Legio XVII: Roman Legion at War (18 page)

Levi immediate chimed in, “It’s his decision; he’s of age, if he wants to go, he should go.  Joseph, are you asking for our blessing?

“Yes,” Joseph said, “I want to go.”

Levi rose from the table and embraced his son.  “Then you have our blessing.  Come with me to the
biblioteca
[library]
.
”  Levi found and unrolled a large scroll.  He was looking for a particular Psalm to read to Joseph.  “Ah, here it is.  Listen Joseph and remember these words from Psalm 91:”

Levi rolled the scroll and carefully put it back on the shelf.  He then kissed Joseph and held him for a long minute.  Rebecca had entered the room while Levi was reading and stood silently against the wall.  She was crying.

Before they left the room, Joseph said, Father, I need to talk to you.”  Levi sat down.  Joseph remained standing and continued in a confrontational tone.  “You raised me to be Jewish, but I do not like being different from my friends.  I do not like it and do not understand why I have to be Jewish. It is a choice right?”

Levi thought for a moment.  He knew this day would come.  He felt no anger and kept his voice calm.  “Joseph, my son, I had the same thoughts and feelings myself many years ago.  My father said to me that I was a Jew by birth, but whether or not I observed the traditions was, indeed, up to me.  For years I lived like all the other Romans and did what I wished.  I am now deeply ashamed of my behavior.  One morning after drinking heavily the night before, I realized that I was wasting my life, dishonoring my father, and my God.  I made a decision to return to our traditions and serve God.  You too must make your own decision who you will serve, man or God.

After Joseph left the house and Lucia dismissed the children to go play, she sat back in her chair and just looked at Manius.

After what seemed to Manius a very long time, she said, “I’m going to miss you.  I need you and the children will be lost without you.  Is there any way you can let this assignment go to someone else.  Someone younger?”

“Lucia,” he said, “I want to do this.  It may be the only time in my life where I can command a Legion.  I’ve trained my entire life for just such a mission.  Please don’t make it any harder for me.  I really need you to be a good Roman wife and wish me well, please.”

Her eyes filled with tears as she said, “As you wish.”

Later that evening as they sat and talked in the
peristylium
, Lucia suddenly remembered the name Timo and asked Manius if he would see him during his mission.  Manius was stunned!  It had been 12 years since he mentioned Timo’s name to Lucia while telling her about the brave little 10 year old
Raeti
boy who attacked the Roman Army single handedly.

Manius took her hand and kissed it.  “How do you remember that?”  he asked excitedly.  “I’d completely forgotten.  I remember now, I promised the tribal elders that I would give Timo a Roman bride when he came of age.  “Thank you so much for remembering little Timo.  This is wonderful!  Perhaps I can find his bride and take her with the Legion when we march north.  This is perfect.  Lucia I love you!”

Lucia said, “Why not let me handle this.  I’ll put out the word among the women that Rome needs to identify a suitable wife for the young
Rhaetian
King and solicit volunteers.  Perhaps, Rebecca could help me organize a committee to interview the girls and make the selection.  I think there may be a lot of young “princesses” in Rome who would jump at the chance to be a real Queen.  She would need language and cultural training, but I believe this could be done before you depart.”

“I really, really love you,” said Manius with a big smile.

Change of Command ~.Early August 210 BC

In a formal change of command with a Consul, several Senators and, surprisingly, Ambassador Farrid from Carthage in attendance, Manius turned over the responsibility of running the training camp to another Tribune by the name of Quintus Sentius Calvus.  Manius knew him as one who liked to party and was addicted to gambling.  He had tried subtly to influence the choice of his successor, but without success.  Sometime politics overrides the best choice and one has to settle for someone less.  Political pull was clearly the basis on which Calvus got the job.

Tribune Calvus had all the proper credentials for a successful career.  He was born into a wealthy patrician family; served during the Gallic Wars with Manius; and married into wealth.  Yet Calvus was extremely displeased that he did not get the respect he felt was due from his patrician peers and plebian subordinates.  This was true; he did not.  Calvus had a spoiled-rich-kid reputation.  He would alternate between days of intense feverish energy and periods of equally intense melancholy.  It was the high energy periods that mostly got him into trouble, but he could offend equally well while he was depressed.  He drank too much wine, too often, and was known as a ladies’ man and gambler.  He could not be trusted to do anything consistently correct, but he was too well connected to ignore.

He wanted Manius’ job as Camp Commandant, for reasons that would not become clear for several months.  After much arm twisting, Calvus was named the new Commandant, which made it all the stranger, when a mere six months later, he was replaced as Camp Commandant and assigned to Manius as Second-in-Command for the Cisalpine Mission.

But Manius now had other things on his mind than the new Commandant of
Campus Martius
.  As he looked at Farrid, he was perplexed and a little disturbed as to why the Carthaginian Ambassador was at the Change of Command ceremony.  Manius knew Farrid, but had had little contact with him.  Once about three years ago, Farrid got Senate approval to visit
Campus Martius
to witness Legionaries training and Manius had to brief him and show him around.  Manius knew he was a spy for Carthage, but had no choice in the matter.  During the visit, Davood was polite, required very little maintenance, and did not miss a thing.  He made Manius’ skin crawl. “No,” he thought to himself, “He isn’t here to see me.  He’s somehow connected to Calvus.”

When Hannibal crossed the Alps eight years ago and invaded Italy, Davood was in Rome, by chance, or so it seemed.  From then on, he was a permanent fixture with his fingers into everything.  These were difficult days for Davood and he suffered much verbal abuse from enraged citizens.  To burnish his moral vitae, he could often be found in hospitals and orphanages helping the victims of his countrymen’s wartime successes.  In time, he amassed a wealth of personal good will, but remained a spy dedicated to serving the interests of Carthage to the detriment of Rome.

Unbeknown to Manius, Farrid and Tribune Calvus had long ago forged a bond of mutual interests.  The “under appreciated” and disgruntled Calvus had found a sympathetic listener and friend in Farrid who agreed with him that the Roman Army did not value Calvus’ worth nor reward him appropriately.  Farrid knew money would not entice Calvus to become a traitor, but rather the promise of
post-bellum
Carthaginian honors, prestige, and titles.

Farrid convinced Calvus that Carthage did not seek the destruction of Rome, but needed economic freedom to develop the natural resources of Spain, Sicily, and Sardinia.  Farrid pointed out quite sincerely that Rome could have all the rest of the Mediterranean basin, as well as Greece,
Illyria
[western part of the Balkan Peninsula], and anything else they could conquer.

Farrid suggested to Calvus that he should, “Use your enormous talent to subtly alter the way Rome trains its Legionaries.  The weaker Rome’s military becomes the quicker Carthage will be able to end the war and good Romans like yourself will be placed in positions of power and honor.”  Calvus readily agreed and asked Farrid to provide him a written pledge that Carthage would honor its promises to him.  In time, Farrid produced a signed bogus document and Calvus was satisfied.

Farrid maintained his close contact with Calvus, as he did with all his agents, and, over time, his requests to Calvus for general information became more and more specific.  At first, Calvus was uncomfortable providing military information to Farrid, but slowly began to enjoy his new role as spy.  He found the secret meetings with Farrid to be exciting and flattering and could not turn his back on the amorous attention he received at the lavish parties hosted by the Carthaginian embassy.

Deployment Countdown

As soon as he could respectfully excuse himself from the Change of Command ceremony, Manius retreated to his temporary office where Joseph was already waiting. Over the next two hours, Manius dictated to Joseph a series of deliberate steps that he needed to undertake in the coming days.  Despite Joseph’s youth, Manius found him to be far wiser than his age would indicate and extremely useful while planning for the upcoming campaign into the Cisalpine and Austria.

Administratively, Joseph was assigned to one of the Rome-based Legions with duty as
immunes
(administrative assistant) to Tribune Tullus, which freed Joseph from normal Legionary duties.  Joseph’s two friends from basic training were also in Rome and the three occasionally got together.  With the formation of Legio XVII, all three were assigned to the
Hastati
of the XVII.  Joseph retained his
immunes
status for the duration, but was allowed to train with the
Hastati
.

Rather than be paralyzed into inactivity by all that needed to be done, Manius now had an exciting and challenging new purpose for his life and a strong passion to get started.  He was happy again.  He had to prepare himself, a staff, and troops for a lengthy deployment into hostile country.  In his opinion, it could not get any better!

By mid August, Manius had prepared a specific mission statement, which was subsequently approved by the Army leadership and the Senate.  He then went on to convince Levi to increase the funding for the campaign from 1 to 1.5 million
sesterces
[$105 million dollars to $157,500,000].

With these two important steps out of the way, Manius then selected 12 Tribunes by name, based on his personal knowledge of them, to serve as his staff officers.  When the 12 were reduced to six because of their unavailability, he substituted 6 outstanding Centurions who were available and known to him.

Manius knew he faced an uphill battle getting experienced personnel, serviceable equipment, and trained troops since almost the entire Army was in southern Italy or in Spain.

Having served so long in Rome, Manius was well connected.  He used his influence, over stiff resistance, to draw specific people from deployed Legions including the bright young officers that accompanied him to
Cannae
.  He did not make any friends with this maneuver, but felt it was necessary if his mission was to have any chance of success.

Within a month, by mid September, his primary staff of 12, each augmented with two junior aides, was in place and diligently working on their assigned tasks.  The normal challenges of preparing for a lengthy campaign were compounded many times over by the lack of available resources and by the fact that he only had five months to pull it all together.