The Death of Antinous || bxb ✔︎

AURIBUS TENEO LUPUM

He awoke to the sound of bells.

In Rome, man announced the morning, not the gods. While the sun slumbered behind the hillside, Antinous stood up in the dark and lit a candle.

He had never had a room of his own and took careful inventory of all the items that surrounded him. A raised bed stuffed with reeds, a wooden table and chair with a loosened leg, a stylus and wax tablet, ink and papyrus. There was something else that had not been there when he went to sleep the night before: a basket with the emperor's seal on the latch. His fingers grazed the woven straw as he opened it.

Inside were a dozen ripe figs.

He held one under his nose. It smelled of the rich soil of Bithynia and reminded him of the sand, the sea, the trees, and Hadrian. Best save this treat for later he thought prudently and placed it back in the basket.

He pulled a tunic over his head and slipped on his sandals. He then reached for his stylus and tablet. The stone floors of the paedagogium were freshly scrubbed. Slaves were quiet as mice when they cleaned their quarters at night. They came and went unseen and unheard, though their presence could be found in the gleaming square stones of every mosaic, each tall white colonnade, the vases of fresh cut flowers, and brightly restored frescoes. The fountain in the courtyard was now free from fallen leaves, the water clear as glass.

A group of boys walked by with their hands behind their backs in a straight line past the fountain. They stepped in unison with a ceremonial air. One turned his head reproachfully. Antinous joined the end of the line and followed them to class.

The boys, he soon learned, had arranged themselves in a hierarchy. Two competed for leadership, the brothers Remus and Romulus, named after the twins from the Roman myth of the city's founding. All Antinous knew about this myth was that the brothers were suckled by a she-wolf and that one had murdered the other.

He had entered a world of strangers, with strange faces, clothes, customs and manners but discovered that he was not a stranger. They were anticipating his arrival. When they realized he spoke little Latin they addressed him effortlessly in Greek.

Remus somehow knew that a basket had been delivered to his sleeping quarters. "What was in the basket?" he asked with resigned interest, twirling his stylus between his fingers. He wore a shiny copper bracelet the slid up and down his arm.

"The sweetest smelling figs from my homeland."

"What a treat. Do you know who sent them?" Romulus probed. He had the same high forehead and determined chin as his brother but with smaller eyes set widely apart that seemed to watch him from every angle.

"I don't know for certain but the emperor's seal was on the latch."

The boys flashed him twin smiles and switched back to Latin.

He was expected to study grammar, rhetoric, mathematics and philosophy, his best subject, though those who chose to study the latter as a vocation were sent to Athens. Philosophy was distinctly Greek. Romans emphasized rhetoric, which would prepare students for the daily realities of civil service. They viewed knowledge as a means to an end, not an end in and of itself. They therefore thought philosophy frivolous. Music too. Antinous didn't dare mention that he played the lyre.

His first lecture was in grammar, his worst subject in Nikomedia. He barely succeeded in understanding Greek grammar and was dreading what horrors Latin had in store for him.

The teacher had not yet arrived. The other boys stood in the corner playing dice. Antinous would have joined them had they not been playing for two sestertii. These were the sons of senators and aristocrats with limitless funds at their disposal. Antinous was given state allowance, one sestertius a day, just enough to keep him fed and clothed.