“I’m not sure how much more of this I can listen to,” said Jenny. “It’s not helping us.”
Jake pretended not to hear her. “Let’s say for the sake of argument you’re right,” he said. “How could the Etruscans have stumbled on this network when mainstream science” – on seeing the doctor’s glare he backtracked – “when all the rest of science missed it?”
“This is a matter wherein Roger’s research correlated with mine so precisely that I became convinced we had found symptoms of the same phenomenon. Are you familiar with Etruscan religion?”
“I’m not,” said Jenny.
“Let me fill you in then,” replied Dr Nesta. “A child prophet named Tages was said to have dictated the Etruscan holy text to man.”
“He was unearthed under a plough,” said Jake. “It was one of the only ‘revealed’ religions of the ancient world.”
“Correct. Very good. But did you know that in 1982 a grave thought to be that of Tages himself was discovered here in Italy?”
Jake was caught off guard. “No way.”
“Indeed yes. At a place called Pian di Civita, an hour’s drive north from here.”
“How did they know it was Tages’s grave?”
“It dated from about 800 BC,” said Dr Nesta. “That coincides exactly with the beginning of Etruscan religion. And inside was the skeleton of a boy who was obviously revered.”
“So he was a prince of some description,” suggested Jenny.
“There was evidence of child sacrifice,” said Nesta. “For several generations after the boy was laid to rest, infants were killed and buried in the vicinity of his skeleton. This is unique for Etruscan burials.”
A cold breeze stirred, whispering through the Temple of Saturn.
“The bones also showed evidence of frequent periods of famine,” Nesta continued. “If you accept this was Tages, it would explain the Disciplina Etrusca’s preoccupation with agriculture, predicting whether the crops would fail.”
Jake recalled the brontoscopic calendar.
If it should thunder it threatens dearth of food.
“More fascinating still, the child’s skull showed he’d had a cranial haemorrhage – it is likely he suffered from severe epilepsy. That could have led to …”
“Hallucinations,” interrupted Jake. “Visions, like Joan of Arc had.”
Dr Nesta nodded. “But Roger and I go further. We posit that this brain damage attuned the child to this background medium. He tapped into the grid, taught others to communicate with it. The incantations he set down in the Disciplina Etrusca … how can I put this? Flattered the network. It was compelled to listen.”
“Carry on,” said Jake in a guarded voice. “What happened after Tages died?”
“The Etruscans shielded their secret,” said Dr Nesta. “And for a time they were top dog in the western Mediterranean. But Rome stole it away. Whether by espionage or raid we can never know. But overnight the town’s fortunes changed forever. Then the conquest of Italy began. And as Rome rose, so Etruscan civilization fell. Roger even went so far as to suggest the exact year of the theft – 390 BC, when barbarians from Gaul sacked Rome. It was the last time the city would be overrun for nine centuries. Roger hypothesized that such a crushing defeat led Rome to try to mimic their Etruscan neighbours’ success. To covet what they possessed.” Dr Nesta lowered his voice. “In 390 BC the smooth flow of history was interrupted, like a … like a needle knocked from a record. Within a hundred and twenty years Romans had conquered Italy. The world was next. Only the theft of the Disciplina could explain it. Could explain this.” He indicated the Forum with a sweep of the arm. “This was the centre of an empire spanning from Spain to Syria, from Scotland to the Sahara Desert. Ask yourself – in a preindustrial age, could such a feat of conquest and administration be possible without help?”
“It pains me to engage with this fantasy,” said Jenny. “But if your theory’s correct, why didn’t the Etruscans take over the world?”
“Because, signora, the Etruscans were by their nature pessimists. Every surviving inscription portrays a fatalistic race, a people who had long believed their civilization would end after its anointed ten saecula.”
Jake felt a crackle of gloom on hearing the words.
“For them the Disciplina Etrusca led only to a self-fulfilling prophecy of defeat and decline,” Nesta continued. “But in the hands of the Romans, a people with ambition and confidence? It became a golden circle of conquest. The skies would have predicted triumph after triumph.”
“But Rome suffered defeats,” Jake shot back. “Long after you claim they obtained the Disciplina. When Hannibal crossed the Alps with his elephants it took the Romans completely by surprise – Carthage nearly destroyed Rome forever.”
“Do not underestimate human arrogance,” said Dr Nesta. “The Roman senators may not have believed such a feat was possible, they may have ignored the warnings. Or perhaps the soothsayers were afraid to reveal what the omens were telling them.”
“But Hannibal ravaged the Romans for twenty years. If they could predict the future, how do you explain the defeat at Cannae? Why did they lose a single battle?”
“Perhaps the clouds predicted only losses,” said Dr Nesta. “And what preceded the final defeat of Hannibal? A great increase in devoutness in Rome. Religious rites were observed with especial rigour. For the first time in centuries slaves were sacrificed. The network was appeased – Hannibal met his Waterloo.”
“What stopped Rome then?” said Jenny. “Why doesn’t the empire live on?”
“That we know,” Jake blurted out.
There was a moment’s silence. Then Jenny said, “It almost sounds like you believe it yourself, Jake.”
“Don’t be so silly.”
“Go on then, what were you going to say?”
“He was going to say that Constantine ordered the destruction of the Disciplina Etrusca,” Dr Nesta replied. “He trusted to Christianity instead. It was a poor decision. And again, history is our prime witness. Consider the greatest historian of them all, your Edward Gibbon. The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire blames only Christianity for what befell the empire.” Again Dr Nesta crossed himself.
“Gibbon merely argued that with Jesus as a rival figurehead to the emperor, Rome lost cohesiveness,” said Jake. “And without the figure of a divine Caesar to hold the empire together, it fell apart.”
“Gibbon identified the symptoms, but he misidentified the cause. Do you think the ancients would have kept on about this science for a thousand years if it didn’t work? What modern arrogance! It’s as Roger always said. There is this public misconception that ancient people were not fully evolved – cavemen grunt, modern humans think and our ancestors were somewhere in between. But the human who emerges from ancient literature is the same species as us. You see, the people who the ancient texts portray were every bit like us. They loved and lost. They planned for the future. They lied and schemed and were afraid of disease. Indisputably the classical world contained true genius, and yet still Rome clung to augury. Ask yourself why?” He grimaced. “For centuries Rome was governed as badly as … as Italy today, for instance. The emperors were mad, the civil wars were unending, the society was a stew of corruption. And yet for all its flaws Rome always seemed to prevail. What edge did it have?”
“If what you’re saying is true,” Jenny pressed, “then why isn’t thunder prophecy the central theme of Roman literature?”
Dr Nesta laughed. “First, because there was something very un-Roman about it – relying on superstition for success. The Romans liked to pretend everything they achieved was through hard work and endeavour, not some stolen secret. And if you had the edge on your rivals, wouldn’t you keep it to yourselves?”
“The Romans made a big show of taking the omens,” Jake observed.
“And yet it was examining livers and interpreting the flight of birds that were central to public ceremony,” said Dr Nesta. “If you knew the future was encoded in bolts of lightning, how clever to celebrate such ludicrous, such silly techniques.”
The group had meandered to the Temple of the Vestal Virgins, the priestesses charged with keeping the sacred flame of Rome alight. All that remained was a circular row of columns; it reminded Jake of a classical folly in the grounds of some Victorian mill-owner.
“And these were the women who kept the secret for so long,” said Dr Nesta. “Every Roman knew the Vestal Virgins were fundamental to the security of Rome – but not why. A dire power is best kept by a secretive group. Who controlled the Vestal Virgins controlled the fate of Rome. For they were keepers of the sacred flame.”
“Power in the hands of women?” Jenny snorted. “I thought we were second-class citizens.”
“Roger had a theory that females were more capable of interpreting the omens than men,” said Dr Nesta. “More perceptive, more open to the frequency. It was not for nothing the Etruscans gave their women a degree of freedom that scandalized the ancient world.”
Jake thought of Florence.
“Enough of this.” Jenny’s eyes glittered. “We met you at considerable risk, hoping for information about Roger. Stuff that would stand up in a court of law. Have you got anything useful to tell us? Anything at all?”
The scientist grimaced again. “Beyond what I have already said? No. But they killed him, signora. You must believe what I say.”
“With a lightning bolt?” Jenny laughed. “Even if that was possible, why would they get him like that? It’s so blatant.”
“I believe you have the phrase in English,” said Dr Nesta. “Hiding in plain sight.”
*
“That’s what you get when you bring together a pseudo-scientist and a disturbed historian,” Jenny growled as they returned to the hotel. “And we risked everything to meet him. I should have my bloody head examined.”
“Perhaps there was a grain of truth in what he was saying about the grave of Tages,” muttered Jake. “All that stuff about the haemorrhage. It was interesting, at least. And it wouldn’t be the first time in history somebody with a brain defect was hailed as saviour.”
Jenny gripped his wrist.
“What?” asked Jake. “What is it?”
“Grain … saviour …”
“I don’t follow,” he said.
“I think I’ve just worked out where Eusebius’s final hiding place is.”