Herod from Hell

Brutus’ forces had successfully invaded the camp of Octavian, who barely escaped with his life. His fevered body was literally dragged to safety by his troops. They stood as a phalanx around the young prince until reinforcements arrived. That night, things went from bad to worse for Antony and Octavian. Word arrived that the republicans had scored a naval victory over Antony and Octavian’s ships at sea. They had to keep that news from Brutus and Cassius at all costs. It would have been an incredible morale boost for their troops. That is how the first day ended. The second and decisive day of battle was marked by confusion and tragedy. After his retreat, Cassius could not live with himself. He was a more experienced general than Brutus, and yet, Brutus had proven more successful. As part of Antony’s army chased Cassius further back and away from Brutus, Cassius committed suicide. Antony turned his attention to Brutus and with a united army began to push Brutus’ forces backwards toward a wooded area. Brutus fled into the forest which was surrounded by Antony’s men by night fall. When the forest was set on fire, Brutus realized that all was lost, stole the sword of one of his men and followed Cassius’ example. Having recovered from his illness, Octavian arrived too late to share in the victory, which was just fine with Antony. The senior general tried to respect the body of Brutus, but Octavian, perhaps out frustration, ordered that it be decapitated and the head carried back to Rome and placed at the feet of a statue of Caesar. The one thing that Antony and Octavian agreed upon was that the Republic was as dead as Brutus. However, Antony failed to seize the initiative. Perhaps he was lulled into a sense of over-confidence because of Octavian’s sickly nature. Perhaps he wanted to have a good time. In any case, he traveled to the East instead of home to Rome. This miscalculation was immense in the history of the empire. It gave Octavian time to consolidate his position in Italy, rationalize his behavior at Philippi, and intimidate the third and oldest member of the Triumvirate, Lepidus. Octavian forced Lepidus to give up Hispania, not a small chunk of change at the time since silver and gold flowed from its mines. Lepidus was given an honorary title and retired to his villa. As Octavian continued to aggregate power, Antony secured the Asian territories. I had first met him as a child because he had befriended my father and then later used him as an ally. Now I was forced to appear before Antony in embarrassment because of my support for Cassius. Ever worse delegations of Jewish leaders went to Antony to file complaints against me. In 41 B.C., I found myself before the great man in Bithynia. I was exonerated only after I paid him a bribe. However, during my hearing, I sensed sensitivity in Marc Antony that surprised me. I had to defend myself again in Daphne near Antioch a few months later and decided to push toward friendship with Antony. I found him in a very good mood, having just arrived from the nearby Cydnus River, the location of his first assignation with Cleopatra. At the end of my hearing, he ruled in my favor and gave me a wink. I had to defend myself for a third time in Tyre, where a very large contingent of Jews accused me of sedition and treason. Before we were half through their testimony, Antony broke in and told them he did not believe them. They left in anger. In private Antony asked me, “What have you done to so piss off these damn priests?” “I am not a Jew,” I told him. “Well, do something about it. You are distracting me from the love of my life.” “How did you win her heart?” I asked. “When I came to Asia and established my camp in Tarsus, I sent my former boyhood lover, Quintus Dellius with messages for Queen Cleopatra. Dellius knew how I liked my sex, if you know what I mean. He described the details to the Queen, who smiled knowingly throughout the interview. Quintus convinced her that she should come to me, not the other way around.” “So she was suitor and you were the, the . . . ?” “She likes to be an equal with the man,” he explained. “How’s that?” “She sometimes would get behind me and well...” “Never mind.” He would not let it go. “She sometimes likes to be like a boy so I would get rough with her now and then. You know wrestling around as you would with a Greek teenager. The exercise is wonderful.” I was beginning to understand why there were so many rumors about the way Antony liked his sex. He caught the expression on my face. “Herod, you can be so parochial. The world is changing. I knew she had ambition. After all, her last mate had been Julius Caesar, a father figure to both of us. So I allowed her to seduce me on her lavish, gilded barge that was pushed through the water by silver oars and pulled by purple sails. She met me on the Cydnus River where I camped near Tarsus. I greeted her as ‘sister.’ Cleopatra was at the height of her beauty and charm. She wore a silk gown embroidered in Egyptian symbols with gold threads. Her jewelry was made from lapis lazuli; a necklace of pearls covered her white breasts and dropped the silver head of a wolf into her décolletage. Our first dinner on the barge was sumptuous. She played Aphrodite to my Dionysus, providing me with a mask of gold and a crown of grape clusters. She was no longer the girl of 13, I had first met. She was no longer the slim wife of Caesar. At 28, she was now a woman in full blossom and in my prime at 42, we were a perfect match. I could not get enough of her. Night after night we dined knee deep rose petals and her guests were allowed to make off with whatever they cared to take of her golden plates, silver goblets, and silk tapestries. After our mutually satisfying assignation, she used her wealth to win over my generals, who at first opposed the partnership. Her funds were as impressive as her feasts. This was important to me since I was preparing to avenge the Roman loss to the Parthians and regain the standards lost by Crassus over a dozen years earlier.” After several other conversations with Antony, it was clear to me that Cleopatra could seduce Antony with pleasures, knowing that he had a corrupted soul. Antony soon ceded control of Phoenicia, Cole-Syria, Cyprus and parts of Arabia to her. She was gobbling territories as if they were chocolates. He followed her to Alexandria and made it the focus of his rule. She became Aphrodite/Isis to his Dionysus/Osiris. They initiated several mystical cults which I had hoped would distract her from geographic matters. Her cruelty once again emerged when she begged Antony to have her sister Arisnoe killed in Ephesus. The deed was done with scorpions in her bed sheets as she slept in the Temple of Artemis. Then, Cleopatra covered her crime by building a monument to Arisnoe in the center of Ephesus in the shape of the Pharaoh’s lighthouse; the lantern on top was kept perpetually lit.