Soon the rumor spread that Claudius had arrived. The first to rush out were the freedmen Polybius, Myron, Arpocras, Ampheus, and Pheronaotus, all of whom Claudius had sent on ahead of him, so that he would never lack for attendants. Then the two Praetorian prefects Justus Catonius and Rufrius Pollio. Then his advisors Saturninus Lusius, Pedo Pompeius, Lupus, and Celer Asinius, all ex-consuls. Last of all came his brother’s daughter, his sister’s daughter, his sons-in-law, his fathers-in-law, his mothers-in-law—all relations, clearly. And forming a receiving line they came to greet Claudius. When Claudius saw them, he exclaimed, “‘The whole world is full of friends.’ How did you all get here?” Then Pedo Pompeius replied, “What are you saying, you paragon of cruelty? You ask how? Who else sent us here but you, you murderer of all your friends. Let’s go to court. This time I will show you the defendant’s table and the judge’s bench.”

Pedo led him to the courtroom of Aeacus, who presided over cases brought under the capital homicide law. Pedo asked for permission to bring a charge against Claudius and read the indictment: thirty-five senators killed, three hundred twenty-one Roman knights, and others “as many as the grains of sand and the motes of dust.” Claudius couldn’t find a lawyer to represent him. Finally Publius Petronius turned up: an old crony of his, and a man fluent in the Claudian tongue. He asked for a continuance; he was refused. Pedo Pompeius read the accusation to loud cheers. The defense attorney began to try to argue his side of the case. Aeacus, a most fair-minded man, told him he couldn’t. Having heard only one side of the case, he condemned Claudius, saying:

Were you to suffer what you inflicted on others,

Straight justice would be done.’

There was a long silence. Everyone was struck dumb, stunned by the novelty of the idea. They said that such a thing had never happened. To Claudius, though, the idea seemed more unfair than novel.

There was a long discussion about the sentence, what he ought to suffer. There were those who said that Sisyphus had pushed his load for a long time; that Tantalus would die of thirst unless someone helped him; that at some point poor Ixion ought to have the brake put on his wheel. But it was decided not to give a respite to any of the old-timers, lest Claudius at some point expect the same consideration. A new type of punishment would have to be dreamed up for him: some futile task involving the hope of a goal without any result. Aeacus then ordered him to play dice using a dice-box with a hole drilled in the bottom.

And already Claudius was starting to chase after the dice that always kept falling out, and he was getting nowhere:

Whenever he tried to throw from the echoing dice-box,

Both dice escaped from the hole cut in the bottom.