The Memoirs of Cleopatra (73 page)

“Beware,” said Olympos sourly, “of the man who adopts a foreign culture with abandon. It ruins him.”

Olympos had avoided Antony, seeing him only from afar, and deflected all my attempts to introduce them, claiming that he had many patients to attend, and no time.

“Perhaps you should meet him,” I said. “It seems very odd to me that my physician, and one of my best friends, keeps his distance.”

“I don’t need to meet him,” said Olympos. “I can study him better if he does not know me.”

“And?” I asked.

“Well, he is a fine physical specimen. He does resemble Hercules. Doesn’t he claim Hercules as an ancestor?”

“An evasive answer,” I said. “What of the man himself, if you know so much?”

“I can see why you find him attractive.”

“Tell me something I don’t already know.”

“Don’t trust him,” he blurted out. “He isn’t reliable.”

I was surprised. I had not expected this. “In what way? What do you mean?”

“Oh, I think he’s a good man. I must admit that.” He sounded cross to say it. “But he has that nature that’s—” He stopped. “He doesn’t really want to be ruler of the world, he just wants to take the easy way. The strongest nature that’s nearest him will always lead him, rule him. Now it’s you. When he gets in the vicinity of Octavian, it will be him.”

Again, I was surprised. “You’ve never seen Octavian. How can you speak knowledgeably about his nature?”

“I just know,” said Olympos stubbornly.

“I may have to send you to Rome to observe firsthand,” I said lightly, not liking his remarks about Antony. But worse was the feeling that he and I both, separately, sensed something hard, intransigent, and formidable in Octavian. Until now I had thought it was just my own impression, probably colored by personal motives.

The day of my twenty-ninth birthday came, but I did not celebrate it or even tell Antony about it. I was afraid he would stage some gigantic festivity to honor me, and the very thought was unappealing. The spectacle at Tarsus had quite satisfied me in that regard for the foreseeable future. Mardian gave me a new writing set, with seals carved of amethyst, and Caesarion had taught his lizard to pull a miniature cart as a trick for me, but that was all. Olympos brought me an enormous jar of the choicest silphion from Cyrenaica, with a note saying, “Here! A present you can really use!” I was so embarrassed I shoved it into a box and hid it. Why was he so obsessed with that subject? It really was time he married and diverted his attention to his own bed.

But I knew Antony would want to celebrate his own birthday in some lavish manner, and so I suggested that we reserve the entire Gymnasion for him and his guests.

“We can have our own Ptolemaieia,” I said one evening. “It isn’t scheduled for another three years, but does it matter?” The biggest athletic games and contests outside of Olympia were held every four years in Alexandria, with horseracing, field sports, gymnastics, and tragedies and comedies in the theater.

“What will you call it, the Antonieia?” He laughed dismissively. I knew then that he meant to have it.

“I’ll call it
Natalicia Nobilissimi Antoni
,” I said. “The Birthday Celebration of the Most Noble Antony.”

He raised his eyebrows. “You know more Latin than you let on.”

I always enjoyed surprising him. “And of course you will have to compete in everything, so it will be a smaller affair than the regular games,” I continued. “After all, you are not a charioteer, nor do you perform acrobatics—do you?” I hoped not. The races were notoriously expensive to put on.

“No,” he said. “But you must remember what birthday it will be for me—my forty-second. Perhaps it isn’t a good idea to compete, unless I should make a present to myself of losing.”

“Nonsense!” I said. “You should compete against your own men and officers, not runners and wrestlers who do nothing besides train. It would be unfair otherwise.” And it would give some structure to his days, training for it. He was too proud just to walk out on the field with no practice. As it was now, he stayed up far too late and slept half the morning away, on a perpetual holiday.

“These will be Greek games and athletics,” I warned him. “None of that killing you Romans love so much.”

“When with Greeks, do as the Greeks do,” he said. “It is generally much more civilized.”

“Spoken like a convert,” I said. “Now if you would just embrace the Greek harmony of a balanced life—”

“Bah!” He laughed. “Dionysus
is
excess—that’s what he’s all about. Drunken soberness, artistic license, freedom of the senses—”

“But Hercules has to keep himself fit in order to perform all his labors and turn into a god. The two sides of you will have to take turns.”

“They do,” he said. “They do. Don’t you know that yet?”

In truth, Antony had a deep and abiding interest in the theater; he loved plays, and took his patronage of the Dionysian guild of actors seriously. There was that in him that loved costume and playacting, and even in Rome he had had actors and actresses as his friends in his retinue, much to Cicero’s disgust. In Alexandria he attended not only the theater, but lectures and demonstrations at the Museion, while I accompanied him in his late-night revels. We were both doing things out of character, seeking to please the other.

January fourteenth,
Ludi et Natalicia Nobilissimi Antoni
, the Games and Birthday Celebration of the Most Noble Antony, was a still, blue-skied day. I was surprised at how enthusiastic all the guests had been about the entertainment. Women were eager to be invited to sit in the stone grandstand and ogle the oiled male bodies, while the men, even the older ones, were unexpectedly willing to strip off most of their clothes and compete. One man of sixty-five—a supply officer from Antony’s guard—sought permission to enter the contests. A champion runner from a Ptolemaieia of twenty years ago also asked if he could compete. But the other contestants were personal friends of mine or Antony’s, and that was what gave it such curiosity value. We knew these people in other capacities, and suddenly they would appear, flinging off their tunics, imitating famous athletes. Perhaps they had always had a secret desire to do so.

Since there was nothing official about this—it was just a private celebration—we decided that absolute nakedness was not required.

“Unless you’d like to!” I remarked to Antony. After all, he had appeared almost that way at the Lupercalia. But that was long ago, when he’d held a lesser position.

“No, I can restrain myself,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to be the only one on the field like that, and I don’t think the rest would do it.”

He was right about that. The only people who ever felt comfortable with nudity were the Greeks; Romans and Egyptians and—horrors!—barbarians avoided it. As for the Jews, they found the whole idea repugnant and did not like even to pass by a gymnasion.

There would be a pentathlon, the test of an all-round athlete—footrace, jumping, discus, javelin, and wrestling. Then there would be military exercises like swordfighting and a race with armor, only for Antony and his soldiers.

“Is Hercules ready?” I said, as we prepared to depart for the Gymnasion. A great group of guests would accompany us, drawn in all the litters and chariots I had been able to summon from the royal stables.

“Yes,” he said, oddly subdued.

“What is it?” Had he suddenly got cold feet? What a time to do it!

“I was just thinking—I am almost exactly twice Octavian’s age. For every year he’s lived, I’ve lived two. I don’t know which is the advantage—my experience, or all those years he has yet tucked away in reserve.”

“Now that’s a Roman Antony, a brooding Antony, that I seldom see.” This dark mood would not help his celebration. I must chase it away. “Octavian is so sickly that he’ll never reach the age of forty-two. He’s not strong like you; not only would he never have made it across the Alps, he can barely make it from his house to the Roman Forum.”

Antony laughed. “Now that’s an exaggeration, my love.”

“Well, isn’t it true he’s always getting sick—at crucial moments? He was sick at the battle of Philippi, and you did all the fighting. He was so sick at Brundisium, on his way back to Rome, that he wasn’t expected to live. He was too sick to accompany Caesar to Spain. He’s always sick!”

“Yes, but, as you said, only at crucial moments. Maybe it’s his nerves that are sickly, not his body.” He laughed. “Here, my little warrior. Why don’t you take my sword, the one I used at Philippi? Wear it tonight; it will go with the mood of this whole silly thing for you to dress like me.” He unbuckled it and handed it to me.

I took it, almost fearfully. It was a most important sword, the avenging sword. “Won’t you use it in the exercises?”

“No. I can never use it for games. But still, I want it there. You take it.” He fitted its belt and hilt around me, crushing the gown I was wearing. “Come now!” His mood seemed light enough now. “Take my helmet, too.” He lowered it onto my head. “There! A right fearsome soldier!”

“I can kill if I have to,” I said slowly. He should know that.

“Now who has a dark mood? Banish it.” He laughed. “Lead on to wherever you will take me, my Queen.”

“Today it is to the Gymnasion,” I said. “Nothing sinister about that.”

The trumpets had blown, announcing the beginning of the contests. Almost fifty men were on the field, in various costumes. Some wore only loincloths, others short, barbarian-style pants that stopped above their knees, some kilts, and others tunics. All of them had been oiled in the special room for that purpose, the
eliothesium
, and now they gleamed. Oh, how they gleamed—every muscle and tendon highlighted.

“I adore olive oil on a male body,” whispered Charmian. “It’s even more arousing than sweat.”

“I like both of them,” said the wife of the under-treasurer, startling me. I had always assumed she was most excited by ledger books.

Looking at them, I was struck by how well proportioned Antony was for his heavy muscles. He truly was one of those men who looked best with the least clothing, as regular clothes made him appear stocky. There was no sign that age had made any inroads into him; he was blessed with a physique that could maintain itself with little help. Certainly his Dionysian progress through the eastern provinces would have done in a frailer body.

Participating in the games were a number of Romans from Antony’s praetorian guard, elite soldiers; the Egyptian head charioteer and several archers; some Greek officials from the treasury; some of the company of Dionysiac artists; a tutor Antony had picked up in Syria, named Nicolaus of Damascus; my favorite Museion philosopher, Philostratos; and perhaps most surprising of all, old Athenagoras, a physician who headed a mummy-preservation society. Oiled up, he looked like a mummy himself, stringy and dessicated. But he trotted by surprisingly swiftly, chortling and calling, “Watch me in the footrace! They call me the Natron Flash!” He was met with a shower of flowers and cheers from the women.

I noticed that Charmian’s eyes seldom left one of the Roman guards who stayed near Antony, a tall, light-haired man who knew Antony’s comings and goings—and kept them to himself. “I see you find someone interesting,” I remarked, and Charmian nodded.

“You will have to give him the victor’s laurel—if he wins it,” I said.

The contestants were warming up in a series of movements that looked almost comical—jumping up and down, beating their chests, sprinting forward and then stopping abruptly. Then they lined up at the marble starting line, digging their toes into the cleft in the stone, and were off at the cry
Apite!—
go!—for the six-hundred-foot race. At first it looked like a shiny clump of bodies trying to keep together, but soon they separated and one tall Egyptian took the lead, followed by a Greek and then, surprisingly, by Antony. I had not expected that he could move so swiftly, as usually men with heavy muscles are not fleet of foot. But perhaps the thick legs supplied the extra power that propelled him forward.

The Natron Flash lagged two lengths behind the rest, his kilt flapping wildly. But he received the biggest ovation, and yelled as he passed, “What do you expect for a sixty-two-year-old? Hermes?”

The former champion from the Ptolemaieia—who was still only in his forties—finished fourth.

Next came discus throwing, an event that needed both strength and grace. The way a thrower rotated and moved his body was of utmost importance, and no one was allowed to turn and turn and wind himself up like a top. Statues celebrating the pose of a discus thrower were very popular, and as the men practiced, most of the women looked on appreciatively.

“It’s like watching all the statues moving,” said Charmian. Her favorite was also going to compete in this event. Not everyone would enter all contests; only poor Antony.

Only about fifteen men grasped the discus and, turning their torsos far to the right, stretched out in a graceful arc and flung it far from them. Charmian’s man won by a hand’s breadth, followed by the Egyptian head charioteer, and, once again third—by Antony. His upper-body strength had made the discus soar as it left his hand.

A great cheer went up for all the contestants, in this most aesthetically appealing of all events.

Next was the javelin throw, a favorite of the soldiers. Of all the athletic events, this was the one most rooted in actual warfare. But these javelins were made of elderwood, a lighter type than the military ones of yew. Besides being of lighter wood, the ones used for contests had leather thongs wound around the middle of the shaft to make them fly steady, and the ends were sharpened to stick into the ground, to measure distance. Each man was allowed three throws.

War is ugly, and no good ruler would wish it on his people. But even the most vehement critic of war would be forced to admit that many of the actions of soldiers are in themselves glorious, almost works of art, and the javelin throw is one such event. Just watching a man as he stood poised and ready to throw, running up to the mark, pulling the spear behind his head, then extending his other arm for balance before stopping and letting fly—such beauty! The gods forgive me for the joy I took in watching it.