piety,” and Aaron has accused Lucius of observing “popish tricks and cere-
monies” ( 5. 1. 76 ), anachronistically calling up the “Roman” religion which, for
Protestant England, was itself “misbelief.” Too, it is clear from Aaron’s last
speech act that he—and anyone—can speak the speech of Christianity, re-
gardless of faith. “Repent[ing]” any good he did (if any) “from [his] very
soul,” he puts religion on at the very moment he puts it off ( 5. 3. 189 ). At worst,
then, Marcus’s denunciation of the “misbelieving” Moor is self-referential and
self-incriminating; at best, it is blatantly ideological, undeniably unrelated to
the “wrongs unspeakable” that the Moor is asked to speak as well as to polit-
ical transgression that Lucius must defend and that incrimination of the
Moor obscures.
And significantly, if not consequently, the Roman audience is decidedly
quiet on both fronts, on the matter of Rome and the matter of the Moor. The
one named Roman, Emilius, assures Marcus, the “reverend man of Rome,”
that the “common voice” will support his story and Lucius’s rule ( 5. 3. 136 , 139 ).
Editors have amended a speech prefix, which in the early quarto is “Marcus,”
to have “All Romans” subsequently endorse the Andronici’s actions by reiter-
ating the refrain “Lucius, all hail, Rome’s gracious governor!” ( 5. 3. 145 ).^71 Ye t
we do not want to be too quick to put words in the mouth of the “common
voice,” especially in light of Shakespeare’s subsequent Roman plays, where the
appropriation and eclipse of that voice is constantly at stake and where repre-
sentation itself, as a political process, is constantly under suspicion.^72 Lucius’s
and Marcus’s extended defenses of a politically indefensible coup suggests that
the public “uproar” is not so easily silenced. When “a Roman” finally does
speak, signs of skepticism remain. He dictates two actions, both which subtly
challenge the Andronici’s stance. First, he directs the “sad Andronici,” who
have become nostalgically, atavistically, caught in their “obsequious tears” for
the dead Titus, to “have done with woes” ( 5. 3. 175 , 151 ). Then, he implores Lu-
cius to “give sentence” on Aaron, the “execrable wretch / That hath been
breeder of these dire events” ( 5. 3. 176 – 77 ). Although he seeks the punishment
Marcus has prescribed, he changes and so challenges the terms of complaint.
Instead of stereotyping Aaron as a “misbelieving Moor,” he indicts the
“wretch” for the “dire events” that Aaron has, in fact, committed. That is, he
turns the focus from who the Moor categorically is to what this particular
Moor has done, thus displacing and replacing discriminationwithincrimina-
tion, the “misbeliever” with the criminal. Though the desired sentence is the
same, the terms of sentencing are radically different.
If Marcus does not understand the potential skepticism within the “com-
“Incorporate in Rome” 97