General Antonidus
Encyclopedia
General Antonidus is a fictive
character in Conn Iggulden
's best-sellings Emperor book series. In the series, he is a optimate-party general
supporting Sulla in the Servilian war.
In the first book, Gates of Rome, the general is - though not given a role - a probably supporting general of the grand-general Sulla of the roman conservatives, fighting the populares
led by Cinna
and Gaius Marius
, the latter of whose sister's son (in reality wife's brother's son) was no other than Julius Caesar
, then a teenager. Sulla arranged games and soon rose to consul, the second most powerful title in the Roman Republic
, held by two men and the most powerful in peace. However, Sulla got in conflict with his co-consul Marius and was - after various intrigues and fightings - sent to Greece
to fight Mithridates VI of Pontus
. He had bribed senators to choose Marius' Primigenia legion to send, but with a few votes Marius won by selling his house and "outbribing" Sulla, he was sent away with Antonidus and their Second Aulelia legion instead. However, the military mastermind Sulla left soldiers inside Rome itself before marching. Fighting Mithridates (less than 20,000 soldiers clashed in battle) he won, and calmly returned to fight Marius in the battle of the Gates of Rome, where Marius was assassinated and the city with its empire conquered by Sulla, Antonidus and the conservatives. After banishing Caesar but sparing his life (claiming he didn't have to kill him, and then it would just be foolish to do so, indeed showing a bit of scruples
in the otherwise so merciless ruler).
In the sequel Death of Kings
, Antonidus plays a central role. He accompanies Sulla as the womanizing and alcoholic ruler is poisoned, an act of Tubruk, Caesar's and Brutus
' earlier guardian
when they were children (they are similar age in the novels, though Brutus were fifteen years younger and sometimes claimed to be Caesar's son - though unlikely - in reality). Antonidus partly takes over the power after the death of his master, but cannot prevent a bit of anarchy, though the dictatorship
placing optimates in power was abolished. Upon Caesar's return to Rome (when he was about 25 years old) after fighting pirates in the Mediterranean, Antonidus blames him for acting without permission and murdering a Roman soldier in Libya
. Antonidus and his supporter, the conservative Cato the younger
is, however, pressured down by Pompey
, as Antonidus and Cato had acted together in a plot where Cato hired an assassin
to kill a loved one of all those believed by them to be involved in the Sulla assassination, as an act of revenge, but mostly to recognize and try to get out the real mastermind behind the assassination. Not able to guess at all the truth, the daughter of Pompey Magnus is killed, he himself then supports Caesar as Antonidus and Cato opposes his acts, where he once for all (ironically, as Caesar worshipped his uncle Marius and hated Sulla) finished Sulla's work, defeating Mithridates as he made rebellion again, Mithridates dying in the battle and handed over to Roman authorities for burial by cremation
.
This is, in Iggulden's novel (though not historical accurate, supporting the thrilling plot), the first reason why Pompey and Caesar become friends. Pompey is also a close friend of Crassus, populare and the richest man in Rome. As the (implied to be) leper assassin paid by Cato is planning to murder Crassus' wife, Antonidus visits him and tells him to take "the other", aiming Caesar's loved and beautiful wife Cornelia
, the daughter of Cinna, who earlier fought the conservatives with Marius. After Sulla's victory, the house of Marius was given to Antonidus, who now resides there, in Caesar's eyes illegally. Caesar smuggles weapons into the city and seizes the house, by arms but without blood. Antonidus is furious and has Caesar brought to court. Caesar has a magnificent speech, putting the people (who rather likes a populare than an optimate as Antonidus) on his side. However, Antonidus has the best arguments and hired lawyer
s, making the first two judges vote for him. The third and last rises, superior he puts in his veto for Caesar and thereby saves him from decapitation
, and since Antonidus has lived in the house now declared to having belonged to Caesar for the last years Caesar demands to be paid as a landlord
. Antonidus, lacking the resources paying for an extremely large and luxury house for almost ten years (having it bought rather than given, for ten denarii, about a dollar 2006) is sold as a slave, begging Cato for money but refused. He is then put on a farm in northern Italy, slaving for a rich lord in a garden. Then, suddenly he is saved when Spartacus
with 80,000 slaves seizes parts of Italy, and Spartacus himself frees Antonidus in the yard. Not knowing who he had been (or not caring) he lets Antonidus have "an hour or two - alone - with the lord and his daughters", who were taken prisoners, presumably raping the daughters and maybe - but probably not - killing his lord. He then accompanied Spartacus when Crixus
convinced him of that they should stay in Italy now when they were so successful, sacking and plundering, rather than escape to the free Gaul
and Germania
. Spartacus is convinced, and the slave army is led to Calabria
where Crassus has them shut in with a wall to starve them. Spartacus hires pirates to transport them to Sicily
, by the historians to create a slaveless independent state there, a sanctuary for his tens of thousands of men, but the pirates are defeated by Pompey's navy (while Caesar's wife and Tubruk are killed, Crassus later defeats the slave army and Spartacus is killed, Pompey tracks down the leper assassin and has him see his daughters die and then kills him in a personal vendetta
, then has Cato executed, but in the last moment he slashes his own throat with a concealed knife). Antonidus however escapes during the naval battle on board a ship with the gold reserve of Spartacus, supposedly living rich in Algeria
for the rest of his life.
Fictive
Fictive may refer to:* Fictive kinship* Fictive motion, a relatively new subject in psycholinguistics and cognitive linguistics...
character in Conn Iggulden
Conn Iggulden
Conn Iggulden is a British author who mainly writes historical fiction. He also co-authored The Dangerous Book for Boys.-Background:...
's best-sellings Emperor book series. In the series, he is a optimate-party general
General
A general officer is an officer of high military rank, usually in the army, and in some nations, the air force. The term is widely used by many nations of the world, and when a country uses a different term, there is an equivalent title given....
supporting Sulla in the Servilian war.
In the first book, Gates of Rome, the general is - though not given a role - a probably supporting general of the grand-general Sulla of the roman conservatives, fighting the populares
Populares
Populares were aristocratic leaders in the late Roman Republic who relied on the people's assemblies and tribunate to acquire political power. They are regarded in modern scholarship as in opposition to the optimates, who are identified with the conservative interests of a senatorial elite...
led by Cinna
Cinna
Cinna was a cognomen that distinguished a patrician branch of the gens Cornelia, particularly in the late Roman Republic.Prominent members of this family include:...
and Gaius Marius
Gaius Marius
Gaius Marius was a Roman general and statesman. He was elected consul an unprecedented seven times during his career. He was also noted for his dramatic reforms of Roman armies, authorizing recruitment of landless citizens, eliminating the manipular military formations, and reorganizing the...
, the latter of whose sister's son (in reality wife's brother's son) was no other than Julius Caesar
Julius Caesar
Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....
, then a teenager. Sulla arranged games and soon rose to consul, the second most powerful title in the Roman Republic
Roman Republic
The Roman Republic was the period of the ancient Roman civilization where the government operated as a republic. It began with the overthrow of the Roman monarchy, traditionally dated around 508 BC, and its replacement by a government headed by two consuls, elected annually by the citizens and...
, held by two men and the most powerful in peace. However, Sulla got in conflict with his co-consul Marius and was - after various intrigues and fightings - sent to Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
to fight Mithridates VI of Pontus
Mithridates VI of Pontus
Mithridates VI or Mithradates VI Mithradates , from Old Persian Mithradatha, "gift of Mithra"; 134 BC – 63 BC, also known as Mithradates the Great and Eupator Dionysius, was king of Pontus and Armenia Minor in northern Anatolia from about 120 BC to 63 BC...
. He had bribed senators to choose Marius' Primigenia legion to send, but with a few votes Marius won by selling his house and "outbribing" Sulla, he was sent away with Antonidus and their Second Aulelia legion instead. However, the military mastermind Sulla left soldiers inside Rome itself before marching. Fighting Mithridates (less than 20,000 soldiers clashed in battle) he won, and calmly returned to fight Marius in the battle of the Gates of Rome, where Marius was assassinated and the city with its empire conquered by Sulla, Antonidus and the conservatives. After banishing Caesar but sparing his life (claiming he didn't have to kill him, and then it would just be foolish to do so, indeed showing a bit of scruples
Scruples
The word scruples or scruple can mean: – a doubt or hesitation that troubles the conscience or that comes from the difficulty of determining whether something is right...
in the otherwise so merciless ruler).
In the sequel Death of Kings
Death of Kings
Death of Kings, published in 2011, is the sixth novel of Bernard Cornwell's Saxon Tales series. It continues the story of Saxon warlord Uhtred of Bebbanburg who keeps fighting against a new Danish invasion of Wessex and Mercia....
, Antonidus plays a central role. He accompanies Sulla as the womanizing and alcoholic ruler is poisoned, an act of Tubruk, Caesar's and Brutus
Brutus
Brutus is the cognomen of the Roman gens Junia, a prominent family of the Roman Republic. The plural of Brutus is Bruti, and the vocative form is Brute, as immortalized in the quotation "Et tu, Brute?", from Shakespeare's play, Julius Caesar....
' earlier guardian
Legal guardian
A legal guardian is a person who has the legal authority to care for the personal and property interests of another person, called a ward. Usually, a person has the status of guardian because the ward is incapable of caring for his or her own interests due to infancy, incapacity, or disability...
when they were children (they are similar age in the novels, though Brutus were fifteen years younger and sometimes claimed to be Caesar's son - though unlikely - in reality). Antonidus partly takes over the power after the death of his master, but cannot prevent a bit of anarchy, though the dictatorship
Dictatorship
A dictatorship is defined as an autocratic form of government in which the government is ruled by an individual, the dictator. It has three possible meanings:...
placing optimates in power was abolished. Upon Caesar's return to Rome (when he was about 25 years old) after fighting pirates in the Mediterranean, Antonidus blames him for acting without permission and murdering a Roman soldier in Libya
Libya
Libya is an African country in the Maghreb region of North Africa bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia to the west....
. Antonidus and his supporter, the conservative Cato the younger
Cato the Younger
Marcus Porcius Cato Uticensis , commonly known as Cato the Younger to distinguish him from his great-grandfather , was a politician and statesman in the late Roman Republic, and a follower of the Stoic philosophy...
is, however, pressured down by Pompey
Pompey
Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, also known as Pompey or Pompey the Great , was a military and political leader of the late Roman Republic...
, as Antonidus and Cato had acted together in a plot where Cato hired an assassin
Assassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
to kill a loved one of all those believed by them to be involved in the Sulla assassination, as an act of revenge, but mostly to recognize and try to get out the real mastermind behind the assassination. Not able to guess at all the truth, the daughter of Pompey Magnus is killed, he himself then supports Caesar as Antonidus and Cato opposes his acts, where he once for all (ironically, as Caesar worshipped his uncle Marius and hated Sulla) finished Sulla's work, defeating Mithridates as he made rebellion again, Mithridates dying in the battle and handed over to Roman authorities for burial by cremation
Cremation
Cremation is the process of reducing bodies to basic chemical compounds such as gasses and bone fragments. This is accomplished through high-temperature burning, vaporization and oxidation....
.
This is, in Iggulden's novel (though not historical accurate, supporting the thrilling plot), the first reason why Pompey and Caesar become friends. Pompey is also a close friend of Crassus, populare and the richest man in Rome. As the (implied to be) leper assassin paid by Cato is planning to murder Crassus' wife, Antonidus visits him and tells him to take "the other", aiming Caesar's loved and beautiful wife Cornelia
Cornelia
Cornelia is a feminine given name. It is a feminine form of the name Cornelius. Nel or Nelly can be used as a shortened version of Cornelia...
, the daughter of Cinna, who earlier fought the conservatives with Marius. After Sulla's victory, the house of Marius was given to Antonidus, who now resides there, in Caesar's eyes illegally. Caesar smuggles weapons into the city and seizes the house, by arms but without blood. Antonidus is furious and has Caesar brought to court. Caesar has a magnificent speech, putting the people (who rather likes a populare than an optimate as Antonidus) on his side. However, Antonidus has the best arguments and hired lawyer
Lawyer
A lawyer, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is "a person learned in the law; as an attorney, counsel or solicitor; a person who is practicing law." Law is the system of rules of conduct established by the sovereign government of a society to correct wrongs, maintain the stability of political...
s, making the first two judges vote for him. The third and last rises, superior he puts in his veto for Caesar and thereby saves him from decapitation
Decapitation
Decapitation is the separation of the head from the body. Beheading typically refers to the act of intentional decapitation, e.g., as a means of murder or execution; it may be accomplished, for example, with an axe, sword, knife, wire, or by other more sophisticated means such as a guillotine...
, and since Antonidus has lived in the house now declared to having belonged to Caesar for the last years Caesar demands to be paid as a landlord
Landlord
A landlord is the owner of a house, apartment, condominium, or real estate which is rented or leased to an individual or business, who is called a tenant . When a juristic person is in this position, the term landlord is used. Other terms include lessor and owner...
. Antonidus, lacking the resources paying for an extremely large and luxury house for almost ten years (having it bought rather than given, for ten denarii, about a dollar 2006) is sold as a slave, begging Cato for money but refused. He is then put on a farm in northern Italy, slaving for a rich lord in a garden. Then, suddenly he is saved when Spartacus
Spartacus
Spartacus was a famous leader of the slaves in the Third Servile War, a major slave uprising against the Roman Republic. Little is known about Spartacus beyond the events of the war, and surviving historical accounts are sometimes contradictory and may not always be reliable...
with 80,000 slaves seizes parts of Italy, and Spartacus himself frees Antonidus in the yard. Not knowing who he had been (or not caring) he lets Antonidus have "an hour or two - alone - with the lord and his daughters", who were taken prisoners, presumably raping the daughters and maybe - but probably not - killing his lord. He then accompanied Spartacus when Crixus
Crixus
Crixus was a leader of the slave rebellion in the Third Servile War, along with Spartacus and Oenomaus.He was a Gaul , and had been a slave for several years before the revolt. Crixus had fought for the Allobroges against the Romans and had been captured. Like his companions, Crixus had trained as...
convinced him of that they should stay in Italy now when they were so successful, sacking and plundering, rather than escape to the free Gaul
Gaul
Gaul was a region of Western Europe during the Iron Age and Roman era, encompassing present day France, Luxembourg and Belgium, most of Switzerland, the western part of Northern Italy, as well as the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the left bank of the Rhine. The Gauls were the speakers of...
and Germania
Germania
Germania was the Greek and Roman geographical term for the geographical regions inhabited by mainly by peoples considered to be Germani. It was most often used to refer especially to the east of the Rhine and north of the Danube...
. Spartacus is convinced, and the slave army is led to Calabria
Calabria
Calabria , in antiquity known as Bruttium, is a region in southern Italy, south of Naples, located at the "toe" of the Italian Peninsula. The capital city of Calabria is Catanzaro....
where Crassus has them shut in with a wall to starve them. Spartacus hires pirates to transport them to Sicily
Sicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...
, by the historians to create a slaveless independent state there, a sanctuary for his tens of thousands of men, but the pirates are defeated by Pompey's navy (while Caesar's wife and Tubruk are killed, Crassus later defeats the slave army and Spartacus is killed, Pompey tracks down the leper assassin and has him see his daughters die and then kills him in a personal vendetta
Feud
A feud , referred to in more extreme cases as a blood feud, vendetta, faida, or private war, is a long-running argument or fight between parties—often groups of people, especially families or clans. Feuds begin because one party perceives itself to have been attacked, insulted or wronged by another...
, then has Cato executed, but in the last moment he slashes his own throat with a concealed knife). Antonidus however escapes during the naval battle on board a ship with the gold reserve of Spartacus, supposedly living rich in Algeria
Algeria
Algeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria , also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of Northwest Africa with Algiers as its capital.In terms of land area, it is the largest country in Africa and the Arab...
for the rest of his life.