Steven Saylor - A murder on the Appian way

"There were sceptics in the crowd. I suppose it is a rather incredible story."

"But it all sounds only too credible to us, eh, Eco?"

The next morning, Pompey's legislation to reform the law courts, proposed a month before, was officially voted on and approved by the Senate. Immediately, Appius Claudius brought formal charges against Milo, accusing him of the crime of political violence in the murder of their uncle. Under Pompey's new rules for the courts, each side was allowed ten days to prepare for the trial. Rome held its breath.

If convicted, Milo would be subject to immediate, permanent exile and the confiscation of almost all his possessions. He would be disgraced and dispossessed. He would be finished in Rome forever.

But what if he was absolved? I tried to imagine the reaction in the city. I could envision only endless flames, rubble and bloodshed. Could even Pompey with his troops contain such a whirlwind? Reason, morality and simple pragmatism argued that any verdict other than guilty was impossible, except…

Except that Milo had Cicero on his side. And as I had learned from long, sometimes bitter experience, with Cicero for the defence, anything was possible.

The trial of Titus Annius Milo began on the morning of the fourth day of the month of Aprilis, with the examination of witnesses in the courtyard of the Temple of Liberty. Presiding over the court from a raised tribunal was the former consul Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, a grim-jawed, humourless former consul hand-picked by Pompey himself and, purely as a formality, approved by a vote of the people's assembly. Testimony was given before a panel of 360 potential jurors who sat on raised benches on either side of the courtyard. This panel had been selected from a list of eligible senators and men of property drawn up by Pompey. Of these, eighty-one would ultimately be chosen by lot to make up the jury.

Milo and his advocates, Cicero and Marcus Claudius Marcellus, sat with their secretaries on benches feeing the tribunal, as did the prosecutors, Clodius's nephew Appius Claudius, Publius Valerius Nepos, and Marc Antony. Also present were numerous officers of the court, including a battery of secretaries to record the testimony in Tironian shorthand.

A huge crowd gathered at the open end of the courtyard to view the proceedings. Those with foresight sent slaves ahead to save places for them. Eco and I, with our long experience of trials, had managed to secure excellent seats in the tenth row; Davus and one of his fellow bodyguards had arrived well before dawn with our folding chairs, and dozed on them until we arrived. Latecomers without chairs crowded into every vacant nook and cranny and continually tried to push their way in from the Forum.

Pompey was not present. Nor were Pompey's soldiers, who seemed so omnipresent everywhere else in the city. Even Pompey would not

dare to post armed troops at a Roman trial. Surely they would not be needed; even the Clodians would not dare to disrupt a Roman trial. A political gathering was one thing. A public trial, the most sacred of Roman institutions, the cornerstone of Roman justice, was another matter.

The first witness to be called was Gaius Causinius Schola, one of the men who had accompanied Clodius on horseback that day on the Appian Way. He testified that Clodius's party had met and passed Milo's larger party close to the tenth hour of the day; that a scuffle had broken out among the rearguard of the two parties, for reasons he did not know, though he suspected that Milo's men had started it; that when Clodius turned and cast a dark look at Birria, the gladiator hurled a spear at Clodius and wounded him, knocking him from his horse. Fighting broke out, and Schola himself was knocked from his horse and driven into the woods by Milo's slaves. He remained in hiding until well after dark, then made his way to Clodius's villa, where he found that the place was in shambles and that the foreman and the tutor Halicor had been murdered. The next day he returned to Rome.

In essentials, Schola's story matched what I had learned from Felicia, though in the finer details he cast Clodius in an even more innocent light.

When the time for cross-examination arrived, a thrill of anticipation passed through the crowd as Milo, Cicero and Marcellus conferred. Milo and Cicero remained seated. Their colleague Marcellus stepped forward.

Someone in the crowd shouted, "Let's see Cicero!"

"No, let's see Milo — with his head on a stick!"

Marcellus ignored them. He was a seasoned orator, used to the give and take of debates in the Senate and catcalls from the rabble at trials. "So, Schola," he began, "you claim that the incident on the Appian Way occurred at the tenth hour of the day. And yet — "

There was an eruption of jeering from the crowd, drowning him out. Marcellus scowled and waited for the noise to subside, but as soon as he' opened his mouth again, the jeering recommenced, even louder. He opened his arms in an appeal to Domitius on the tribunal, then gave a start as a stone the size of a child's fist came hurtling through the air and struck him in the back. He whirled about and stared at the crowd with a look of utter shock on his face.

The mob, still screaming and jeering, began to rush towards the tribunal, pouring in along the sides of the seated crowd, knocking down bystanders and stampeding over broken folding chairs. Eco and I seemed to be safe enough, since we were seated near the centre of the seated spectators with plenty of occupied chairs all around us. Then a group of men came scrambling right through the midst of the seated crowd, stepping on people's laps and shoulders.

Domitius rose to his feet and shouted furiously at the prosecutors. They shrugged helplessly, making an elaborate mime of being unable to hear him and equally unable to do anything about the unruly crowd. The panel of potential jurors, men of substance who were not easily intimidated, shook their heads and looked thoroughly disgusted. Milo, Cicero and Marcellus, together with their secretaries, gathered up armfuls of scrolls and wax tablets and rushed to join Domitius on the tribunal. As the mob drew closer and showed no sign of stopping, Milo and his party retreated into the Temple of Liberty, leaving Domitius to stand with his hands on his hips, defying the mob to violate a sacred temple. But the mob seemed satisfied to have silenced Marcellus and driven Milo to flight. They occupied the tribunal and in a jubilant mood began to stamp their feet and recite lewd chants about Milo's wife Fausta. "When it became evident that order was not going to be restored, jurors and peaceful spectators who had not already fled began to disperse. Eventually there was a rumour that Pompey was coming with a troop of armed soldiers. This caused the mob to abandon the tribunal and scatter in all directions.

Thus ended the first day of Milo's trial.

The next day began much as the first, except that the room for spectators was more constricted, thanks to the soldiers who now flanked the courtyard on either side. At Domitius's insistence, Pompey had assigned troops to keep order during the trial. Roman justice would be carried out with the assistance of Roman steel

The hearing of witnesses resumed with the testimony of various persons from the vicinity of Bovillae, beginning with Felicia. Like an actor finally allowed to have a major role, she seemed determined to make the most of her time as a witness. She flashed her incongruous smile and projected her sultry demeanour while the advocates examined and cross-examined her; many of the spectators, meanwhile, seemed to be examining her in another way. The day was off to an appropriately bizarre beginning.

Her brother Felix testified next, about the comings and goings of the victims and their pursuers, including the bound prisoners, who were now known to be Philemon and his companions. Philemon himself testified, reiterating the story he had told at the contio. The wife of the slain innkeeper at Bovillae did not appear; she was still in seclusion down in Rhegium, I assumed. Her sister and brother-in-law, the current keepers of the inn, gave secondhand testimony about what the widow had told them and described the gory aftermath.