Attila (9 page)

Much encouraged, Titus set off next day at dawn, and after an easy journey of some twenty miles, reached Sufetula, a han some town, completely Roman despite its Punic name. Built on a grid pattern in a striking ochre-coloured stone, it boasted a theatre and amphitheatre, aqueduct, public baths, a cathedral, and no fewer than three triumphal arches. Boniface's advance guard was already in the streets, requisitioning billets and ordering grass to be cut for fodder. Titus could travel much faster than cavalry on the march, so he pressed on, hoping to catch up with Boniface's advancing force at the fortress settlement of Cillium, some thirty-five miles further on. He arrived there to find the general's troops pitching camp outside the place, which was not large enough to provide adequate billeting. A tribune conducted Titus to where the Count was pacing up and down in a grove of figs.

‘A courier from Ravenna with a message for you, sir,' announced the officer. ‘Says it's urgent.'

‘Ah, they all say that,' murmured Boniface, breaking off his perambulations to face them. ‘A message that was not urgent – now that would be breaking the mould. Well, we'd better have a look at it.' And he held out his hand to Titus.

Titus found himself staring at an extraordinary figure who might almost have stepped down from the Arch of Constantine. It was not so much that the man was huge (he must have stood at least six and a half feet), as that his appearance commanded attention. He was wearing parade armour which looked as though it dated from the time of Gallienus or Aurelian: a muscle cuirass complete with Gorgon's-head pectoral, and an old-style Attic helmet which had gone out in the West with Diocletian. And – a real period piece – instead of the modern
spatha
, a short
gladius
sword depended from the general's baldric. Even the cut of his hair – a brutal stubble extending to both face and scalp – seemed to echo the fashion of that distant era. But there was nothing brutal about Boniface's manner.

‘You like my uniform?' the general enquired affably, as he took Aetius' letter from Titus. ‘Yes, it is indeed a bit outdated, but as it's been handed down in my family for seven generations I feel a certain obligation to wear it. However, you must be tired after your journey. The tribune here will see that you can bathe and change and have a meal. Later, we shall share a flask of wine and you will give me all the news from Ravenna.'

When Titus had departed with the officer, the Count unrolled the letter and began to read.

Written at Ravenna, Province of Flaminia and Picenum, Diocese of Italy, in the consulships of Hierus and Ardaburius, VII Kalends Jul.
¹²
Flav. Aetius, Master of the Horse of All the Gauls, Count; to my lord Boniface, Count of Africa and commander of all forces there, greetings.

Most noble and excellent Count, I write this in haste and secrecy as a true friend, out of concern for your welfare and for that of Rome. I have it from the most impeccable of sources that you will shortly receive, in the name of the Emperor, a formal summons from the Empress Mother Aelia Galla Placidia, ordering you to return forthwith from Africa to Ravenna. What has transpired to make her take this step I cannot say, but the palace is a hotbed of intrigue, swarming with scheming eunuchs and courtiers whose only concern is to advance their own careers. I know only that there exists a faction, jealous of your success and power, which drips poison into the Augusta's ear, turning her against you. You, who of all her subjects have served her the most loyally. Such injustice! My friend, I urge you in the strongest terms I know: do not obey the summons when it comes. For if you do these creatures will encompass your destruction. Remember Stilicho, who, after his fall from favour presented himself at Ravenna without armed supporters and was summarily executed. Rome can ill afford the loss of the foremost of her servants. Meanwhile, I shall plead your cause with the Augusta; be sure these lies will be exposed in time. Farewell.

Sent by the hand of my trusted agent T. Valerius Rufinus.

Boniface reread the letter in growing incredulity. How could the Empress believe such perfidy? Placidia of all people, whom he had stood up for through thick and thin. Well, at least he was forewarned, thanks to Aetius. There were still, it would seem, some honest Romans left. What to do? If he returned to Ravenna, assuming the summons came, that would be equivalent to signing
his own death-warrant, as Aetius' warning had made clear. But if he refused, that would be construed as revolt, in which case an armed force would almost certainly be sent to arrest him.

However, if his enemies imagined he would give in meekly, they were in for a surprise. He would put his troops in a state of readiness, and prepare to resist. Of their loyalty he had no doubt, but of their ability to repel an expedition in force he was less certain. His Roman troops supplemented by Berber auxiliaries were adequate for occasional campaigns against insurgents. But faced with the might of an Imperial army . . . ? Well, the Gods (sorry, God, he amended to himself with a touch of gallows humour) would decide.

As soon as he spotted the distant but rapidly approaching dust-cloud, Boniface sensed that it spelled trouble. The cluster of dots at the cloud's centre swiftly resolved itself into a knot of hard-riding soldiers. They pulled up at the camp's perimeter; two decurions in full armour dismounted and marched purposefully towards him.

They saluted, then one handed Boniface a scroll. He did not need to unroll it to know what it contained: a summons, written in purple ink, to return to Ravenna.

‘You are to come with us, sir,' said the officer respectfully but firmly.

For a moment Boniface hesitated, weighing up the enormous repercussions of ignoring an imperial summons.

‘That won't be possible,' he said, gravely courteous. ‘I regret, gentlemen, that your journey has been wasted.'

 

¹
The Rhine.

²
Aquitaine.

³
Trier.

⁴
Arles, Provence.

⁵
Sbeitla, in central Tunisia.

⁶
River Dee.

⁷
Marseille.

⁸
The incident is recounted in Chapter 33 of Gibbon's
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
.

⁹
Present-day Tozeur in Tunisia; then a Roman outpost marking the south-west extremity of the empire.

¹⁰
Present-day Testour.

¹¹
Now Sbiba.

¹²
25 June 427.

And absolutely, with a master's right, Christ claims our hearts, our lips, our time

Paulinus, Bishop of Nola,
Letter to Ausonius
,
c
. 395

Pacing nervously in the palace of his friend the Bishop of Carthage, Aurelius Augustinus – Bishop of Hippo in the diocese of Africa, famed author of
Confessions
and
City of God
, universally revered for his piety and spiritual example – was apprehensive. For today was the first of January, the day of the naming of the consuls, and of the most popular and eagerly anticipated festival of the year, which from time immemorial had been celebrated throughout the Roman world, the Feast of the Kalends. And he, Augustine, was about to go into the forum of Carthage and denounce it.

It had not been an easy or a quick decision. It came to him that, in a sense, it was a decision for the making of which his whole life had been a preparation.

The world into which he had been born, the golden afterglow of the reign of the great Constantine, was, Augustine reflected, very different from the one he now inhabited. Then Christians, their faith established by Constantine as the official religion of the Roman state after years of savage persecution, had been willing partners in a compact with the empire, and Christianity had become a unifying force in a realm once riven by divisions and disharmony.

But the empire, apparently so strong and stable, had within a generation descended into crisis. Disaster had succeeded disaster: Adrianopolis, the Gothic invasions, the crossing of the Rhenus by German hordes, the sack of Rome. In place of stability and confidence – chaos and insecurity. Yet, even as the empire weakened, its child the Church grew in power and authority. Had not Ambrose, Bishop of Mediolanum, forced the mighty Theodosius to kneel before him and do penance for his sins? The recent
consensus between Church and state broke down as Christian leaders increasingly stressed the irrelevance of earthly matters, and began to contemplate what had previously been unthinkable: a Church surviving in a world without the Roman Empire.

All this, happening within Augustine's lifetime, had strangely mirrored the events of his own career. His hedonistic student days when, not yet a Christian, he had lived for the sweet embrace of women and the addictive thrill of the arena, had been matched in the world by an easy-going co-existence between Christianity and other faiths. Then had come that blinding moment of epiphany, when he had seemed to hear a child's voice exhorting him to seek inspiration in the Christians' Bible: ‘
Tolle, lege
– Take up and read.' From that moment, even while storm-clouds gathered round the empire, and the Church – abandoning its relaxed attitude to pagan gods – declared virtual war on heresy, he had tried to give himself completely to the service of Christ, eschewing worldly affairs and pleasures. It had not been easy. ‘Give me chastity and continence – but not yet' had epitomized the sharpness of his struggle, as he had recorded in
Confessions
. Others too, like his friend Paulinus, Bishop of Nola, in rejecting the world for God, had had to make agonizing personal choices. In Paulinus' case, this had meant ending relations with his dearest friend, the cultured and worldly poet Ausonius.

It was the terrible trauma engendered by the sack of Rome that had crystallized these aspirations, and prompted Augustine to begin writing his
magnum opus
, the
City of God
. No more should men concern themselves with the Earthly City, he had argued; instead they should strive towards the New Jerusalem, the Heavenly City, with its promise of union with God. With this vision had grown a conviction that men could not gain entrance to the City of God by their own striving. Sin barred the way. All men were sinners, but could not of their own free will purge themselves of sin. For this they needed Grace, a dispensation God alone could grant. But those who were vouchsafed this gift – the Elect – were already predestined to receive it. In the matter of salvation, God's will was everything, man's nothing. The bishop intoned to himself the rubric that formed the bedrock of his theology: ‘Grace, predestination, divine will.'

The moment of truth was now at hand. If the beliefs expressed with such passionate conviction in his sermons and writings were
not to appear so much hypocrisy, he could not allow the Feast of the Kalends – given over to drunkenness, gluttony, debauchery, exchange of gifts, and competitive displays of wealth – to pass while he remained silent. The feast was a flagrant celebration of everything the old pagan Rome had represented. To stand by and say nothing would be shamefully to condone it. With thumping heart but with mind resolved, Augustine left the palace and set out for the forum.

Of the great Phoenician city of Carthage that Hannibal had known, barring the harbours nothing remained. Its conquerors had, with truly Roman single-mindedness, destroyed it then rebuilt it according to their own models. The second city of the West, through whose streets Augustine now walked, was, with its forum, basilicas, theatre, and university, barely distinguishable from other great urban centres of the Imperium Romanum.

Halfway up Byrsa Hill leading to the capitol and forum, Augustine had to pause for breath. Age was catching up with him, he thought ruefully; soon he would be seventy-five. Drawing in grateful lungfuls of cool winter air, he surveyed the scene. To the north, beyond the city limits, loomed the headland of Cape Carthage, while below him to the east extended the vast double harbour – the elliptical one for merchant vessels, the circular for warships. Westwards, beyond the (deconsecrated) Temple of Neptune, stretched the suburbs of Megara, dominated by the circus and the vast oval of the amphitheatre, with the arches of Hadrian's mighty aqueduct striding away into the far distance towards the spring of Zaghouan, sixty miles inland.

Augustine entered the forum. It all looked innocent and joyful he thought, looking at the gently swirling crowds, the happy, excited faces, the cheerful colours of best garments looked out for this most special of occasions. But this smiling persona hid an ugly reality. Augustine's sacred duty must now be to tear away that mask and expose the lust and depravity that lurked beneath. Suddenly, he felt calm and confident, as though God's grace had touched him; the pounding of his heart stilled. He held up his hands, and – such was the greatness of his prestige – the murmurous jubilation in the forum died away as people recognized the tall, spare figure and began to spread the word: ‘It's the Bishop of Hippo . . . It's Augustine himself . . . He's come to bless us.'

‘People of Carthage, friends and fellow Christians,' Augustine began, ‘I rejoice to see you gathered here today, as a loving father rejoices to see his children playing. But what if the youngsters' games should cause them to stray into a wadi, where deadly snakes and scorpions lurk concealed? Would he not warn them? And would he not be wanting in a father's duty if he failed to do so?' A ripple of agreement passed through the throng. Not one among them but could recall a parent's anxious warning not to play in scrubland or deserted buildings.

A good start, Augustine thought. The trick when addressing an audience was always to speak with them, not at them; the
Homilies
of Chrysostom, the ‘Golden-mouthed' Archbishop of Constantinople, had taught him that. His confidence growing, he pressed home his argument.