dem” ( 1. 1. 5 – 6 ), gives precedence to inherited Roman rights, to the emperor
“that held [the rule] last” and, according to Titus, held it “upright”
( 1. 1. 202 – 3 ).^31 In the case of the sacrifice, Titus’s adherence to primogeniture
absolutely closes out Tamora’s voice. Still a queen, the Goth reaches out to the
“Roman brethen” as a mother whose “passion for her son” should translate
across cultures, urging the “gracious conqueror” to understand her plight
through his and imploring: “if thy sons were ever dear to thee, / O, think my
son to be as dear to me” ( 1. 1. 107 , 109 – 11 ).^32 She further underlines the politi-
cal advantage Titus has already achieved through the display of captive Goths.
“Sufficeth not that we are brought to Rome,” she asks, “To beautify thy tri-
umphs, and return / Captive to thee and to thy Roman yoke?” ( 1. 1. 111 – 14 ).
Whether we take her words as devious or sincere and the sacrifice as “cruel”
or pious, Titus’s response shows how immovably entrenched he is in the
Rome of his own making.^33 First, he refocuses the gaze on his sons’ bodies,
the “brethren whom your Goths beheld /Alive and dead,” using the same lan-
guage he has used before to exalt his offspring ( 1. 1. 125 – 26 ; emphasis added).
For them, Alarbus must die; there is no space for negotiation. And after the
deed has been done, though Tamora and her sons express their outrage
openly, Titus averts his gaze from these warnings of impending disaster, re-
treats to the obsequies he cherishes, and idealizes the impenetrable safety of
the tomb, emphasizing how “secure” it is “from worldly chances and mishaps”
( 1. 1. 155 ): “Here lurks no treason,” he asserts, “here no envy swells, / Here grow
no damned drugs, here are no storms, / No noise, but silence and eternal
sleep” ( 1. 1. 156 – 59 ). In thus bounding off the tomb, Titus simultaneously
bounds himself off from “worldly chances and mishaps,” recognizing only
their most abstract embodiments (storms, noise, treason, envy) and ignoring
the more pressing and apparent threats of the Goths.
Within these opening ceremonies, the only space Titus makes for the
Goths and Moor is one that, instead of accommodating their domestic posi-
tion, reaffirms his. Ceding the place of emperor to Saturninus, he asks for “a
staff of honour for mine age, / But not a sceptre to control the world”
( 1. 1. 201 – 2 ). When Saturninus, in turn and in gratitude, selects Lavinia for his
empress, Titus reciprocates by turning over his “sword,” “chariot,” and “pris-
oners,” “consecrat[ing]” them as “presents well worthy Rome’s imperious
lord,” “the tribute that I owe, / Mine honour’s ensigns humbled at thy feet”
( 1. 1. 252 – 56 ). These gestures set the stage for a major political upheaval:
Bassianus will claim Lavinia as his own and Saturninus will reject her—and
with her, Titus and Titus’s Rome—in favor of Tamora, the Gothic queen. Yet
74 chapter three