In this short story set in a Roman province (likely Britain), Andros, a mosaic-maker, has been hired by a merchant named Cornelius Kaeso to install a mosaic depicting the goddess Juno and her peacock in his dining room. To make the ‘eyes’ on the peacock’s tail, Andros has fashioned 100 pieces from the fragments of a glass vessel that had been accidentally broken by a household slave. As he works on the mosaic, Andros reflects on the aspirations he had to craft mosaics for the wealthy of Gaul and Rome when he was young, but, while he has become a competent craftsman, he has never found the success or appreciative audience he had hoped for. Kaeso’s often maligned daughter Serenilla then enters the room to watch Andros work, which she takes great enjoyment from. 

After Serenilla is called away by her nurse, Kaeso himself appears to inspect the mosaic, commenting that it looks expensive enough, especially by lamplight, and after Andros tells him it will be finished in several days Kaeso announces that he will host a dinner-party as soon as it is done. A few days later, when Andros has almost finished the mosaic, he discovers one of the last five glass pieces is missing. Serenilla visits him again, and saddened that the peacock will not be completed, offers Andros the blue bead from a necklace she has recently bought as a replacement. Using the bead to complete the mosaic, both Andros and Serenilla gain satisfaction from having their contribution recognised by the other.

The date and location of the story are unclear, but Andros’ desire to go to Gaul, which is described as a more prosperous region, suggests that as was the case with many of Sutcliff’s novels the story takes place in Britain.

Sutcliff often sought to make her works didactic (1973: 306) and one possible moral of this story is that there is always someone who will appreciate your efforts, no matter how menial, while another is that art can bring together people from very different walks of life. Andros and Serenilla are two individuals that could not be more different: old and young, male and female, rich and poor. However, one trait they do share is that they go unappreciated, with Andros never having achieved his dreams of becoming a well-respected mosaic-maker, while Serenilla’s “dull-looking and lumpish” appearance is a source of disappointment to her mother, who wanted a beautiful daughter in pretty clothes, and her father largely ignores her in favour of her brothers. In the end, despite their differences they find solace with each other, with Serenilla not only interested in Andros’ work but also willing to sacrifice her favourite necklace to see it completed, while she finally finds a sense of accomplishment in making such a contribution. 

The character of Serenilla may also contain certain autobiographical traits of Sutcliff, such as a difficult relationship with an overbearing mother and an absent father, although unlike Kaeso’s emotional absence in the story Sutcliff’s father was literally away at sea for much of her childhood. Moreover, the distraction that the mosaic provides Serenilla is reminiscent of the refuge that Sutcliff sought in reading and art during her own isolated adolescence (Sutcliff 1983; Fisher 1974: 183). 

Sutcliff would often spend around two months researching the period in which her stories were set (Meek 1962: 12–13), and one can often see influence of academic discourse in her works. In this case, the story touches on various often discussed issues regarding ‘art’ and its manufacture in the Roman Empire. One such issue is what was classed as ‘art’ and who was deemed an ‘artist’, for although Artos wants his ‘art’ to be admired, he is seen more as a craftsman than an artist. Moreover, Kaeso has no interest in art and only wants a mosaic so he can show-off to other merchants, suggesting that it is the prestige that comes with being able own a mosaic, rather than its specific content, that people of Kaeso’s class are interested in. There is also the process by which materials were acquired for mosaics, with Andros thankful for the broken glass vessel, as otherwise he would not have had the means to make the peacock’s tail as beautiful. One wonders how common such circumstances were, and to what extent the mosaic-makers must have made do with what materials were available, and how this impacted on the final result. 

Additionally, it is inferred that the more well-regarded mosaic-makers reside on the continent, as we also find in the Sutcliff short story Eagle’s Egg (1981) (the British artisan Vedrix hired to lay a mosaic in the council of chamber at Eburacum (York) when the town council cannot afford to bring in an artisan from abroad). The suggestion that the work of local artisans in Britain was of a lower standard than their continental contemporaries echoes R. G. Collingwood’s derogatory appraisal of Romano-British art as blundering, stupid and ugly (Collingwood and Myres 1937: 249–250), whose works Sutcliff used to research her stories (Meek 1962: 71). However, recent analyses have tended to be more nuanced than this, observing that art manufactured in the provinces would have been influenced by local styles and may not have sought to emulate those on the continent. (Croxford 2016).

Collingwood, Robin George and John Nowell Linton Myres, Roman Britain and the English Settlements, Oxford: Clarendon, 1936.

Croxford, Ben, “Art in Roman Britain”, in Martin Millett, Louise Revell and Alison Moore, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Roman Britain, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016, 599–618.

Fisher, Emma, "Rosemary Sutcliff", in Justin Wintle, ed., The Pied Pipers: Interviews with the Influential creators of Children's Literature, London: Paddington Press, 1974,182–191.

Henig, Martin, The Art of Roman Britain, London: B.T. Batsford, 1995.

Meek, Margaret, Rosemary Sutcliff, London: Bodley Head, 1962.

Sutcliff, Rosemary, Blue Remembered Hills, London: Bodley Head, 1983.

Sutcliff, Rosemary, “History is People”, in Virginia Haviland, ed., Children and Literature: Views and Reviews, Brighton: Scott Foresman and Company, 1973, 305–312.

My documentary on Rosemary Sutcliff’s life and works to make her centenary can be found here.