Emperor

While Aurelia sat, Cornelius carried a brimming cup of wine and walked around the triclinium, looking at the frescoes and the tapestry. He didn't seem distracted by Aurelia's charms. Perhaps, Thalius wondered, as many of Constantine's eastern-tinged courtiers were rumoured to be, Cornelius preferred to pluck his fruit from a different tree.

Thalius lumbered to his feet, picked up a jug of wine and refreshed their cups. 'In the absence of a servant I must remember my duties as a host. You're taken by that fresco, Ulpius Cornelius?'

This particular painting showed a portrait of Christ at the time of His mission, a smooth-faced man of thirty or so, His hand raised in blessing. The figure was surrounded by symbols: the chi-rho, a sunburst behind Christ's head, and a small acrostic in a lower corner.

'It's done well enough,' Cornelius said, rather patronisingly. 'But Christ was a fisherman in Judea, wasn't he?'

'Actually a carpenter.'

'And a rabble-rouser. He would never have worn a toga!'

Thalius smiled. 'That's what the pattern-book showed, and my artist didn't have the confidence to deviate from the design.'

'Interesting symbolism.' Cornelius tapped the chi-rho with a fingernail. 'I've seen this before.'

Aurelia languidly uncurled from her couch and joined them. 'It's called the Christogram. The first two letters in Christ's name in Greek, superimposed-you see?'

'I have seen this scrawled on temple walls. Even in Rome.'

Thalius said, 'A relic of the days of persecution. Such symbols as this united a community under pressure.'

'But now Christians are under pressure no more,' Cornelius said. 'And your Christogram has become a symbol of pride, yes?'

Aurelia said, 'Ah, but the Christogram is more than that. Look again, Cornelius. Haven't you seen figures rather like this in other contexts?'

Cornelius stepped back and tipped his head. 'Do you know, I have. In Egypt, I think. It is rather like the ankh, an ancient mystic symbol-surely much more ancient than Christianity!'

Aurelia murmured, 'As a girl I learned to write Greek. This is also rather like a sign you make when editing a passage of writing-chi-rho for chreston, which means good.'

'One symbol with many meanings, then,' Cornelius said.

'But that's intentional,' Aurelia said. 'You can scrawl a chi-rho on your wall; a Christian will see the Christogram, a pagan will see an Egyptian good-luck sign. It appeals to everybody and offends nobody. The Emperor's advisers are wily to encourage it.

'Constantine is a Christian. Everybody knows that. And he wishes to establish Christianity as the empire's core religion. But almost everybody else of influence-like you, Cornelius!-remains pagan. Most of the army too, despite Constantine being one of its own. Constantine, and the bishops who manipulate him, is proceeding subtly, through tools such as this clever little symbol. But, like the rain beating on your tiles, Cornelius, each drop brings you pagans closer to the day when the roof falls in.'

Thalius said, 'You seem to have thought deeply about this, madam.'

'Emperors make the weather,' she murmured. 'It is best to pay them attention. Besides I am fascinated by the sheer machination of it all.'

Cornelius said, 'Machination, yes. And there are plenty who doubt Constantine's sincerity about his conversion in the first place. How is it even possible for a good pagan to become Christian?'

'Oh, I believe he is sincere,' Aurelia said. 'And as for how he was converted, you can see it painted up here on dear Thalius's wall.'

Cornelius looked again. 'You mean the sunburst around Christ's head?'

Aurelia said, 'Constantine grew up as a protege of Apollo. And some years ago he hailed the sun god, Sol Invictus, as his tutelary god. Some would identify Apollo with the sun, and others identify the sun with your Christ, Thalius: Jesus is sol justitiae, the sun of justice. So you see there is a progression, logical in its way, through an overlapping identity of deities, from Apollo, via the sun, to Christ. But it will be quite a challenge for the biographers to make sense of all this one day.'

Thalius felt irritated at this smug analysis. 'All this theological trickery has nothing to do with the true nature of Christ and His message.'

Aurelia just laughed.

Cornelius turned to Thalius. 'It is a little difficult to understand, good Thalius, what it is you object to about an emperor adopting your own long-marginalised faith.'

'But the faith of Constantine isn't necessarily mine,' Thalius said unhappily. 'Constantine's warrior God has nothing to do with Christ and His teachings. And the Church he is creating is a mirror of the man and his empire: centralised, autocratic, intolerant, ruthless. That is why true Christians are appalled. Many of us are turning away-becoming ascetic, hermits and monks, retreating into the wilderness.'

Cornelius winked at Aurelia. 'What a loss to society!'

'Be nice, Cornelius,' murmured Aurelia.

'Frankly, Thalius,' Cornelius said, 'the fate of your derivative little sect is of little interest to me compared to the use Constantine evidently plans to make of it.'

Aurelia was interested. 'And that use is?'

'Isn't it obvious? Constantine is turning the empire into a monarchy. He will be a king as supreme and unchallenged as the rulers of ancient Persia and Egypt. And he wants to draw on the unity of Christianity to cement all that in place; he imposes this alien cult on us in order to control us all.'

Aurelia said, 'You asked Thalius what he objected to in an emperor who adopted his own faith. Now I ask you, Ulpius Cornelius: what is wrong with an emperor whose goal is to unify the empire? Isn't that better than the bloody chaos of our youth?'

'Not if it is done the wrong way,' Cornelius said. 'Not if it means abandoning everything that made Rome strong in the first place. For if he does that, even if he succeeds in the short term, in the long run only ruin will ensue.'

Aurelia tutted, mocking him. 'And I had you down as a rational man, Ulpius Cornelius. Are you superstitious like Thalius here? Do you fear that if you turn your back on Rome's old gods they will punish you?'

Cornelius reddened, and Thalius saw there must be some truth in the charge. But the courtier said, 'I talk of political realities, madam. Of a system that has worked for centuries. There has always been room for another god or two in our infinitely flexible pantheon! And that way nobody, from Germany to Africa, from Britain to Asia Minor, need be excluded from the consciousness of empire. It is not its army that made Rome strong but its inclusivity.'

'But that is because Rome's gods are so like its subjects' gods,' Aurelia said. 'The Romans were farmers, as our ancestors were, Thalius. And farmers, rooted to their land, have gods of specific places. So the gods can happily coexist-each to his own scrap of land. The Jews, though, were nomads. And their god, who became Christ's God, was a god of no-place, or perhaps of all places, an infinite god of the sky. But there is only one sky, and in such a scheme there can be only one god. Now the Romans are accepting this sole nomadic god as their own. There will be a fight to the death, Cornelius, a battle between the old farmers' gods and the new sky god. There cannot be room for both. Now there will only be exclusivity, and intolerance.'

Cornelius pursed his lips, and Thalius saw his deep dislike of being analysed in this way by a provincial woman, however valid the points she made. 'Well, madam, you are here too. What is your objection to Constantine?'