Ashes Under Uricon

Chapter 27. Collapse (401-6)

By Mihangel

Venit et extremis legio praetenta Britannis,
Quae Scotto dat frena truci ferroque notatas
Perlegit exanimes Picto moriente figuras;
Agmina quin etiam flavis obiecta Sygambris
Quaeque domant Chattos inmansuetosque Cheruscos,
Excubiis Rhenum solo terrore relinquunt.

From distant Britain went the guardian force
Which held in leash the Irish savages
And knew the marks tattooed on dying Picts.
Legions which cowed the hordes from Thüringen,
The Ruhr, and Hessen, they are gone. Defence
Is left to terror of the Roman name.
Tonight there is no watch upon the Rhine.

Claudian, The Gothic War

"Your question has been answered, then," said Opilio when we told him about it over dinner in the kitchen. "I must have a word with Florentius. He sounds interesting. So does Pelagius."

And so too was our new master. Opilio found a house and moved his family up from Corinium. By means of gentle tactics of quiet persuasion and simply letting his presence be felt, he curbed the worst public excesses of the councillors. But their private attitudes were beyond his reach. Christianity might proclaim all men equal before God; but even if that might ideally apply in the next world, it emphatically did not in this. Supposed Christians still lorded it over their workers -- they would force them, for example, to pray, and use the whip to encourage them to pray more diligently. Worse, it was rumoured but never proved, they killed recalcitrant labourers. Poverty was now widespread and our charity had never been so busy. Middling farmers and tenants were feeling the pinch, while at the bottom of the heap the peasants, forbidden by law to move away from the soil dug by their fathers and grandfathers before them, were sunk in despair. The lowly were marginalised by society, just as the western provinces were marginalised by Rome.

At the centre of things, Alaric the Goth, alternately ally and enemy, was on the warpath again. His aim was not to overthrow the empire, but only to establish a Gothic homeland in Italy, which he invaded. If the government had understood his limited purpose, much anguish would have been saved. But it responded with arrogance and incompetence. Young Honorius, whose only interest was breeding poultry, was not involved. It was Stilicho who was in effective charge and, to meet the Goths, he strengthened Italy's defences by recalling most of the remaining troops from Britain and the Rhine frontier. He claimed to have left enough soldiers to keep us safe against Picts and Saxons and Irish, to which we replied with hollow laughter. At least he did not try to remove the Cornovian Cohort, and at least the Goths were forced for the moment out of Italy. But it was symptomatic of the times. The brooding eye of empire was withdrawing from the fringes to focus on the centre.

Subjection and impoverishment and neglect generated a groundswell of lower-class discontent. Britain was not alone in this. In parts of Gaul the downtrodden had the same grudge against the powerful and wealthy and against the harshness of the government. They rose in revolt, expelled officials, and torched the homes of the rich. Some areas, we heard, were already far beyond the rule of law, and paganism was reviving and flourishing.

Britain was not that far down the road; not yet. We heard occasional reports of brigandage, but the general climate was one of uncertainty, a philosophy of wait and see. There was an almost palpable feeling that a storm was brewing; and wise men do not venture out in the face of an imminent downpour. But, in this climate, Pelagianism made great strides. It had enough adherents in the town by now to merit its own church, in opposition to the catholic one from whose congregation arose a chorus of of disdain but from whose bishop not a murmur.

The economy was beginning to wobble. Everyday things we had rarely thought about could no longer be taken for granted. Imported luxuries like fish sauce and olives became expensive and then unobtainable. Much more importantly, the supply of bronze coins to Britain from the imperial mints had already stopped. Shortage of small change was an irritant, but now the supply of silver coins ceased as well. This was serious, for wages were mostly paid in silver. Old coins remained in use, increasingly worn and often clipped round the edges, so that money had to be weighed rather than counted, and many people hoarded away what coins they could lay hands on. Barter had always been the norm in the mountains and quite common in the countryside, but now the town was compelled to learn new ways. A tanned cowskin (which had to be measured) for half a sack of grain (which had to be weighed); a rather larger skin for half a sack and five cabbages. Taxes reverted, willy-nilly, to payment in kind. So did payment to the Cohort.

Pottery was another case in point. Hitherto we had relied on wares, respectable but not fancy, mass-produced by the Durotriges. These factories now closed down. Military demand, long their mainstay, had vanished. In the absence of low-value coins the manufacturers found it impossible to distribute low-priced goods over a wide area, and the marketing network collapsed. All that was now for sale, or barter, was crude and coarse ware from small local kilns -- there was one just outside the town -- or, increasingly, platters and bowls and cups of wood or leather. In almost every corner of day-to-day life we had to rethink and adapt.

The whole metal industry was in trouble as well. How, with the shortage of coins, were the miners to be paid? Where, indeed, were their wages to come from as exports dwindled and ingots piled up in the warehouse? The Gaulish market for my lead and copper was struggling, but I still had to meet my quota demanded by the government. I spent more and more time at Abonae negotiating, in competition with my counterpart from the Dobunni, for foreign orders, and more and more at Corinium conferring with the Count of the Mines. He was sympathetic but powerless to reduce my quota, for his hands too were tied. But, through his influence, he helped in another direction. The governor made available unoccupied state land near the mines. I put my workers on half time and allocated them smallholdings to cultivate, with willing help from Maqqos-Colini's Irish. If the worst came to the worst they would not be wholly without support.

There was further bad news for the Procurator of Mines. Other Irish were becoming troublesome again; not on our coasts, but along the northern shores of Gaul and the southern shores of Britain, and especially in Dumnonia where they were settling without authority. Indeed the high king of Ireland himself was killed there while raiding. And I lost a whole consignment of metal destined for Armorica; a crewman who survived and ultimately made it back to Abonae reported that the ship had struck a reef. Insurance, these days, was unobtainable. My capital was vastly greater than Tad's had been on that similar occasion forty years before, but it still hurt. The threat of Irish freebooters pouncing on my cargoes added to my woes.

The only bright note was the rent for the saltworks. There was a commodity which remained in demand and did not depend on export. But I had to dig deep into my buried hoard to see me through, and Bran suffered similar if more local problems. A bronzesmith might now pay his water rates with brooches, which was all he had. But brooches were no use to Bran, nor could he use them as wages for his plumbers. We had much to learn about the niceties of barter.

Then, six years after Opilio arrived in Viroconium, nature began to turn against us. First an earthquake struck. It was worst, we gathered, in the mountains, where people were knocked off their feet but their houses, being no more than wooden huts, took little damage. In the town the shock was less, but the ground rumbled, windows rattled, tiles fell off roofs, cracks appeared in walls, and in the cattle market cows awaiting their end in placid unconcern ran instantly amok. Water pipes too came apart, which kept Bran busy for weeks. Worst of all, as it proved, stretches of Pulcher's now rickety palisade collapsed, and were not repaired. Almost everybody, Christian and pagan alike, saw the earthquake as a sign of the wrath of God or the gods, and as a portent of direr trouble ahead.

Confronting difficulties in company with like-minded people is easier than confronting them alone. We made common cause with the downtrodden and, even if we could do little beyond our charity to ease their lot, we tried to keep alive a community of spirit. Above all, Bran was my rock and I, he said, was his. Had we lived by ourselves, with only the occasional visit from Maglocunus and Dumnorix, we might have suffocated in the general miasma of gloom. But the presence of a young family was an enormous boost. Cunorix, although he was having difficulty selling his wolfhounds for which Gaul had been the largest market, was a perennial optimist. And Eriugenus, with his father's auburn hair and broad grin and cheerful disposition, was a delight. If to our own boys we were surrogate fathers, to him we were surrogate grandfathers. He kept us young.

Opilio's Titus joined him at elementary school. Together they progressed to old Nonius, who was truly old now but was still imparting as vigorously as ever the myths of Rome's origin, even as Rome herself was thrashing in her death throes. Together, in our house and in Opilio's, they played, and larked, and grew up. Together they . . .

We had none of us seen it coming, not even Cunorix and Aesicunia. We must have been blind, or blinkered by the new morality. One day in the late autumn of that year, when they were fifteen, I was passing Eriugenus' room. The door was open, and there they were on the bed, in each other's arms, kissing and fondling. So help me, I was shocked. Never mind that Bran and I still kissed and fondled, and more. Never mind that Eriugenus had always known that we were lovers, and that Maglocunus and Dumnorix -- whom he idolised -- were lovers too. I was still shocked to see it in this new generation, in these very different times.

I did not butt in on them, but told Bran at once. He was as surprised as me; not disapproving, but deeply concerned. Cunorix and Aesicunia would feel the same, but they were visiting Maqqos-Colini and would be away for some time. The main cause for concern was Opilio. He might be tolerant, human and humane. He was emphatically no Pulcher. But he was a Christian, a real Christian, and he was our Guardian, the governor's agent, committed to upholding the law and the morality behind the law. We called the boys in.

"Yes, we're in love," they admitted, not in the least defensively.

"We haven't told you yet," Titus added, "nor our parents, because there are problems."

"How right you are. Would you spell out the problems as you see them?"

"Well, Eriugenus doesn't have any, not for himself. And we doubt his parents would. Or you. But I've got two. One of them's me. I'm a Christian. I really am. It means a lot to me. And Christ's whole message is love. The trouble is that everybody thinks that doesn't include love between men. Or boys."

"Did Christ," asked Bran, putting his finger on the nub of the matter, "say anything about it himself?"

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing."

"Then why do they think love between men isn't on?"

"Because the apostle Paul says so. In his letter to the Romans. At least they say he says so. I'm not so sure. I've read it a dozen times and I still don't really understand it. Paul tried to interpret Christ's message for the Jews and gentiles," he explained considerately, aware of our ignorance. "And I'm not sure he always got it right. I don't see how any proper love can be foul, as he calls it. But then he was a bit of a killjoy."

"Hmmm. And on top of that, it's illegal."

"Yes. But you break the law, don't you? So do Maglocunus and Dumnorix. Eriugenus has told me all about them."

"All about them?"

Titus broke into a grin. "Yes, all. I've met Dumnorix and he's great. I'm longing to meet Maglocunus too." The grin faded. "Why? Shouldn't Eriugenus have told me?"

Bran's eyes consulted mine. "No, it's all right. It's a good lesson about the danger of breaking the law. So long as you don't pass the full story on. You haven't told your father?"

"No. If he hears it at all, it should be from you."

This boy's head was well screwed on.

"Well, that brings us to your father. We take it he's your second problem, and for the same reason?"

"That's right. He is a Christian too, even if he's pretty broad-minded and goes for Pelagius . . . And I love him," he added very simply. "In the other sense, of course . . . I haven't talked to him about it. I don't know where to start."

We pondered. We were in no position to interpret their scriptures to Christians.

"What about this?" I suggested. "Bran, shall you and I ask Florentius if he has any idea what this Paul's saying? And if he has, and if it's favourable, get him and Opilio in to dinner and raise the question in a general way? With reference to the British attitude to male love. You two boys wouldn't come into the picture at all. Or into the meal, either."

So it was agreed.

"Oh, before you disappear, boys, have you taken this any further than kissing?"

"No. We don't want to until the problems are sorted."

That was no doubt true of the virtuous Titus. But Eriugenus' face, and his silence, suggested that he did want to, and was finding loyal patience irksome.

"Poor lad," I said when they had gone. "Eriugenus, I mean. Quid iuvenis, magnum qui versat in ossibus ignem durus amor? What of the youth in whose marrow great fires are stirred by relentless love?" I sighed. "It's our fault, really. But at least they're being responsible."

"Fault, my love?" asked Bran. "That implies there's something wrong about it. All right, it's dangerous. But it's not wrong, is it?"

"No. It's not wrong. But if we hadn't been as we are, setting the example, would they have come to this?"

"Who knows? Quite possibly."

Florentius, sworn to secrecy, was eminently helpful. Yes, he thought that the Christians did, as so often, make more of Paul's words than was justified, and that Paul himself sometimes twisted the Jewish law to his own ends. And yes, he would be glad to put his views to Opilio. They knew each other well by now, with a mutual respect. The dinner was a success, up to a point. Florentius put forward two arguments. The first was that neither the Jewish nor the Christian scriptures anywhere condemned love between men. The only question at issue was what men do about it. The gist of his second argument was that Paul, writing for a Jewish audience, was contrasting gentile practices which were traditionally unclean for Jews -- including anal intercourse between men -- with sins which were sins for everyone. And his conclusion was that by no means everything unclean to the Jews -- eating pork was an obvious example -- was forbidden to Christians.

"Interesting," said Opilio, "very interesting. But I'm far from convinced. It conflicts with what our churchmen teach, and it conflicts with the civil law, which is quite clear." He turned to Bran and me. "From all I hear, your Maglocunus broke the law and paid for it with his life. If he really did pay." He gave us a quizzical sidelong glance. "For all I know, you two may be breaking the law. If you are, no need to fear, so long as I see nothing with my own eyes, and nobody lays a complaint. Your household is your business, just as mine is mine. For me, Paul's meaning is an academic question. I must remember to ask Felix for his view. Though I'll be lucky to get a clear-cut answer."

None the less, Opilio's own view was clear enough, and a damper on the boys' hopes. But to him the matter was currently of no great importance or urgency; and any urgency there may have been was soon dispelled. Next day an unexpected visitor called on us, clandestinely and by night. It was Vitalinus, a councillor from Glevum, a brooding hook-nosed man in his forties, whom we already knew slightly from occasional encounters at the Provincial Council. It was soon obvious why he had come to us rather than to anyone else on the Town Council, Marotamus now being dead. Were Vitalinus' business to reach the wrong ears, he would be instantly arrested; for it was treason.

We talked far into the night. The empire, he pointed out, was in a mess. Old-fashioned Roman patriotism prevented any realistic appreciation of what was now possible. The upper classes kept a deep-rooted faith in traditional military methods. Diplomacy, they felt, was ineffective. The barbarians should be suppressed with the sword and, ideally, eliminated from the army. It was all part and parcel of that ancient and deep tradition of manliness, that the highest glory for Rome was success in war. Catholic Christian thinking supported it. But it was an opinion wedded to attitudes it could no longer afford.

Britain was also in a mess, Vitalinus said, but not yet in such a mess as Gaul and some other parts of the empire. We were insulated from the worst privations, and our elite was making the most of it. But British resources were sinking without trace in the chaos on the continent. The best way forward, he argued, was political detachment from Rome, without cutting cultural or economic ties. We ought to go it alone, inviting in barbarian federates as a defence, or at the worst hiring barbarian mercenaries. He and like-minded friends had therefore launched a movement for an independent Britain, and were touting for support. The poor, he claimed, were behind them, and the oppressed, and the sidelined. They called themelves the Combrogi, the fellow-countrymen, the nationalists.

On the other side of the fence were the loyalists: those with vested interests, the conservative, the rich and the catholic. They hoped to maintain and strengthen ties with Rome and with the armies still battling on the continent, and to bring them back to Britain in greater force. They were, as Vitalinus bitterly put it, like sinners expecting divine grace, gratuitously given, to see them through. The alternative, his alternative, was to use our free will to help ourselves, just as Pelagius preached.

To Bran and me, all this was a revelation. In the wealthier centres of Britain a power struggle was afoot of which poor marginal little Viroconium had heard not a whisper. Vitalinus wanted our personal support. Not here and now, not on the spur of the moment, but he hoped to hear our decision when he returned from the mountains. He was on his way there to try to win over the Cohort. We could see why. The support of the most effective fighting force on the island was, although he did not say so, much more desirable than anything we could offer. We told him where he would most likely find Amminus, and he left at dawn.

Bran and I -- and Cunorix and Aesicunia when they returned -- had very mixed feelings. Our sympathies lay with the nationalists. But were their aspirations within the bounds of practical politics? Could they achieve anything without force? They doubtless had, if it came to it, the advantage of numbers, but the loyalists held every other card. Bloody civil war was not an enticing prospect. We decided to sit on the fence.

Vitalinus did not return by way of Viroconium, because he was overtaken by events. Nationalists in London jumped the gun and proclaimed one of their number, a certain Marcus, as emperor. He had the backing of what was left of the troops in the east and north, who had not been paid for years and were utterly disenchanted with the government's neglect. He did not have the backing of our Cohort. Amminus' prime concern, he told us, was the best interests of the Cornovii. If supporting the Combrogi would help the Cornovii -- not the council, but the civitas as a whole -- he would do so. But in the present uncertainty he would wait and see. Vitalinus also sent us a message, in guarded language in case it fell into the wrong hands, to the same effect. He too was now playing a waiting game. If Marcus proved his worth, he would support him. If not, he would disown him and try again. Everyone else, even the loyalists, waited too.

But Marcus, as far as we could tell from the sporadic news which trickled through, sat on his haunches and did absolutely nothing. The Town Council passed a resolution, unanimous except for two dissenters, affirming the Cornovii's unswerving loyalty to Honorius, and sent it to the governor in Corinium and the Deputy Prefect in London, although nobody knew if the Deputy Prefect was still in post or even alive. This message may have been true to the extent that the council at large preferred Honorius to Marcus. But most of the rest of the Cornovii, liking neither, were sunk in apathy and cared not a hoot.