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Updated: June 8, 2025
He might have sought refuge among the Germans, but only by leaving his young wife, Eponina, behind him, and he had not the heart to forsake her. At moments of disaster and sorrow we learn the true value of life; nor did Julius Sabinus welcome the idea of death. He possessed a villa, beneath which there stretched vast subterranean caverns, known only to him and two freedmen.
By the tenderest affection Eponina softened the anxieties of her husband, the birth of two sons served still more to alleviate the misery of their distressful situation, and all the happiness that could possibly come to two so circumstanced attended the pair in their straitened place of refuge.
The poor woman had come out of her usual apathy, and proved herself, beside the present Sabinus, another Eponina.
But the friends who were in their confidence advised them not to risk as yet the chance of imperial clemency, and to return to their secret asylum. There they lived for nine years, during which "as a lioness in her den, neither more nor less," says Plutarch, "Eponina gave birth to two young whelps, and suckled them herself at her teat."
The pitiable tale of the captives had no effect upon him; the devotion of the wife roused no sympathy in his heart; Sabinus had dared rebel against Rome, no time nor circumstance could soften that flagitious crime; without hesitation the chief was condemned to death, and instant execution ordered. This cruel sentence changed the tone of Eponina.
Eponina's magnificent cry is the cry of all those whose hearts have been touched by love; as it is also the cry of those whose soul has discovered an interest, duty, or even a hope, in life. The flame that inspired Eponina inspires the sage also, lost in monotonous hours as she in her gloomy retreat.
To Eponina there came not a sorrow but kindled yet one more torch in the gloom of her cavern; and does not the sadness that forces the soul back into itself, to the retreat it has made, kindle deep consolation there?
At last they were discovered and brought before Vespasian at Rome: "Caesar," said Eponina, showing him her children, "I conceived them and suckled them in a tomb, that there might be more of us to ask thy mercy." But Vespasian was merciful only from prudence, and not by nature or from magnanimity; and he sent Sabinus to execution.
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