1.       From p. 14 to p. 25:

For I was different from other men.  My left leg was rather stiff and difficult to use, my left foot turned sharply inwards, and so, when I walked, I had problems with my balance.  In some way or other, my muscles were always either too soft or too hard, with the result that I found it difficult to coordinate fully the movements involved in walking.  It was a handicap which no longer troubled me, because I had been born with it and had grown up with it.  I had never known anything else.  And Santonix had taught me to change those things I could change, and to accept what I could not alter.  That was the key to happiness.  Because when you had accepted something disagreeable, you were free to devote yourself to the beautiful things in life.  This realisation seems to me to be even more significant than the Celtic skill of wrought-iron work, which the Romans themselves try to copy, although they have yet to master it, and that is why they still run about in helmets made of bronze.

In those days, I was a very happy man, inquisitive and adventurous, and I was yet to meet anyone with whom I would have liked to change places.

‘Korisios,’ my uncle Celtillus started off again to explain to me one more time how he intended to get me to the coast.  He told me how heavy downpours of rain could make the roads impassable, and that, to meet this eventuality, he had bought an extra horse.  Wanda was to ride with me.

‘Wanda!’ I exclaimed.  ‘Just what have I done to the gods that they should have burdened me with that Germanic slave?  I sometimes ask myself just who is whose slave here!’

Celtillus shook his head in irritation.  ‘Korisios, the gods have kept me alive so that I can bring you to the Atlanticus.’

‘But, Celtillus,’ I burst out laughing, ‘lately, I’ve often wondered whether you really are the same fellow who served twenty years as a mercenary in the Roman army.  You fought in Spain, in North Africa, in Egypt and on Delos.  You should have caught fungus poisoning, or run aground in a trireme or been beheaded by a Parthian cavalryman, but no, you survived all such adversities.  And you are afraid?’

‘Korisios, unfortunately you never knew your father.  But I can tell you here and now, your father knew no fear, and yet he never reached the Mediterranean.’

I knew the story down to the last detail, because it was told over and over again in our village community.  Back then, my father, Korisios the Blacksmith, had made his way with Uncle Celtillus over the Poeninus to Rome, in order to serve as a mercenary in Rome’s army.  Celtic blacksmiths were very much sought after as mercenaries.  Yet only a few days later my father had broken a tooth biting on a mussel and, although the legion’s doctor had pulled the tooth, his cheek had swollen up like a pig’s bladder.  A Greek doctor is supposed to have said later that the pus had poisoned his blood.  I never knew my mother either.  She died giving birth to me.  That was a fate which did not weigh heavily on us Celts, since death is nothing more than a transition to the next life.  For that reason, we can also put up with the tricks the gods play so much better than other peoples, because we know of the transmigration of souls, and so a hard life amounts to nothing more than a hard day.  And that, too, is why we have no reason to drown the handicapped, and the handicapped have no reason to drown themselves.  In my case, that would have been utterly pointless anyway, for I am an excellent swimmer, and so it would have been difficult for me to drown myself.  However, be that as it may.  I was seventeen at that time and just bubbling over with energy and zest for life.  The fact that I grew up without parents has never struck me as unfair, for it was a frequent occurrence, and no Celt need feel lonely because of that; families decimated by sickness and death merely formed new extended families, and so I lived together with Uncle Celtillus and twenty-nine other relatives in the one single long-house.  Wasn’t life wonderful?

‘Yes, yes,’ murmured Uncle Celtillus, ‘you’re young, Korisios, but what are you going to do if Ariovistus is standing face to face with you?’

‘I’ll make him laugh,’ I replied cheekily.

Celtillus shook his head in disbelief and ran his hand over his bushy moustache in puzzlement.  My own one was already quite splendid, but unfortunately it still was not as bristly and bushy as Celtillus’s.  But presumably the druids had developed some evil-smelling tincture for that too.  That was fine by me, so long as it wasn’t mixed with garum, that fish sauce.

‘Korisios, I can feel the strength in my arms waning.  The way that still lies before me is short.  I shall not live to see the Atlanticus.  And my last thoughts concern you, Korisios.  What is to become of you?’

‘Uncle,’ I said with feigned outrage, ‘your despondency borders on blasphemy.  Either I shall one day, in the Forest of the Carnutes, be elevated to be a druid, or I shall by that time have established my trading house in Massilia and will have successfully copied everything that the Romans produce and will be selling it all over Gaul.  I shall ruin the Romans.’

That may sound like an exaggeration, but I was completely serious about the idea of a trading house.  Lately there were more and more frequent days on which I preferred the career of a merchant to the druids’ profession.  I was really undecided.  I wanted fame and honour; whether as a merchant or a druid, I was still not altogether clear.

Celtillus nodded.  He had grown old.  By this time, he was the oldest in our community.  Well over fifty already.  Ever since he had returned to us, ten years ago, he felt responsible for me.  After all, we belonged to the same clan.  It was for my sake that he bought the young Germanic slave, Wanda, last year.  She was supposed to take his place one day, when he passed over into the next life.  But I had no need of a crutch made of flesh and blood.  I did not require a slave.  And certainly not Wanda.  For sure, she had, in the meantime, become like a sister to me, but in fact like the kind of sister you would most dearly love to plunge into the marshes.

‘Korisios,’ murmured Celtillus, ‘when I lie awake at nights and reflect on this and that, I sometimes think you might be right, the gods do have some special purpose for you.’

‘At least three of them,’ I grinned.

At that, even Uncle Celtillus laughed, such a broad laugh that you could see the four teeth, ground down by the coarse grain, which the gods had still left him.  ‘Who knows, Korisios, your faith in your own success is so unshakeable that I sometimes ask myself …’

‘What, then, is the worst that could happen to me?’ I laughed.

Uncle Celtillus looked at me in amazement.

‘What is worse, Uncle?  That Ariovistus cuts out my heart or that the Romans nail me to a cross?  Whatever it is, it will be over quickly, and then I shall travel with the ferryman into my new life.’

Celtillus seemed relieved.  I had given him courage, although at that moment I no longer felt at ease, because the fact that someone like Celtillus was worried did indeed disturb me somewhat.  On the other hand, Uncle Celtillus had, for years now, simply been drinking too much.  To be sure, drinking builds up courage, but once the effect of the wine recedes, you become jumpy and fearful like a startled deer.  I grasped the iron hilt which Celtillus had fixed to my oak branch so that I could hoist myself up more easily, and got to my feet.

‘Wanda,’ I called angrily, as if she were supposed to be permanently by my side.

‘Yes, master!’  She was sitting behind me and had obviously not let me out of her sight all this time.  However, her ‘Yes, master’ sounded by no means humble or obsequious.  On the contrary.  She uttered her ‘Yes, master’ in such a way that it almost sounded ironic.  She was, fundamentally, an impertinent creature.  And clung like a limpet into the bargain.  Of course, that had been what Uncle Celtillus had ordered her to do.  He often threatened her with the whip, but I believe he had come to love her like his own daughter.  Be that as it may, there was not one part of her whole body that indicated any sign of breeding.

‘I’d like to go up to the cliff again.’

Wanda nodded, took a firm grip of my left arm and walked with me, slowly, up the hill.  She had long since accustomed herself to my slow pace.  She was the substitute for my left leg.  Although she had, in the meantime, mastered our language, she never sought to initiate a conversation from her side.  Nevertheless, I had managed to get her to speak to me only in Germanic.  The thing was, I was just as thirsty for new knowledge as Uncle Celtillus for undiluted Roman wine.  Celtillus, by the way, had taught me Latin.  In no time at all.  And Kretos, the merchant from Massilia who was perpetually plagued by toothache, had confirmed to me last year that I had now mastered the Greek language, both spoken and written.  These successes had brought about an enormous rise in my standing in our community and had spurred me on to learn even more.  I would have dearly loved to have a marble plaque made, listing everything that I already knew and have mastered.  But then, no one here would have been able to read it anyway …

Once we had reached the top of the cliff, Wanda let go of my arm and withdrew her hand very slowly, as if she were expecting at any moment that I would lose my balance and she would have to catch me.  It was at moments like these that my thoughts turned to the marshes I already mentioned.  Of course I wouldn’t lose my balance!  With both hands, I propped myself up on the slightly raised slab of rock and pulled myself up.  Although Wanda knew perfectly well that I hated it, she grasped me gently round the hips and helped me.  I really did detest that.  With a powerful leap, Lucia had reached the rock slab too.  Now she was looking down at Wanda and whimpering quietly.  For some inexplicable reason, Lucia loved Wanda above all else.  And since I loved Lucia, I called to Wanda, ‘Come on up, the sun’s shining here.’

‘Yes, master.’  Lithely, Wanda clambered up to join me on the ledge.  She had long, straw-blond hair, which she wore in a plait to one side.  That plait was worth a fortune.  I knew from Kretos that, in Egypt, they would have paid a great deal of gold for it.  Apparently, the best torsion ropes for catapult machines were made from blond Germanic hair.  I don’t know whether Wanda’s hair was really so fair.  I’ve watched her, down by the stream, rubbing tallow and ashes into her hair.  I smiled at her and mischievously smoothed my moustache.  She held her head slightly bowed, in a sad way, as if she had submitted to her fate.  And yet her wonderfully beautiful eyes radiated dignity.  Wanda had a pretty, narrow face, with full lips which always smelt of fresh water.  She wore a sleeveless dress of red woollen material, under which two firm breasts stood out like hemispheres.  She had draped the material around her in such a way that it could be fastened at her shoulders with two clasps.  Around her waist, the dress was belted.  Ever since she had started wearing that red woollen stuff, she no longer looked like a slave.  And if you presented a slave with two clasps, you might as well give her her freedom.  But that’s the way Uncle Celtillus was.  I mean, that’s what happens when you don’t dilute Roman wine.  You celebrate saturnalia the whole year round.  That was a kind of Roman festival, at which the Romans treated their slaves like masters.  But only during the festival, of course.

Wanda did not seem to read my thoughts.  She sat there, waiting patiently.  I noticed she was wearing a new glass bracelet on her wrist.

‘From Celtillus?’ I asked.

Wanda nodded.  Where willingness to chat was concerned, she was no match for any Celt.  Even the dumb ones.

‘Tell me, Wanda, supposing I were a druid, what would you want to know from me?’

Wanda had crossed her legs and was playing with a beech leaf.

‘We Teutones have no need of druids.’

‘Yes, yes, I know you have no priests, your tribal chiefs take care of that …,’ I retorted brusquely, ‘but just supposing …’

‘Where I come from,’ Wanda interrupted me, ‘only the women have prophetic powers.  No one would ever think of consulting a man.’  That was Wanda, all right!

‘So,’ I tried again, ‘supposing I were a druidess, what would you like to know from me.’

‘But you’re not a druidess,’ she said, offhand.

‘I know that,’ I said, my indignation gradually mounting.  ‘But I’d like to know what you would like to know, if I were a druidess!’

She raised her head and looked me straight in the eyes.

‘Why are you not able to walk, master?’

For a moment, I was flustered.  That was like a mouthful of garum.  I would have liked to talk about the mysterious course of the stars, or about the legendary depths of the oceans, and now she wanted to hear something about my left leg.  What was I supposed to say?  I was born like that!  For me, it was the most natural thing in the world that I should limp through the forest, trip over a root now and then, measuring my length, and on steep banks regularly lose my balance and overshoot my mark with skinned knees.  So what?  Everyone got by in his own way.

‘I’d like to know why you can’t walk,’ repeated Wanda.  By Epona!  How earnestly she could say that!  That’s the way Teutonic women are, they burrow and dig like moles and then sink out of sight like a stone in the marshes, until they can no longer see the sun for sheer darkness.

‘Of course I can walk!  What do you think I’m doing all the time?’  I laughed and went on, in the Germanic language into the bargain, ‘But when I was growing in my mother’s womb, the water suddenly disappeared, in which unborn children thrive like wriggling fish in the waters of the river.  It’s in that water you learn all your movements.  But without water, I could no longer move.  For a very, very long time.  And so I was unable to learn anything.  When I finally came into the world, I was like a Greek statue.  Handsome and well-built,’ — I raised a warning finger — ‘but immobile.’

To my amazement, Wanda was listening intently.  This really seemed to interest her.  I simply could not make her out.  I went on, ‘You Teutons would have exposed me.  It’s the same with the Romans and the Greeks.  Only the Celts and the Egyptians bring up handicapped children.  For they believe that gods inhabit them.’

I was grinning all over my face.  I was quite delighted with this interpretation.  It could have been my own invention.

‘Master, why do your priests believe that the gods live in you?’

‘Why?’ I asked in astonishment.  ‘Why indeed!  It’s quite simple: so that you can make use of them in order to walk.  Obviously the gods have some different purpose for me.  They don’t want me to walk for other gods.  Do you understand?  They need my body as their home.’  I raised my head, the way those sons of nobles do, whom I can’t abide.  But at least, that way, Wanda could see me in profile for once.

‘You mean, master, the gods intend that you should become a druid?’

‘I’d like to know as much as a druid does, but not necessarily to be a druid.  After all, it’s forbidden for a druid to drink wine.  How else is he supposed to invent new potions?  I’d much rather become the most important merchant in the Mediterranean.  But with a druid’s wisdom.  As you see, they’d have to invent a new type of druid for me.’

Wanda corrected my syntax, which still caused me problems, and gazed with a smile out over the valley.  After a while, she said, ‘When the Teutones take you as a slave, master, you’ll have perfect command of our language.’

‘Do you think so?  And what will the Teutones do with me?’

‘They’ll put you to work in the salt-mines.  You have to work on all fours there anyway.  And, sooner or later, they’ll kill you,’ was Wanda’s response, as if this were the most matter-of-fact thing in the world.

‘Are you sure they don’t need interpreters?  Or people who can make them laugh?  I can make anybody laugh.’  Wanda looked at me, her expression unmoved.

‘Almost anybody,’ I added.  Suddenly, I felt slightly uneasy.  Straining my eyes, I stared into the distance and could see the cloud of smoke rising away over there at the bend in the Rhenus was becoming ever blacker and larger.  It seemed to me too, as if I had recognised something that was moving in our direction.  But it was still very far off, and I could not make out anything more precise.  Even though my eyesight was excellent.  Not everyone was blessed with that good fortune.  In Massilia, there were probably more eye-doctors than midwives.

‘Wanda, are those horsemen?’ I asked in my Celtic tongue.  I had had enough of these Germanic language exercises.

‘No, master.  But you said that, at your birth, you were made of stone.  Tell me why you’re no longer made of stone.’

I eyed Wanda with suspicion.  I was convinced she had seen horsemen and now wanted to distract me.  As if she had read my thoughts, she said, ‘I didn’t see any horsemen, master.  Tell me more.’

‘As I was in a great hurry to open up my place of business in Massilia, I came into the world two months prematurely.  My mother died in childbirth, my father, Korisios the Blacksmith, wanted to enlist along with Uncle Celtillus as a mercenary in the Roman army, and died, on the way there, of a suppurating tooth.  I was alone with all my relatives and spent my days lying on a piece of hide.  I could barely move.  Whenever the sun shone, they carried me outside into the sunshine, and when it rained, they brought me back inside.  Later, when, to everyone’s surprise, I started to talk, my life became rather more varied.  I had people I could converse with.  And, out of sheer boredom, I began to learn things.  While the other boys of my age were clambering up trees or running races, I had someone explain to me how ore and salt are mined, how swords are forged and where the Pillars of Hercules stand.  Studying became my favourite occupation.  Later, when my friends were learning the craft of hunters or warriors, I expressed the desire to become a druid.  But the then druid, Fumix, talked me into believing I was sick.  All the time, he tried to persuade me of this.  And yet, I felt completely fit.  But the fellow never tired of assuring me that I was even seriously ill and would atone for some awful wrong I had committed in a previous life.  Although I am not a druid, I’m almost certain that, even then, Fumix was suffering from mistletoe poisoning.  So I prayed earnestly to our goddess Ellen, who is responsible for sickness, not that I should be made well — after all I already was — but that this Fumix should perish, like mackerel in the sun.  To my amazement, he died a few days later, and I drank Roman wine for the first time.  A Falerno at that.  Certainly a very refined Roman one, that is to say, diluted with water.  So now do you understand why I always insist that the gods had banded together in my favour?’

Wanda looked at me sceptically.  ‘But you were made of stone when you were born.  Did your gods help you?’

I was taken aback by Wanda’s persistence.  I would never have expected that of her.  She always seemed to me so indifferent, devoid of curiosity, contentedly resigned to her fate.  I gave her a smile, but I don’t think she noticed it at all.  So I went on with my tale.

‘Uncle Celtillus helped me.  He came back from the legion and set me on my feet.  The poor soul genuinely believed I had spent seven years lying on the ground, although I was able to walk, after a fashion.  That was simply the kind of set idea you get into your head only by drinking undiluted Roman wine.  Uncle Celtillus had been struck by this notion in Alexandria.  He had been given his pay and had boozed the whole night away.  In the course of it, a legion doctor of Egyptian extraction had talked of the horrendous effects head wounds can have on the movements of the arms and legs.  He had explained that the brain consisted of millions of hieroglyphic tablets.  And when one of these tablets splintered, you had to go back to the very start and relearn the lost knowledge.  He had mentioned children who had been missing individual tablets from birth, for instance the ones which explain to the head how the legs are set in motion.  In Egypt, too, these children are the dwellings of the gods.  That couldn’t be changed.  And it was for the best.  Yet it was possible for all those hieroglyphs which hadn’t been there at birth to be chiselled in later.  For example, the secret of how to walk.  The brain could learn that sort of thing later on.  Just as a person learns a language, so the brain could learn new abilities.  In the end, it all came down to the duration, intensity and frequency of the movements.  If you walked for hours each day, he said, the movement would, with the passage of time, be stored, carved into stone and, from then on, correctly reproduced.  Wanda, you just can’t imagine the things Uncle Celtillus got up to with me on his return!  It was terrible!  I would be lying peacefully under my oak-tree, eating the berries the boys and girls, my countless friends, had brought home from the forest for me.  And along came this Uncle Celtillus, whom I didn’t even know, claiming to be my uncle, knelt down in front of me, spread my legs wide and, like some galley-slave gone mad, started moving my legs in time to some rhythm.  That caused great merriment in our community, for what good was that supposed to do since I was unable to move my left leg by myself?  Was Celtillus intending to follow me in future on all fours and move my left leg?  Or was he thinking of building a wooden wheel on to me, just below the left hip?  Yet, to everyone’s amazement, I was able, a year later, to draw up my left leg without outside assistance.  Wasn’t that wonderful?  But that wasn’t enough for Celtillus.  Just imagine!  I could raise my left leg all by myself, which made my everyday life amazingly more varied, and this frustrated centurion and slave-driver still wasn’t satisfied!  So, he brought me to my feet and let go of me.  I dropped like a hard apple from the tree.  While other people fall soft and their head hits the ground from a very short distance, I went down stiff as a marble pillar.  I was happy to put up with a blood-smeared face because I was convinced that that would make Uncle Celtillus stop.  But no.  Instead, he taught me how to fall properly …  And then it went on from there, like some gladiator school in Capua.  It was my most ardent wish that I could discover the concoction that had despatched our dead druid Fumix to the ferryman, so that I could slip it into Celtillus’s wine.  I hated Celtillus and wished he would die on the spot.  Where was the justice in all this?  Why have we so many gods, if not one of them would take pity on me?  Why did my father and my mother have to die, when this accursed torturer was allowed to live?  It was a pretty awful time, and I seriously toyed with the thought of exchanging my gods for other ones.  Celtillus bound strips of hide round my knees, put a leather helmet on my head and set me on my feet again.  I staggered about, as if I had mixed a bronze pot of undiluted wine with cervisia and drunk it straight off.  If I came past a campfire, people would put their earthenware vessels somewhere safe out of my way.  Anyone would have thought the pottery south of the bend in the Rhenus was paying me for my walk-abouts.  Wherever I appeared, there was shattered crockery.  And every time I fell down, that frustrated slave-driver would say, ‘Korisios, you are allowed to fall, but you’re not allowed to lie there.’  So I would get up again and gradually became the terror of the community.  I felt like some sea-monster from the North Sea in our legends.  Any encounter with the girls in our community was rather embarrassing.  Because whenever I fell, I would always try to hold on to something.  Instinctively.  And so it often happened that I’d grab some piece of linen cloth and drag it to the ground with me.  This made the other boys envious of me, because none of them was so often surrounded by pretty, naked girls as I was.’

Wanda laughed softly.

‘You see, Wanda, I can make anybody laugh!’

2.       From p. 272 to 279:

‘Romans!’ bellowed Caesar down the hillside.  ‘Soldiers!  Before you stand the descendants of those barbarians whom we already defeated outside Massilia.  They are bandits who bring only war and corruption and never tire of boasting of their deeds.  If we stand face to face with them today, it is the wish of the immortal gods that these barbarians be punished for once and for all.  Romans! Legionaries!  We have been chosen by the gods to carry out the destiny of the Helvetii.  Do battle, legionaries!  Seize the gold of the Helvetii.  It is yours by right.  Fight, legionaries!  Earn for yourselves the respect of your centurions.  Earn for yourselves the respect of Caesar.  Rome looks to you.  Let battle commence!’

The legionaries yelled the fear out of their guts.  In rhythmical couplets they raised cheers for Rome and Caesar and gave each other courage, while, at the foot of the hill, the Celts presented an extraordinary spectacle.  A Celtic nobleman stood naked between the Helvetian and Roman lines and, at the top of his voice, challenged the primipilus, the highest-ranking centurion, to single combat.  If I had written down all the words he used, which were accompanied by the loud scornful laughter of the Celtic warriors, I could probably have published a small encyclopaedia of Celtic scatology.  But no centurion was prepared to take up the challenge.  Four legions stood facing the naked Celt.  Four legions, each forming three lines, one behind the other.  The Aeduan cavalry had been withdrawn.  Caesar no longer trusted it.  The naked Celt was beating his chest and hurling still more imprecations across at the legions.  Finally, to show his contempt, he peed in their direction.  When he then turned his backside to them and went into a crouch, a well-aimed arrow struck him between the shoulder-blades.  In fury, a number of Celtic noblemen tore off their weapons and their clothing and, now naked themselves, stepped forward, gesticulating wildly.  The cowardice of the Romans was absolutely beyond their comprehension.  What use was a victory gained by underhand means?  The Romans were refusing honourable combat!  All they wanted was victory!  The naked princes were beside themselves with rage.  In the end, a centurion from the second row lost his composure and rushed forward.  His courage was greeted by the Celts with a hurricane of cries of approval.  The naked Celts were just about to start fighting over who was to be allowed to fight the Roman when a further naked Celt stepped out into the broad corridor separating the Celtic and Roman battle lines.  The centurion immediately went into a defensive position and drew his gladius.  The naked Celt was tall and armed only with a long sword and a battleaxe.  While the centurion kept changing the position of his shield and his sword arm, the naked giant pounded fearlessly towards the rather short centurion, who, using clever tactics, bobbed lithely from one foot to the other, so as to be able to take lightning-quick evasive action if necessary.  But then, the Celt’s axe whistled through the air, split the centurion’s red shield, slit open his shirt of chain mail and came to rest embedded in his breast-bone.  With two strides, the naked giant was standing in front of the centurion, who was gasping for breath, and with one smooth stroke lopped his head off.  With a howl, the Celtic battle-lines stabbed the air with their swords.  The giant bent down to pick up the severed head.  With a circling motion, he swung it, still spurting blood, through the air.  A hail of arrows then laid him low.  A monstrous deed!  It was unbelievable how unsporting these Romans behaved!  There they stood, like cowards.  Discipline, they called that.  Uneasily, they were waiting for the cornus to sound the attack.  At the foot of the hill, more and more Celts kept pushing into the front lines.  As if every one of them wanted to be the first when it came to dying.  They were standing so close to each other that their shields overlapped.  Suddenly, from all directions, came the ear-splitting trumpeting of the cornus.  The legionaries launched their javelins and stormed down the hill.  Like an iron mesh, thousands upon thousands of missiles hissed through the air, momentarily blocking the view of the Celtic battle-lines.  Because the Helvetians were standing so close together, the pila often pierced two shields and thus pinned them together.  In vain, the Celts strove to shake loose the spears, the soft iron points of which bent on impact.  Unnerved, many of them dropped their shields and were run through by the javelins which now followed, hurled down the slope by the legionaries from the second and third ranks.  When the legionaries, running down with gladius drawn, reached the Helvetian lines, there were already yawning gaps in them, and it was a simple matter for the battle-hardened Romans to smash their shields into the faces of the Celts while simultaneously thrusting with their gladius to run them through accurately at armpit or abdomen height.  Since the Romans fought in close, but not cramped, formation, wielding short swords most suitable for stabbing thrusts, they were far superior to the nonplussed Celts, who used broadswords that were excessively long and therefore unwieldy.  With unexpected speed, the Helvetians withdrew up a hillside, barely a thousand paces away.  The legionaries, convinced of victory, pressed inexorably forwards.  But suddenly some fifteen thousand Boii and Tigurii appeared on the battlefield.  They had formed the rearguard of the Helvetian campaign.  They plunged straight into the fight and flung themselves upon the right, unprotected flank of the advancing legionaries.  When the Helvetians, who had withdrawn up the hill, saw the vociferous reinforcements, they returned to the attack once more and ran back down the slope.  With full force, they clashed with their pursuers, who were now being hard pressed from two sides.  Caesar immediately gave the order for the first two ranks of the four legions to withstand the Helvetians on the hill, while the third and last rank was to stop the advance of the Boii and Tigurii.  There was bitter fighting on both sides. The Helvetii knew that defeat would spell the end of their dreams of the Atlantic, and each and every legionary was aware that to lose here, out in this wilderness, meant certain death.  No one was seen to retreat on either side.  Only the spellbound Roman slaves, following the spectacle up on the hill, where the baggage had been barricaded in, believed the Romans to be under pressure.  At first, they merely exchanged cheeky grins.  Gradually, one after the other took to his heels down the other side of the hill, and suddenly they were running away in their hundreds.  With howls of derision.  The centurions forbade the recruits to set off in pursuit.  They needed every spare man.  The battle down the hill was turning into a full-blown slaughter, which lasted from noon until far into the night.  Losses on both sides were enormous, the wounded incalculable.  Yet even those who, because of the severe wounds they had sustained, had withdrawn from the struggle for the time being, soon got back on their feet in order to fight on.  Each side strove to bring about victory with one final effort.  Men fell and died, thousands of them lying on the blood-soaked ground.  Like a madman, one centurion, with both arms hacked off, ran across the vast field of corpses before slipping on a pulp of steaming entrails and falling his length.  A Celt staggered into the enemy lines, trying as he did to pluck a broken pilum from his neck.  One swing of a sword lopped off his head.  A large eyeball rolled across the bronze chest armour of a young tribune who lay motionless, but with his eyes wide open, staring heavenwards.  A Celt collapsed, dead, in a heap on top of him.  The gladius was still stuck in his armpit.  And little by little the Celts’ battle-cries became weaker.  The Boii and Tigurii were gradually withdrawing.  They did so in such a quiet and orderly way as to create the impression that they had now simply had enough of the battle.  The women and elders, who had stayed where the long wagon train had halted at midday, had by this time formed the wagons into a fortress.  The returning Boii and Tigurii climbed on to the flat beds of the vehicles, barricaded themselves behind grain-sacks and barrels and hurled their spears from there on to the disciplined advance of the legionaries.  The Helvetians had withdrawn on to their hilltop and were attempting to hold back the advancing Romans until they had brought their baggage to safety.  Then a centurion shouted out that Caesar would personally reward the first man to penetrate the Helvetian camp, whereupon the legionaries, scorning death, rushed the Celtic positions.  At last they succeeded in forcing their way into the heart of the camp and in seizing possession of the whole train.  The children of the most respected aristocrats were taken prisoner, the legendary gold reserves fell into the hands of the Roman soldiers.  The surviving Helvetii, Rauraci, Boii and Tigurii left the field of battle.  Silently and without haste, as if paying their last respects to the whimpering battlefield.

The Romans sank to the ground, exhausted, and thanked the gods that the nightmare was over.  Many wept quietly and openly.  Some trembled all over and muttered in confusion, as if they had lost their minds.  I felt as if paralysed.  All through the night we could hear the pleading, groaning and whimpering of the dying.  Until the early hours of the morning, exhausted legionaries had to comfort young recruits who, racked by uncontrollable fits of crying, lay writhing on the ground or wandered about, distraught.  What tales they had been told about their ancestors’ glorious battles, about the campaigns their relatives had taken part in!  But no one had told them what war was really like.

Caesar was sitting rigidly in his tent.  A scout reported that the Helvetians had resumed their trek.  He estimated the survivors at some sixty to seventy thousand.  Caesar ordered their pursuit.

‘We are no longer in a position to do that,’ muttered Labienus.  Caesar knew that the battle had ended indecisively.  He might just as well have left the battlefield first.  But knowing Caesar as well as I did by that time, I am certain he regarded the outcome of the battle as a sign from the gods.

‘How long will we need to bury the dead?’ Caesar asked, looking round.

‘At least three days, Caesar.’

Almost ashamedly, he looked down at his mud-spattered boots.  Three days — that meant he had suffered enormous losses.

‘Labienus, send messengers to the tribe of the Lingones.  In one, maybe two days, the Helvetii will have reached their territory.  I forbid the Lingones to give assistance to the Helvetii.  If they violate my order, I shall deal with the Lingones in the same way as I have dealt with the Helvetii.  Tell them that.’

‘Caesar,’ said one of the young tribunes, ‘we found vast amounts of gold in the Helvetians’ camp.  Should we …’

‘Can gold bring my dead men back to life or heal the dying?’ snorted the centurion Lucius Speratus Ursulus.  His left eye had turned black.  Under the tattered right sleeve of his tunica, a crust of blood had formed.

‘To some extent, yes,’ replied Caesar calmly.  ‘Gold means legions, legions mean power, and power means Rome.  Bring me the Helvetians’ gold!’

In an enormous tent, guarded by Caesar’s personal bodyguard, the recruits had heaped up the Helvetian gold.  There were whole wagonloads of rough ingots, countless barrels filled with Celtic, Massilian, Roman and Greek gold and silver coins.  Caesar had insisted that I accompany him.  Since the terrain was slippery in places, I had taken Wanda along.  Caesar took a torch from one of the soldiers of his bodyguard and sent him outside.  Now he was standing alone in the midst of his gold.  It must have had a value well into the millions.  And it was Caesar’s gold.

‘Is this why you invaded free Gaul?’ I asked Caesar.

He plunged his hand into a barrel full of Massilian gold coins, took out a handful and let them fall back into the barrel.

‘Druid,’ Caesar replied, lost in thought, as the shadows of the guards patrolled across the walls of the tent, ‘did you ever ask Alexander why he conquered an entire empire?’

Caesar was a man possessed.  It was not the gold which fascinated him, but the possibilities which that gold now opened up for him.  He was incapable of enjoying what had hitherto been achieved.  In his mind, he was already working out the realisation of an even more daring plan.  Caesar, when you saw him like this, was the slave of his own ambition.

Suddenly, an old wooden chest with gilt hinges attracted his attention.  He knelt before it and was about to open it.

‘Don’t do it,’ I warned.

He turned and handed me the torch, in order to have both hands free.

‘Why should I not open it, Druid?  The chest is not even locked.’

‘It is not locked because no Celt would ever contemplate opening it.’

Caesar turned towards me.  He was grinning from ear to ear.  He liked that.  A Celt was ordering him not to open a chest.

‘It’s the chest of a druid.  You must give it back before the gods punish you.’

Now it was finally clear to Caesar what he had to do.  I had threatened him with punishment from the gods.  If he opened the chest, he would make the Celtic gods his opponents.  That was altogether to his taste.  To quarrel with gods.  To defeat them, or to perish.  As Caesar opened the chest, I turned away in shame.

3.       From p. 291 to p. 296:

One morning — the fourth watch was not yet over — I was wakened by Lucia’s growling.  I glanced at Wanda, who was sleeping gently and peacefully beside me, and felt happy that the gods had, so far, been so well-disposed towards me.  Looking back, the story they had mapped out for me was not so bad at all.  I do always maintain that the ways of the gods are often unfathomable, and that you recognise only much later the divine plan which lies behind them.

‘Korisios!’  Now I could hear the cries.  The voice was coming from outside.  It was Krixios.  A praetorian was standing beside him.

‘Caesar wishes to speak with you.’

I got up at once and followed the praetorian to Caesar’s command tent.  Wanda accompanied me.  Peace and quiet still lay over the camp.  The sentries on the ramparts were huddled in thick woollen cloaks and warming their hands over small fires.  It was still cool in the early morning hours.  Even from some distance away, I could see the hot steam rising from Caesar’s tent.  Slaves were just leaving it with empty bronze pots.  The aroma of warm scrambled eggs hung in the air.  The praetorian pushed the tent-flap aside and ushered me in.  Inside the tent, hot steam had accumulated.  You could not see your hand in front of your face.  But for Wanda, I would have stumbled over the very first obstacle I came across.

‘Sit, Korisios,’ I heard Caesar’s voice.  I groped my way carefully to a chair and sat down.  Somehow, it was uncomfortable.  Something sticking in my back.  I turned round.  Over the back of the chair hung a leather belt with a short sword and a dagger in it.  All at once, I was wide awake.  Was today the day on which Santonix the druid’s prophecy was to be fulfilled?  My hand tightened round the hilt of the gladius.  It was fashioned out of elaborately worked ox-bones.  Each finger fitted exactly into the rounded grooves.  A cold draught blew into the tent and cleared the steam.  I was startled.  Caesar was lying before me, not three paces away, in a wooden bathtub filled to the brim with warm water.  He had his head laid back, his eyes were shut.  Wearily, his sweat-bathed head with its thinning hair was resting on the edge of the tub.  But it was not the heat that was troubling him.  Caesar seemed to be suffering.  He was in pain.  A servant had entered the tent and was putting several dishes on the small table which stood next to the bath.  As quietly as he had come, he disappeared again.  As he did so, cold air streamed into the tent and further improved the visibility.

‘Can you heal, Druid?’ asked Caesar, his voice weak.

‘I can heal him whom the gods wish to be healed,’ I replied.

Caesar seemed to think about this.  After a while, he said, ‘Druid, when the Celts laid down their arms, you greeted a warrior.  Basilus, you called him.’

‘Yes, why do you ask?’

‘He asked you whether you two would ever meet again.’

‘Yes, that’s correct.’

‘Why did he ask you?  Can you foretell the future?  You don’t talk to the gods, do you?’

‘What are you afraid of, Caesar?  Aren’t you yourself under the protection of the immortal gods?’

Caesar sat up abruptly.  As he did so, the water spilled over the edge of the bath.  Caesar’s chest was smooth shaven.  Not so much as a single tiny hair anywhere.

‘A Caesar knows no fear, Druid.  You surely do not imagine that I have nightmares simply because I have had your druids’ golden sickles melted down.’

‘You didn’t have the golden sickles melted down, Caesar,’ I said with complete certainty.  I was running a serious risk here.  But Caesar’s surprise confirmed my view.

‘How do you know that, Druid?’

‘If you had done that, you would not be having nightmares.  I don’t believe our gods would treat you so leniently.’

‘Rome bestowed on me the title of Pontifex Maximus.  I am therefore the highest priest of the civilised world.  Why should I not be entitled to destroy your holy relics?  Who else should have that entitlement, if not I, the pontifex maximus of the Roman Republic?’

‘Man’s order of things is a constant source of amusement for the gods, Caesar.  Gold has dulled your reason.  Already you are lusting for more and are thinking you can now descend upon the holy places of the Celts, too.  Did you yourself not say that the gods sometimes grant one a lengthy period of good fortune only in order that the sudden downfall will be all the more cruelly felt?’

Caesar leaned back in the bath and laid his head on the linen-padded rim.  He closed his eyes.  His jaw was tense.  He seemed to be in pain.

‘I don’t understand you Celts,’ he murmured.  ‘What exactly have I done for all Gaul to be suddenly at my feet?’

‘The first step into the bog is always easy, but when the body is being slowly sucked in and you flail your arms about in desperation and, despite yourself, hasten your doom, then and only then, Caesar, do you realise that that first step is the most fateful one.’

‘Do you mean by that that all those Gallic princes who are crawling in the dust before me here are about to set a trap for me?’

‘No, Caesar, their subjugation without a fight is genuine.  It’s the gods who are making you their plaything.’

Caesar remained silent.  After a while, he invited me to have something to eat.  He himself was not hungry.

‘It’s a Punic dish,’ murmured Caesar.  ‘I had ordered Punic mash …’  His voice sounded sluggish.  I passed the dish with the mash to Wanda.  It was a fragrant Gallic cream cheese which had been brought to the boil with barley grains, honey, eggs and milk.  A delicacy!  And with it, there were garlic balls.  These were made of fresh cheese, grated with fresh herbs and several cloves of garlic and mixed with oil and vinegar.  The paste had then been shaped into balls and was served with salty bread.  

‘Tastes exquisite, this Punic mash.  Did Hannibal bring you the recipe to Rome?’

‘Only as far as the gates of Rome,’ Caesar smiled wearily.  ‘By the way, do you know the word the Phoenicians use in their language for “elephant”?’

I shook my head and went on eating.

‘”Caesar”.  In the Carthaginians’ language, Caesar means elephant.  And we kept this nickname because one of our forefathers killed an elephant in a battle against Hannibal.’  After a pause, Caesar added, ‘Some people claim that happened in the First Punic War.  But I prefer the Second Punic War.  It’s certainly more honourable to have killed one of Hannibal’s elephants.’

In the camp, the signal for reveille rang out.  Caesar murmured, ‘Are there herbs which clear the senses, and others which cloud them?’

‘Yes,’ I replied hesitantly, ‘just as wine can make you feel merry and cheerful, so also can certain herbs make you fearful and despondent.  In our insides, it looks like a cooking-pot.  It’s up to us whether it all tastes bitter or sweet.  Nuts provide renewed strength.’

‘Then tell them to bring me nuts, Druid,’ muttered Caesar, reaching out for my hand.  ‘I thank you, Druid, for your honesty.  I would have had a Roman crucified for that.  But there is no crescent decorating your ankle as yet.’

‘What does the crescent signify?’ I asked rather eagerly.

‘The crescent?  Only citizens of Rome wear the crescent.  And in Rome, only the sons of senators do.’

Caesar must have noticed my excitement.  But he was too tired to react to it.  As if of their own accord, his eyes fell shut.  Then he murmured that I should leave him now.

Outside, we stood for a time under the canopy over the entrance, chatting with the praetorian guards.  Although I was feverishly going over Caesar’s words in my mind, we talked about eggs.  The second most important topic for a legionary is indeed food.  And when they talk about food, the talk is about eggs.  When camp had at last been reached and the march was over, everyone always wanted to know where the cheapest eggs were to be found.  Thirty thousand legionaries had nothing in their heads but eggs: raw eggs, boiled eggs, scrambled eggs.  Egg omelette, egg sauces and egg mash.

By the time we were making our way back to our own tent, there was bustling activity everywhere.  Small fires were already burning outside the legionaries’ tents, their bronze pots with their pretty handles hanging over them.  In these bronze casseroles, the slaves were preparing the breakfast porridge.

I reflected for a long time on my remarkable conversation with Caesar.  I realised that he probably mistrusted every Roman.  Every Roman with whom he came in contact was a potential competitor in Rome.  Perhaps that was why he appreciated my company.  I was not a rival.  Perhaps I also reminded him a little of his Grammaticus Antonius Gripho.    Something you have loved as a child, you often love for the rest of your life.

4.       From p. 368 to p. 371

When I was taken to Caesar’s tent in the middle of the night, he was lying on the damp earth, suffering violent convulsions, writhing like a worm in vinegar-water.  White foam was streaming from his mouth.  Between his teeth he had a piece of wood, a centurion’s baton.  His dark eyes were staring wildly.  They were struggling, pleading for help, crying out their pain to the gods.  But no word passed his lips, no sound tried to leave that tortured body.  It was as if the gods had made him their plaything.

I had brought the leather pouch in which I kept my dried herbs, because I had been told that Caesar was at death’s door.  But he was not dying.  I immediately demanded water and wine and began the hasty preparation of a tincture.  I added some crumbled mistletoe leaf, not too much, because mistletoe can kill, as it had killed the druid Fumix.  But mistletoe can also heal.  And then again, it is practically without effect when foaming waves are forming in the human body.  Nevertheless, it assists the other herbs in taking the wind out of the sails of the ship that is steering towards the other world.

A short time later, I poured the viscous brew into him.  It goes without saying, I could have killed Caesar.  It would have been a simple matter.  I don’t even believe for a moment they would have crucified me for it.  The medicus was not versed in the powers of the forest.  He knew only that people foaming at the mouth were being called by the gods to their presence.  No, I’m convinced they would not even have suspected me.  But I didn’t want to kill Caesar.  I wanted to heal him, I wanted to save him.  Just as he had saved me in the battle against Ariovistus.  For us Celts, it is a duty to repay one favour with another.  But that was not the only reason I saved Caesar.  I helped him because I was his druid.

Slowly his muscles relaxed, his eyelids drooped in exhaustion.

‘Leave me alone with the druid,’ Caesar murmured.  Everyone let out a deep breath, relieved and grateful, and left me alone with Caesar.

‘What is this, Druid?’

I said nothing.

‘Will I have it more frequently?’

I remained silent.

‘Speak, Druid.  What will happen if that comes back more often?’

‘Then they will name this ailment after you, Caesar.’

Caesar opened his eyes and grinned.  Cautiously, he reached out for my arm and held it fast.

‘It’s the gods, isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ I replied, ‘you have been favoured by the gods.  You believe that you, as Pontifex Maximus, have the right to pillage their temples and their holy relics.  But just as you have both friends and enemies in Rome, so do you also have friends and foes among the gods.  So beware, Caesar.  What you have done, no Celt would dare do.  The holy ponds, in which we have sunk our gold, are not kept secret among us, because no Celt would venture to lay hands on the property of the gods.’

‘And suppose someone nevertheless does?’

‘Then he is most cruelly punished.’

‘You flay the skin off him and salt him …’

‘No, Caesar, death is no punishment.  Whoever desecrates that which belongs to the gods will be excluded from the services of the gods for life.  That is far worse than a hundred deaths.’

‘I enjoy the protection of the gods, Druid.  For that reason I can afford to do what no Celt could permit himself.’

‘I, too, enjoy the protection of the gods,’ I said, menacingly.  Yet Caesar did not take it as a threat.  He sat up and gripped my hand.

‘Druid, is it true that there are among your gods those who were born as ordinary men?’

I nodded.

Caesar seemed pensive.  Then he raised his eyebrows helplessly and said, ‘Who knows why the gods have brought us together.’

Caesar opened a chest with iron fittings and bronze decorations, a chest so large that a man would have had no problem concealing himself inside it.  He took out two heavy leather pouches and laid them on the table.

‘Open them, Druid.’

I opened one leather purse.  It was filled with heavy gold coins.  They were freshly minted pieces from the capital.

‘That is no booty,’ smiled Caesar.  ‘That is Roman gold.  It’s yours, Druid.’

I looked sceptically at Caesar.  It was an absolute fortune he was offering me.

‘I thank you, Caesar,’ I said.

‘I have heard that you still owe money to a merchant from Massilia …’

I could not help laughing, because after all Caesar had been until very recently one of the deepest in debt in all Rome.  Had that ever caused him sleepless nights?  So why was he worrying about my debts?

‘Yes,’ I said, ‘but, according to the terms of the contract, I am not allowed to pay back my debts all at once.  A little every year.  That’s the way Kretos wishes it.  In that way, I remain in his debt and am compelled to be of service to him.’

‘In a few years,’ laughed Caesar, ‘it will be an easy matter for you to buy out Kretos’ merchant business in Massilia.  Nubian slave-girls will lie at your feet, and a golden crescent will adorn your left ankle.’

I was surprised to hear this from Caesar’s lips.  It was the same prophecy as I had heard from the druid.  At that moment, as I held the heavy gold in my hand, I genuinely believed that Caesar did indeed not only bear the title of Pontifex Maximus, but also that he might possibly be descended from the gods.  I thought all the more highly of Caesar because he had not offered me desecrated Celtic gold.  Caesar had also made me a rich man.  Thanks to him, I was held in high respect and standing in not only Celtic, but also Roman society.  I do not believe I would have come so far in Celtic circles.  For sure, Santonix had been a wise man, and well disposed towards me, but what other Celtic nobleman would have supported my appointment as druid?  Not even Verucloetius.  Far less Fumix.  Not to mention all the princes of noble birth who took the last crust of bread out of our mouths, or their snooty, smug sons.  I have to be honest.  At first, I had earnestly wished for Caesar’s death, but what he had given me now, no Celt had ever before offered me.   

English translation ©2001 by Ian Mitchell

[Vielleicht könnte dieser kurze Text — aus: Barry Cunliffe: Rome and her Empire (Constable, London, 1994, S. 180-181) — als historischer Hintergrund für jemanden, der das ganze Buch nicht gelesen hat, nützlich sein.]

Beyond the Mediterranean coastal strip, the Roman Province, lay Gallia Comata — the land of the shaggy-haired Gauls.  Further north again, in the vicinity of the Rhine and beyond, were the warlike Germans, groups of whom, the Cimbri and the Teutones, had already, in the late second century B.C., thrust south through Gaul and into Spain and north Italy, causing near-panic in Rome.  The situation had further deteriorated by Caesar’s time.  The Gaullish tribes were now constantly squabbling among themselves, while the Germans and the Alpine tribes were beginning to experience a growth in population which was causing serious internal stress.

In 59 B.C. matters came to a head: two tribes in northeast Gaul, the Aedui and Sequani, were locked in political conflict.  The Sequani sought the support of a neighbouring German tribe — the Suebi led by Ariovistus — while the Aedui appealed to Rome, their ally, for help.  To make matters worse, it was at precisely this moment that the Helvetii, who lived in the west of Switzerland, decided that their homeland was too small for their growing population and that they must move westward into Gaul — a migration which would have taken them through Roman territory and threatened Roman allies.

For Caesar the situation was clear-cut.  Surveying the political scene, he realised, he said, that Gaul would either have to be taken over by Rome or it would become German.  For a man of Caesar’s ambition it was a most attractive situation. 

Caesar’s first campaign was incisive.  He marched first to Geneva to prevent the Helvetii from crossing the Rhône, and then chased them through the territory of the Sequani, where they were beaten and the remnants forced to return home.

…

The next year (57-56 B.C.) rebellion flared up.

[Und schließlich, die Übersetzung des Klappentextes, der auch nicht schaden kann.]

58 B.C.:  A roué up to his neck in debt becomes proconsul in Gallia.  His name: Gaius Julius Caesar.  Very soon he ranges through the land on his private rapacious campaigns, because only by means of the Celts’ gold can he ensure his political survival in Rome.  At the same time, the young Celt and apprentice druid Korisios, along with the beautiful, headstrong slave, Wanda, is fleeing his war-threatened homeland and heading west towards the Atlantic.  Near Bibracte, the paths of the Roman and the druid cross.  Fascinated by the personality of the proconsul, the scholar Korisios enters his service as a scribe.  From close range, he observes Caesar, the man obsessed by power, and his triumphant pillaging raids through Gaul.  The destinies of these two very different men seem, in some mysterious way, to be closely bound together; they both enjoy the benevolence of the gods.

However, the Romans’ massacre of a Germanic tribe and an act of desperation on the part of Wanda lead to a breach.  When his beloved slave is sold at a market, Korisios sides with the Celtic uprising against Caesar.    And when the ultimate downfall of the Celts in Gaul is sealed, the young druid beseeches the gods one last time for their aid: he is prepared to sacrifice his own life in order to find Wanda and to give her her freedom.

‘Caesar’s Druid’ is a powerful portrayal of the manners and morals of antique times, full of passion and adventure, of Celtic rituals and moody gods — brilliantly researched and with all the tension of a thriller.