Antony and Cleopatra (6 page)

Unrestrained luxury, weakness abroad and murderous competition for royal power characterised the career of Ptolemy VIII. The kingdom founded by Ptolemy I two centuries earlier had become far less stable and efficient. It is true that no serious challenger for the throne appeared from outside the Ptolemaic family. To that extent the celebration of the family, and the frequency of incestuous marriage, ensured that only blood relations were seen as capable of attaining the monarchy. Yet in spite of the incest, and the generally high rate of infant mortality in the ancient world, the Ptolemies remained numerous, their numbers thinned more by homicidal ambition than anything else. In spite of its best efforts, the family failed to wipe itself out, and the battles for power continued.

The shadow of Rome grew stronger as the second century progressed. The Romans did not want the wealth of Egypt to be taken over by any other power, but had limited interest in the family squabbles of the Ptolemies and, as yet, no desire to turn it into a province of their own. Both Ptolemy VI and Physcon at different times fled to Rome and tried to gain support. Foreign assistance was preferable to letting a rival win, as Cleopatra II also showed when she sought Seleucid help. The Hellenistic kingdoms decayed, spending their strength in struggles with each other or smashed by the Roman military machine. The Ptolemies survived, in spite of a succession of weak kings and bitter family in-fighting.

Cleopatra was born into the ruling house of a decaying kingdom in a world dominated by Rome. For generations her family had married and slaughtered each other as they struggled for power. None doubted their absolute right to rule, or questioned that luxury and excess were not admirable in themselves. To be born a Ptolemy brought unique expectations and dangers. Ambition, ruthlessness and an utterly self-centred attitude mingled with the ever-present fear of death at the hands of courtiers and family.

On 14 January 83
BC
friends and relatives of Mark Antony's parents were called to their house. The aristocratic families of Rome liked witnesses to the arrival of a new member and his mother Julia had gone into labour. Only women attended the birth itself, unless things went badly wrong and a male doctor was summoned. Usually, the mother was attended by a midwife and some female relations and slaves. The father and guests waited elsewhere in the house.

Infant mortality was very high in the ancient world, as indeed it was until comparatively modern times. Many children were stillborn or died hours, days or months later. Some Roman tombstones are very precise in the age of the little boys or girls they commemorate. It was also a very dangerous time for the mother and many women died during or soon after childbirth. The Roman aristocracy used marriage to cement political alliances, so women like Julia were usually young – quite often in their mid teens – for their first pregnancy.

In this case everything seems to have gone smoothly. A boy was born and when the midwife laid the infant down for inspection there was no sign of deformity or unusual weakness. Julia would produce two more sons in fairly rapid succession and all grew into healthy adults, and she would herself enjoy a long life. Some children were rejected by their parents, but in well-off families this was usually only the case if they had serious defects or seemed far too weak to survive. There was no question of that in this case and once Antony's father was shown his son, he and Julia quickly accepted the child.
¹

Ritual was everywhere in Roman society and marked every stage of an individual's life. Fires were lit on the family altars in the house. The witnesses would also make offerings when they returned to their own homes. On the night of 21/22 January, the family held a vigil and performed a series of rituals as part of a purification ceremony
(lustratio).
The next morning priests observed the flight of birds to predict what the future held for the boy. He was also presented with a talisman or charm called the
bulla.
This was normally of gold and was placed in a leather bag around the boy's neck. He would wear this until he became an adult.

On the day of the purification the boy was formally named as Marcus Antonius and soon afterwards this was registered officially. ‘Antonius' was the family or clan name – in Latin, the
nomen.
Most Roman aristocrats had three names, the
tria nomina
and the
nomen
were followed by a
cognomen
peculiar to that section of the wider family or clan. Julia's father was called Lucius Julius Caesar. The Julii were a large and very ancient group, and the more specific ‘Caesar', which first appeared at the turn of the third and second centuries BC, helped to differentiate the various branches of the line. Some families, including the Antonii, never felt this necessary, probably because there were not many branches of the line.
²

‘Marcus' was the
praenomen
equivalent to our first name (or in Britain, still habitually, the Christian name). Although it was not an absolutely fixed system, aristocratic families tended to employ the same names in the same order for each generation. Antony's father was also called Marcus Antonius, as was his father. In due course his two brothers were named Caius and Lucius. In formal documents each would also be listed as ‘son of Marcus'.

It was important in Roman public life to identify a man very specifically. The same was not true of women, who could not vote or stand for office. Girls received only a single name, their father's
nomen
in the feminine form. Therefore Antony's mother was Julia because her father was a Julius. Any daughter born to an Antonius was named Antonia and if more than one daughter was born these were simply numbered – at least for official purposes. Families tended to employ nicknames to avoid confusion.

Julia was a patrician, but her husband's family was plebeian and so were her children. The patricians were Rome's oldest aristocracy and in the early days of the Republic only they could hold the consulship. Over time many wealthy plebeian families forced their way into politics and were able to demand a greater share of power. It was eventually established that one of the two consuls each year must be plebeian, and as time passed it became reasonably common for neither to be a patrician. Some patrician lines dwindled in wealth and influence, and others died out altogether. By the first century
BC
the overwhelming majority of senators were plebeian. There were a number of plebeian families who could boast of having been at the centre of public life for centuries. Simply being patrician was no guarantee of political success.

The Antonii were not the greatest of the plebeian lines, but they were very well established as members of the Senate and had done particularly well in the last two generations. Antony's grandfather Marcus Antonius was famous as one of the greatest orators ever produced by Rome. Cicero claimed that along with one of his contemporaries, Antonius took Latin eloquence to

In 113
BC
Antonius was elected quaestor, a junior magistracy with mainly financial responsibilities, and was sent to assist the governor of the province of Asia (modern-day western Turkey). A man became eligible for the quaestorship at thirty. En route to the province Antonius found himself caught up in scandal when he was accused of having an affair with a Vestal Virgin. Rome's only female priesthood, the Vestals took a vow to remain chaste for thirty years and tended the temple and sacred flame of the goddess Vesta. For a man to seduce a Vestal was a dreadful impurity, which threatened Rome's special relationship with the gods. If found guilty, a man's career would be over and he might suffer even worse punishment. The penalty for the Vestals was far more ghastly, for they were entombed alive to bury the impurity.

Trials of Vestals and their alleged lovers tended to occur following some disaster when people were nervous and wanted someone to blame. Three Vestals were accused of breaking their vow in 114
BC,
and when only one was condemned the issue was raised again in the next year and a new round of trials begun in a special tribunal presided over by an eminent and stern former consul.

As a magistrate serving on public business, Antonius was exempt from prosecution, but won general admiration when he voluntarily returned to Rome to answer the charge. This did nothing to dampen the enthusiasm of judge and prosecution in pressing for a conviction. Although Antonius staunchly denied the charge, his accusers sensed that a young slave who carried a lantern for his master at night could be coerced into incriminating him. Roman law only accepted the testimony of slaves if they were questioned under torture, since it was assumed that otherwise they would always support their owners. The boy is supposed to have assured Antonius that nothing could persuade him to speak against his master, regardless of the pain. ‘Lacerated with many stripes, put on the rack, and burned with hot plates, he guarded the defendant's safety and destroyed all the force of the prosecution.' Antonius was acquitted. It is not recorded whether he rewarded the slave. Our source for the story blamed fortune for such a great spirit being ‘enclosed in the body of a slave'. Two Vestals – it is not clear whether one was the woman with whom he was accused of having an affair – were less fortunate and were condemned to death.
⁴

Oratory was very important in a political career, but the success of Marcus Antonius suggests that he also had considerable military and administrative ability. In 102
BC
he went to govern the nearby province of Cilicia as praetor. His command was extended for a further two years by the Senate and he led a tough and ultimately successful campaign against the pirates infesting that area. He celebrated a triumph, which no doubt helped him to win election to the consulship for 99
BC. T
wo years later he was censor, one of the two magistrates who oversaw the census of Roman citizens completed every five years. Only one in five consuls could hope to reach the censorship and it was an office of tremendous prestige.

Marcus Antonius was one of the leading senators of his day, but prominence would prove to be a dangerous thing in the first century BC. In 91
BC
a politician pressing for the extension of Roman citizenship to the allies of Italy was assassinated. Many of the Italian communities chose to rebel and the result was the Social War – the name comes from the Latin
socii,
meaning ‘allies' – which was fought at high cost in lives and with great savagery. Roman victory had as much to do with their willingness to grant citizenship to all those who remained loyal, and many more who capitulated quickly, as it did with military skill. It was a conflict that accustomed many soldiers to fighting against enemies very much like themselves.

By 88
BC
the rebellion was substantially over and the consul Lucius Cornelius Sulla was given command in the war against King Mithridates VI of Pontus. The latter was exploiting the crumbling of the Seleucid Empire and Roman preoccupation to expand from his heartland on the southern coast of the Black Sea. A campaign in the Hellenistic east offered a Roman general all the glory and plunder he could desire, and Sulla left Rome to recruit and train his army. In his absence a radical politician campaigned to have the command transferred to Marius, the great military hero of the last generation, but now in his late sixties.
⁵

Consul for the first time in 107, Marius had won a victory in Numidia, but was then voted into an unprecedented succession of consulships every year from 104 to 101
BC.
This violated precedent and law, which stipulated that ten years should elapse between each consulship. At the time, the Italian Peninsula was menaced by migrating northern tribes who had already slaughtered every army sent against them and there was clearly a strong feeling that the crisis required an extraordinary solution. Marius dealt with the barbarians, smashing them in a final battle in 101
BC.
He celebrated a triumph and was rewarded by being voted a sixth consulship by a grateful Rome.

The Roman Empire in the first century
BC

It was a spectacular career, especially since Marius was the first of his family to embark on a public career and enter the Senate. He was what the Romans called a ‘new man'
(novus homo),
who had had to make a name for himself rather than rely on the fame of his family. Marius revelled in popular acclaim and seems to have struggled to cope when this began to fade. He played a relatively modest part in the Social War and may well have suffered from poor health. Yet in spite of his advanced age he decided that he wanted the command against Mithridates and the Popular Assembly was willing to pass a law transferring it to him. In every respect this was a break with tradition, even if it was not actually illegal. Yet in the past Marius had broken other traditions and gone on to win.
⁶

This time it was different. Sulla was a patrician, but came from a family that had long since fallen away from the centre of public life. He had come to politics at a late age, determined to rise to the top and had secured the plum command against Mithridates. He refused to let this be taken from him, and his soldiers were equally unwilling to lose the chance of the rich plunder likely in an eastern war. The senior officers were less keen and only one man of senatorial rank accompanied Sulla as he led his legions to Rome. Marius and his opponents had no organised force to meet them and could not hope to defend the city successfully. Many were killed, although Marius escaped. Sulla stayed only for a short time before taking his troops off to fight Mithridates and did not return for five years.

Marius came back first, raising his own army and seizing Rome in 87
BC
. This time the attack was more violent and the executions that followed more numerous and brutal. Marcus Antonius was one of the victims, although whether because of a long-standing grudge or recent opposition to Marius is uncertain. At first the orator went into hiding and was sheltered in the house of one of his clients, a man attached to him by long-standing obligation or favour. His protector was not especially wealthy, but wanted to entertain his guest in a manner appropriate for such a distinguished senator. He sent a slave out to buy some high-quality wine. The owner of the tavern was surprised at this unusual purchase and, chatting to the slave, discovered what was happening. He then promptly took the story to a delighted Marius, who was at dinner. Our sources claim that he had to be persuaded by his friends not to go and kill Antonius himself.