Caprius: Roman Slave Boy

Caprius woke up with a jolt. The sun was already up and he had to milk the goats so his master's family could have milk for meals. Naprena, the cook, also liked to use a little milk in the flat bread she made for breakfast. After he had milked each nanny, he would feed her a little oats. Sometimes the younger milking nannies attempting to get to their oats faster would kick at the milking bucket. Caprius would quit milking her, chasing her away, selecting another goat to milk. He would come back later to finish the impatient one.

Naprena said, "It is such a fine day today, I almost feel like singing!" as she took the milk from Caprius.

Caprius would have to wait to eat until the master's family had eaten; then he, along with the rest of the household staff, could eat whatever was left. Of course, Naprena would always cook plenty for all. After Caprius cleaned the goat sheds, it would be time to eat.

Their master was a Roman senator. He was leaving for Rome that day.

Aulus, the butcher and head gardener, said to Caprius, "When you take the goats out today, leave two young bucks to be butchered. The master is going to need meat on his trip. And leave Gertell, the old nanny. She's getting lame, and I have to make up some sausage."

"Come on, Decima," Caprius said to his Great Pyrenees dog. Decima had been the tenth in a litter of pups of a neighbor's dog. They drove the goats up the high hills surrounding the villa, taking along some cheese and left over flat bread from breakfast to eat for lunch. After getting the herd up there, he would sit on a large rock, watching the steam rising from Mount Vesuvius twenty or thirty miles to the south. Occasionally he would feel the Earth tremors; often there would be lightning storms over the mountain. Aulus had told him one time that the lightning was Jupiter, and the Earth rumblings were from his wife, Juno, throwing things at him.

Decima would lay by the same rock, but watched the flock, occasionally racing after a goat that was wondering too far from the rest. When the sun got near to the top of the sky, Caprius opened his goatskin lunch bag. Inside the bag were some cheese, flat bread, some goat meat, and a meaty goat thighbone for Decima. After lunch, he watched an eagle, a sacred animal of Jupiter, hunting for mice or other little critters. The eagle would coast along thermal updrafts going for miles without a beat of its wings, slipping off the updraft to drift back down the slope for a while, then inch back into the updraft again to come back up the mountain.

When the sun got near the horizon, the goats started heading back down the path. Decima tightened up the herd, pushing those not quite ready to go. Caprius picked up his lunch bag and walking staff, and followed them all down.

When they got back to the villa, it was all lit up.

"I wonder what is going on, Decima," he said to the dog, "The place looks as if there were a festival going on."

As soon as she saw him, Naprena exclaimed obviously shaken, "Oh, Caprius! Oh Caprius! They were killed!"

Sobbingly, Naprena told him how they were met by highwaymen, and were killed by them, just before they got to the Appian Way. She explained that the senator's wife had decided to go along at the last minute to do some shopping in Rome.

"I don't know what is going to happen to us. I guess we will just have to wait until the son comes down from Rome. He never was very interested in this place after he grew up. He just wanted to go to Rome, living the life of the idle rich. Of course, maybe he will change his mind with this new situation. It is hard to tell. Oh, I just don't know what is going to happen to us at all."

"Calm down, Naprena," Aulus said, "We will find out soon enough. I am sure they will abide by mos maiorun, in other words the custom of our ancestors. I have already hired someone to get a troupe of professional mourners, and he will have portrait masks made of the most notable ancestors of our master. I have also contracted someone to build a crematorium, and to build a suitable monument for them. I am having 'non fui, non sum, non curo' engraved on it."

"A wreath!" said Caprius, "The master should have a wreath! He earned one when he fought in the wars."

"Yes, Caprius," said Aulus, "I already have one ready for him. Another senator is going to give the eulogy, and we have musicians singing the neniae. I also need you to bring up the biggest breeding buck and nanny to sacrifice. They will become a feast for Charon, the ferryman, to take him across the river of death."

The next morning a messenger from Rome came. The master's son was not going to come.

"This is unheard of," Naprena said, "I just don't know what is going to happen with us now. I just don't know."

The messenger from Rome said, "The property has been sold, the livestock and slaves are to be taken to Rome to sell also."

The funeral and cremation took place that day. A man came taking the goats, and much of the farm equipment. The next few days there was a procession of people taking many items from the house. They all presented Aulus with proof of sale bills.

On the fourth day, several large caged wagons arrived along with many armed guards. They collected any documentation that Aulus had, tying his hands behind him, throwing him into one of the cages. They rounded up the household slaves putting them all into the cages. They were efficient but rough. They would not break any bones, or even skin, since that would reduce the value of the slaves. One of the slaves tried to run away. They quickly ran him down; the boss of that crew was on horseback ready to run him over, if necessary. They bound and gagged him, throwing him face down into a cage.

None of the slaves had ever been to Rome before. Aulus had been to Naples once with the master, but that was many years before, and it was only a small fishing village at that time. Naprena often bought food and sometimes other goods not produced on the estate, but it was only a day market much like a farmer's market. Caprius could not believe his eyes when they got to Rome. So many people, so many horses, carts, wagons, so many buildings, and they were so big.

They came to a large gate, stopping long enough for the gate to open, the procession of wagon cages then entered a compound, the gate closing after them. They were released from there cages and told to strip naked, the one that was bound and gagged was thrown to the ground, and a knife was used to cut off all of his clothes. Guards drove them into a deep pool of water. On the far side were men that pushed their heads under the surface. The water reeked of a disinfectant to kill any lice or fleas, on the other side guards split them up, directing them to different holding cells.

Night came and Caprius was alone in his cell, but it was noisy in the building; many cells had a number of people. In the morning, a guard took Caprius out of his cell, leading him to a room that had clothes for him to wear. Caprius tried to talk to the guard, but he just grunted, pointed to his mouth: His tongue had been cut out. He pointed to his ears. Then he waved his open hand back and forth.

After Caprius put on a toga, the guard straighten it out, and led him to another room, leaving him alone with very corpulent man sitting behind a table. The man was chewing on a quite meaty bone, but in a meticulous way. He wiped off his mouth several times between each bite.

"Yes," he said after several minutes, "I believe you will do very nicely. Consul Gaius Marius, now allows ordinary citizens to become solders. Not only that, but when he watches the games at the amphitheater, he sometimes frees a combatant if they will join the army. Not only that, but he rewards me very nicely as well. I am going to feature you, and you will kill your opponent. Do not worry, he will be an old man, but dressed up to look like a barbarian from north of the Rhine river."

"You will kill him, and do it quickly; or I will have you pulled behind racing chariots until you are quite dead. Perceptum?"

Caprius shook his head yes. The man took a staff off the table, and banged it on the floor twice. Someone came into the room immediately. "This is Fabianus. He will be your trainer for the next few weeks. Listen well to him."

As they walked to the training quarters, Fabianus said, "You are a special case. I have never been in that office before. I believe that it is because you resemble the statue of one of the gods; but in the arena, it will not help you at all. You will have to fight and kill, or you, yourself, will be killed. If you are killed, they may well put me back out there, and I sure do not want that."

He got first class food and lots of sleep in the next few weeks. He learned defensive moves and how to avoid sneak attracts. He spent many hours doing calisthenics: push-ups, pull-ups, jumping jacks and other exercises. He learned to wear heavy armor and helmets of various kinds. He learned many different fighting techniques from others that had fought in the arena many times. They were instructed to teach him everything they knew, but to not kill him or even seriously injure him. He, on the other hand, learned how to kill someone in the heat of the battle. They put many condemned people in to battle him, people not trained to kill. The killing bothered him at first, but after a dozen or so, he got over much of it. After six weeks, they deemed him ready.

"You will be the last event of the day at the circus," Fabianus declared, "You will get nothing to eat, but will have a good drink of wine before you go out. Your opponent will be weak, old, and untrained, but you have to make the fight look good. Play with him for a while, then kill him quickly."

Caprius watched most of the games from a gate into the circus arena. Shortly before his event he was whisked away to get ready. He put on his armor. He was given a larger than normal sword in one hand and a chain flail in the other, without any shield or any helmet. Every other combatant that day had some sort of shield and some sort of helmet. It would make Caprius stand out, emphasizing his presence to the Consul Marius.

Caprius went out one gate, his opponent out another. They both stood in front of Consul Marius, with their weapons up to salute him. Consul Marius gave the signal for them to fight. The two combatants circled around each other twice. Then the old man-made a swing of his weapon, so close that Caprius felt the wind on his cheek. The old man defended against the attacks that Caprius made. The attacks became more aggressive, the old man keeping up, finally knocking his chain flail out of his hands.

"This man knows how to fight," thought Caprius, "They put him out here not knowing this at all."

Caprius, now angered, became more vicious, the old man tiring, swung his sword around, slicing off the head of the old man, and then he plunged the sword through old man's chest, and into the ground, his body still trying to jump around.

Caprius stood up, looking at where Consul Marius sat. The Consul looked back, not moving.

"Well, what is it going to be?" thought Caprius, "Are you going to put your thumbs up or down? Are you going to free me to go into the legion, or are you going to have me die here, today?"

Caprius just stood there, the consul just sat there seemingly forever.