It was eight days since the earthquake. There had been no tidal wave. But there had been four big aftershocks. Among the many rescuers and looters scrabbling among the ruins, many more had died. As ever, it was not the earthquake that had killed but the buildings. More fires had broken out as homeowners raked through the debris, desperately searching for their loved ones or possessions.
Yet everything that could be done had been done. The governor of Asia, Maximillianus, had put the two hundred and fifty auxiliary soldiers in the town at the disposal of the civic authorities. Corvus, the eirenarch of Ephesus, had deployed them with his fifty men of the watch. Fires had been doused, the most dangerous ruins that could be got at had been pulled down. Looting and lynching had been discouraged by means of some exemplary executions in prominent places.
The meeting Ballista had just left had addressed the longer-term concerns. The governor had gathered a small consilium of men of rank: the scribe to the demos Publius Vedius Antoninus, the asiarch Gaius Valerius Festus, the wealthy notable Flavius Damianus, the eirenarch Corvus, and Ballista himself. Ballista knew all these men except one from his previous time in Ephesus. Three years before, he had been there, serving as deputy to the governor. Ironically, the governor was the one man he had not met previously. One thing he knew of the others was that they disliked each other strongly. Inamicitia was rife among them; in some cases, it had run in their families for generations.
Yet today, personal and familial animosities mainly set aside, in something almost approaching collegiality, the men had spent hours in discussion. How to prevent rioting and rapine, and how to avoid pestilence and famine – the problems were grave, but the consensus among the hegemones present was that they were not insuperable.
Maintaining public order was always an issue in a city such as Ephesus, whose population was often estimated to approach a quarter of a million. One aspect of the discussion had surprised Ballista. Flavius Damianus, the Christian-hater, whom Ballista detested of old as a man who took perverse pleasure in the physical suffering of others, had proposed that proclamations be posted announcing that attacks on those who might be thought to have brought down the anger of the gods be banned from the city on pain of death. It might be, thought Ballista, that Flavius Damianus hated the idea of the poor taking matters into their own hands even more than he loathed the atheist followers of the crucified Jew.
The imperial priest Gaius Valerius Festus had raised serious concerns about the great temple of Artemis outside the city. On the one hand, it was filled with incalculable treasures, both sacred and profane; not for nothing was it known as the bank of Asia. On the other, it had an imperially recognized right of asylum and, because of that, as was ever the case with such places, in its grounds abided a horde of murderers, kidnappers, rapists, and other lesser criminals down on their luck. Either way, it was a potential source of serious trouble. After due deliberation, and acknowledging that it would stretch the tiny force of armed men thinner still, Maximillianus ordered fifty of the auxiliary soldiers to reinforce the civilian temple guards. No one had suggested that the goddess might look after her own.
Ballista had recommended that the troops be brought in from their individual billets, which were spread across the city, and gathered in two or three requisitioned barracks so that the largest possible numbers could be sent out quickly in the event of serious disorder. The consilium was divided. Publius Vedius Antoninus and Flavius Damianus supported the notion: only a fool trusted the fickle hoi polloi. But in the end, the governor had been swayed by the views of Corvus. Given that there were no sizable bandit groups in the nearby mountains at the moment, and that there had been a robust investigation of all lower-class clubs in the city, with any suspicious collegia being suppressed, just the previous year, a more visible presence of armed men throughout the city would have a calming effect. Ballista had to acknowledge that there was something in the local eirenarch’s view.
Everyone knew that pestilence followed an earthquake like vulgar abuse followed a philosopher. Already the governor’s palace was hung with swags of laurel, that sure preventative of plague. Ephesus possessed public slaves whose sole duty was to carry the dead out of the city. But the number of corpses visible, let alone those still buried in the ruins, was far beyond anything with which the libitinarii could deal. The scribe to the demos was assigned just twenty soldiers to assist the libitinarii, but he was to have the authority to compulsorily recruit as many privately owned able-bodied slaves as he felt necessary. Areas of public land out on the Caystros plain were designated for anonymous mass graves.
The aqueducts and water supply had been less damaged than might have been expected, but not all was as it should be. Clean drinking water might stave off disease. Flavius Damianus promised to put things to rights, using his own slaves and tenants, at no cost to the city or the imperial fiscus. The governor’s accensus wrote out a commission, which Maximillianus had signed there and then.
No apocalyptic vision was complete without famine. Hunger was the terror that constantly gnawed at all the cities of the imperium. To assuage their fear – on occasion to ameliorate the harsh reality – frequently they stripped the countryside bare, reducing peasants and poor tenant farmers to eating strange, sometimes noxious roots and leaves. The three rich men in the consilium stepped up. They would feed their city. They would scour their estates, empty their granaries, have their dependants transport the produce to Ephesus.
Given the potentially ruinous magnanimity of their gesture, it was only right that the governor had allowed Flavius Damianus to discourse at some length on how such generosity and love of the polis ran deep in his family – had not his eponymous ancestor, the famous sophist, planted his lands with fruit trees and given the demos free access to them? After that, naturally, both Gaius Valerius Festus and Publius Vedius Antoninus were granted similar indulgence.
Ballista’s thoughts had wandered. Could it be that a disaster such as this transformed the love of honour with which the Greek elite so often credited themselves into a practical reality? Yet looked at in a more sardonic way, this engrained virtue of philotimia was nothing if not competitive. By this signal act of generosity, these three eupatrids were elevating themselves far above the rest of the rich men in the Boule of Ephesus. The demos could not but praise them: their action would reach the ears of the emperor.
Was there an imperium -wide pattern to be found here? Was there a small group of incredibly rich men rising up from the ranks of the larger oligarchy in each city? Ballista remembered how, in Arete, his friend Iarhai had told him that there used to be a dozen or so leading men in that city. When Ballista had arrived at that town, there had been just three. Maybe, but Arete had been a special case. Situated perilously but profitably between the great empires of Rome and Persia, its notables owed their status to their abilities in deploying armed force. And now, had this earthquake not made Ephesus also something of a special case? Of the four hundred and fifty members of the Ephesian Boule, forty-seven were dead or unaccounted for. Unsurprisingly, finding this out had been one of the first acts of the authorities.
When Publius Vedius Antoninus launched into an ample review of the buildings with which past members of his family had adorned the city, some might have considered he had strayed rather from the point. Maximillianus urbanely interjected to thank most, most sincerely each of the eupatrids. He was sure many decrees of the Boule and Demos of the Ephesians would be passed extolling their virtues. It may well be that when the Heroon of Androclos was repaired, the heroic founder would have to share his quarters with statues of men still living. Their munificence was unparalleled: Hellas and poverty might be foster sisters, but one should not forget that Croesus had reigned here in Asia.