'Falco doesn't need your Claudian anecdotes,' muttered Vespasian. 'And I was there!'

The clerk blushed; forgetting the Emperor's history was a bad mistake. Vespasian had commanded the Second Augusta at the Battle of the Medway, and he and the Second had played a celebrated part in the conquest of Britain.

'Caesar!' Canidius writhed in misery. 'The Fourteenth's roll of honour includes defeating Queen Boudicca, for which-along with the Twentieth Valeria-they were awarded the honorific title of "Martia Victrix".'

You may wonder why the Second Augusta did not win that prestigious handle too. The answer is that due to the kind of mix-up which we like to pretend never happens, the wonderful Second (my own legion as well as Vespasian's) failed to show up at the battlefield. The legions which did face the Iceni were lucky to survive. That was why any member of the Second needed to avoid the Fourteenth Gemina, honorific titles and all.

Canidius went on: 'In the recent wars, the Fourteenth's Batavian auxiliaries featured crucially. They had been separated from their parent legion and summoned to Germany under Vitellius. The Fourteenth themselves were devoted first to Nero-since after the Boudiccan Revolt he had called them his best legion-and then supported Otho. Otho brought them to Italy. This placed the legion and its native cohorts on opposing sides, and at the first battle of Bedriacum:' Canidius tailed off unhappily.

He was intending to fudge the issue, so I barged in: 'Whether the Fourteenth Gemina actually took part at Bedriacum is a moot point. Rather than admit they had been beaten in battle, they claimed they had not been there!'

Vespasian grumbled under his breath. He must think they were simply covering up.

Canidius rushed on again. 'After Otho's suicide, the legion and its auxiliaries were reunited by Vitellius. There was some rivalry,' the archive clerk said, with quaint discretion. He had no real grasp of what the Emperor required.