Item Seed: Tertium Bellum In Caelo Polyporum.

Blame this.

tertium-bellum-in-caelo-polyporum-google-docs

 

Tertium Bellum In Caelo Polyporum

 

Tertium Bellum In Caelo Polyporum (“The Third War Against the Sky Octopuses”) exists only in palimpsest form: the earliest copy was apparently a 10th Century transcription of an earlier scroll.  The copy was later erased sometime in the 13th Century so that the parchment could be used for monastery tithe records (modern-day researchers found it via a standard check for palimpsests).  The records were eventually found, slightly buried, in the back of a natural cave in Spain, next to the remains of a trussed-up monk: both the remains and the bag holding the parchment had been covered with quicklime before burial, which ironically enough helped preserve the parchment itself.  Interestingly, Interpol is still treating this discovery as being part of an open murder investigation, although that may simply be because even international police organizations are allowed to have a little fun sometimes, too.

But back to the text: it does, indeed, purport to be a narrative about a Roman campaign in Hispania Citerior some time around 155 BC.  The Sky Octopuses were apparently a continuing danger to Roman colonists and collaborators in that region; a mature one could pull a man into the sky, and even the immature ones could wreak havoc on sheep and crops.  The text suggests that there had been at least two previous occasions where troops were sent to handle the problem (presumably, the First and Second Wars), but to no permanent avail.  Eventually, two full legions were sent out to seek out the menace, and destroy it – which the legions did, with typical Roman ruthless efficiency.  It turned out that the Sky Octopuses were being magically controlled by Carthaginian sorcerers attempting to destabilize Roman rule in Hispania; the text ends with an account of the surviving magicians sent back to Rome to ‘mutely warn of Carthage’s evil.’

 

…Obviously, the general consensus among the scholarly community is that this manuscript is an elaborate practical joke, made by some unsung comic genius in the Dark Ages who was willing if not downright eager to confuse future scholars and sages by ‘transcribing’ something this absurd. After all, it absolutely has to be a fake, because nobody else in the world had ever heard of Sky Octopuses before now. And it also absolutely has to be a fake from the Dark Ages, because every check and test on the parchment confirms that it’s really that old.

 

And yet, there’s that Interpol investigation.  Which keeps poking into various places in various Spanish mountain ranges.  Maybe there’s more to this than a little harmless investigatory fun, after all…