Watching the ships roll in
An outstanding person in the harbour area was Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, a statesman and orator. In 373 he was governor of Africa, in 384 City Prefect, and in 391 consul. He was a spokesman for the pagan party. As City Prefect he wrote to Theodosius and Arcadius:
You are going to send a royal fleet to augment with plentiful supplies of corn the free maintenance of a devoted people. This fleet senate and people together will welcome in the entrances to the Tiber. We shall revere as almost sacred the ships which will have brought in their bountiful cargoes of the crops of Egypt. He owned a villa near Ostia, possibly near Acilia, a bit to the north. From there he could easily walk down to the Tiber to watch the tow boats on their way to Rome. In one of his letters, from 389 AD, he wrote:
You continue to remain silent; your example, however, does not prevent me from enjoying chatting, especially since my leisure lends itself particularly to abundant remarks. I am in the fields but without the country soul. I am satisfied from the bank of the Tiber - the river flows along my property - to look at the loaded ships, and have no more, as before, concern for the provisioning of my fellow citizens. The general fear, born of scarcity, has indeed become joy, since the Father of the Fatherland, object of our veneration, compensated by convoys from Macedonia for the African deficit. As well, all henceforth cherish him as a foster god of the human race, for he did not tolerate that the obstinate southern winds have rights against Rome. From the observatory of my estate, I therefore count the passage of foreign ships and rejoice that the supply of the Roman people is regulated not by the fate of the provinces but by the wishes of the Prince. I know that my words will reach his ears and this by virtue of a dedication that never leaves you silent about what pertains to the common good. Therefore will I be right to limit my speech, to leave it to your eloquence to report with more brilliance, if you judge it appropriate, that what I told you, with veracity but without exaggeration.
A drawing of tow boats on the Tiber published by Cornelius Meyer in 1685.In 388 AD the estate was under military pressure, perhaps as a result of Symmachus's involvement in a political struggle:
Then, to speak now to you about my domestic concerns, our domain at Ostia is overwhelmed under the weight of the troops. We can only invoke laws that remain a dead letter; to the Gods to bring our cause to fruition. In the meantime, what torments us is not the fear of damage, but the insult to the law. The debates of our colleagues who had provoked my arrival restored to our eternal Princes the choice of people to delegate to Africa. The Fathers therefore ceasing to deliberate, makes me free. Galla, his oldest child, married his friend Nicomachus Flavianus. Another letter, about the same military issue, was written "to his Nicomachus children":
Returned to the city of our fathers and to our Penates, we discover what to be shocked about, because repeated assaults hit our land at Ostia. But if your projects have a happy outcome, give me the gift of a letter whose joy can erase the cloud of affronts today.
An ivory diptych, almost 30 centimeters high, with reference to the aristocratic families of the Symmachi and Nicomachi.
It bears testimony to some kind of alliance between the families, probably a marriage that occurred between 393 and 401 AD.
Two priestesses are depicted, standing before an altar, with references to Ceres, Cybele, Bacchus, and Jupiter.
It was once attached to a reliquary from the 13th century, in the abbey of Montier-en-Der, between Verdun and Troyes.
There it was said to have come from the Holy Land, but more likely it was obtained in Rome by an abbott in the 7th century.
The left panel, in the Musée de Cluny.
Photo: Wikimedia, Sailko.
The right panel, in the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Photo: Wikimedia, Sailko.The pagan poet Rutilius Namatianus briefly mentions the harbours in his poem "The Voyage Home", set in 416 AD. Ostia no longer matters, he says. By now it is noteworthy only, because Aeneas reached Italian soil in the Laurentine area, to the south of the city.
Then at length I proceed to the ships, where with twy-horned brow the branching Tiber cleaves his way to the right. The channel on the left is avoided for its unapproachable sands: its one remaining boast is to have welcomed Aeneas. And now the sun in the paler sky of the Scorpion's Claws had lengthened the space of the night-watches. We hesitate to make trial of the sea; we tarry in the haven, unreluctant to endure idleness amid the delays which bar our voyage, so long as the setting Pleiad storms upon the treacherous main, and the anger of the squally season is hot.
The Voyage Home (De Reditu Suo) was made into a film in 2004.
Photo: IMDb.
