John Roberts - The Princess and the Pirates

The next morning I went about in a daze. The dream did not fade from memory as most of mine do but rather stayed sharp in all its details, and I had no doubt that it was a vision of utmost significance. But what did it mean? There are those who interpret dreams as a profession, but I had always doubted their gifts. In any case I felt that the goddess had not spoken to me in riddles, but rather had shown me some real thing, though whether this was a reflection of the present or a prophecy of the future I did not know.

Leaving Hermes in the house to relay any messages from the naval base, I walked out into the town. The hour was early, but already it was abuzz with news of the murder. People eyed me warily, perhaps expecting some sort of violent vengeance from Rome, but I paid them no attention. For once my political and street senses were in abeyance. I had my mind on higher matters. Almost without conscious volition, my steps took me back to the Temple of Aphrodite.

“Senator!” The priestess lone regarded me with some surprise. “You are back so soon?” She was supervising a bevy of her ever-charming acolytes who were hanging enormous, colorful wreaths all over the temple and its grounds.

“I hate to bother you when you are so busy preparing for the festival,” I said to her. “But last night I believe your goddess sent me a vision.” I added hastily, “Please, I am not the sort of person who has visions all the time. Quite the contrary in fact. That is why I hope you might be able to help me.”

“Surely,” she said, as if this were the sort of request she received every day. Maybe it was. She issued instructions to the white-robed women and asked me to accompany her. We went to a secluded part of the garden surrounded by a high hedge, its open side over looking the sea. I sat beside her on a marble bench supported by carved dolphins and told her of my dream. She followed this recitation with a look of deep seriousness, saying nothing until I was finished.

“This is most unusual,” she said, when I was done. “Aphrodite very often appears in dreams. Most often it is because the dreamers are troubled in matters of love or fearful of barrenness or the dangers of childbirth. She has dominion over all these things. Here on Cyprus and some of the other islands she guides the thoughts and decisions of seafarers as well. What you saw in your dream is most uncharacteristic.”

“Then perhaps it was merely a reflection of my own worries and the goddess had nothing to do with it,” I said, almost relieved.

“No, what you saw was a true vision. I know this. Her appeararance as sea foam means she was Aphrodite of Paphos and no other.”

“But what can it mean?”

“Do you have your purse with you, Senator?” she asked.

“I do.”

“Then take out the smallest coin you have.”

Mystified, I took the marsupium from beneath my tunic and rummaged through it. I drew forth a copper coin, the smallest minted in Rome. It bore the image of an augur from a previous generation, indifferently struck. I handed it to her, and she weighed it in her palm.

“What do you call the metal this coin is made of?”

“The Latin word is aes, ” I answered.

“And what is it called in Greek?”

I thought for a moment. “Kyprios. ” Then I made the connection. “It means ‘Cyprian,’ doesn’t it?” And then it struck me that, in poems, Aphrodite is often called “the Cyprian.”

“Exactly. Copper has been mined on this island since the days of the pharaohs. The copper mines of Cyprus have been the wealth of the island, as the silver mines of Laurium were the wealth of Athens. What the goddess showed you in your dream is the result of more than two thousand years of copper mining. The land is ravaged, its soil destroyed by digging and erosion, its timber harvested for wood to smelt the ore.”

“How much of the island is ruined?” I asked her.

“Most of it,” she said sadly. “What seems so fair from offshore is a wasteland just a short walk inland. This island has enriched pharaohs and Great Kings and Macedonian conquerors and now, it seems, it is to enrich Rome. But I do not think that if Aphrodite were to choose a home now, she would pick Cyprus.”

I was shocked and saddened. If there is one thing that is sure to enrage an Italian, it is the destruction of productive land. We treat other people with great brutality at times, but we always respect and honor land. At heart we are all still small landholders, tending our few acres of field and orchard.

“Why did she reveal this to me?” I asked. “Surely there is nothing I can do about the ruination of her home.”

“Someday you may be able to,” she said. You are Roman, of a great family, and destined to hold high office. People say that Romans can do anything-that you divert rivers to serve your purposes, drain swamps to make new farmland, create harbors where there is only exposed shoreline. Perhaps such a people can restore Cyprus to the garden it once was.”

“We admit to few limitations,” I agreed. “It would be an intriguing project.” I would never admit to her that anything lay beyond the powers of Roman genius. “When I return to Rome I will speak to the College of Pontifices. Caesar is Pontifex Maximus, and he is fond of undertaking projects in the name of Venus, since she is the ancestress of his house. Venus, or Aphrodite, was the mother of the Trojan hero Aeneas, who fled the burning city and settled in Italy. The Julian gens trace their descent from his son, Julus.”

“I see. He is busy in Gaul, is he not?”

“Yes, but soon he will return to Rome. He will be incomparably rich and ready to undertake all sorts of extravagant things. That is his style. My wife is his niece.”

“Ah, then there was good reason for Aphrodite to make her wishes known to you. Rome is the new master of Cyprus, you have a great future ahead of you as a Roman statesman, and you are related by marriage to the most glorious Roman of the age, who, it seems, is her many times great grandchild.”

It always annoyed me when people spoke as if Caesar were the greatest man in Rome, but that was how he publicized himself so I suppose it was excusable.

I took my leave of lone with many thanks and a gift for the temple. I fully intended to carry out my promise to approach the pontifices, whose pronouncements the Senate would follow, as soon as I returned to Rome.

It is not every day a goddess visits you and makes her wishes known.

By mid afternoon the town was in full uproar for Silvanus’s funeral. The house slaves were out in the plaza between the governor’s mansion and the Temple of Poseidon, wailing fit to terrify an invading army. With military thoroughness, Gabinius had organized the whole affair. Carpenters were hammering away, erecting temporary stands for the local notables, men were roping off an area for the common spectators, women were bringing in heaps of flowers, and a funeral pyre of expensive, fragrant woods was being stacked in the center of the open area.

I thought it was clever of Gabinius to make such a show of it. Surely, whatever the state of anti-Roman sentiment, nobody would start a riot amid such solemnities. Everyone loves a good funeral. Just in case, though, Gabinius’s hard-bitten veterans were everywhere to be seen. I even spotted a few on the roof of the temple. It pays to be cautious, but I couldn’t catch even the sound of anti-Roman grumbling, and I’ve been in enough newly conquered cities to develop sharp ears for that sort of talk.

Seeing that everything appeared well in hand, I walked down to the market. The place was as busy as always and there was lively conversation about the demise of Silvanus, but the mood was not ugly and nobody cast evil looks in my direction.