Tom and Jan are teenagers in love. Tom lives in a caravan park in Rudheath with his parents. Tom's father is a Sergeant Major in the Army, but Tom's mother refuses to live in the barracks like other wives. There is no privacy for Tom. He has to pretend not to hear the doings of his parents at night, especially after "Mess night". Jan's parents are doctors, possibly mental health specialists. They also leave Rudheath, removing one of Tom's sanctuaries, as he used their house for studying, though his parents accuse the couple of using it for sex.
Tom is highly intelligent and knowledgeable. He quotes cosmology, poetry and Shakespeare constantly, mostly as a defence against the world around him. He is polite, almost florid in his speech with strangers, even as he can be curt and sardonic with those close to him. As the novel progresses we see that he, like Holden Caulfield before him, is descending into mental breakdown.
Jan's commitment to Tom comes partially from the rootlessness of her upbringing, moving from place to place as her parents work at different hospitals. Tom to her represents stability, and to some extent so does the axe-head. She calls it her "Bunty", a "real thing". When Tom gives the axe-head away it removes that token of stability, even as Tom himself is becoming unstable.
Tom's parents seem to be living in a different world. Tom's mother does not like Jan, seeing her as a schemer who will derail Tom's chance at an education, just another girl who will get pregnant, possibly by some other boy. Tom's father is unable to communicate with his son, especially about sex. Both parents try to find refuge in an idealised family life, having Tom pose for pictures while pretending to cut his birthday cake. Even though Tom's father is near the top of the non-commissioned ranks in the Army, the family is constantly short of money.
Tom's fate is to abandon all stability, real, imagined or symbolic.
Thomas and Margery Rowley live in Barthomley. Thomas has epileptic fits in which he has visions of another person in turmoil, who may be Tom. The village regards John Fowler, the son of the Rector, as their leader. He is charismatic, educated, and has sided with the Parliamentary forces. He is wanted by the Royalists. He may also be a sociopath. He taunts Thomas about his fits, about Margery, and about their old rival Thomas Venables, a former villager, enemy of John Fowler and a rival to Thomas Rowley for Margery. Venables was born on Mow Cop, a place thought to be cursed. He is now a soldier with the Royalists. Thomas Rowley stands watches in the church tower, but he only stares at Mow Cop, as if that is the centre of the universe. In fact in Roman times the local tribesmen believe that to be true.
A group of Roman soldiers are on the run from the army, the local tribes and anybody else who might threaten them. They are led by Logan, their former cohort leader, who reminds them constantly that they are "the Ninth", possibly meaning the lost Ninth Legion. Logan also complains that they are "soldiers, not bricklayers"; the last testified activity for the 9th Legion in Britain is during the rebuilding in stone of the legionary fortress at York (Eburacum) in AD 107-8. Initially the other soldiers are Face, Magoo and Buzzard, along with Macey, who is subject to fits and berserker rages. In these states he fights like ten men but has strange visions, even claiming to be someone else, somewhere else while his body fights.
In some ways Logan reflects John Fowler. Both use others to benefit themselves. Macey is Logan's weapon of choice– when there is killing to be done it is Logan who knows the "Big Words" that incite Macey's fits. Logan also kills Buzzard for disobeying him, even though Buzzard is the best at scouting territory.
The girl-goddess-priestess sees all the soldiers as being lost from their tribes. This rootlessness echoes Tom and Jan's failure to find a place to call their own.
As in his other works, Garner peppers his characters' speech with the dialect of Cheshire. The inhabitants of Civil War Barthomley speak the broadest version, and the dialect is heard least among the rootless modern-day characters. The Roman-era characters speak, in the case of the soldiers, an Englishman's perception of Vietnam-era military jargon, and for the rest an English peppered with Cheshire dialect and pagan references. In attempting to "go native" Logan tries to master the differences between "Cats" speech and "Mothers" speech. Though the English language had not yet reached Britain, the differences in vocabulary suggest that the "Mothers" tribe speaks a Yorkshire dialect, e.g. calling a yard or enclosure a "garth".
The name "Cats" for the Cheshire tribe may be an allusion to the Cheshire Cat popularised by Lewis Carroll, or a reference to the Catti tribes found in northern Britain and Germania. History and archaeology would place the area around Mow Cop on the frontier between the Cornovii and the Brigantes tribes. The etymology of Cornovii contains a reference to 'horns' rather than 'cats;' Garner may have employed the Celtic root 'catu' (as in Catuvellauni) which meant 'battle,' a reference to the warlike nature of the tribe.
The linguistic connection between the Brigantes and the Celtic goddess Brigantia might suggest an origin for Garner's "Mothers."
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