Augustus (25 page)

When news came on the following day of what had taken place at Cumae, Octavian decided to brave the strait and make his way to Calvisius. This was a bad mistake. Sextus dashed out of Messana in large numbers and attacked Octavian’s fleet, which fled toward the Italian shore. Many were driven onto the rocks and set on fire. As night fell Sextus caught sight of Calvisius’ fleet sailing south to the rescue and withdrew to Messana.

Octavian, in danger of his life and not yet aware that Calvisius was close by, scrambled ashore with his attendants, pulled men out of the water, and took refuge with them in the mountains. They lit bonfires to alert those still afloat to their existence and whereabouts. However, the warship crews were too busy putting their boats to rights and trying to make good the waterlogged wrecks to come to their aid. The survivors spent the night without food or any other necessities. Octavian did not sleep, but went about the various groups and did his best to keep their spirits up.

By great good fortune, the XIIIth Legion happened to be marching through the mountains by night (presumably making all speed to Rhegium, a port opposite Messana, in anticipation of the planned invasion of Sicily). Its commander learned of the disaster at sea and, guessing that the fires in the hills denoted survivors, led his force in their direction.

Octavian and his men were in a poor way. They were given food, and a makeshift tent was pitched for the exhausted triumvir. With typical self-discipline, he sent messengers in all directions to announce that he was alive and still in charge. Having learned, too, of Calvisius’ arrival with his fleet, he now allowed himself to snatch some sleep. It had been a terrible twenty-four hours, as he was reminded all too graphically when he awoke. Appian describes the scene: “At daybreak, as he looked out over the sea, his gaze was met by ships that had been set on fire, ships that were still half-ablaze or half-burned, and ships that had been smashed.”

As if that were not enough, a gale came up in the afternoon, one of the fiercest in living memory, whipping a vicious swell with a strong current in the narrow seas. Sextus was safely inside the harbor of Messana; Menodorus, with an experienced eye for the unpredictable Mediterranean weather, sailed out to sea, where he rode out the storm; but Octavian’s surviving ships were blown against the craggy coast and pounded against the rocks and one another. Night fell, but there was no letup in the wind until morning. More than half of the fleet was sunk, and most of the rest was badly damaged.

Another dark night of traveling through mountains ensued—and, surely, a dark night of the soul, too; for this was the worst crisis of Octavian’s career. His humiliating double defeat at sea not only signaled the ruin of his hopes to eliminate Sextus Pompeius but might well set off conspiracies against him in Rome.

Methodically, Octavian took the necessary steps to reduce this risk. Orders were sent to all his supporters and military commanders to watch out for trouble. Detachments of infantry were posted along the coastline to deter an invasion by Sextus. Men were left behind to salvage and repair his galleys.

Meanwhile, the son of Pompey the Great celebrated his great victory. Since his arrival in Sicily, he had identified the god of the sea, Neptune, with his father on coins that he had issued. Now he proclaimed himself the son of Neptune, took to wearing a dark blue cloak (instead of a commander’s regulation purple), and sacrificed some horses (and, it was rumored, men) to the god by driving them into the sea.

With a heavy heart, Octavian journeyed north to Campania, brooding on what he should do next. He needed many new ships, but had neither money nor time to build them.

Embarrassing though it was, he realized that he would have to humble himself and ask again for assistance from his fellow triumvirs—Lepidus, half forgotten in Africa; Mark Antony, whom he had snubbed only months before. Without their support, he could make no progress; also, left to their own devices, his colleagues might well open discussions with Sextus. He sent them an urgent appeal.

Almost at once, though, Octavian wished he had not done so, for he was given new heart by the return from Gaul of his friend Agrippa. The twenty-four-year-old commander had great achievements to his credit, having secured the frontier on the Rhine and founded a new city, Colonia Agrippinensis (or, as it became, Cologne). He was offered a triumph, but, sensitive to his friend’s distress, declined.

Now the victorious young general turned his attention to a style of warfare with which he was almost completely unfamiliar: fighting at sea. He decided exactly what he needed—a sufficient stretch of water, with large supplies of wood in the vicinity, where he could build a new fleet, then train both it and himself, safe from the maraudings of Sextus Pompeius, safe even from Sextus’ knowledge.

Agrippa knew the very place. According to Homer, the lake of Avernus was the gateway into Hades, where the dead led shadowy and enfeebled existences. Not far from Cumae, Avernus was a huge water-filled crater, with a diameter of nearly five miles and a depth of thirty-seven yards. Except for one narrow entrance, it was completely surrounded by densely wooded hills, giving it a somber, oppressive atmosphere. Here and there on the slopes, volcanic springs spewed a mixture of water and flames, steam and smoke.

A short way south was the Lucrine lake, separated from the sea by a low thin strip of land (“as broad as a wagon road,” wrote the contemporary geographer Strabo).

No sentimentalist, Agrippa was undaunted by the gloomy spirit of the place. He had the brilliantly simple, highly ambitious idea of cutting a canal south from Avernus to the Lucrine lake and thence to the sea. This was quickly done, while a tunnel was also driven northward to the seaside town of Cumae, so creating a second means of access. In this way, a huge, new, completely secure, secret harbor was created, which was named Portus Julius.

The trees on the slopes of Avernus were cut down; keels were laid and galleys built. Twenty thousand freed slaves were recruited as oarsmen, and learned their craft in safety and secrecy. Among other things, they were able to practice using a lethal refinement of the
corvus
that Agrippa had invented: this was the
harpax,
a grapnel fired from a ship-borne catapult.

This vast enterprise called for substantial resources. Wealthy supporters of Octavian financed ships, and a message came from Antony offering military help. It is likely that Agrippa brought funds with him from Gaul, and money was raised from the empire’s provinces.

In response to Octavian’s plea, transmitted by the emollient Maecenas, Antony, who had spent the winter at Athens, agreed to return to Italy in the spring or early summer of 37
B.C.
; it was in his interest to ensure that the west was quiet before he set off against Parthia and also he needed (as was allowed by the Treaty of Brundisium) to recruit troops in Italy.

He sailed with a large fleet to Brundisium, but once again found its port closed to him. Irritated by this evidence of Octavian’s renewed fickleness, he sailed round to Tarentum, where he invited Octavian to join him. He was now not at all sure that he would support his fellow triumvir against Sextus. Octavia was accompanying Antony and was very upset at the prospect of another quarrel breaking out between her brother and her husband. “If the worst should happen,” she wrote to her brother, according to Plutarch, “and war break out between you, no one can say which of you is fated to conquer the other, but what is quite certain is that my fate will be miserable.”

Octavian took the point; indeed, he had probably done so even before his sister approached him. His refusal to meet his colleague had been as much of a blunder as his original cry for help. He was certainly not ready for war with Antony and had no excuse even for wishing it. There were matters that the triumvirs needed to discuss—for example, an extension of the Triumvirate, which was on the point of expiry. A meeting was evidently in order. The only eventuality Octavian wanted to avoid was Antony joining him in the war against Sextus. To ensure his future as co-ruler of the empire, he must win his own battles.

So it was agreed that a conference be held at Tarentum. Maecenas traveled down from Rome to make the arrangements and plan the agenda. He was also an unofficial minister of culture, who recognized the importance of the arts to the promotion of a political regime. He had a sharp eye for literary talent, and was always on the lookout for it. He gathered a group of poets around him, to whom he gave the freedom of his house at Rome. Chief of these was Virgil, now in his early thirties.

Another member of the inner circle was Horace, twenty-seven years old and Maecenas’ favorite. A lover of the peaceful life, Horace agreed with the Greek philosopher Epicurus that pleasure was the only good. Completely without vanity, he has left thumbnail descriptions of his rotund appearance:

Come and see me when you want a laugh. I’m fat and sleek,

In prime condition, a porker from Epicurus’ herd.

And

Of small build, prematurely grey, and fond of the sun,

He was quick to lose his temper, but not hard to appease.

His eminent patron was portly too, and wrote him an epigram in verse: “If I don’t love you, Horace, more than my life, may your friend look skinnier than a rag-doll.”

It was typical of the man that Maecenas assembled some poets to accompany him on the journey, probably for the fun of it and for good conversation, though these literary personalities may have been dragooned into providing secretarial services.

Horace wrote a lighthearted poem describing the trip. After two days’ leisurely travel from Rome he and a companion, a professor of rhetoric, arrived at a great malarial swamp, the Pomptine Marshes (before his death, Julius Caesar had planned to drain them, but this was not accomplished until Benito Mussolini did it in the 1930s). They left the road for a night and were hauled through wet wasteland in a barge.

Horace was then joined by Maecenas, and the following day by Virgil and two other poets. The company stopped at Capua (today’s Santa Maria Capua Vetere), where they took an afternoon off from travel. Capua was one of the richest cities in Italy; Cicero had called it a “second Rome.” A great center for gladiatorial combats, it boasted a fine amphitheater (the ruins that can be seen today are of a later building), where Spartacus once fought.

However, no one was interested in seeing the sights; Maecenas went off to take some exercise, while Horace, who had an eye infection, and the delicate Virgil took a siesta, “for ball-games are bad for inflamed eyes and dyspeptic stomachs.”

Some days later, when the arid hills of Apulia (today’s Puglia), Horace’s homeland, came into view, the travelers took refuge from the heat in a villa at Trivicum (Trevico). Horace’s sore eyes were irritated by a smoky stove, but his spirits were lifted by the prospect of an amorous encounter.

On this occasion, his hopes were frustrated:

Here, like an utter fool, I stayed awake till midnight

Waiting for a girl who broke her promise. Sleep in the end

Overtook me, still keyed up for sex. Then scenes from a dirty

Dream spattered my nightshirt and stomach as I lay on my back.

Three more days rolling along in wagons were made exceptionally uncomfortable and exhausting because the roads had been damaged by heavy rain, still bucketing down. The weather improved as Horace and his friends approached Brundisium, before making their way to the elegant Greek city of Tarentum and the world of great affairs.

The principals—Mark Antony and Octavian—eventually met at the little river Taras, which flowed into the sea at a point between Tarentum and Metapontum, another city founded by mainland Greeks. It was a splendid sight: an army peacefully encamped on land and a great fleet lying quietly offshore. The idea was that the stream should separate the two mutually distrustful parties. Without planning to do so, the triumvirs arrived at the same time. Antony, who was staying at Tarentum, leaped down impulsively from his carriage, jumped unaccompanied into one of the small boats moored at the riverbank, and started to cross over to Octavian.

Realizing that he would lose face if he did not immediately return this demonstration of trust, Octavian, too, boarded a boat himself. The triumvirs met in midstream, and immediately fell into an argument, because each politely wanted to disembark on the other’s bank. Octavian won, on the grounds that Octavia was at Tarentum and he would not see her if Antony and he met on his side of the river. He sat beside Antony in his carriage and arrived unescorted at his colleague’s quarters in the city. He slept there that night, without any of his guards.