Caesar NOTES
SOURCES FOR CAESAR STUDIES
Sallust, War with Jugurtha,
War with Catiline; Histories (70s)
Caesar, Gallic Wars, Civil Wars
Diodorus of
Suetonius, Caesar the God, Lives of 12 emperors
Appian (100 AD), History of Roman Wars, Civil Wars
Cassius Dio (230 AD),
Universal History of
Plutarch's Lives - Gracchi, Marius Sulla,
Sertorius,
Pompey, Crassus, Caesar,
Livian epitomators -
Fragments of Livy;
Perioichae; Florus,
Justin, Eutropius, Orosius
Valerius Maximus,
Illustrious Lives
Oros. Flor. Eut. Velleius Paterculus (Vell. Pat.)
C. Julius C. f. C. n.
Caesar, Aunt Julia = C. Marius
daughter named Julia who becomes wife of Cn.
Pompey
Servilia, mother of M. Brutus.
70 BC triangular
struggle between Pompey, M. Licinius Crassus, and the
Senate
EVENTS OF THE 60S BC
Lex Gabinia, 67
BC, gave Pompey extraordinary command over the pirates. Maius imperium.
Lex Manilia, 66
BC, Pompey received the Mithradatic Command,
replacing L. Lucullus, conquered the East, reorganized territories. Returned to
Optimates/populares
Julius Caesar (quaestor 69-68 BC in
Catilinarian Conspiracy, 63 BC, M. Tullius Cicero Consul; C. Antonius Hybrida
L. Sergius Catalina pr. 68 BC,
sought cos. 66 for 65; sought cos. Again in 64 for 63
Bona Dea Scandal 62 BC; P. Clodius was having an affair with Caesar’s wife Pompeia; Pontifices; P. Clodius indicted
for sacrilege; Cicero = Terentia; Clodius’ sister Clodia; Catullus was her lover
Caesar elected Praetor in 62, assigned province of
Spain, couldn’t leave town because of his debts, Crassus paid all his debts so
he could leave.
62 BC, Pompey returned in triumph; legislative agenda
failed through 60 BC, Afranius, Petreius
Caesar earned a triumph for his campaigns in Spain in
61, requested the consulship in absentia, forced to return to Rome to seek
office 60 BC, elected consul for 59 with help of Pompey and Crassus, forged
“First Triumvirate”
64 Caesar elected Pontifex Maximus
praetor in 62, held command in
Imperator -- triumphing
Roman general
M. Porcius Cato the Younger,
Optimates, party of good government, blocked Caesar’s
bid to seek consulship in absentia. He also blocked legislation to obtain land
and bounties for Pompey’s veterans, and blocked remission of tax revenues
requested by Asian tax collectors supported by Crassus. Cato’s
attempt to restore power to the oligarchy.
maius imperium
M. Tullius
Cicero, cos. 63 BC
Pompey needed land for
his veterans
L. Sergius
Cataline,
Sallust, The Catininarian Conspiracy
M. Porcius
Cato the Younger, quaestor 63.
C. Julius Caesar, cos.
59 BC, L. Calpurnius Bibulus
Q. Lucceius;
Caesar was first; M. Calpurnius Bibulus
second;
First Triumvirate,
59 BC, three men combine their influence to seize power at Rome
Caesar’s legislation of 59 BC:
1. Agrarian bill for veterans and urban poor. In
2. Pompey’s acts in the East were ratified
3. Asian tax contract remissions for Crassus and the
publicans
How to preserve power –
Caesar
obtains a 5 year grant of imperium in Cisalpine Gaul;
with an option to extend the command to
Transalpine Gaul or Illyria
2. Pompey
married Caesar's daughter Julia; Caesar married Calpurnia,
whose father became consul in 58 BC; P. Gabinius, P. Clodius, tr. pl. 58;
1.
offices for the following year: P. Gabinius
elected consul for 58; P. Clodius elected tr. Pl. in
58; Cicero sent into exile; Cato gets assigned duty of selling off the royal
estate of the Ptolemies in Cyprus; Clodius then turned on Pompey. Pompey recruits a friend of
Cicero named T, Anneius Milo to organize an anti_Clodian gang
Caesar's 5-year grant of
imperium in Gaul – extraordinary command; 5 year
command in Cisalpine Gaul, with an option to extend the command to Transalpine
Gaul or Illyria
Catullus - Mamurra mentula; Clodia/Lesbia
Vercingetorix Averni
Q. Labienus
Renewal of the
Triumvirate in 56 BC
Pompey and Crassus became
consuls in 55 BC; Caesar received 5 more years in
L. Domitius
Ahenobarbus; Lucca in 56 BC, Triumvirate renewed;
Caesar received a renewal of 5 years of imperium;
Pompey received the command of the 2 provinces of Spain; Crassus would receive
the province of Syria to wage war against the Parthians;
Pompey and Crassus to be elected consuls; interregnum; Pompey and Crassus
elected coss for 55 BC; Julia, 54 BC; Crassus was
killed at Carrhae in 53; murder of P. Clodius by Milo in 52 BC; elected Pompey sole consul to
suppress the urban violence
56 BC triumvirate met at
59 BC proconsul of
L. Domitius
Ahenobarbus (cos. 54) ;
54 Julia died; 53
Crassus killed at the battle of Carrhae;
Cato and his faction were
able to come to an understanding with Pompey
P. Clodius
killed in 52 BC; Pompey becomes sole consul; Q. Metellus
Scipio Nasica; Caesar becomes identified by all as
the threat.
51 BC law of the 10
tribunes, granting Caesar the right to run for the consulship in absentia
50 Claudius Marcellus
and L. Aemilius Paullus
cons 50 BC; C. Scribonius Curio tr., M. Antony tr.
49; SC passed asking the magistrates
Civil War 49-46 BC:
Pompey and Caesar, Clementia, pauci
potentes
L. Domitius Ahenobarbus;
Clementia; pauci potentes
Magister equitum
Caesarion
5 triumphs:
10 grant of dictatorship to restore the republic
CAESAR’S DICTATORSHIP
Scenario 1: Caesar planned to seize absolute power
from the beginning but hid his true intentions until he was certain he had
control (promise to restore republic was a ruse)
Scenario 2: Caesar tried to work with the aristocracy until
the Pompey brothers mounted rebellion in
Scenario 3: Caesar was manipulated by subordinates and
misled by the adulation of the Roman people and allowed himself to be pushed
into absolute power. We have no idea of his true intentions.
Eulogies to Cato; Caesar wrote Anti-Cato, as an
indication of his anger at this time; his rebuking of the two tribunes who
refused to stand during his parade
Imperator for life, tribunician
potestas for life; right to put his statues on the
rostrum, the right to put his statues in all the temples, the right to wear
triumphal garb and a laurel wreath; the right to have his statue led in the epulones of the gods; a cult was created to his ‘genius’;
M. Antony was its flamen; Caesar received honor, Pater patriae (father of his country) Caesar constructed a new
forum, the Forum Julia with the Temple of Venus Genetrix
at its center and with a statue of Caesar beside Venus inside. He invited Cleopatra
and Caesarion to reside at his villa outside
M. Crawford, Roman Republican Coinage.
Sulla took the name Felix
Jan. 44 bc;
Caesar revised the mint. Put his own face on the
coins. Caesar celebrated an ovation on Jan 23, 44, and was recorded as Dict. For the 4th time; consul for the 5th time.
By Feb. 15 he referred to himself as Dictator in Perpetuo
He announced that he would leave
Caesar avoided the term, REX, but he was dressed as
Jupiter, called Imperator, had a cult by his name, statues of himself with all
the gods, and a Hellenistic queen outside the city who claimed that her
illegitimate son, Caesarion, was his. Dictator for
Life was his solution.
He was murdered, fittingly, below the statue of Pompey
at the Senate meeting at Pompey’s Temple to Venus in the Campus Martius; he was assassinated by 67 senators, including
Brutus, Cassius, Dec. Iunius Brutus Albinus (cos.
Designate 42 BC)
JPVD BALSDON, The Ides of
March, Historia
7 (1958), 91 f.