Antipater Comes Home

After this Bathyllus too was brought into the inquiry, the final proof of Antipater’s designs. He was Antipater’s freedman, and he had come bringing another poison, the venom of asps and the juices of other serpents, so that if the first drug proved too weak, Pheroras and his wife might be armed with this one against the king. As a further piece of Antipater’s daring against his father, he also brought letters that Antipater had concocted against his brothers. These were Archelaus and Philip, the king’s sons, who were being educated in Rome; they were already young men, and full of spirit. Since they were rising up to threaten his hopes, Antipater was eager to get them out of the way. Some letters against them he forged himself in the name of his friends in Rome; others of those friends he bribed to write that the young men spoke very abusively of their father, openly lamented Alexander and Aristobulus, and resented being called home. For their father was already sending for them, and that was what troubled Antipater most.

Even before his journey, while he was still in Judea, Antipater had paid to have such letters against them sent from Rome. Then, so as to stay clear of suspicion, he would go to his father and speak in his brothers’ defense, saying that some of what was written was false and the rest was the mistakes of youth. At the same time, since he was paying out a great deal of money to those who wrote against his brothers, he tried to confuse the accounts. He bought costly clothing, embroidered rugs, silver and gold cups and many other valuables, so that in the great expense laid out on these he could bury the fees paid for the letters. In fact he reported expenses of two hundred talents, and his chief excuse for them was his lawsuit against Syllaeus. Now all his villainies, even the smaller ones, were laid bare along with his greater crime: the tortures all cried out that he had plotted to kill his father, and the letters that he had plotted a second murder of brothers. Yet none of those who came to Rome told him what had happened in Judea, though seven months passed between his conviction and his return, so great was the hatred everyone felt for him. Perhaps it was the ghosts of his murdered brothers that stopped the mouths of those who meant to tell him. At any rate, he wrote from Rome announcing that he would soon arrive, and that Caesar had sent him off with honor. [a]

The king was eager to get the plotter into his hands, and afraid that he might learn the truth beforehand and be on his guard. So he answered pretense with pretense in his letter: he wrote warmly in every other respect and urged him to hurry, since if he came quickly, Herod would set aside his complaints against his mother; for Antipater knew that his mother had been driven out. Earlier, at Tarentum, he had received the letter about Pheroras’s death and mourned for him greatly, for which some praised him, as a man grieving for his uncle. But his distress, it seems, came from the failure of his plot: he was weeping not for Pheroras but for the agent he had lost. And already a kind of fear came over him about what had been done, in case the poison had been discovered. Later, in Cilicia, he received the letter from his father mentioned above, and at once made haste. But as he sailed into Celenderis, the thought of his mother’s misfortunes took hold of him, as if his soul were already foretelling something on its own. The more prudent of his friends advised him not to throw himself into his father’s hands until he had learned clearly why his mother had been driven out, for they feared he might be added to the charges against her. But the less thoughtful, who were more eager to see their homeland than concerned for Antipater’s good, urged him to hurry on. Delay, they said, would give his father grounds for an ugly suspicion and his slanderers an opening; if anything had been stirred up against him now, it was because he was away, for no one would have dared it in his presence. It was absurd to lose certain blessings over uncertain suspicions, instead of quickly giving himself up to his father and receiving the kingdom, which was wavering on him alone. He followed their advice, for some divine power was driving him on. He crossed over and landed at Sebastos, the harbor of Caesarea. [c]

There he met with an unexpected and complete solitude. Everyone turned aside, and no one dared to approach him. He was hated by all alike, and now that hatred was free to show itself; and fear of the king turned many away, since every city was by now full of the rumors about Antipater, and Antipater alone did not know where he stood. No one had ever been sent off more splendidly than he was when he sailed for Rome, and no one was ever welcomed back with less honor. He already sensed the disasters at home, but out of cunning he still hid it, and though inwardly dead with fear, he forced his face into a look of confidence. There was no more escape for him, and no way out of what surrounded him. Even there no clear news from home reached him, because of the king’s threats; yet a more cheerful hope remained. Perhaps nothing had been discovered; or if anything had, perhaps he could smooth it over with impudence and tricks, which were his only means of rescue. [f]

Fenced about by these hopes, he came to the palace without his friends, for they had been insulted and shut out at the first gate. Varus, the governor of Syria, happened to be inside. Antipater went in to his father and, steeling himself with boldness, came near as if to embrace him. Herod held out his hands to keep him off, turned his head aside, and cried out, “This too is the mark of a father-murderer — to want to throw his arms around me while he stands under such charges! Go to ruin, you most godless wretch! Do not touch me until you have cleared yourself of these accusations. I give you a court, and a judge, Varus, who has arrived at just the right moment. Go and think out your defense for tomorrow; I am giving your tricks time.” Antipater was too stunned to make any answer and went away. His mother and his wife came to him and told him all the evidence in detail. Then he came to his senses and set about considering his defense. [g]