Chapter V: LXXVII
on 30 April 2017
at 12:00 pm
Chapter: chapter V
Characters: Antonia Felicia, Damon, Felix, Irenaeus, Leah Aurora, Lurio, Mus, Persephone, Tadius, Urbana
Location: Domus Antonia, Roma Urbs
New comic!
(No further commentary at the moment; I have to hurry back to work 🙂 )
So Mus thinks it’s Menader’s ashes?
With the only identification being the necklace and a vague description of a body, Mus could maybe be forgiven for some confusion–especially about those last few hours, what with having gotten drunk and then hit by a building.
This release and the previous seem to be out of order. In the previous Iphis is back at his master’s home about to be grilled for what he knows and here he is at Iusta’s home waiting to return.
That’s just me still needing to improve my face-drawing skills. They wander off-model sometimes.
Tadius is meant to be very lanky and long boned, and Iphis small and compact. Damon needs to eat more and get rid of that residual lean-and-hungry look. I’m kind of thinking he’s just going to grow up and look like 10K from Z Nation, which would be sort of appropriate to the comic.
Iphis has been spying on Vibia, Alexander, and Alexander’s servants; he and Mus have only met the one time so far when they sussed out each other’s membership in a subversive organisation.
Does Damon think too much, you know such men are dangerous. 😉
I’d have to say that Damon probably should try more thinking, and less grabbing things and running.
I know some time has passed, but i never cease to be impressed. Y Mus, the person. His two attendants are already loyal to him, not the people who own them. He really has come into his own.
Iphis used to have longer hair, and before the disaster, a happier face.
I do enjoy drawing hair, though I figure there must have been a limit to how long, loose, and flying-in-the-breeze-caught-in-the-trees Palatine servants’ hair could be before they were suspected of being crazed eastern hedonists. But maybe we’ll let Iphis gradually test how long his new master will indulge him. And maybe he’ll find some things to be happier about….
Ilike the way all but one panel has all the free males, the slave males, and the females. So “that guy” must have been free. Whatis Urbana’s status? I’ve been wondering for a while.
Thank you for noticing that! 😀 😀
(Even Persephone gets to hang out with the gals.)
Urbana’s backstory, as currently in my head, is as a highly educated free (or freed) wet nurse–maybe call it a governess–who saw her former employers and life wiped away and assumed that a wealthy woman like Iusta wouldn’t be nursing her own infant and would need a hand.
If I can stay revved up and get comics done at a nice pace, there’ll be more opportunities to show how she and Iusta interact, and more of what Urbana is teaching the kids. Native-level fluency in Greek would be top of the list.
Her name comes from a list of various real, ordinary people, that I occasionally grab characters from 🙂
Does Urbana know the baby isn’t Iusta’s biological child? She must know by now, surely. Also, where did Leah Aurora acquire that half-Hebrew-half-Latin name?
Yes, by now that truth must have come out!
I’ve yet to come up with the story behind the little girl’s name–usually the name for a character comes first, from someone mentioned in the historical record (in graffiti, in a an ancient contract, on a tomb, on a list, in a poem…). Urbana’s daughter started out as just Aurora but acquired the Leah (Leia) by popular demand, from her hair buns (and with Carrie Fisher…I felt I should make the name official). But I like the challenge and the potential dimensions that name it adds to Urbana’s back story, once it’s expanded.
Who is Ulpius? I’ve lost track of who some characters are.
You are differentiating people better, but it’s a large, confusing cast.
Love the kittens.
M Ulpius Trajanus was the young, somewhat shell-shocked (so to speak) son of a general Felix met after a battle, who now pals around with Titus & Domitian’s shouty cousin Sabinus. He has somehow come into ownership of Iphis.
Domitian says he can get rid of some of the cast if that’d help….
Also, he’s this guy!