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Assassination of Julius Caesar

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These articles cover Ancient Rome and the fall of the Republic
Roman Republic, Mark Antony, Cleopatra VII, Assassination of Julius Caesar, Crassus, Pompey, Brutus, Cato the Younger, Theatre of Pompey, Cicero, First Triumvirate, Comitium
Morte di Giulio Cesare (Death of Julius Caesar) by Vincenzo Camuccini.

The Assassination of Julius Caesar was the result of a conspiracy of a group of senators, led by Gaius Cassius Longinus and Marcus Junius Brutus, who wanted to overthrow Julius Caesar, who in a civil war had risen from military general to political master of the Roman Republic. The conspirators killed Caesar on the Ides of March (March 15th) in 44 BC, which led, then, to another civil war and eventually the ascendancy of Caesar's adopted heir Octavian to the position of Roman Emperor.

The conspired plot

Ancient biographers describe the tension between Caesar and the Senate, and his possible claims to the title of king. These events would be the principal motive for Caesar's assassination by his political opponents in the Senate.

Plutarch records that at one point, Caesar informed the Senate that his honours were more in need of reduction than augmentation, but withdrew this position so as not to appear ungrateful. He was given the title Pater Patriae ("Father of the Fatherland").[1] He was appointed dictator a third time, and then nominated for nine consecutive one-year terms as dictator, effectually making him dictator for ten years. He was also given censorial authority as praefectus morum (prefect of morals) for three years.

The Senate named Caesar dictator perpetuo ("dictator in perpetuity"). Roman mints printed a denarius coin with this title and his profile on one side, and with an image of the goddess Ceres and Caesar's title of Augur Pontifex Maximus on the reverse. While printing the title of dictator was significant, Caesar's image was not, as it was customary to print consuls and other public officials on coins during the Republic.

According to Cassius Dio, a senatorial delegation went to inform Caesar of new honours they had bestowed upon him in 44 BC. Caesar received them while sitting in the Temple of Venus Genetrix, rather than rising to meet them. According to Dio, this was a chief excuse for the offended senators to plot his assassination. He wrote that a few of Caesar's supporters blamed his failure to rise on a sudden attack of diarrhoea, but his enemies discounted this in observing that he had walked home unaided.[citation needed]

Suetonius wrote that Caesar failed to rise in the temple either because he was restrained by Cornelius Balbus or that he balked at the suggestion he should rise.[2] Suetonius also gave the account of a crowd assembled to greet Caesar upon his return to Rome. A member of the crowd placed a laurel wreath on the statue of Caesar on the Rostra. The tribunes Gaius Epidius Marcellus and Lucius Caesetius Flavius ordered that the wreath be removed as it was a symbol of Jupiter and royalty. Caesar had the tribunes censored from office through his official powers.[3] According to Suetonius, he was unable to dissociate himself from the royal title from this point forward.[4] Suetonius also gives the story that a crowd shouted to him "rex", the Latin word for king. Caesar replied, "I am Caesar, not Rex".[4] Also, at the festival of the Lupercalia, while he gave a speech from the Rostra, Mark Antony, who had been elected co-consul with Caesar, attempted to place a crown on his head several times. Caesar put it aside to be used as a sacrifice to Jupiter Opitimus Maximus.[3]

Plutarch and Suetonius are similar in their depiction of these events, but Dio combines the stories writing that the tribunes arrested the citizens who placed diadems or wreaths on statues of Caesar. He then places the crowd shouting "rex" on the Alban Hill with the tribunes arresting a member of this crowd as well. The plebeian protested that he was unable to speak his mind freely. Caesar then brought the tribunes before the senate and put the matter to a vote, thereafter removing them from office and erasing their names from the records.

Sculpture of Julius Caesar by 17th century French sculptor Nicolas Coustou.

Suetonius adds that Lucius Cotta proposed to the Senate that Caesar should be granted the title of "king" for it was prophesied that only a king would conquer Parthia.[5] Caesar intended to invade Parthia, a task which would later give considerable trouble to Mark Antony during the second triumvirate.

Brutus began to conspire against Caesar with his friend and brother-in-law Gaius Cassius Longinus and other men, calling themselves the Liberatores ("Liberators"). Many plans were discussed by the group, as documented by Nicolaus of Damascus:

The conspirators never met openly, but they assembled a few at a time in each other's homes. There were many discussions and proposals, as might be expected, while they investigated how and where to execute their design. Some suggested that they should make the attempt as he was going along the Sacred Way, which was one of his favorite walks. Another idea was for it to be done at the elections during which he had to cross a bridge to appoint the magistrates in the Campus Martius; they should draw lots for some to push him from the bridge and for others to run up and kill him. A third plan was to wait for a coming gladiatorial show. The advantage of that would be that, because of the show, no suspicion would be aroused if arms were seen prepared for the attempt. But the majority opinion favoured killing him while he sat in the Senate, where he would be by himself since only Senators would be admitted, and where the many conspirators could hide their daggers beneath their togas. This plan won the day.

Nicolaus also writes that in the days leading up to the assassination, Caesar was told by doctors, friends, and even his wife, Calpurnia, not to attend the Senate on the Ides for various reasons, including medical concerns and troubling dreams had by Calpurnia:

...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 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.

Julius Caesar had been preparing to invade Parthia, the Caucasus and Scythia, and then swing back onto Germania through Eastern Europe. and planned to leave for the East in the latter half of March, which forced a timetable onto the conspirators. Two days before the actual assassination, Cassius met with the conspirators and told them that, should anyone discover the plan, they were to turn their knives on themselves.[6] His successors did attempt the conquests of Parthia and Germania, but without lasting results.

Ides of March: Assasination Day

On the Ides of March (March 15; see Roman calendar) of 44 BC, a group of senators called Caesar to the forum for the purpose of reading a petition, written by the senators, asking him to hand power back to the Senate. However, the petition was a fake.[7] Mark Antony, having vaguely learned of the plot the night before from a terrified Liberator named Servilius Casca, and fearing the worst, went to head Caesar off at the steps of the forum. However, the group of senators intercepted Caesar just as he was passing the Theatre of Pompey, located in the Campus Martius, and directed him to a room adjoining the east portico.[8]

The senators encircle Caesar.

As Caesar began to read the false petition, Tillius Cimber, who had handed him the petition, pulled down Caesar's tunic. According to Suetonius, Caesar then cried to Cimber, "Why, this is violence!" ("Ista quidem vis est!").[9] At the same time, the aforementioned Casca produced his dagger and made a glancing thrust at the dictator's neck. Caesar turned around quickly and caught Casca by the arm. According to Plutarch, he said in Latin, "Casca, you villain, what are you doing?"[10] Casca, frightened, shouted "Help, brother!" in Greek ("ἀδελφέ, βοήθει!", "adelphe, boethei!"). Within moments, the entire group, including Brutus, was striking out at the dictator. Caesar attempted to get away, but, blinded by blood, he tripped and fell; the men continued stabbing him as he lay defenceless on the lower steps of the portico. According to Eutropius, around sixty or more men participated in the assassination. He was stabbed 23 times.[11] According to Suetonius, a physician later established that only one wound, the second one to his chest, had been lethal.[12]

The dictator's last words are not known with certainty, and are a contested subject among scholars and historians alike. Suetonius reports that others have said Caesar's last words were the Greek phrase "καὶ σύ, τέκνον;"[13] (transliterated as "Kai su, teknon?": "You too, child?" in English). However, Suetonius himself says Caesar said nothing.[9] Plutarch also reports that Caesar said nothing, pulling his toga over his head when he saw Brutus among the conspirators.[14] The version best known in the English-speaking world is the Latin phrase "Et tu, Brute?" ("And you, Brutus?", commonly rendered as "You too, Brutus");[15][16] this derives from Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, where it actually forms the first half of a macaronic line: "Et tu, Brute? Then fall, Caesar." It has no basis in historical fact and Shakespeare's use of Latin here is not from any assumption that Caesar would have been using the language, but because the phrase was already popular at the time the play was written.[17]

Senators abandon Caesar's corpse in this visualization.

According to Plutarch, after the assassination, Brutus stepped forward as if to say something to his fellow senators; they, however, fled the building.[18] Brutus and his companions then marched to the Capitol while crying out to their beloved city: "People of Rome, we are once again free!". They were met with silence, as the citizens of Rome had locked themselves inside their houses as soon as the rumour of what had taken place had begun to spread.

A wax statue of Caesar was erected in the forum displaying the 23 stab wounds. A crowd who had amassed there started a fire, which badly damaged the forum and neighbouring buildings. In the ensuing chaos Mark Antony, Octavian (later Augustus Caesar), and others fought a series of five civil wars, which would end in the formation of the Roman Empire.

Aftermath of the assassination

Deification of Julius Caesar as represented in a 16th century engraving.

The result unforeseen by the assassins was that Caesar's death precipitated the end of the Roman Republic.[19] The Roman middle and lower classes, with whom Caesar was popular, became enraged that a small group of aristocrats had killed Caesar, especially after Antony gave a dramatic eulogy that appealed to the common people, a reflection of public opinion following Caesar's murder. Antony, who had been drifting apart from Caesar, capitalised on the grief of the Roman mob and threatened to unleash them on the Optimates, perhaps with the intent of taking control of Rome himself. But, to his surprise and chagrin, Caesar had named his grandnephew Gaius Octavian his sole heir, bequeathing him the immensely potent Caesar name as well as making him one of the wealthiest citizens in the Republic.[20] Gaius Octavian became, for all intents and purposes, the son of the great Caesar, and consequently also inherited the loyalty of much of the Roman populace. Octavian, aged only 19 at the time of Caesar's death, proved to have considerable political skills, and while Antony dealt with Decimus Brutus in the first round of the new civil wars, Octavian consolidated his tenuous position.

File:Aug11 01.jpg
Bust of Octavian, later known to history as Emperor Augustus.

In order to combat Brutus and Cassius, who were massing an enormous army in Greece, Antony needed soldiers, the cash from Caesar's war chests, and the legitimacy that Caesar's name would provide for any action he took against them. With the passage of the lex Titia on November 27, 43 BC,[21] the Second Triumvirate was officially formed, composed of Antony, Octavian, and Caesar's loyal cavalry commander Lepidus.[22] It formally deified Caesar as Divus Iulius in 42 BC, and Caesar Octavian henceforth became Divi filius ("Son of a god").[23] Seeing that Caesar's clemency had resulted in his murder, the Second Triumvirate brought back the horror of proscription, abandoned since Sulla.[24] It engaged in the legally-sanctioned murder of a large number of its opponents in order to secure funding for its forty-five legions in the second civil war against Brutus and Cassius.[25] Antony and Octavius defeated them at Philippi.[26]

Afterward, Mark Antony married Caesar's lover, Cleopatra, intending to use the fabulously wealthy Egypt as a base to dominate Rome. A third civil war broke out between Octavian on one hand and Antony and Cleopatra on the other. This final civil war, culminating in the latter's defeat at Actium, resulted in the permanent ascendancy of Octavian, who became the first Roman emperor, under the name Caesar Augustus, a name that raised him to status of a deity.[27]

List of conspirators

Some forty people joined in the plot, but most of their names are lost to history. The known members were:

Marcus Tullius Cicero was not a member of the conspiracy and was surprised by it, but later wrote to the conspirator Trebonius that he wished he had been "...invited to that superb banquet." He believed that the Liberatores should also have killed Mark Antony.[28] The conspirators had decided, however, that the death of a single tyrant would be more symbolically effective, claiming that the intent was not a coup d'état, but tyrannicide.

References

  1. ^ Alternate title: Parens patriae
  2. ^ Suetonius, Julius 78
  3. ^ a b Plutarch, Caesar 61
  4. ^ a b Suetonius, Julius 79.2
  5. ^ Suetonius, Julius 79.3
  6. ^ Plutarch, Caesar 58.6
  7. ^ "Petition effectiveness: improving citizens' direct access to parliament" (PDF). Parliament of Western Australia. Retrieved 2008-08-28.
  8. ^ "Theatrum Pompei". Oxford University Press. Retrieved 2008-08-28.
  9. ^ a b Suetonius, Life of the Caesars, Julius trans. J C Rolfe [1]
  10. ^ Plutarch, Life of Caesar, ch. 66: "ὁ μεν πληγείς, Ῥωμαιστί· 'Μιαρώτατε Κάσκα, τί ποιεῖς;'"
  11. ^ Woolf Greg (2006), Et Tu Brute? - The Murder of Caesar and Political Assassination, 199 pages - ISBN 1-8619-7741-7
  12. ^ Suetonius, Julius, c. 82.
  13. ^ Suetonius, Julius 82.2
  14. ^ Plutarch, Caesar 66.9
  15. ^ Stone, Jon R. (2005). The Routledge Dictionary of Latin Quotations. London: Routledge. p. 250. ISBN 0415969093.
  16. ^ Morwood, James (1994). The Pocket Oxford Latin Dictionary (Latin-English). Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0198602839.
  17. ^ It appears, for example, in Richard Eedes' Latin play Caesar Interfectus of 1582 and The True Tragedie of Richarde Duke of Yorke &tc of 1595, Shakespeare's source work for other plays. Dyce, Alexander (1866). The Works of William Shakespeare. London: Chapman and Hall. pp. p 648. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  18. ^ Plutarch, Caesar, 67
  19. ^ Florus, Epitome 2.7.1
  20. ^ Suetonius, Julius 83.2
  21. ^ Osgood, Josiah (2006). Caesar's Legacy: Civil War and the Emergence of the Roman Empire. Cambridge University Press. p. 60.
  22. ^ Suetonius, Augustus 13.1; Florus, Epitome 2.6
  23. ^ Warrior, Valerie M. (2006). Roman Religion. Cambridge University Press. p. 110. ISBN 0521825113.
  24. ^ Florus, Epitome 2.6.3
  25. ^ Zoch, Paul A. (200). Ancient Rome: An Introductory History. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 217-218. ISBN 0806132876.
  26. ^ Florus, Epitome 2.7.11-14; Appian, The Civil Wars 5.3
  27. ^ Florus, Epitome 2.34.66
  28. ^ Ad Att. XIV 12
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