Letter 2

The following is a letter found in the journal of Tacitus Aeneas Livia, measured to be written in 323 YBCE, around the completion of the Julia of Primaporta. In this letter, Tacitus recalls the day of Julia’s first introduction to Anaxagoras’ class, and recounts stories of her experience as the only female student amongst a forum of boys. Notably, since this is a retrospective letter, he refers to Julia as “Augusta”, which is what her more formal title was during her imperial rule. While his word is widely reliable, it is important to note that these events occurred around 340-338 YBCE, and as such Tacitus is writing from memory and may himself be exaggerating or misremembering some details, especially when he quotes the words of people. For example, he writes 11-12 year old children as if they harbored the intellect of grown adults; and while he and his class may have been talented, I personally find that there is reason to doubt the vocabulary you are about to read. However, though the words themselves may be a little embellished, what cannot be dramatized is the heart he had for whom he would call his friend.

- E. Celestina

Pedagogue Anaxagoras arrived that morning with a strange confidence in his walk. He had dressed in his usual linens, his hair combed as ordinary as it was, but his expression was one of vigor and excitement that he often only displayed for the most passionate of subjects. I knew upon him entering the amphitheater that that day would be different. He first asked the forty or fifty young men in his class what we thought of the word “aequalitas”. Of course, the ever excitable Marcus, later to become an honorable legionnaire, raised his hand first and defined it as sameness: to give the same opportunities and status uniformly. Following his word was Tiberius, a soon-to-be scholar, who also mentioned it was of fairness: to split an apple evenly amongst one another. Anaxagoras commended them, further pontificating that Exetia has exhibited aequalitas since the days of Artorius. Though it has annexed lands as far west as Hibernia and as far east as the Dragonshards, Exetia has given citizenship and social opportunity to Exetians and annexed peoples alike. He pointed around the amphitheater, then unto himself, for though the majority were native Exetians, there were Thebians, Hibernians, and Londinians alike, present amongst each other with no concerns about identity. Though that day was long ago, I can still recall exactly the words my pedagogue inquired verbatim: “What, then, is Exetia missing in aequalitas? Discuss this amongst yourselves.”

Next to me was my good comrade Cassian, still comrade with me as I write these words, and the two of us debated if there were such imperfections within Exetia. In our conversation, we concluded that prisoners of war were not granted aequalitas— even after serving their punishment, they were disallowed from full citizenship and voting, and often only worked as farmhands for minimum salary. I recall bringing up the truth that only native Exetians could become Senators, with all other types of citizens’ highest political office being Representative, though through further conversation we deliberated this was intentional, as Senators maintained the governance with the Princeps, and Representatives guided their choices by acting as the voices of the annexed lands. Afterward, all of us shared our findings with the rest of the amphitheater, and Anaxagoras found us all widely correct. “Aequalitas is something to be reached, but never grasped.” However, he reprimanded that all of us were missing one example of failed aequalitas, and that our inability to recognize this one is why this was perhaps the most unseen and normalized “inequalitas” of all.

He then ordered all of us to turn around, and I still recall the sight of Augusta as she stepped down the steps of the Amphitheater, the sound of her sandal steps louder than our clamoring voices. She was dressed in a white and red stola to hide her femininity, though the modesty she was dressed in, looking back, only served to make it more obvious that she was not of the same sex as us. As she continued to walk, Anaxagoras made us out to be fools. “Forty-three young male minds here, and not a single one of you could determine that what was missing here was the voice of a female. You all shall be henceforth subject to harsher criticism.” Augusta took a seat two rows in front of my own, and I could make out her golden and red hair that only those of the Augustin line exhibited. Within this amphitheater was the daughter of the Princeps, though our precocious minds could not fully comprehend this truth at the time. Anaxagoras introduced her as Julia, daughter of the Princeps, who would be joining our class as not a special guest, but of a permanent student. We, as foolish children, were at first confused and defiant, but he quieted us with words of reprimand and threat of corporal punishment. “I was ordered by the Principes to instruct her the same as all of you. Thus, I denied her a private pedagogy, for that is inequalitas by definition. If she is to one day lead you all, she must first learn to be amongst you all. The same goes both ways. Treat her not as a woman, but as a person of thought just like yourselves.”

At the time, I of course was remarkably skeptical. The Pedagogue Garden had not a female foot in it for as long as its existence, until that very day, for female education was reserved for rudimentary forum classrooms or private tutoring. Of course, though Anaxagoras instructed us to denote her as an equal, our prematurity found that such an order would be challenging to follow. I recall two such stories that demonstrate the breadth of our erroneous discrimination:

The first occurred only weeks after her introduction. Pedagogue Anaxagoras had instructed us to come up with questions regarding Exetia’s domestic policies to discuss amongst ourselves then share with the theater. It was then that one of the more disruptive students, Nero Justinian, whose legacy I cannot find, blurted out: “Perhaps Julia can explain household grain taxation, since women were so inclined for the domestic sphere.” I recall much of the class laughing, regrettably myself being one of them. Anaxagoras, then, noted Augusta raising her hand to answer the question right then and there. To quiet the laughter of the amphitheater, she had risen to her feet and spoke with a voice that carried almost as far as the Pedagogue. “For lower class land, ten percent of their harvest is given to the state. Middle class tithes fifteen, and the upper class tithes twenty. However, in times of war, this amount may be increased at the wishes of the Princeps—my father—or by Senate decree, for if the military is not fed enough grain in battle, armies may collapse in starvation before a single sword is drawn.” She did not turn to, or address Nero in any way, keeping her eyes remained on Anaxagoras, who I remembered held an entertained smile on his face. She then blithely commented, “And if you are curious, I do know how to turn grain into bread. Can any of you say the same?”

The second story occurred two or three months later, when most of us had passed our eleventh birthday, Augusta included. Even after two entire academic seasons with Augusta, there were still doubts amongst many of us that she was fit to be amongst our class. Though she harbored the wit of an equal, what we believed to be the ultimate gap between the two sexes was in the physical space. Pedagogue Anaxagoras tasked us with exercise on a warm spring morning that quickly turned hot as the sun grew higher in the sky. I remember him saying that when we serve our mandated four years of Legionary service, they expect us to be physically fit, and as such we must begin early. He ordered us to do six laps around the Pedagogue Gardens, a cumulative distance of nearly ten kilometers, and by the second lap much of us had reached our limit. I recall myself arriving back at the amphitheater after the third lap with a soaked tunica of my own saliva and sweat, heaving breaths that burned my lungs that I would not feel again until far into my military service. Anaxagoras told us all to remain once we finished our third lap, as he showed us an Exetian standard upon a thin column about three meters tall. Whoever was the first to touch the top of the standard, he said, would be exempt from needing to run the following three laps, but we merely had one attempt each. We all took turns climbing the column, yet our short, still thin arms and the wideness and smoothness of the travertine proved too difficult for us to properly climb. After Cassian and Marcus failed, I had tried my hand, and had climbed further than any other boy in the class, able to touch the base of the standard itself. Yet my foot had slipped and I fell backwards, caught by an amused Anaxagoras who told me to keep running.

Half of us had already started our fourth lap, unaware of the last attempt of our class. I and twenty or so others stopped and watched Augusta, though we fully intended our witness to be of mockery. Us boys had tried and failed, and so she with a smaller frame could not possibly go any further. Yet as she got halfway, she undid the sash of her stola and fashioned the clothing into a rope, and threw it up at the standard. It failed to latch, so I watched as she grimaced, her teeth rattling against each other as she climbed up another several centimeters with just three of her limbs. She had not lost ground or fallen, so Anaxagoras did not stop her. Upon her second try, her rope had hooked around the eagle’s wing of the standard, and she pulled it off. The clatter of the metal standard echoed in the amphitheater, before Augusta hoisted herself back down and handed it to her Pedagogue. She sat down at the nearest seat, and the last thing I remember of that day is him shooing us away with his hand as he brought out a plate of grapes for him and Augusta to share as her reward. It was from then forward that I think my esteem and concern for her began, though both at the time were still very much overshadowed by my childish envy at her apparent audacity.

It would be two whole academic sessions later, when we had reached twelve years of age, that Pedagogue Anaxagoras’ class began to show who were the standout minds. Around springtime of that year, four of us had shown more promise for scholarship than the rest: myself, my comrade Cassian, Marcus, and Augusta. He organized our next assignment thus: the four of us would split into pairs, and we would come up with a superior argument to the opposition pertaining to the following issue: “Does the Princeps serve the people, or do the people serve the Princeps?”. The rest of the class would be the mock-Senate, and our side would be considered victors if we received a majority vote.

Cassian and Augusta were placed together, and the former presented the following opening argument: “The Princeps is a symbol of, and server of the people. Their name, meaning first of equals, implies that they do not stand above, but stand alongside other Exetians. They are granted special powers from the Senate in order to execute their commands, but their commands are always to ensure the wellbeing and peace of Exetia. Additionally, they always fight amongst our legions when wartime occurs, when less ideal leaders would simply lean back and let their generals battle for them. They sacrifice their own safety for the sake of Exetia, and so they serve, and are not the served.”

I allowed Marcus to offer our opposing view. As I recall, he said: “The people of Exetia owe their safety to, and ultimately serve, the Princeps. Ever since the times of antiquity, centuries ago during Exeter’s founding, the Princeps has acted as the ultimate voice of our land. They are, in all honesty, more akin to a line of kings than they would like to admit—though we do not say the words explicitly, it is true that a sliver of all of our taxes are given to the Principate family to fund their palace and their amenities. They are a family funded by the state, which is funded by the people. Thus, we serve them.”

It was Augusta’s turn to counter Marcus’ argument. I recall her adjusting her stola, the look upon her face characteristically tight and perhaps uncertain. The topic of discussion was, after all, her entire line of forefathers, and may have been intentional by Anaxagoras to make her uncomfortable. However, she still spoke: “The fact that my fam…the Principate is funded by the state may be true, but it does not imply servitude for the people to them. I would argue the opposite: Princeps Constantinus has used the taxes he has received and redistributed it to host grand games, pave and restore roads and buildings, and build memorials for fallen soldiers, especially unknown ones. In fact, whatever tax funds remaining is not given to them personally, but often to their hired servants to offer them a living salary. Most of the currency they receive is from their agrarian land, which, as Principate, one-third of it must be distributed to low-income families within Exeter. They—no—we are not a family to be treated as kings, like the old carriers of Caliburn and Chastiefol. We are subjects of Exetia, and you are not subjects of our laurels.”

It was an argument that was compelling and got the class stirring in thought. However, as I stood upon the center stage, I felt myself knowing exactly how to respond. “If all of this is true, then why, Julia, have countless legionnaires fallen for the sake of your father? We all have heard of the reports when Princeps Constantinus returns from conflict: dragonkin threatening his life, flames or ice approaching his body, yet he was always guarded by men who stood in front of him, not beside him. If he was truly the first among equals, he should stand to protect the citizens and soldiers he serves, not have them act as his shield. Furthermore, while I acknowledge the fact that the taxes the citizenry gives to the government is redistributed to support Exetia, it is still true that your residence is, by far, the largest of Exeter. If you were, again, truly only an equal amongst us, then why should your home stand at the top of the Aurelian Hill? And if you, yourself, are as of this moment, an equal, then why must your presence here be revolutionary?”

The class had noted sixty-percent in favor of Marcus and I. Anaxagoras awarded us with a plate of cheeses and a glass of dilute wine, then ordered Augusta and Cassian to take two laps around the Garden. Before Augusta ran off, I recall him explicitly telling her: “Lady Julia, your intelligence is bright, but wisdom only comes from experience. To earn it, you must learn how to survive and counter worthy questions.”

Throughout her run, and for the rest of the day and days afterward, Augusta was quiet.