here, the opening act suggests, we must first see Rome for what it is: a place
where the crossing of cultures is not the exception but the rule.
Even before the sacrifice, Titus’s valorization of all things Roman appears
curiously strained by the situation which is its prompt. His triumphant en-
trance into Rome coincides purposefully with an internal political crisis, the
uneasy selection of a Roman emperor, for which he provides the perfect solu-
tion. While Saturninus implores the “noble patricians” to support his “succes-
sive title” of “first-born son” of the last emperor (1.1.1, 4–5), his younger
brother, Bassianus, turns instead to the people, his “friends, followers, [and]
favourers of [his] right,” urging them to “fight for freedom” and endorse “pure
election,” which he hopes, of course, to win (1.1.9, 16–17). Before anything
can be resolved, Marcus enters with a crown and circumvents the conflict
with the announcement that “the people of Rome,” “have by common
voice / In election for the Roman empery / Chosen Andronicus” and that
Titus “by the senate is accited home / From weary wars against the barbarous
Goths” (1.1.20–23, 27–28). Being at once the “noble” Titus’s brother (1.1.53)
and a tribune, “a special party” who “stand[s]” for “the people,” Marcus is use-
fully poised between the two factions that Saturninus and Bassianus have set
at odds, and, he makes clear, his resolution comes with the support of both
the “common voice” and the senate (1.1.20–21). Accordingly, the election of
“the good Andronicus” seems to resolve all tensions (1.1.40), prompting both
Saturninus and Bassianus to dismiss their claims, disband their supporters,
and at least profess a loyalty to the new state.^16
The circumstances surrounding Titus’s recall, however, raise serious ques-
tions about the status of Rome’s war with the Goths and the integrity both of
the Roman triumph and of the exaltations that adorn it. For despite all the
pomp and circumstance, there is no guarantee that the war is actually over.
Titus, after all, has been “accited home” by the senate, explicitly because he
won the election, not the war. It could be little more than a happy coincidence
that he is able to return to Rome “laden with honour’s spoils” (1.1.39). Even
Titus does not fully suppress the contingency of the victory, admitting that
the Goths “have given me leave to sheathe my sword” (1.1.89).^17 To be sure,
when Marcus justifies the outcome of the election, he cites Titus’s “many good
and great deserts to Rome” ( 1. 1. 24 ) and, echoing the captain, singles out the
fact that Titus has “yoked a nation”—the Gothic nation—“strong” ( 1. 1. 30 ).
But Marcus’s rendering of the military backstory leading to this politically
welcome and unusually well-timed climax leaves significant room for doubt.
For ten years, Marcus testifies, Titus has been fighting for “this cause of
70 chapter three