one to them? Yes, all cities in all times
have their slaves. They just change the word slave into another word
to protect the slave-owners. Well, since
I'm a slave by warfare, then I am still
and forever at war. But every slave
silently knows the word that carries hope
and red fire in the belly: "Freedom!"
[LIBERTAS.] And some succeed. We
destroy the slavery by open rebellion or
we just refuse to recognize the slavery,
deep within ourselves. Either way, "our
hunger" [FAMES NOSTRA] is satisfied.
My freedom is as precious as life itself to
me, but I do recognize that it has very
little value to the rest of this city. One
more letter, dear friend, and then no
more! "I shall be free." [EGO ERO
LIBER.] On the 19th day of November.
VALE.

[81 A.D.]
"Every politician has his own gang."
[OMNIS CANDIDATUS CIVILIS TURBAM SUAM HABET.] Cuparius

Stephanus to Petronius Largus: Hello. Here I sit and lie

down alternately, on the saddest day of the year; the
sun has entered CAPRICORNUS. On 20th day of
December, they celebrated and threw the body of the
Emperor Vitellius into the TIBERIS River. I was in the crowd,
watching, taking it all in. On the 1st of January, some months back,
the legionaries in Germany had voted their general, Vitellius, in as the
new Emperor. He almost lasted the full year.

Today, the Senators are proclaiming their allegiances loudly and

swearing their most solemn oaths to the new Emperor,
C.Vespasianus. However, oratory is a lost art; I have no need to
personally see and hear these "sad puppets" [PUPAE MISERAE]
performing their same old lines. That's the fourth Emperor this year
and we still have a few days left for any new candidates to jump up.
They just don't grow emperors like they used to. Going back to
Augustus himself, I don't think that even one of the subsequent
emperors has yet died a natural and honourable death.

I was in the FORUM supervising some of my shops and apartments

on the 16th day of January while privately nursing a bloody throbbing
tooth. "I remember it too well." [NIMIS BENE EIUS MEMINI.] The
Praetorian Guard made a big show of marching and shouting. A
crowd had collected attentively behind them. Meanwhile, the then-
current Emperor Galba was being carried through the FORUM in his
entourage, enjoying his noble power and presence. The Guards
surrounded him, said something curtly, and cut off his head right
there and then. The poor old man didn't put up a fight or even a
protest. They delivered his head to Otho who apparently paid them
very handsomely out of his new wealth as the new Emperor of all the
Romans.

The Emperor Galba collected the taxes efficiently but he didn't spend
it very freely for himself, the Legions, the People, the Senate, or the
Praetorian Guard. The son of an old upper-class family, he should
have been satisfied as the Governor of HISPANIA and should not
have listened to his ambitious troops. If he became the Emperor, then
they surely were in for some new wealth and power. I then went into
one of my taverns for some wine and to hear the latest "gossip"
[GERRAE], "opinions" [SENTENTIAE], and "rumours" [FAMAE] first-
hand. It was breaking news and red-hot history that we had just
witnessed. We heard graphically how Senator Piso, the adopted son
of Galba, was dragged out of hiding in the sacred Temple of VESTA
and forced to eat the swords of Otho's soldiers.

Otho, who was a close dear friend to Emperor Nero, came from
mighty Etruscan ancestors. On the 20th day of April, he committed
suicide, after the troops of the new Emperor Vitellius defeated the
troops of the old Emperor Otho. No, Otho and his toupee didn't last
very long on top of the Roman Pyramid.

Vitellius was the general of the Lower German Legions, the best and
finest troops in the Empire. When they voted for an Emperor, or for
anything else, others listened softly. The man, himself, was quite
simply "a drunk" [EBRIOSUS] and "a glutton" [HELLUO]. Every meal
was another fantastic feast: "eat" [EDE], "drink" [BIBE], "vomit"
[VOME]...eat, drink, vomit...and so on. To really, really celebrate, he
would gobble down 1000 (silver) plates of chicken!
Vitellius had entered the city in civilian clothes as a gesture. And a
new gang of bureaucrats and non-Roman soldiers followed him in. I
recognised Germans and Gauls, but there were plenty of strange
soldiers too. There were also new soldiers not in uniform--milling
about in taverns and FORUM's, collecting information and hearsay.
This year's emperors will make their friends very rich and make their
allies citizens. The army is a shining example of democracy. Each of
the sides had named their own senators, generals, governors,
judges, priests, accountants, whores, street-cleaners. There were 4
different ROMA's this year. And each side claims to be cleaning up
the old city and getting rid of the cheats and liars and incompetents. I
wonder if other cities have these problems? One man, Roscius,
lasted as Consul for one whole day before they dragged his
disinterested carcass away.

Some of the eastern Legions had cast their precious votes for
Mucianus, the Governor of SYRIA. He declined and suggested
Vespasianus instead. On the 1st day of July, Vespasianus was
elected Emperor by the eastern Legions. Vitellius expelled all the
magicians and witches and astrologers out of ROMA on the 1st day
of October. Luckily, you and I have never had any use for emperors
and witches and such things. Eventually the troops of Vespasianus
stormed the troops of Vitellius in ROMA.

I joined the scattered spectators watching the battles and street

skirmishes. There was killing, beating, burning, pillaging, raping---
perhaps the saddest ROMA that there ever was. They even burned
down the Temple of IUPPITER the Best and Greatest with its records
and tablets! Roman soldiers! IUPPITER, IUNO, and MINERVA must
have raised an eyebrow. ROMA sacked! A lot of these soldiers were
Danubian, I can vouch for that. It seems that a lot of the poorer
citizens had joined in on the general looting. And it all seemed to be a
natural progression from the suicide of that "sick" [AEGER] Nero.
Some have even babbled about how they still miss him! At least, the
Races ran on time. :they whispered. Every cause in the city has its
supporters. Some people will always be idiots. As you, yourself, have
said: There is "the Good" [BONUM] and "the Bad" [MALUM], and
"the Ugly" [TURPE]. The death of Nero marked the end of Caesar's
long grip on ROMA.
Before these victorious troops had conquered ROMA, they had
practised, on their way down the whole of northern ITALIA. My aunt
and uncle moved themselves and some few small valuables into one
of my apartments here, a few days ago. It represented the pitiful
remains of all their years of work and struggle. They're still living in
quiet shock, as if they were "thunderstruck" [ATTONITI], as if they
were only half here---and half still back there in the ruins of their
home. They had left their home in CREMONA and struggled to reach
me in ROMA.

The armies of Vitellius and Vespasianus had earlier raced for the
strategic city of CREMONA. The army of Vitellius won and the
citizens whole-heartedly welcomed the first army that they saw. The
slower army coiled around the city. My uncle said that the besiegers
had one legion from PANNONIA, another from MOESIA, another
was Celtic, and there were others that he didn't recognize. He told me
that the fields around the city walls were full of the attackers' dead
friends and fallen comrades, but the army of Vespasianus maintained
their siege.

When the city was finally forced to give in, the victors had to pass by
the heaps of their own dead, as they made their victorious march into
CREMONA---the massacre started slowly. It was not meant to
happen at first. Fifty thousand armed men entered the city and for IV
days and nights there were no laws, no gods, no defence. The only
resistance was when two soldiers saw the same thing that they both
wanted. CREMONA had seen many years of Roman life since
becoming a colony in 209 B.C., but never anything like this.

The city's only crime was being caught between two armies. My uncle
guessed that there were at least fifty thousand dead Roman people.
One per soldier. That's what happens when you live in a town on a
border. They took what they wanted and they left the blood. It was a
rich city as I, myself, remember it. I imagine that the ghosts of the
former Gaul inhabitants of CREMONA from long ago would not have
enjoyed being invaded again and displaced by so many new Roman
spirits, again. He keeps repeating softly and absent-mindedly:
"CREMONA's burning." [CREMONA ARDET.] And I keep echoing to
my inner self: "ROMA's burning, too." [ROMA QUOQUE ARDET.]
The Emperor Vitellius was finally captured and dragged from street to
busy street as some sort of lesson. They beat him "as an animal" [UT
ANIMAL] would be flogged and in the FORUM, they ended up
beating him to death. They hacked off his head and threw the rest of
him into the TIBERIS. I saw this "with my own eyes" [MEIS OCULIS].

These emperors are like competing "spiders" [ARANEI]. They each

spin "a web" [ARANEUM] across the juicy city and across "the
Mediterranean Sea" [MARE NOSTRUM]. A web formed with lines of
soldiers. The Emperor Vespasianus has yet to show up in his ROMA.
Flavius Sabinus, Vespasian's older brother, was killed here in all the
confusion, then dumped into that river, and the Emperor's younger
son, Domitianus, barely escaped with
his skin. The son of a tax collector
becomes a general and then an
emperor! They say that Vespasianus
hates music, the theater, and any
useless decorations. A tax collector, my
gods! How does he measure things?
What does he want to do in the end?
What will he do later when he starts
feeling stronger and stronger? Where
will it all end when the beginning is so
violent and reactionary? What about his
little flunkies? What will they try to do
when nobody is looking? Who will really
be in charge and what will be paid?
Everybody wants a proper share of a
good thing. This could get ugly---very
ugly! I'm in a terrible state. I have my
properties still, but the rents and the customers' cash are hard to
come by these days. "I'm broke" [SUM FRACTUS], but things could
be worse, I suppose. VALE.

[December 21, 69 A.D.]

APPENDIX
The nice-and-easy (down-and-dirty) guide to Latin pronunciation.
(Ready, set, and...away we go, BRUTUS....)
[A E I O U]
NOTES:
hint
Try and pronounce the vowels stronger than you do the consonants
and keep those vowels nice and tight unlike English vowels that
usually contain more than one simple vowel sound.
And NO pausing there for extra emphasis: hello-o-o-o-o.
And try to keep those syllables: consonant-first+vowel-second, if
you can. That applies to the whole sentence as you would in
French, Italian, or Spanish.

long vowels
In the long-lost letters, long vowels are underlined: ROMA

nouns + adjectives
In the long-lost letters, if a word or phrase is translated out of
context (not as a complete sentence), then it is usually just
translated in a nominative to simplify things.

word order:
The final word in a series is very emphatic:
The dog the cat in the kitchen bloody saw.
CANIS FELEM IN CULINA CRUENTUS VIDIT.
You start stringing words out in a line and in the end you arrive at
the final word (verb) that puts the puzzle together for you
(hopefully).
The verb "to be" is an exception and is used like in English.
Normal word order is: subject object verb.
Girls songs sing.
PUELLAE CANTUS CANTANT.
Helping words: subject+helper object+helper helper+verb.
girls songs sing.
Girls pretty songs Roman slowly sing.
PUELLAE PULCHRAE CANTUS ROMANOS TARDE CANTANT.

If you change the normal word order THEN you're emphasizing

something (adding more information into the statement):
Ship my well sails. NAVIGIUM MEUM BENE NAVIGAT.
MY ship well sails. MEUM NAVIGIUM BENE NAVIGAT.
"MY" well ship sails. MEUM BENE NAVIGIUM NAVIGAT.
(A bit too much emphasis, but there it is....)

Questions usually start with the important question-word first.

vowels can be long or short

A mA mAma AMARE (to love)
E mAde mEt PEDES (feet)
I mE mIss FILIUS (son)
O mOle mOb PORTO (I carry)
U mOOn mOOr BRUTUS (heavy)

Y is an odd vowel: like a French U: TU aimes ça?

(but you can be lazy and say it like the Roman vowel U, if you like)

diphthongs (2 vowels pronounced as one)

AE mIne AES (bronze)
AU mOUse CAUSA (cause)
OE mOIst MOENIA (castle)
consonants
B's are b's (except before S or T when they are p's) URBS (city)
C's are k's like in "Cap"
CIRCUS (circle)
G's are g's like in "Gap" (it never sounds like a j: "Gin")
GLOBUS (ball)
R's are a rolling trill (like a Spanish R)
ROMA
S's are s's as in "cloSe enough" (not as z's in "cloSe the door")
CASA (cottage)
T's are simple t's as in "Tea" (not as the English t in "Tree")
NOSTER (ours)
V's are w's (except for Roman Catholics then it's a v)
VESTER (yours)
X's are the sound of two Roman letters: CS
NEXUS (bond)
Z's are like the English word "adds" but don't pronounce the "a"
ZONA (belt)
(really two English letters: DZ like the z in the Italian word: "Zero")
CH,PH,TH are two separate consonants (both pronounced)
CHARA (wild cabbage)
(but they stick together in any syllable)
PUL-CHRA (beautiful)
Any consonant doubled-up is pronounced as two separate sounds
PHI-LIP-PUS (Philip)
(but in two separate syllables)
I's at the beginning of a word followed by a vowel
IUNO
or in between vowels are consonant y: "Yes"
MAIUS (May)
U's after any Q are consonant w: "qWick"
QUIS (who)

(A J or a V is written for the consonant-sound, to make it clearer.)

JUGULAE (Orion's Belt)
(I personally don't like using the J but I do use the V.)
VACCA (cow)

syllables and accent

There are as many syllables as vowels or diphthongs in a word
A-GRI-CO-LA (farmer)
and syllables try to be consonant-first+vowel-second.
SO-RI-CI-NA (squealing)

An L or R following a B, C, D, G, P, T stay in the same syllable

PE-TRA (rock)
and QU stay together in the same syllable too.
LI-QUET (it's clear)

The accent is (almost) never on the last syllable of a word.

(One-syllable words don't usually have any accent.)
NON (no/not)
In two-syllable words, the first syllable has the accent.
SO-DES (please)

(The accent is often the second-last syllable,

E-DU-CA-TRIX (nurse)
but sometimes it is the third-last syllable.)
FA-TA-LI-TER (by fate)

The Rule for whether-the-second-or-third-syllable-has-the-accent is:

The second-last syllable has the accent if it has a long vowel,
DE-CO-RE (gracefully)
a diphthong,
CO-MOE-DUS (comedian)
or there's a short vowel followed by 2 or more consonants.
DO-CU-MEN-TUM(example)
(R, L, or H after a consonant (as per above) DON'T add up to two
consonants for this rule...they stick together in their own syllables.
E-LE-CE-BRA (snare)
(Q+U together count as one consonant for this rule too.)
A-LI-QUID (something)
OTHERWISE give the accent to the third-last syllable by default.
PRO-BA-BI-LIS (probable)

finally:
If you ever get into trouble with any of these rules (or any other
rules): just go for it---it's better to have talked and lost than never to
have ET CETERA. The people who use a language, define a
language. A language will have variations; jazz, punk, southern,
cockney, sign-language, pidgin, low, or high Latins can all exist (as
in any other language) for a free person in a free country with a free
soul (as long as the intent is a common human meaning).

There are also other legitimate Latins today with their own
pronunciations: church, botanical, zoological, medicinal, scientific,
legal, literary, gangs, and others. VALE.