On This Day In Roman History, March 15
The dictator perpetuo of Rome, Gaius Julius Caesar, is assassinated by the Liberatores within the Theater of Pompey on March 15, 44 BCE. The Republic which lasted the last four and a half centuries was for the first time threatened. During the late morning of the Ides, Mark Antony attempted to stop Caesar near the steps of the forum after discovering the plot from a severely frightened Liberatores named Publius Servilius Casca Longus. His plan failed when a group of Senators stopped Caesar while he was passing the Theatrum Pompeii. They brought him into a room located in the east portico of the building and some 60 men began stabbing Caesar after a quick verbal confrontation from a man name Lucius Tillius Cimber. As it became apparent what was happening Caesar yelled, "Ista quidem vis est!" which means "Why, this is violence!". The group of assassins moved to the streets and proclaimed "People of Rome, we are once again free!" but were met with silence as the majority of residence began fleeing into their homes and locking their doors. A group of slaves carried Caesar's body to his home where he was examined by a physician. This autopsy showed that only one of the stabs was fatal and a wax figurine of Caesar was put on display in the forum showing the 23 stab wounds. The civil war that would spring up within this power vacuum forever changed and transformed Rome from its Republican Era into its Principate Imperial Era.
Did you know?
Marcus Tullius Cicero was not invited nor informed of the assassination despite his viewpoints and personal alliances, making him a possible candidate for the Liberatores. In a personal letter a conspirator named Gaius Trebonius Cicero wrote that he wished he was "invited to that superb banquet." It was his personal opinion that Antony should have been killed as well, but the Liberatores claimed they must symbolically kill just one in order to appear more in line with committing a "tyrannicide" rather than just overthrowing the government itself.
Pictured: La Mort de César (ca. 1859–1867) by Jean-Léon Gérôme. Characteristically, Gérôme has depicted not the incident itself, but its immediate aftermath. The illusion of reality that Gérôme imparted to his paintings with his smooth, polished technique led one critic to comment, "If photography had existed in Caesar's day, one could believe that the picture was painted from a photograph taken on the spot at the very moment of the catastrophe." Via Wikimedia Commons.
Today's selected quote is from a Greek historian from the Augustan age named Nicolaus of Damascus. He describes how several friends, doctors, and Caesar's wife Calpurnia implore him not to leave his home on the Ides: "...his friends were alarmed at certain rumors and tried to stop him going to the Senate-house, as did his doctors, for he was suffering from one of his occasional dizzy spells. His wife, Calpurnia, especially, who was frightened by some visions in her dreams, clung to him and said that she would not let him go out that day. But [Decimus] Brutus, one of the conspirators who was then thought of as a firm friend, came up and said, 'What is this, Caesar? Are you a man to pay attention to a woman's dreams and the idle gossip of stupid men, and to insult the Senate by not going out, although it has honoured you and has been specially summoned by you? But listen to me, cast aside the forebodings of all these people, and come. The Senate has been in session waiting for you since early this morning.' This swayed Caesar and he left."
Opinion
Welcome to my daily opinion! Many Roman citizens and politicians viewed Caesar as an incredibly effective leader who was doing so much more good than bad, and that just maybe dictator for life wasn't such a bad idea. The public was also increasingly viewing the Senate as a corrupt aristocracy that was slow to respond and even slower to act. Technologies that connect humans today allow for vast numbers of individuals to work quickly and efficiently together, but in these classical times a quick response from an individual not tied down by the slow (even slower than today's) bureaucracy could mean the difference between a victory or defeat. Caesar's power, and later Octavian's power, proved to be much quicker and beneficial in terms of lawmaking and military response because the decisions were being made by one man. The only apparent downside to this is if that one man doesn't make great decisions... you have a problem. Today I think it’s important to view these past events and really decide what the true price of liberty is; it may be even more important to remember how unintended consequences can define history.
Sources
Fuller, J. F. (1991). Julius Caesar: Man, soldier and tyrant. Da Capo Press.
S., Thomson, A., & Forester, T. (2007). Lives of the twelve Caesars: Caligula. S.I.: DoDo Press.
Woolf, G. (2006). Et tu, Brute?: the murder of Caesar and political assassination. London: Profile Books.
Further Reading:
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