The Lycian Prince 69 (Conclusion)

(March 2001 A.D.)

Dr. Peter Barry, a leading authority on post-Augustan Roman history, was wading through the many ancient manuscripts housed in the archives of Istanbul University. He was researching for the biography that he hoped would be the definitive study of his subject when his mobile phone rang. It was a colleague who specialised in a later period and had been drawn to a monastery in northern Greece, where fellow academics had recently discovered some very old but remarkably well preserved artefacts dating back to the fourth century A.D..

Dr. Barry spent little time in hurrying to the remote location to examine one of these finds. It was a tondo, a circular painting approximately three-quarters of a metre in diameter, which had been dated to about 330 A.D.. It had been preserved for so long in such a good state because it had been covered in a well-chosen protective resin and had clearly been excellently looked after over the many centuries. The Doctor’s current research had been concentrating for the moment on his subject’s principal advisers and how they had influenced key actions, particularly the two momentous decisions that had had such a profound affect on the history of the world. His colleague made the call as soon as he recognised that the tondo might be of considerable interest to that study.

When Dr. Barry examined the portrait of a group of seven people, he was instantly spellbound. Depicted were five middle-aged men standing behind a younger seated woman, in front of whom, on the floor, reclined a boy, aged about twelve. The artist had been good. Despite the period’s typical stylisation, those portrayed displayed their main natural characteristics, including an obvious look of happiness and pride. All were identified by name in Latin script. His colleague told him that there had been immediate recognition of the names of all of the men as they were some of the most important of their time.

The one standing to the extreme left, who was the husband of the younger woman, was dressed splendidly in Roman general’s apparel whilst the one on the extreme right wore clothing appropriate to a very senior bishop of the period. The three central adult males were attired in rich civilian garb. However, attention had then been drawn to the boy. He had the same name of an Emperor of a much later time. The theory was that the picture had been so well preserved and cared for, and was one of the few precious items to escape, over one thousand years later, the plunder of the city where it had been kept, that the boy could be a direct forebear of his namesake. As a family treasure, the tondo would have been cherished by the lad and his progeny and passed carefully from generation to generation until coming into the possession of his famous descendent. It would then undergo transformation into religious icon because of its significance, and as such be protected through later ages. None of the academics realised that the lad in the picture was named, like some of his many brothers, after young Lycians horribly executed by King Lysus.

Dr. Barry was, however, more concerned with the central man who was the main topic of his present investigation, as he had seemingly come from nowhere to be his biographical subject’s main adviser for almost 25 years. He knew, from his research, that the seated woman, the general’s wife, was the adviser’s younger sister but nothing else about her was understood.

Dr. Barry read the names to himself. He did not know that the general on the left of the painting, Armillatus, had once, in Germania, cowered in terror behind a boy who had then become his lifelong hero. He had seen his friend save the life of a young Praetorian and this, and other later examples of the lad’s selfless courage, had spurred him to become the Empire’s most daring and successful soldier, unheralded in the history books because, as usual, the Emperor took the credit for all victories. The general had, in particular, been a decisive influence at the bloody battle of the Milvian Bridge of 312 A.D., one of the least-known but most important clashes in history.

The Doctor did know that the bishop on the right, Sura, was rumoured to be a eunuch. However, if true, that had not prevented him from gaining high political office and playing a major role in the development of the early Christian Church, being especially influential at the Council of Nicea in 325 A.D., which settled disputes about doctrine, particularly that regarding the Holy Trinity. Cratinus, next to Sura, was renowned for his charitable works throughout the Empire. He had naturally gravitated to the Empire’s new heart to pursue his vocation. Prodicus, next to Armillatus, was the esteemed Governor of Lycia and former Imperial adviser. However, it was the mysterious central figure that really beguiled the academic researcher.

Dr. Barry had gradually managed to piece together, from a variety of sources, a sketchy chronicle from about 306 A.D. for the man, although much seemed more legend than fact. He had apparently first appeared to history in that year in a small port, inhabited mainly by Greeks. However, one otherwise unsubstantiated account suggested that he had earlier spent some time in Egypt, where he had become rich through trading spices in partnership with an Arab, having escaped enslavement in Nubia just before that kingdom had entered a dark period of internecine civil war.

The man entered the service of the local Roman Governor as a freeman administrator, and he soon gained the reputation of being very able and incorruptible. A number of sources commented about his kindness and largesse, particularly with orphaned children. He adopted many and brought them up within an ideal happy domestic atmosphere. He was apparently renowned for never beating any of his charges regardless of how naughty they had been. Instead, he would gently talk to them about their misbehaviour and would be so persuasive that his young adopted sons and daughters gained a reputation for excellent manners and only very rare misconduct. More than one hundred were adopted over the years and all grew to be worthy citizens and excellent parents themselves, the boy called Justinian in the painting being just one. The man was never short of adoring family visitors until the day he died.

Dioclteian’s ultimate successor visited the man’s town in 313 A.D. and the provincial administrator was introduced by the Governor to the new master of the Roman Empire, and his then principal adviser, Prodicus, and main general, Armillatus. It was clear at once that all four recognised each other.

Dr. Barry looked again at the man’s name on the painting. It was very unusual and he had never come across it before. He could not believe that it was the adviser’s real name and presumed that it had been adopted by him as a pseudonym for some now obscure reason. Under the figure of the golden-haired blue-eyed man was the word ‘Antus’. The Doctor of course did not know of the young black, Zeni, who, by sacrificing his own life, had saved a young white. The latter, to honour his friend, had taken the name that he had been called by the dead hero. The Doctor also did not appreciate that the man had only learned about his mother’s whereabouts after her martyrdom in 305 A.D. and had immediately said his farewells to the kind Arab and his son in Alexandria to find his now orphaned 15 years old sister. The man had eventually found her in the small Greek port, which became his home, being well cared for by a 29 years old eunuch whom he knew well.

Dr. Barry thought again about the ancient scroll that he had come across at Istanbul University. The script had propounded the rumour that Antus and the Emperor Constantine the Great, the subject of his biography, had first met, and had been more than just acquaintances, in Germania about 290 A.D.. It suggested that, at the time, the former was a 13 years old in the service of Diocletian whilst the latter was an 18 years old Praetorian officer. The Doctor did not know that Antus, then known as Anthonius, and Constantine had actually saved each other’s lives before making love in a Germanian forest, or that the former did not appreciate the latter’s true status until they met again 23 years later.

Dr. Barry had heard about the story of a young prince who had supposedly saved Lycia from Diocletian’s anger at about this time. However, the boy had then disappeared from historical record and the Doctor did not even consider a connection.

Dr. Barry knew that he could not yet prove his conjecture that it was Antus’ counsel that had changed the world. However, he was certain that Constantine would not on his own have come up with the idea of moving the capital of the Empire to Byzantium, where the adviser had settled anonymously with his sister and friend amongst fellow Greeks, many of Lycian origin, because Diocletian was still alive, albeit in retirement. The relocation of the centre of Imperial power to the town, which swiftly grew into a great metropolis renamed Constantinople, would help the Empire in the east thrive for over a thousand more years.

Dr. Barry was equally sure that making the faith of a certain struggling religious sect, heavily persecuted under Diocletian, the official state religion was not an original concept of the new Emperor. After all, it had been the new Imperial adviser who had been the true architect of the Edict of Milan of 313 A.D., which had brought the persecution of Christians to an end, making their faith legal.

Dr. Barry therefore wondered whether there had ever been anyone who could rival the profound influence on history achieved by the blonde blue-eyed adviser. The Doctor had debated within his own mind, without coming to a conclusion, whether such unparalleled accomplishment was despite or because of the fact that the man was a nullified eunuch.

THE END

of

‘THE LYCIAN PRINCE’

by

PUEROS

Author’s Note

The tondo exists and the named personages in the painting were factual characters. I wondered how five friends from disparate backgrounds, and apparently of four different nationalities (1 Lycian, 2 Roman, 1 Sicilian and 1 Hispanian), could all know each other from childhood and come to be such influential people during the reign of Constantine the Great, despite the fact that two also somehow, somewhere suffered castration. However, the discovery, in August 2001, of an ancient copy of a manuscript by a certain Alexandrian stimulated me into writing this saga, spiced with some of my own sexual fantasies, to provide an explanation that, I hoped, might be of interest to some of the wider public.

Pueros

(also known as Dr. Peter Barry)

Author’s Postscript

I shall leave it to the reader to split fact from fantasy in all the 69 chapters. Thank you to those who have patiently followed the saga to its conclusion and to eunuch.org for allowing such a long tale to be posted.