György Spiró - Captivity

“When the Druseion was opened,” said Matthew, “Herod the Great tried to persuade Augustus to make the trip here, but all to no avail.”

“It’s also worth having a look at what’s belowground,” said Plotius. “The sewers are so wide and tall, and the chambers that have been fashioned within them are so big that one could hold banquets in them when the tide is out. They have been built in parallel with an interconnecting cross-passage so that rainwater and sewage can flow easily; the sea comes in at high water and on the ebb all the filth is washed away. There is no need for power to clean it.

Alexandros displayed a lively interest in the sewage canals; he wished to see them if that were possible.

Plotius told them that the Romans had completed the system, doubling the width of a section of the aqueduct constructed by Herod because the population had grown and there was a growing demand for water. The seven-mile aqueduct was an incredible engineering feat; it rested on arches that were something like five hundred feet high, and at one place a tunnel bored through a hill and into the city. Over the entire seven miles from spring to city, unobservable to the eye, it sloped slightly downward, without a single hitch; it could hardly be believed that Herod had been able to get this constructed in the first place, and that the Romans were later able to double its capacity, also without a hitch.

Uri noted that when it came down to it, in the end, all aqueducts worked on the same principle, and there were some in Rome that ran even higher aboveground.

“Sure,” Plotius retorted angrily, “but those were not built in the lethargic and imprecise East!”

A devil got into Uri:

“But the pyramids are said to be incredibly precise in their construction. Doesn’t Egypt count as the East?”

Plotius waved that aside in annoyance.

Just opposite the harbor entrance, and thus at its southernmost point, at the foot of the stadium, there was an enormous theater that opened northward, toward the sea, Matthew said, and from its highest point it was possible to see a long way, so there was no barge that would not be spotted from at least twenty or thirty stadia away. It held fifteen thousand people. Pilate had recently replaced its old plaster flooring with marble.

“That’s exactly how Ostia should be built,” Matthew sighed. “Herod the Great had the money; Augustus and Tiberius didn’t…”

“But Herod the Great murdered and robbed on an unimaginable scale,” Alexandros observed. “That is how he got the money. I have no wish for the Romans to get a splendid harbor at that sort of price.”

“All the same, it’s ridiculous,” said Matthew.

Uri did quietly wonder to himself whether Herod the Great had actually murdered any more than Tiberius was said to have. To start with, he had done his murdering through the Praetorian prefect Sejanus, then he had gotten a new Praetorian prefect, Macro, to murder Sejanus and his followers. It was said that Tiberius used force to induce the wealthy to draw up their last will and testament in his favor, so it was more than likely that he had enough money to build a harbor if he wanted.

Matthew outlined that he was putting his trust in Pilate receiving them in Herod’s palace; it might be a matter of luck, but Pilate had already received one delegation that he’d led some six years ago. He had rarely met a Roman who was more agreeable, polite, tactful, or knowledgeable about Jewish affairs, but the important thing was the palace: an immense and glittering building that stood at the southern end of the city on a promontory that ran into the sea, directly above it. It was 240 cubits in length by 130 in breadth, and in the middle it had a pool surrounded by splendid colonnades, one of the columns bearing the names of all the Roman prefects to date, in Greek as well as Latin, and a list of their merits. That was the residence of all the prefects, Pilate too, and he seldom went to Jerusalem; it was a truly marvelous building. It would be nice to see it again inside.

“Can boats be moored by the palace?” Alexandros inquired.

Matthew paused to think. He had not seen a boat over in that direction, but there seemed to be no reason why not. He looked at Alexandros with some amazement.

“Why? Do you want to deliver something directly to the palace?” he asked with a grin.

Alexandros shook his head; he was just interested.

“No doubt Herod sited his palace,” chipped in Plotius, “in a place that he would be able to escape from by ship, if need be, so as to avoid a possible naval blockade of the harbor.”

Uri did not understand what had put such a sharp edge to the tone of Plotius’s voice. Matthew must also have sensed something of the kind because he abandoned his attempt to sketch the history of the town and stared fixedly at the shore.

Uri was glad they had arrived, but he was unable to say goodbye to the dog. He searched and called, but Remus was nowhere to be seen; maybe he had hidden away somewhere in grief. Uri was astonished that he should almost come to crying over a dopey dog.

When they stepped from the gangplank to the shore, Matthew knelt and kissed the ground, which at this point was composed of slabs of marble. Uri hesitated but on seeing that the others did the same, he kneeled down likewise, though he did not kiss the slab, jut touched it with the tip of his nose. Hilarus and Alexandros shed tears, and even Valerius was moved, wiping his nose on his shawl.

A toll of six sesterces per head had to be paid to the Greek exciseman. Matthew had forewarned them that these were not like the Greeks in Italia, with whom it was possible to joke along; these Greeks hated Jews. It mattered not that Jews were multiplying faster than the Greeks; the city was still not truly theirs.

It was typical that the largest house of prayer stood on a plot of land belonging to a Greek merchant, who would not sell the plot. There was no way of compelling him to do so. It had not raised any problems, but whenever he was approached with a new proposal to sell it, he threatened instantly to build on the neighboring plots, because those also belonged to him, and he could block access to the house of prayer. The concept of easement was familiar enough in Caesarea and Judaea, but it was not exactly clear how large it should be; it would not be helpful if the Greek landowner left only an alleyway for the Jewish faithful.

“It’s Alexandria writ small,” Alexandros declared derisively, perhaps hinting at the Greco-Jewish rivalry there, but perhaps also because it was conspicuous how bereft the oversize harbor was of ships.

Plotius remarked that less than half the inhabitants of Alexandria were Jewish, so the comparison did not quite stand, to which Alexandros rejoined that if there were more Jews in Caesarea, then it was high time they forced the Greeks out, but Matthew held that to be foolish because the Greeks would take their revenge on all the Jewish minorities living in Syrian towns. Hilarus tried to put a stop to the senseless squabbling by repeating again and again that they had arrived, they had arrived.

Uri lazily wondered, as they walked over from the mole to the promenade fringed with all the grand buildings, what he would need to do to prevail on his companions to make the return leg of the trip via Alexandria. Maybe the ship would cost more, but it was a shorter route, so part of the extra expense could be recovered.

Caesarea was packed with magnificent buildings, vast palaces and villas, constructed in the finest of Greek styles — a miniature Rome with parks, a theater, a stadium, baths. The town’s location was favorable, and over the city rose a mountainside dotted with attractive big buildings. The harbor surpassed that of Syracusa — smaller perhaps, but orderly and clean. Well-tended date palms and cypresses, planted and pruned to uniform shape, bordered the promenade, which also had a stretch on which lulav and etrog were being grown for Sukkot. Uri could scarcely believe his eyes; he peered, went closer, and stared until tears came. Up till then he had only seen a lulav, with its long, slender branches dense with small leaves, or etrog, with its fruits, in painted images or ritual carvings, placed next to a menorah or shofar. So these plants really did exist! On the fifth day after Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, on the fifteenth day of Tishri, comes the festival of thanksgiving, when the autumn harvest is celebrated in Palestine; then lulav branches and etrog lemons have to be taken into the Temple, traditionally, but not in the houses of prayer across the Diaspora, partly because they are not native elsewhere, but also because there is but one Temple, the one in Jerusalem. Word had it that only the Jews of Alexandria were unwilling to acknowledge this, and therefore they carried lulav branches and etrog lemons into their largest house of prayer, the Basilica.