The October Horse: A Novel of Caesar and Cleopatra by Colleen McCullough
Elysian Fields Republican Romans had no real belief in the intact survival of the individual after death, though they did believe in an underworld peopled by “shades,” characterless and mindless effigies of the dead. The Elysian Fields contained the most virtuous shades, it seems because in them, a shade could relive human emotions and appetites after a meal of blood.
Epicure, Epicurean An adherent of the school of philosophy founded by the Greek Epicurus. He advocated a brand of hedonism so exquisitely refined that it approached asceticism on its left hand, so to speak. Aman’s pleasures had to be relished, strung out; any excess defeated the purpose.
Epirus That area of western Greece isolated from the mainstream of Greek culture by the Gulf of Corinth and the high mountains of central Greece. In Caesar’s time it was largely depopulated, and had become the fief of absentee Roman landlords who grazed cattle herds for hides, tallow and blood-and-bone fertilizer. It was a notoriously wet land, hence unsuitable for sheep.
epitome A synopsis or drastic abridgment of a long work that concentrated upon packing a maximum of information into a minimum number of words. Its purpose was to enable readers to gain encyclopedic knowledge without needing to plough through a full work. Brutus was well known as an epitomizer.
ethnarch A general term to indicate a magistrate of a Greek town or district.
Etruria The Latin name for what had once been the realm of the Etruscans. It incorporated the wide plains and hills of northwestern peninsular Italy from the course of the Tiber River to the course of the Arnus River. Modern Tuscany.
Euxine Sea The modern Black Sea.
Fannian paper Somewhere between 150 and 130 B.C., one Fannius, a Roman, took the worst grade of papyrus paper and subjected it to a treatment that turned it into paper as good as the best hieratical grade. Its cheapness put good paper within the economic reach of all literate persons.
fasces An inheritance from the Etruscans. The fasces were cylindrical bundles of red-dyed birch rods tightly bound together in a crisscross pattern by red leather thongs. Carried by men called lictors, they preceded a curule magistrate as indication of his imperium. Within the pomerium of Rome, only the rods (there were probably thirty per bundle, for the thirty curiae) were put into the bundle, but outside the pomerium a single-headed axe was inserted into the bundle to indicate that the magistrate not only had the power to chastise, but also to execute.
fellatio (and allied terms) Sucking the penis. He who was having his penis sucked was the irrumator. A fellator was male, a fellatrix female.
femina mentula A woman with a penis. A mortal insult.
feriae Holidays. Depending upon the actual gradation of holiday, public business tended to be suspended.
fiscus A purse or money bag. It referred to State moneys.
flamen A priest, but not a pontifex. There were three major flaminates: Dialis (Jupiter Optimus Maximus), Martialis (Mars), and Quirinalis (Quirinus). Martialis and Quirinalis were part-time positions, but the flamen Dialis was a full-time priest who was surrounded by taboos: he couldn’t wear knots, touch iron or other metal, eat leavened bread, witness death, encounter a dog, mount a horse, and many more. Not the right priesthood for Caesar, who held it from age thirteen until, at nineteen, Sulla assisted him in escaping it. The major flamines had to be patricians.
forum A Roman public meeting place.
Forum Boarium The meat markets.
Forum Holitorium The vegetable markets, located half inside the Servian Walls and half outside, on the banks of the Tiber near the Circus Flaminius.
Forum Julii Modern Fréjus, on the French Cote d’Azur.
Forum Julium Caesar’s new forum in Rome.
Forum Romanum The old, original forum of Rome, located just below the Capitol. It contained Rome’s most important public buildings, and was the political heart of the Republic.
freedman A manumitted slave. He was obligated to wear the cap of liberty, a skullcap. Though technically free (and, if his former master was a Roman, himself a Roman citizen), he remained in the patronage of his former master, and had little chance under the Republic’s timocratic electoral structure to exercise his vote in a tribal assembly, as he was automatically put into Esquilina or Suburana, two of the four urban tribes. However, if he qualified economically, as some freedmen did, he might rise high in the Classes.
Further SpainHispania Ulterior. The southwestern part of the Iberian peninsula, more fertile and prosperous than its Nearer neighbor. It was enormously rich in gold, silver, lead and iron.
Gades Modern Cádiz, in Spain.
Galatia An enclave of Gauls who settled in Anatolia in the grassy regions between Bithynia and the Halys River. Its ancient city, Ancyra, is now the Turkish capital, Ankara.
galbanum A resin obtained from the sap of Bubon galbanum, a Syrian plant. It was used in ancient medicine.
games In Latin, ludi. They began modestly under the Kings, but, by the time of the late Republic, had mushroomed into days-long celebrations. At first they consisted of chariot races, but came to include wild-beast hunts, athletic competitions, plays and mimes, pageants and parades. The most popular were the ludi Romani, held in September. They did not include gladiatorial combat. Free Roman citizen men and women were admitted, freedmen and non-citizens were disbarred. Women were allowed to sit with men in the circus, but not in the theaters.
garum A highly esteemed flavoring essence made from fish by a process guaranteed to make a modern man or woman ill. It stank!
Garumna River The Garonne, in France. Gaul, Gauls Any region inhabited by Celtic peoples was a Gaul. The adjective was Gallic.
gens A family. A man’s gentilicial name was his family’s name: in Caesar’s case, for instance, his gens was the gens Julia, hence his being described as a Julian.
gens humana The human family of all the world’s peoples.
Genua Modern Genoa, in Italy.
Gerrae! Utter rubbish, complete nonsense!
gig A two-wheeled vehicle drawn by between one and four mules, and usually not fully enclosed. It more likely had a leather top.
gladiator A soldier of the sawdust, a professional warrior who performed his trade for an audience as an entertainment. Inherited from the Etruscans, he always flourished throughout Italy, hired to perform at funeral games held in a town’s marketplace or forum, not in an amphitheater. His origins might be several: a deserter from the legions, a condemned criminal, a slave, or even a free man of a mind to fight as a gladiator. He lived in a school and was not locked up or locked in, or ill treated; expecting to make money from him, his owner was more likely to pamper him. Gladiators were not expected to fight to the death, and the Empire’s “thumbs down” verdict had not come into being. The Republican gladiator was a very profitable and attractive investment. Usually he fought for six years or thirty bouts, whichever came first; some became adulated stars. Once retired, he tended to hire himself out as a bully-boy or bouncer. Caesar owned thousands of these soldiers of the sawdust, basing them in schools around Capua or Ravenna, and hiring them out all over Italy.
Gracchi, the Tiberius and Gaius Sempronius Gracchus were high Roman nobles of eminent family; their mother was Scipio Africanus’s daughter, their father a censor as well as a consular. Both of them served under Scipio Aemilianus (q.v.), Tiberius in the Third Punic War, Gaius at Numantia; they were conspicuously brave.
Almost ten years older than Gaius, Tiberius was elected a tribune of the plebs in 133 B.C., and set out to right the wrongs the Senate was perpetrating against the poorer elements in the Roman citizen populace. Opposition was rife, and Tiberius committed the unpardonable sin of attempting to run for the tribunate of the plebs a second time. In a fracas on the Capitol, he was murdered.
Turmoil died down until his younger brother Gaius was elected a tribune of the plebs in 123 B.C. Gaius’s reforms were wider and of more significance for the poor, and met with even greater opposition from the conservative elements in the Senate. When he had not finished his
When he was defeated, he and his friend Marcus Fulvius Flaccus resorted to violence. The Senate’s response was to eschew the traditional resort to a dictator, and pass its first-ever Senatus Consultum Ultimum, or Ultimate Decree. Fulvius Flaccus and two of his sons were murdered, and Gaius Gracchus is said to have committed suicide.
The conservative elements in the Senate may have won, but the Romans themselves held that the Brothers Gracchi commenced the rot which eventuated in the death of the Republic.
The only direct descendant of the Gracchi was Fulvia, daughter of Gaius Gracchus’s only child, Sempronia. Significantly, she was the wife of three demagogues: Publius Clodius, Curio, Mark Antony.
grain dole It had long been the custom for famous Roman political men to win favor with the lower classes by subsidizing grain (wheat). In terms of votes they got little out of it except a reputation for philanthropy that stood them in good stead with the electors when it came to high office. (See tribe entry.) Philanthropy was thought admirable.
Then in 58 B.C. the tribune of the plebs Publius Clodius legislated a free grain dole providing 5 modii of free wheat per month to all Roman citizen men (a ration that enabled a family to bake one large loaf of bread per day). Clodius funded his program by annexing the island of Cyprus, hitherto a possession of the Ptolemies of Egypt. No means test was applied. However, when Caesar was Dictator he cut the free grain dole from 300,000 to 150,000 by introducing a means test.
Hades The name of the ruler of the underworld, and of his realm. It is not to be confused with Christian concepts of Hell.
Halys River The modern Kizil Irmak River of central Turkey.
Head Count In Latin, capite censi. These were the proletarii, the impoverished lowest stratum of Roman citizens; during a census they were simply counted off as heads, hence the name. They belonged to a tribe (usually one of the four urban tribes), but did not qualify for the Classes. Gaius Marius (q.v.) opened the army to them as a career.
Hector The son of Priam, King of Troy (Ilium), who led the Trojans against Agamemnon and the Greeks until he fell in battle to Achilles. His wife was Andromache, his son Astyanax.
Hellenization A term used to describe the Greek cultural influences at work on the ancient world of the Mediterranean and Asia Minor after the conquests of Alexander the Great.
Hellespont The modern Dardanelles, the straits between the Aegean Sea and the Sea of Marmara, gateway to the Black Sea.
hermed A pedestal adorned with male genitalia was “hermed.”
Homer By tradition, a blind Greek poet from the Aegean coast of Asia Minor who wrote the Iliad and the Odyssey, the two most admired, famed and loved epic poems of all antiquity.
hostis Enemy. The term levied upon a man declared an enemy of the Roman State. It stripped him of his citizenship and property, and usually also of his life, rendering him nefas, sacrilegious.
hydromel A solution of honey and water.
Iberus River The Ebro, in Spain.
Ichor The fluid which coursed through the veins of a god or goddess. It was not blood.
Ides One of the three enumerated dates in the Roman month. It fell on the thirteenth of January, February, April, June, Sextilis (August), September, November and December. In March, May, Quinctilis (July) and October, it fell on the fifteenth.
Ilium The Roman name for Troy.
Illyricum The wild and mountainous lands on the eastern side of the upper Adriatic Sea. They included Istria and Dalmatia.
imperator Properly, the commander or general of a Roman army. Gradually the term came to be given only to a general who won a great victory; in order to be awarded a triumph by the Senate, he had to have been hailed “imperator on the field” by his army. It is, of course, the origin of the word “emperor.”
imperium This was the degree of authority vested in a curule magistrate or promagistrate. Having imperium meant that a man had the authority of his office, and could not be gainsaid within the parameters of his office. It was conferred by a lex curiata (q.v.), and lasted for one year unless specifically legislated for longer. The number of lictors indicated the degree of imperium.
imperium maius Unlimited imperium. Its holder’s level of imperium was so high that he outranked even the consuls of the year. Until the time of Pompey the Great, it was relatively rare. After him, everyone tried to get in on the act.
in absentia In absence. As used in this book, a candidate for electoral office who stood (or tried to stand) for that office without crossing the pomerium into Rome to declare his candidacy.
ineptes Fools, idiots, incompetents.
infra dignitatem Beneath one’s notice.
in loco parentis Having the authority of a parent at law.
inimicus Unfriendly, an opponent.
insula An island. It was also the name given to tall apartment buildings, as they were surrounded by lanes or alleys on all sides.
in suo anno “In his year.” Used to describe the man who had been elected to magisterial office at the correct age.
Isis The Egyptian goddess. But also, a Hellenized deity. In Rome she was worshiped principally by Greek freedmen, of whom there were many, many thousands. As her rites were flagellatory, most Romans found Isis and her worship highly offensive.
Italian Gaul Italy north of the Arnus and Rubicon Rivers, bounded on its north, east and west by the Alps. Its proper Latin name was Gallia Cisalpina-“Gaul on this side of the Alps”-and its peoples were considered by the Romans as inferiors, Gauls.
Italy, Italia The peninsula south of the Arnus and Rubicon Rivers.
iugerum, iugera The Roman unit of land measurement. In modern terms, one iugerum was 0.623 (or five-eighths) of an acre, or 0.252 (one-quarter) of a hectare.
Kalends One of the three enumerated dates in a Roman month. It was always the first day of the month.
knights The Ordo Equester, or First Class of Roman citizens. In the days of the Kings of Rome and the early Republic, these men had formed the cavalry in a Roman army. By late Republican times, the word “knight” indicated his economic, therefore social, status.
Lares Permarini Lares were numinous gods of purely Roman origin who peopled all spheres of Roman existence, from household safety and crossroads to boundary stones. The Lares Permarini were the forces, indefinite in number, which protected the Roman voyager from the perils of the high seas and the deeps.
laserpicium A substance obtained from a north African plant, silphium; it was used as a digestive to relieve over-indulgence.
latifundium, latifundia A latifundium was a large tract of public land leased by one person and run in the manner of a modern ranch. The activity was pastoral rather than agricultural.
Latium The Roman homeland. Its northern boundary was the river Tiber, its southern a line running inland from Tarracina; on the east it merged into the mountains of Samnium.
lectus A couch. A dining room usually had three couches, the lectus summus, lectus medius and lectus imus, forming a U.
legateLegatus. The most senior members of a general’s staff. In order to qualify as a legate, a man had to be of full senatorial rank. Legates answered only to the general, and often held imperium.
legion The smallest unit in a Roman army capable of fighting a war on its own; that is, it was complete within itself in terms of manpower, equipment and function. A legion at full strength contained 4,800 soldiers divided into ten cohorts of six centuries each; it also contained 1,200 noncombatant citizens, as well as artificers and a unit of artillery.
lemur, lemures Creatures from the underworld, shades.
lex, leges A law, laws.
leges Clodiae There were many, but the ones relevant to this book were passed by Publius Clodius in 58 B.C. to regulate the religious activities of consuls, other magistrates, and the Assemblies.
lex curiata A law passed in the special Assembly of the thirty curiae that endowed a c
lex Genucia A law passed in 342 B.C. that stipulated that a period of ten years must elapse between a man’s first and second tenure of the same office.
lex Voconia de mulierum hereditatibus Passed in 169 B.C., it severely curtailed the right of a woman to inherit from a will.
Liguria The mountainous region lying between Genua and Roman Gaul across the Alps, and extending inland as far as the crest of the Maritime Alps. A poor area, it was chiefly famous for its greasy wool, which made splendid waterproof outerwear, and felt.
lingua mundi A language common to all the peoples of the world. In this era, Greek. Later, Latin.
litter A covered cubicle that had poles projecting forward and backward from it on either side, enabling it to be carried by a team of men, usually six or eight in number; some litters were suspended between docile mules. It was a very slow form of transport, but the most comfortable known to the ancient world, as carriages possessed no springs.
locus consularis The place of honor at dinner. It was the right-hand end of the host’s middle couch, to the host’s right.
Long-haired Gaul In Latin, Gallia Comata. Rome had held Gaul across the Alps around the lower course of the Rhodanus River (the Rhone) for many years, and called it The Province. Gaul beyond the limits of The Province was Long-haired Gaul, a vast region inhabited by “uncivilized” tribes which were divided into Celtae and Belgae. They wore their hair long, and stiffened it with limey clay, hence the name. These peoples possessed no uniting national spirit, were Druidic in worship, and wanted no truck with any people from around Our Sea. Then Caesar, in an eight-year war, forced the Long-haired Gauls to submit to Rome and accept its ongoing presence. Long-haired Gaul extended from the Rhenus (Rhine) to the Pyrenees, and from the Atlantic to the Rhodanus.
ludi The games (see that entry).
Lugdunum Modern Lyons, in France.
Lusitani The Celtiberian peoples of western Spain.
Macedonia In Caesar’s day, much larger than at present. On the Adriatic, it went from the town of Lissus south to Epirus; here its two main settlements were the ports of Dyrrachium and Apollonia. It then continued east across the mountains of Candavia, in which arose the Morava, the Axius, the Strymon and the Nestus Rivers. It ended at the Strymon. On its north lay Illyricum and Moesia. On its south lay Greece. Its indigenes were probably Germano-Celtic; successive invasions mixed this original people with others of Dorian Greek, Thracian and Illyrian elements.