Roman Murder Mystery!

[a guest post by Emily Robb, aged 15]

Emily Robb with sheep and helpers

There are five minutes to go until lunchtime: I’m frantically running around my school hall, straightening chairs, propping up toy sheep and running over what I’ll say when 120 Year 7s ask me if I did it; if I killed Marcia Dorothea.

This is in fact not quite as dark and worrying as it may sound.

As a year 11 History prefect it is often my job to talk to prospective students about the subject, help out at lectures and give girls a tour of my school but it is also frequently my job to step back in time, throw on an extraordinarily unflattering costume and act.

In the past two years I have dressed up as a Georgian, a 1920s ‘Flapper’, President Wilson, Neville Chamberlain and now a few weeks ago I became a Roman farmer named Davus in a murder mystery that the History and Latin prefects had organised. Poor Davus’ calm, albeit slightly dull, lifestyle had suddenly become threatened by the ghastly reality of being held suspect in a murder inquiry – and the terrifying prospect of being interrogated by a squealing mass of twelve-year-olds.

Year 7 detectives!

We were keen to make the event as enticing and exciting as possible and so, as a soon-to-be-released film issues trailers to its potential audience, the prefects got to work on some serious marketing. Our main concern was that the murder mystery was not compulsory; would anyone sacrifice their place in the lunch queue and turn up? We were constantly told by teachers that it would be fine – of course they’d turn up – they’re Year 7s: they’ll go to anything! Still we had doubts, so over the next term we started to get inventive and created as many intriguing clues as possible.

The first of these clues interrupted an orderly assembly for their year group when a video was suddenly projected onto the screen of what seemed to be an ancient Roman news reporter (my friend Polly, the Latin prefect), delivering what appeared to be an ancient Roman news bulletin – and an extremely dull one at that. Polly drones on in a dismally monotonous voice about a young girl named Cornelia, sitting under a tree and a cart which has been stuck in a ditch for a good many chapters now (Slight tongue-in-cheek Ecce Romani jokes – anyone remember Ecce Romani?)

suspects?

Just before one of the poor confused year sevens stuck up their hand to ask what on earth was going on, a very urgent looking arm is thrust into camera-shot, holding in its shaking hand a piece of parchment. A rather startled news reporter hurriedly reads through its contents; breaking news, you see, was not commonplace in Ancient Rome. With an exaggerated gasp and eyes aglow with the burden of death, Polly regrettably informs the hall full of twelve year olds that a murder has taken place and that it is from this point forth, their duty to find out who is responsible.

Enticing? We thought so. Next, various prefects arranged for mysterious clues to be included in the daily bulletin that is read out every morning to classes during form-time. These featured cryptic messages such as ‘Don’t be fooled. Refuse the priest a drink’ which would come in handy for them later.

A teacher with cameraman!

The final advertising effort involved quite a large amount of embarrassment on our parts and quite a lot of confusion on theirs. The day before the mystery was to take place the entire cast trudged unwillingly into the changing rooms at the beginning of lunch and worriedly got changed into Roman clothes – armour, tunics, religious robes: the whole shebang. This was definitely going to invite a few laughs at our expense. However we were pleasantly surprised and extremely encouraged by the fact that upon stepping out of the changing rooms and making a rather doleful walk into the canteen we were mobbed by large packs of year sevens, asking us questions and being frankly rather frightening. Nevertheless – the detectives were ready.

The Poster!

With these plans secured, we now felt slightly more confident that the young inspectors were actually going to turn up but we still had much to prepare. Between us, over the next few weeks, maps were drawn, suspects cast, scripts written and scenery planned. As Davus the farmer, it was I who had the misfortune of finding the body of the deceased – a tricky situation to explain when being rigorously interrogated by the surprisingly scary year sevens. However I was innocent (HOORAH!) and I was extremely glad about this; I’m not sure I could have borne the guilt and evidently may have cracked under the judgemental glare of the detectives.

On the day, we arrived a little before lunchtime to set up the hall where the murder mystery would take place. An extremely large poster designed to draw the year sevens in, covered the doors to the hall, with a special message from Caroline Lawrence – author of The Roman Mysteries – wishing the girls luck, at the bottom.

The corpse!

Upon entering the hall the girls were greeted by a rather sombre looking pathologist who showed to them the body (quelle horreur!) from where they were encouraged to follow the path and ask questions of anyone they may pass in doing so. As they journeyed through passageways, through curtains and over rivers the eager detectives seemed prone to beginning their interrogation rather tactlessly with the simple question ‘Was it you?’ Whilst rather dramatic piano music accompanied their travels, the girls questioned lumberjacks, jewellery sellers, mosaic artists, money lenders, slaves, guards, the two temple priests and myself; the farmer. All in costume we made a humorous scene; I surrounded by a field of toy sheep, others clasping cardboard spears and others dressed in head-to-toe religious attire.

signed first edition!

We were surprised and delighted by the amount of staff that couldn’t resist trying their hand at being Poirot or Miss Marple for a lunchtime; one teacher was even accompanied by his own camera man and a full set of thorough interview questions– claiming to be from the local news. The hour whizzed by, with girls still hurriedly filling in sheets in the last minute. The fun wasn’t over, though, as the next week in assembly we got to present the three winners and four runners up with their prizes. For the runners up, sugar mice and for the winning detectives who managed to correctly solve the murder in the shortest time beautiful signed copies of The Slave-Girl from Jerusalem by Caroline of course! What better prize for a Roman Murder Mystery than a copy of the Roman Mysteries?!

I had a fantastic time organising and partaking in the murder mystery and would just like to thank Caroline for her generosity in giving the prizes; they really made it something special! When I look back on my school days as an adult it will be these moments that I’ll remember; not the horrific maths tests or the everlasting physics lessons – the moments where the staff and students work together outside the classroom to create something for everyone to enjoy. I won’t forget the fun I had as Davus the Roman farmer, in fact, after all the worrying, I think I rather prefer his comfy tunic to my school uniform.

Carpe Diem!

P.S. The louder of the two temple priests was the murderer; a priest with a partiality for the wine…

A Romantic Ten Roman Artifacts

Flavia admires herself in a bronze mirror   

by Caroline Lawrence

(this is a special "Americanized" version of an article I wrote for the Classical Association Blog)

Last month I blogged about a dozen of my favourite Roman artifacts. I love Roman artifacts because they are the talismans for my "Hero's Journey" back in time to first century Rome. Also, I use them as clues in my Roman Mysteries series for children aged 8+.

Here are another ten of my favourite artifacts. They are all replicas, but so skilfully made that they could be the real thing. Most of them are made by three clever re-enactors: Romano-celtic medicus Nodge Nolan, scribus peritus Zane Green and Steve Wade AKA Audax the gladiator. In addition to making high-quality replica Roman artifacts, these three talented guys all visit schools to talk about their Roman roles and participate in re-enactment events.

These ten artifacts are all linked to love, beauty or romance.

I. Bronze mirror

In Roman times there weren't many opportunities for seeing yourself very clearly. Maybe if you were mega rich you would have a polished silver mirror, but it wouldn't be as good as even the cheapest pocket mirror today. Considering all the skin diseases and sun damage it might have been a mercy in many people's cases. This wonderful bronze mirror is based on a real one from Pompeii. It partly inspired a scene from the BBC TV adaptation of The Pirates of Pompeii where Flavia wants to impress an older man and imperiously orders her slave girl Nubia to do her hair. In the picture above you can see her admiring the effect in a bronze mirror like this one.


II. Blown glass perfume bottle

Did you know that Romans sometimes added perfume to their wine to sweeten their breath? Ugh. But in that day before mouthwash and deodorant, scent was important. The Roman poet Martial has several epigrams about a perfume-maker called Cosmus. He was obviously the Calvin Klein of first century Rome. I had fun researching poison and perfume for my 11th Roman Mystery, The Sirens of Surrentum. I discovered the ingredients for the most expensive ancient perfumes. I found out which scents men would have worn. I scoured museums for perfume bottles and found one shaped like a little bird. I loved it so much that I worked it into my most romantic Roman Mystery, The Sirens of Surrentum. At a symposium, a woman named Annia Serena begins a story thus: One day when I was seven years old, my mother received a new perfume in the shape of a bird: a delicate blue glass bird that fit in the palm of her hand. You had to snap off the tip of the beak to release the perfume. Serena goes on to tell the shocking result of what happened when she crept into her mother's bedroom to have a sniff and accidentally broke the perfume bottle. (You'll never guess.)
This replica perfume bottle from the Roman site of Empúries in Spain is not shaped like a bird, but I love it anyway.

III. Club-of-Hercules earring

The delightfully-named Nodge Nolan made this earring for me when I was working on my sixth Roman Mystery, The Twelve Tasks of Flavia Gemina. Again, it is based on a Roman or perhaps Scythian original. Why a club? Not very romantic, you say.

Oh, but it is. It's a love club. A club of lurve.

This is the female equivalent of the cave man clubbing his desired cave girl and then dragging her by the hair to his cave. There is even a myth that as punishment for a crime, Hercules had to wear women's clothes for a year and serve a nymph called Omphale and SHE got to wear his lion skin and wield his club.

Cartilia flushed slightly. 'Well,' she said. 'I do have to admit I find your father very attractive. Plus, he still has all his teeth.' Flavia giggled and reached up to touch one of Cartilia's silver earrings; it was a pendant shaped like a tiny club of Hercules. (from The Twelve Tasks of Flavia Gemina)

IV. Beauty Set

I can't remember which re-enactor made me this beauty set, but he kindly engraved the name FLAVIA on the tweezers. Crude but useful, this would have been a poor person's kit for personal grooming. Designed to be worn around the wrist, it consists of (left to right) an ear-scoop, a fingernail cleaner and tweezers. Tweezers were used to pluck hair from underarms etc. Yowtch! The fingernail cleaner is self-explanatory. Ear-scoops were very popular in ancient Rome. Quite rightly, too. The alternative consists of something I saw when I was in Italy a few years ago: an old man who kept his pinky nail long for the express purpose of scooping out ear wax! Yuk.

The Roman poet Martial wrote a slightly naughty Saturnalia gift-tag epigram about an ear-scoop.

Auriscalpium - Si tibi morosa prurigine verminat auris, arma damus tantis apta libidinibus. 

Ear-scoop - If your ear-hole craves a good seeing-to, I've got a little tool that will satisfy such desires. (Martial XIV.23) Ew.

V. Broken oil flask

This broken (replica) oil flask is proof of why it would have been impractical to take a ceramic jar to the baths. Oily fingers are more liable likely to drop it on the mosaic or marble floor. For this reason some bath sets (see above) had little bronze flasks attached for scented oil. It wasn't just women who used scented oil, but men, too. Opobalsam, for example, was the ancient Roman version of Calvin Klein for men. Also known as 'balm of Gilead', its main ingrediant is juice from the exotic balsam tree. According to Pliny this tree is only found in Judaea, modern Israel. My pal Martial has a little epigram about this, of course:
Opobalsam. Balsama me capiunt, haec sunt unguenta virorum: delicias Cosmi vos redolete, nurus. 
Balsam captivates me! This is the oil for men! Gather round, girls and have a sniff of Cosmus's best.
(See? I told you Cosmus was the most famous perfume-maker in Rome...)
Hmm, I wonder if Flavia's groom wore opobalsam on their wedding day?

VI. Hair Pins

Roman women loved hair pins. You can get them in gold, silver, bronze, ivory, ebony or wood. They often have little objects carved or cast at the non-sharp end. Some represent feminine beauty and power: Venus or an empress. Some represent fertility: an apple or pomegranate. Some are apotropaic (they turn away evil) like a hand giving the mano fico, a gesture representing lady bits. (Don't ask) The hair pins shown here are from left to right, a brass hand holding an olive, a simple bone hairpin, a silver hairpin with decorative knob and a bronze stylus, which of course is not a pin but could stand in for one at a pinch.
Martial has a sweet epigram about a gold hairpin:
Acus aurea  - Splendida ne madidi violent bombycina crines, figat acus tortas sustineatque comas. 
Gold hairpin - Lest damp hair spoil brilliant silk, let this hairpin fix and hold up your twisted locks. (Martial 14.24)
I love that poem because I can see the girl fresh from the bath, doing up her hair in the Roman version of a chignon.

VII. Lead Curse Tablet

Steve Wade's beautiful replica curse tablet is made of lead, heavy and smooth and easy to bend. Defixiones, as they are called, have been found throughout the Roman world. You wrote a suitable curse on the lead (sometimes backwards or in code for extra power) and then you rolled it up and nailed it to a tree or door post near the person to be cursed, (hence the name defixio). However archaeologists have found curse tablets tossed in fountains or buried, especially as gods of the underworld were often evoked. Curses could be as mundane as cursing the person who stole your socks (like this one) or as vicious as wishing the death of a charioteer and all four of his horses. But the nastiest curse tablets must have been written by lovers against their rivals. Spirits of the underworld, I give you Ticene of Carisius. Whatever she does, may it turn out badly. I curse her limbs, her complexion, her figure, her head, her hair, her shadow, her brain, her forehead, her eyebrows, her mouth, her nose, her chin, her cheeks, her lips, her speech, her breath, her neck, her liver, her shoulders, her heart, her lungs, her intestines, her stomach, her arms, her fingers, her hands, her navel, her entrails, her thighs, her knees, her calves, her heels, her soles, her toes... (CIL 10.8249 edited)

Curse tablets make a guest appearance in my twelfth Roman Mystery, The Charioteer of Delphi.

VIII. Nubia's Flute

Music was an important part of Roman life, just as it is an important part of our lives. But we don't really know what it sounded like. Some clever scholars, like Susanna Rühling of Musica Romana, have done careful research to recreate the instruments and songs of ancient Rome. You can listen to samples on her website and see some of their beautiful reconstructions, like the double aulos, a twin flute. My replica flute is a monaulos (single pipe) from Egypt. It is just a cheap tourist version. In my books, Flavia's freed slave-girl Nubia is deeply musical and deeply romantic. Her flute is her most prized possession and she always wears it around her neck.  Nubia's handsome young Greek tutor Aristo plays the lyre and she realises she is in love with him when they are playing music together one day during the Saturnalia, in my sixth Roman Mystery, The Twelve Tasks of Flavia Gemina. (I wanted them to cast Robert Pattinson for the role LONG before he appeared in Twilight, so when you read my books, imagine RPatz as Aristo!)
Martial has a naughty epigram about a flute.
Tibiae. Ebria nos madidis rumpit tibicina buccis: saepe duas pariter, saepe monaulon habet. 
Flutes. The tipsy flute girl blows us with her moist mouth, sometimes two together, sometimes just one. (Martial 14.63)
Of course Nubia is not a tipsy flute girl. She is a good girl!

IX. Blank papyrus (because I don't have ivory tablets!)

Non est munera quod putes pusilla, cum donat vacuas poeta chartas, writes the poet Martial.
Don't consider it a small thing when a poet gives you blank sheets. (Martial 14.10)
One of my re-enactor friends, Zane Green, is skilled at preparing papyrus and ruling it and writing on it. But sometimes people gave blank stationery, especially if they were hoping for a letter in return. Here is Zane pumicing some papyrus to make it smooth. He has already ruled lines, ready for someone to write a love poem (or letter) on it. Papyrus comes from the famous Egyptian reed pounded flat and laid in two layers, one lengthwise and one widthwise. When my husband and I visited Egypt to research The Scribes from Alexandria, (in which Flavia and her pals go on a quest up the Nile to find Nubia) we were lucky enough to visit a papyrus factory and see a demonstration of how real papyrus is made.

Martial writes about other writing material and what it signifies. For example, small ivory tablets called Vitellian tablets are for love poetry.
Nondum legerit hos licet puella, novit quid cupiant Vitelliani.
A girl does not have to read these Vitellian tablets to know what they want! (Martial 14.8)

Flavia, 15, gets married

In my final Roman Mystery, The Man from Pomegranate Street, 12-year-old Flavia Gemina (now of a marriageable age) gets one of these Vitellian tablets from an admirer.
‘Who gave you the love-tablet?’ asked Tranquillus.
‘What?’
‘That.’ He pointed at the ivory booklet in her lap.
‘Why do you call it a love-tablet?’ she asked, aware that all the others were watching her, too.
‘Because it’s a love-tablet!’ he said. 
‘How can you tell?’
‘He’s right, Flavia,’ said Aristo gently. ‘It’s a love-tablet.’
‘Stop calling it that–’ she spluttered. ‘How can you possibly know–’
‘He knows because it’s small and dainty and made of ivory,’ said Tranquillus. ‘Did it come wrapped with a ribbon?’
Flavia nodded.
‘It’s the latest fashion,’ said Aristo. ‘For a man to give a woman he loves an ivory tablet with a poetic declaration of his feelings inside.'

X. "Carpe Diem" Scroll

Flavia's favourite motto is Carpe diem! Seize the Day! (Even though her father says her motto should be "Look before you leap!") The famous phrase comes from a Latin love poem by the famous poet Horace. This scroll is on papyrus, beautifully written out by Zane Green.

Tu ne quaesieris, scire nefas, quem mihi, quem tibi finem di dederint, Leuconoe, nec Babylonios temptaris numeros. ut melius, quidquid erit, pati. seu pluris hiemes seu tribuit Iuppiter ultimam, quae nunc oppositis debilitat pumicibus mare Tyrrhenum: sapias, vina liques et spatio brevi spem longam reseces. dum loquimur, fugerit invida. carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero.

Want to know the translation? Here's my slightly free version:

You should not ask, my love - for it is forbidden to know - what the gods have decreed for me or you. Don't even check your horoscope. Much better to embrace whatever happens, whether the gods have granted us many more winters or whether this is our last, which even now dashes the Tyrrhenian sea upon the rocks we gaze out upon. Relax, pour the wine, and put your dreams on hold for just a little. Even as we speak, jealous time speeds past. Seize the day, and do not put your hope in tomorrow. 

Test your knowledge of Romance in Ancient Rome with this easy QUIZ.

[If you want to learn more about Roman artifacts and Roman romance, read my books. The 17 books - plus supplementary titles - in the Roman Mysteries series are perfect for children aged 9+, especially those studying Romans. Americans will only be able to view DVDs of the TV series on computers but there is an interactive game.]

The Mystery of the Latin Pillow

Or: The Curious Case of the Classical Cushion

by Caroline Lawrence, author of The Roman Mysteries

It all started when a keen fan from Tasmania asked me to translate a cushion in her house.

This happens a lot.

Not necessarily being asked to parse a pillow, but I am often asked to help with Latin homework, compose mottoes and translate inscriptions.

Top Fan Julia had a tapestry cushion with Latin on it.
She diligently copied down the Latin and sent it to me:

LOQUERIS
Si vis me flere, Dolendum est

Telephe vel Peleu male si ipsi

dormitabo aut Mandata

on satis est pulchra

Ridentibus adrident, ita

RIDEBO

The Latin looked extremely dodgy so before launching in on a translation, I did what any self-respecting scholar should always do first: I googled it. Sure enough, a search of si-vis-me-flere took me straight to several pages of chat about these pillows. It seems to be a few verses from Horace’s Ars Poetica, but badly garbled.

Quintus Horatius Flaccus AKA Horace was a poet who lived in the time of Julius Caesar and the first emperor Augustus. He is most famous for his Odes and Epodes and for coining the phrase Carpe diem! or 'Seize the day!' His Ars Poetica, 'The Art of Poetry', was actually a letter to a friend, written about 20 BC. A hundred or so years later, the orator Quintilian was the first one to call it the Ars Poetica. The Oxford Classical Dictionary describes it as ‘a most puzzling work … [saying] little that is worthy of Horace.’

So here we have an obscure passage from an obscure Latin treatise. The passage from which the pillow phrases are taken comes about a hundred lines into the letter. If you look at the cushion you can see phrases have been chopped and changed, words have lost initial letters or dropped out altogether.

Here is the non-garbled version:

Non satis est pulchra esse poemata: dulcia sunto
Et quocumque volent animum auditoris agunto.
Ut ridentibus adrident, ita flentibus adflent

humani vultus. Si vis me flere, dolendum est

primum ipsi tibi: tunc tua me infortunia laedent,

Telephe vel Peleu; male si mandata loqueris,

aut dormitabo aut ridebo: tristia maestum
vultum verba decent; iratum, plena minarum
ludentum lasciva, severum seria dictu.

And here is a rough translation:

It’s not enough for poems to be beautiful: they must be persuasive
and able to lead the soul of the hearer wherever they want.
As we grin among those who are smiling,
so we tend to well up around those who weep.
If you want me to cry, you yourself must first feel anguish
Then your misfortunes will move me, O Peleus or Telephus;
if you speak inappropriately, I will doze off or laugh out loud:
sad words require a mournful expression,
angry ones need a face full of menace,
Naughty words suit a playful mood,
serious words go with sober topics.

(By the way, Horace names Telephus and Peleus as examples of mythic characters tragic tales to tell. Telephus was a son of Hercules, famous for a fresco from Pompeii that shows him suckling from a deer. He had a miserable life which included suckling from said deer, being a beggar, almost sleeping with his mother, suffering for many years with a would not heal, etc. Peleus was a prince from Aegina – the island near Athens – and had to become an exile after accidentally killing his brother. Although he later became father of the great warrior Achilles, several tragedies were written about him.)

According to several online discussions, the guilty fabric is manufactured in China. But in the guise of cushions, upholstery, wall-hangings and curtains, it has found its way all over the world: Australia, Germany, Norway, Chile, Oxford, South Yorkshire and Tasmania.

I was at Alderley Edge School for Girls (Greater Manchester area) last week to talk about my series of books set in ancient Rome, when the librarian Ruth pointed at the heavy curtains in the hall. ‘Look!’ she said. ‘Latin curtains!’ I stepped closer and peered at the letters. Sure enough, it read: ‘Loqueris 
Si vis me flere…etc.’

If someone asks you to translate their cushion, and you recognise some of the words I’ve been talking about here, tell them it's garbled but that it says something like: ‘If you want to be a poet, laugh with those who laugh and cry with those who cry.’

How on earth a Chinese manufacturer got hold of the random and rather obscure piece of Latin poetry remains a mystery.

P.S. Someone has recently translated another piece of Latin gobbledygook – the famous lorem ipsum text filler – into English.

[The Roman Mysteries are perfect for children aged 9+. Carrying on from the Roman Mysteries, the Roman Quests series set in Roman Britain launched in May 2016 with Escape from Rome.]