Yesterday, the world jostled, thrilled and was overcome with excitement by the total eclipse of the sun by the moon. We’ve had scientific explanations, videos of eclipse-chasers setting out, scenes from Burgos in Spain where rooms and hotels had been booked for months, even years to see the 100% eclipse. News headlines and social media are filled today with stunning photos.
But how did ancient peoples see it?
I wanted to include a scene with an eclipse in my novel EXSILIUM to invoke a sense of dark things to come, but I doubted one was happening at the time. A storm would have to do. But I was thrilled when I discovered from research that an eclipse actually occurred at the time I needed! And the information came from NASA in the form of a map. I could hardly believe it! Rome wasn’t 100% in its path as Burgos in Spain was yesterday, but the effect would be enough.
So here’s what Lucius Apulius experienced…
Rome, AD 393
In late November, I was trudging down the hill mid morning towards the Senate House when the freezing wind that had forced me to pull my hood up and gather my cloak closer around me suddenly ceased. Although the sun was shining with that bright winter light when I set out, the sky seemed to grow darker. I cursed, thinking a storm was about to roll in, hopefully not hail or sleet. But there was no cloud in the sky, yet it became steadily darker.
Chatter and shouting around me quietened and people stopped in the street to stare upwards. Even mules stopped braying and chickens squawking. Instead of people leaning out of windows and making rude remarks about people passing below, old men and young women were equally hushed. Some gave the Christos sign across their chests, others brought hands to their mouths and staggered against walls as if for protection. Women started to cry; children huddled into their mothers’ skirts. Even a schoolmaster instructing children in a group on the steps of an abandoned temple near me fell silent.
We all watched, transfixed by the bright sun vanishing behind a black disc. I shivered as an ethereal twilight took hold. I knew in my mind it was an eclipse and astronomers could even predict their timings, but I was overwhelmed by the thought it could presage a portentous event as it had for the Divine Julius and Augustus’s deaths. Was Theodosius or Eugenius about to die? Or did it foreshadow ten years of war, or that the barbarians were about to pour over the Danube in overwhelming numbers?
I knew in my mind it would pass – at least, that was what I remembered from my tutor in mathematics many years ago. But he had never seen such a phenomenon and only remembered it as a story from his grandfather. My heart was thudding. I was finding it viscerally disturbing as if Helios himself was dying or losing a war with Luna. How long I stood there, I don’t know. Aside from those whimpering and softly wailing, and those sending prayers and supplications to their gods, every other human being seemed crushed into silence by this force of nature.
The black disc slid inexorably across the sun to leave only an intensely bright ring around it – the only light in the dark day. Gasps and cries now rippled through the crowd, many now on their knees or crouched on the ground as if in their mother’s womb. I could scarcely breathe as I laboured to convince myself that this was not the end of days.
Then slowly, painfully, the black disc moved and sunlight was released. A collective sigh rose from the crowd. Tears rolled down faces, fear turned into relief. Some bent down and helped others to stand. People broke into excited talking and Rome became once more a city of noise. I leant back against a wall and let out a long breath as the sun’s warmth touched my face. The sun, the life-giver, had returned, but I couldn’t rid myself of the feeling in my bones that this eclipse had been a messenger of doom or at the very least of extreme danger.
But for whom?
EXSILIUM, Chapter XV
Alison Morton is the author of Roma Nova thrillers – INCEPTIO, CARINA (novella), PERFIDITAS, SUCCESSIO, AURELIA, NEXUS (novella), INSURRECTIO and RETALIO, and ROMA NOVA EXTRA, a collection of short stories. JULIA PRIMA and EXSILIUM, set in the late 4th century, tell the story of Roma Nova’s foundation. Audiobooks are available for four of the series. Double Identity, Double Pursuit and Double Stakes form a new contemporary thriller series. A new collection of Roma Nova short stories, HEROICA, is now out.
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