Читать книгу Solar Wind. Book one - Олег Красин - Страница 2

The astrologer in purple

Emperor Hadrian3 always believed in horoscopes.

In his luxurious residence in Tibur, built upon his final return to Rome, he indulged in reflections on the winding ways of fate, fascinated by what had occurred in the world since the long twenty years after the death of Emperor Trajan.

Hadrian took in his hands the sheets of parchment that described what was to happen to him. He read once more the lines foretold, and surprised by coincidences.

In the clear lines connecting the twelve houses of the zodiac, he found not only aesthetic pleasure, as in the strict architecture of Athens or geometrically reconciled pyramids of the Pharaohs, but also a deep well of knowledge. As if the horoscope was a material and visible expression of a comprehensive logos.4

The place looked after by Hadrian was not new. Before he was chosen by Octavian Augustus to live there, Horatius and Catullus lived there, and before them other rich patricians. The vast imperial lands, surrounded by yellow-green olive groves and pines with thick crowns, had all the whimsical fantasies of Hadrian. There were halls and theaters, luxurious thermal parks, libraries, porticoes and temples, decorative gardens. In his villa, Hadrian had spent a great deal of time collecting and displaying pictures, statues, vases collected from all over the territory of Rome and now enjoyed their views, sitting on a chair or reclining on the bed.

Sometimes he sat alone all evening with a cup of Falernian wine in his hand, holding a copy of the horoscope of those close to him, pondering about their fates, the contours of which fell behind the lines connecting the trajectory of the planets.

Although the Roman spirit was accustomed to addressing the gods directly—as it was thought, the face of the latter can be seen—predictions of astrologers often looked like an empty amusement for the jaded minds of aristocrats. But Hadrian knew his horoscopes were not lying.

He himself was a devoted, longtime connoisseur of astrology. He was in general very ambitious, and everyone in Rome knew that the best poet, writer, artist, musician playing in cithara, and singer was undoubtedly Hadrian. It was possible, of course, to challenge this opinion, but behind the mask of a charming and open man was a vengeful and brutal character.

According to the story going around Rome, Trajan5 discussed with his architect, Apollodorus of Damascus,6 a new building. Hadrian, who indulged in painting, decided to submit his advice, as he thought it was sensible enough. But Apollodorus hostility smiled at him, rudely cut him off—a man of little sense in architecture.

After becoming Caesar, Hadrian sent Apollodorus the schematics for the Temple of Venus to show that he, Hadrian, could do it without his help, this daring and unequipped architect. Apollodorus here did not show due respect. He ridiculed the emperor, talking about statues being designed too high: “If the goddesses have to get out of their place and get out—they have nothing to do, they will beat the lie about low ceilings.” This humiliation the proud Hadrian could not let Apollodorus get away with it. He executed the man.

Undoubtedly, it is difficult to claim that the commander of the thirty legions is uninformed in any area.

Once upon a time, Hadrian made a horoscope of Marcus Annius Verus, then a boy, a distant relative of his wife Empress Sabina.7 The horoscope predicted Marcus would lead a dignified life and an important post in the hierarchy of power, the post of ruler of the state. Hadrian thought that from this boy it was possible to grow the real ruler of Rome, to nurture it, to shape, as one shapes a beautiful statue from a shapeless block of marble.

Hadrian himself had no children from his wife, and this circumstance forced him to look around, thinking about the choice of a possible successor.

At first, Marcus was drawn by Sabina. For a time, they lived as friendly couple, enjoying life in harmony with each other. Then he appeared, Antinous,8 a beautiful Greek youth with marble white skin, black curly hair, and a direct profile, soft, feminine and inseparable. Hadrian saw him naked, bathing in a mountain spring, and fell in love, then confirmed the opinion of Cicero that the love of a man to another of his sex is a natural consequence of nudity.

So, his relationship with Sabina came to naught.

Sabina did not understand that the love of Antinous was the gift of the gods to an aging emperor, for she made him happy and young, and the absence of love made him miserable, albeit wise. Only who needs wisdom without Antinous?

The wife turned into an evil fury. She slandered him on every street corner. He was informed that she had sworn her infertility, blaming Hadrian. “How can one give birth from such a monster?” she asked, tragically wringing her hands like a cheap actor in a Rusticus theater. Of course, he, Hadrian, knew that the whole thing was her fault: he had married a rotten fruit, a dead land in which no matter how much seed he threw—nothing would grow.

He only succumbed to the persuasion of Trajan's wife Plotina, who wanted to strengthen his influence with the help of Sabina, because she was a distant relative of the emperor Trajan. And, in fairness, it was worth saying that thanks to her, Sabina, Hadrian became Augustus.

But it's in the past. Sympathy, affection, friendship. All in the past! The world was changed by this adorable young man Antinous, years with which were similar to a wonderful dream sent by the goddess of the night Nix, a dream that brings oblivion. Indeed, Hadrian then often felt himself an Odyssey, strewn with sweet-sounding sirens, a traveler who had forgotten his native Ithaca.

It is a pity that his voyage with Antinous on the sea of life turned out to be so short-lived and fleeting. His beloved perished in the waves of the Nile forever. After that the heart of Hadrian froze in sorrow, like a mourning statue above the marble tomb of a dear man. He ordered the memory of the young man to be honored. There were cities named in his honor, statues towering over the squares and streets of the empire. But cities and statues could not obscure the emptiness in his heart.

One such statue stood here in Tibur. Hadrian created the Temple of Antinous and put his sculpture inside. Sometimes he approached it, touching the hand made of cold stone. The inscription “Be immortal as Ra9” was carved on the foundation of the monument. He would cover his eyes, silent, recalling…

But Antinous appeared after the emperor's meeting with Marcus. First, there was Marcus.

The boy was six years old when, in between his far and long journeys, Hadrian saw him. A small, thin, big eyed boy, dressed in a white tunic.

Nearby stood his mother, Domitia Lucilla—a venerable Roman matron, who lost her husband early and did not remarry. She owned a large brick factory on the outskirts of Rome. His great-grandfather, Catilius Severus Regin, a well-known senator who held an important position as prefect of Rome, was also there.

They wanted the emperor to distinguish him, because Marcus was, after all, a distant relative of Caesar through Sabine. Hadrian was then in a good mood without the whims and irritations that had become commonplace in recent times, without a shadow of melancholic sadness at the sight of someone else's youth, which seemed irretrievably lost by himself. And he didn't resist. Distinguish little Verus? Why not!

Hadrian gave him a white rider toga10 with a narrow red stripe and a ring that the boy could not yet wear on his finger because of its large size. This did not seem surprising because there were other boys of tender age, who were already distinguished by emperors. Another mercy aroused surprise—Hadrian the next year introduced Marcus to the priestly college of the Salii,11 these jumpers, keeping the morale in the people. There were twelve of them, and they worshipped Mars, a god who, for the Romans who were used to fighting, was not the last in the divine pantheon.

Probably, the tedious rites associated with walking the streets, dancing, shouting, the noise of the city crowd, did not fit at all for a seven-year-old boy. And yet the boy was given a great honor, about which he did not suspect and did not fully understand its meaning, but his loved ones knew and understood—venerable mother and stern great-grandfather.

Then, another close emperor, his secretary, Gaius Avidius Heliodorus, a Syrian-born man from the city of Kirra, a swarthy man with almond-shaped brown eyes, sympathetically told Hadrian how he watched a strange procession on one of the streets of the city: eleven adult men and a boy walking nearby.

“He was serious, this little Marcus,” Heliodorus said, bowing respectfully before Caesar. “He was walking with a tense frown, as he held a shield in his left hand, and in his right a little twig. Of course, the shield was smaller, not like that of grown men—it was made special—but he faithfully beat it with a wooden stick, and also sang along with all the old battle songs “Help, Lara, us!” and “Be enough, evil Mars!”

“Well, you heard them,” he added.

Tricky Heliodorus did not explain that the meaning of these songs no one remembered, and because of the outsider's eye they seemed a set of incoherent sounds. But Marcus, as the attentive secretary noted, had a good memory, and he confidently sang along with his ringing boyish voice, focused on jumping in the streets to the cheerful and loud cries of the priests.

An integral part of the ritual was the evening meal, accompanied by libations, with loud cries of diverging priests. It was said that Emperor Claudius had somehow specially dressed as a Salii to participate in such drinking in the temple of Mars on Palatine Hill.

The Salii feasted widely, on a grand scale. It used to be the case, and so it was under Marcus. The boy did not seem surprised, as if he had gotten used to the ugly antics of drunken priests from the cradle.

One of the priests, a certain Victor Galerius Fabian, fell under the table, and could hardly be hoisted into place by his fellow feasters. Hadrian knew about this case from the frumentarii12 who reported all the incidents in the empire. He asked, smiling affectionately in a beard that had not yet grayed:

“What did you see, little Verus?”

And Marcus unsophisticated told the emperor about these feasts. Hadrian looked intently into the boy's lively eyes, which did not lie, he saw it, and he liked the honesty of little Annius. That's probably why he nicknamed him “Verissimus.”13

However, this acquaintance with the promising little rider was interrupted for a long time—the emperor was delayed by other countries, distant cities, strangers, and new impressions.

Hadrian, of course, heard a variety of rumors, gossip from Rome, including about Marcus Verus. All the same Heliodorus told how the young Marcus, along with other priests, threw wreaths on a pillow with the image of Mars, and if the priests' wreaths fell somewhere, then Marcus definitely fell on the head of the war god.

“Perhaps our priests' hands were shaking after the wine was drunk,” the emperor observed sarcastically.

But this event once again confirmed Hadrian's conviction in the benefits of horoscopes—because the horoscope left no doubt about the purpose of Marcus, he was expected to be granted honorable and important appointments, and, of course, the highest office in Rome.

“So, the gods favor our Marcus, our Verissimus?” Hadrian asked, stroking the silky skin of the greyhound he had taken with him to hunt. They were in Greece, near Athens. From the imperial palace the rocky bare mountains could be seen, the tops of which clung to lonely clouds.

“Yes, Emperor!” Heliodorus nodded his head. “Everyone took what had happened as a sign sent by the gods.”

“Perhaps, perhaps!” Hadrian muttered thoughtfully, and then quoted with pathos, “The throne and the power over the country are set by this fortune-teller.”14

He cast a fleeting glance at the secretary.

Heliodorus drew his attention to his face, smiled encouragingly, and knowing Hadrian's vanity, decided to play along.

“Caesar, these lines from Virgil?

“No, Heliodorus. How can you not study Annius, his Annales? Every citizen of Rome should know the poem by heart. It is about the iron character of the Romans and their indestructible greatness. Today, call reader Philip! In the evening I intend to listen to an excerpt about the dispute with King Pyrrhus, in which the speech of Appius Claudius the Blind is heard. It is there in those verses,” he said. “You can join in.”

“I'll take it for honor, Caesar!”

“Let you know that I put Ennius above Virgil, who also has talent, but is undisputed, for Virgil took a lot from Annius, his style, his expressions, his words. And Ennius plays “The Abduction of the Sabines”? That's what happens when a man is guided by a great genius.”15

The emperor spoke with enthusiasm. The red toga slid off his shoulder, and the edge of the white tunic appeared, on which the attentive secretary saw a drop of dried blood. Only yesterday there was a lot of bleeding coming from Hadrian's nose, which could hardly be stopped, but today he felt noticeably better. The bleeding frightened him, and over time only intensified.

Returning in the spring in Tibur, Hadrian seriously thought about a successor. It was necessary to rush with this because the bleeding did not stop.

And yet… the horoscope said one thing, but Hadrian's will could do another thing, he was very conceited, proud, and if the horoscope said “yes,” he could say no, not caring about the planetary prophecies, the opinions of the priests or those of the boy's relatives.

Oddly enough, he often wanted to go against the horoscope or general judgments to show everyone that nothing is just given. Let them suffer, let them doubt their hopes, because when they do not come true, they beat more painfully on the heart than direct deception. He, although he leaves a bitter residue in the soul, but not so destructive.

Here, for example, Sabina expected something completely different from him, but her expectations did not materialize, and she was showered in her eyes, as old buildings were crumbled from time to time. Apparently, because the wrinkles crossed her face, it seemed to Hadrian an ugly crack on the old walls. It jarred him, a lover of all graceful things, for old age is ugly in all manifestations.

Now Hadrian himself decided on whether to appoint Marcus Annius Verus as his heir or not. Behind him was the final word, as for the formidable and all-seeing Jupiter. In fact, he, Hadrian, was a god still living among the living. But one day his time would come and then his soul from the flames of the funeral fire would soar to the sky with the freedom of an eagle.16