Herod’s Curse
Trigger Warning: mentions of death, violence, murder, sexual assault, gaslighting, and necrophilia
The morning sun blazed on the white marble
and yellow limestone of Herod’s Temple,
and when its rays struck the golden roof,
Mount Moriah, on which it was built,
gleamed and sparkled as if in flames.
Tormented by fears of rivals,
Herod had his former High Priest
put to death at the age of eighty
and murdered two of his sons.
He loved his second wife Mariamme,
a beautiful Hasmonean princess,
but he feared her powerful family.
He had her attractive, popular brother
drowned after appointing him High Priest
when he was still a teenager.
Herod commanded Mariamme
to be put to death, were he to die.
Herod’s administrator Joseph
revealed to her this secret order
as evidence of her husband’s love:
So death will not separate the two of you.
But Mariamme didn’t see it that way.
Herod’s instructions were proof to her
that her husband was wicked and deranged.
The chronicler Josephus accused her
of arrogance and disobedience:
Being constantly courted by him
because of his love and expecting
no harsh treatment from him,
she maintained an excessive freedom of speech.
And since she was also distressed
by what had happened to her relatives,
she saw fit to speak to Herod of all her feelings.
He was the one person from whom
she had mistakenly expected
not to suffer any harm.
When Herod ordered her to his bed,
she refused his caresses.
Taking revenge, he accused her
of adultery with his administrator.
Summarily, Joseph was put to death.
Herod’s sister, who hated Mariamme,
joined in her condemnation.
To spare her own life,
Mariamme’s mother denounced her.
Mariamme was twenty-eight years old
when she was executed.
She had borne Herod five children.
Mariamme went to her death
with a calm demeanor and no change of color,
and so even in her last moments,
she revealed her nobility of descent
to those who were looking on.
After her death, Mariamme haunted Herod.
He went mad hearing her voice.
The Talmudic rabbis claimed
her preserved her body in honey
so he could gaze upon her every day.
Some said he had intercourse with her corpse.
In the desert, Herod grew ill.
As he lay dying from intestinal cancer,
daring Pharisees stole the royal eagle
from his Temple. In retribution,
he massacred 3,000 of them
side by side with the Temple offering.
He stole along to the throne like a fox,
ruled like a tiger, and died like a dog.
Anne Whitehouse is the author of poetry collections: The Surveyor’s Hand, Blessings and Curses, The Refrain, Meteor Shower, Outside from the Inside, and Steady, as well as the art chapbooks, Surrealist Muse (about Leonora Carrington), Escaping Lee Miller, Frida, and Being Ruth Asawa. Adrienne Fidelin Restored is forthcoming.
