Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [116]
“You must make a friend of the emperor, and impress him,” he assured his companion earnestly.
Tosutigus fell into the trap at once.
“How?”
Vespasian pretended astonishment.
“Make him a present of course – land. You have plenty, but he has less of his own than you suppose.”
Tosutigus frowned. This was not the way he had intended the conversation to go. He knew that in other parts of the island before the conquest began, Celtic chiefs had made gifts to the Roman emperor and in return had received both honours and lucrative contracts. But he was reluctant to part with any portion of a patrimony that had already shrunk in recent generations.
“How much would I need to give?” he asked doubtfully.
“He would not want the estates where your own home is – keep them,” Vespasian replied. “But this land on the high ground, and the land you have to the south west, towards the territory of the Durotriges: give him that.”
“But . . .” Tosutigus was dismayed. “That is three fourths of all my land!”
Vespasian’s look was stony.
“You have just asked him to make you a king. It’s a small price to pay for what you want.”
But, Tosutigus thought, I may not get what I want; and then I will have given all my land to an emperor I shall probably never see.
“And if I refuse?”
Vespasian’s face was a mask.
“Perhaps you would lose it anyway,” he remarked pleasantly.
The threat was obvious. If the Roman decided to take the land anyway, there was nothing he could do. The Durotriges would not make any trouble on his behalf, because he had broken his vow and given up the dune. The Belgae to the east cared nothing for him; the Atrebates had forgotten his existence. Faced with reality, and with Vespasian’s naked power, he realised as a sudden cold sweat broke over his body, the incredible folly of his plan and the weakness of his position. He had no options; he was defenceless. He had even opened the gates of the fort, the only bargaining weapon that he had.
But in this assessment too, Tosutigus was wrong; Vespasian did not in the least want to conquer Sarum. For if this land were to be conquered, then it would automatically come under the control of the military, and perhaps require a small garrison in an inconvenient location. Yet here, he saw at once on the rolling high ground, were exactly the sort of valuable estates that Claudius would be glad to receive for his personal use and for his family: valuable estates, moreover, which were not claimed by any powerful tribe. The legate had no intention of losing such an opportunity to please the emperor. All that was needed, he knew, was a legal document in due form, making a personal gift of them from the present owner to Claudius: that was how such matters were done. But Tosutigus knew little of imperial administration or of Roman legal niceties. He did not understand that the transfer would benefit only Vespasian in the emperor’s eyes, or that such a document would then be used by the clever military bureaucrat to persuade other chiefs to follow his example.
In fact, Vespasian would have been satisfied with half the land he had demanded, in return for which Tosutigus should have held out for at least a grant on Roman citizenship.
But Tosutigus had received a shock, and he panicked.
“It seems I have no choice,” he muttered, and from that point they rode over the chalk ridges in silence.
At the dune, watched in puzzlement by Numex and his men, Vespasian quickly dictated an appropriate document to the centurion who acted as scribe. When it was done, he invited Tosutigus to sign it. It read:
I, Tosutigus, hereditary chief and ally of Rome and in the presence of legate Vespasian, do give to Claudius Nero Germanicus, divine Emperor of Rome, all