Enyo: Goddess of War, Violence and Blood (bathesinblood) wrote in history_dot_com, @ 2012-03-05 06:39:00 |
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Entry tags: | ~enyo, ~tyr |
The End of the Beginning – Cimbrian War – 101 BCE [tag: Tyr]
Enough was enough.
Enyo was not known for being a tolerant deity. If the Roman Senate had listened to her from the beginning, the Teutones and the Cimbri would have been slaughtered from the word go and this wouldn't have been an issue. Instead, the Senate, in their infinite wisdom, sent Junior Consul Papirius Carbo to the Alps to protect the passage to Italia. Which meant Carbo, rather than make an example of the Germanic tribes, entered into negotiations with them.
This was a tragic mistake for the Cimbri and Teutones. Enyo knew it. She saw it. She was a goddess of war after all, of course she would know what would come of the people who invaded lands that were not theirs to invade. Her Roman army brought civilization to tribes that had none. These barbarians were not supposed to try to supplant the tribes and armies that had done so much good for the region.
Besides, she wanted war. She lived for bloodshed.
She loved her Romans -well, as much as Enyo was capable of love, and she was very possessive of the Roman Army. The Greeks, her homeland people, didn't honor her as she felt she was owed. Did she not give them victory against the Persians? Against other city-states? But the Romans, they honored her. So much so that they built a special building for foreign war councils to be held by the Senate. They called it the Templum Bellonae. They gave her a separate name, one she adored – Bellona. And the put her image on their shields and coins. Normally, her Romans pleased her a great deal. The negotiations had confused her.
Thankfully, Carbo wasn't as stupid as he seemed and laid an ambush for the tribes. Which only led to the Barbarians turning on the Romans and annihilating Carbo's army. For that, she was not pleased.
In the years that followed it was back and forth between the Romans and the Barbarians. Wins, losses, wondrous battlefields littered with blood and body parts. But the Romans were not faring well and this displeased the goddess greatly. Her army was superior to all other armies. They would be building a glorious and expansive empire with her aid.
But that wasn't at the forefront of her mind as she stood at Vercellae in bare feet, with her tunic torn, breastplate spattered with gore, her hair wildly dancing from beneath her helm and her skin stained with blood. No, now she was reveling in the moment. Marius was every bit more a better leader than his predecessors. The Teutones had been eliminated as a threat not long before the current battle. And smartly, he saw fit to take the Cimbri down as well.
She re-sheathed her sword and walked through the battlefield, determined to regain her spear and shield. When she found them, she took a good look around and laughed.
They were winning. At least that was how it looked to the goddess as she took in her surroundings. There were the cries and screams of women somewhere nearby, but she only half-heard it. The din of battle far took control of her focus. Enyo was very, very pleased with the bloodshed. The settlement of the Cimbri was decimated, soon the people would be massacred and the women and children... well, Enyo could certainly use some new attendants in her Roman temples.
And if they weren't compliant, she'd just kill them.