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 Spain in 45 BC. At this point Caesar gave up all hope and turned to dictatorship.

 

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 the 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 Rome. He assumed membership in all magistracies, he was Pontifex Maximus, Augur, and served on all boards of magistrates. We are told that the senate deliberately began to offer him honors to make him odious (scenario 3). And that when the Senate came to offer him yet another honor at the Temple of Venus Genetrix, he was advised by Oppius and Balbus not to arise as they greeted him. During the Lupercalia, Feb. 15, Antony tried to offer Caesar a diadem; Caesar refused.

 

Skeptical analysis of the source tradition: JPVD Balsdon, The Ides of March, Historia 7 (1958), 91 f.

 

For Caesar’s coinage:  M. Crawford, Roman Republican Coinage.

 

Sulla took the name Felix, attributed his success to his ‘genius’ (Raubitschek article)

 

Jan. 44 bc; Caesar revised the mint. Put his own face on the coins. Caesar celebrated an ovation on Jan 23, 44, and is 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 Rome to conduct a 5 year campaign against the Parthians and had elections in advance to elect the consuls for the next 5 years. Last Senate Meeting to be held prior to his departure was the Ides of March, 44 BC

 

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 kept a Hellenistic queen outside the city who claimed that her illegitimate son, Caesarion, was his. Dictator for Life was his solution.

 

He was murdered 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)

 

Career of D. Iunius Brutus: D. Iunius Brutus Albinus, Pref. of the Fleet 56 (for Caesar vs. Veneti); prefect 52 (with Caesar in Gaul); legate 49 (commanded navy vs. Massalia for Caesar) and proconsul of Gallia Transalpinus 48-46; Pr. 46, Procos. Cisalpine Gaul 44-43, Cos. Designatus 42 BC

 

His heir and successor: Octavian: C. Julius C.f. Caesar Octavianus; Imp. Julius Divi.f. Caesar; Caesar August, Princeps; Octavian became the first Roman emperor

 

Ancient sources: Suetonius Life of Augustus; Tacitus Annals; Velleius Paterculus; Cassius Dio, Histories; Appian, Histories of the Wars, Nicholas of Damascus, Livy

 

R. Syme, The Roman Revolution (Oxford, 1939)

 

C. Julius C.f. C.n. Caesar Octavianus => Octavian => Augustus (27 BC - 14 AD)

 

Nov. 43 BC, M. Antony, Octavian, and M. Aemilius Lepidus were elected Tresviri rei publicae constituendae (5 years), embarked on proscriptions

 

Octavian’s nomenclature changed:

IMPERATOR JULIUS DIVI FILIUS CAESAR

 

His enemies’ opinion of him:

Peto Octavia(e) Culum (CIL 12.6721.13)

 

His general: M. Vipsanius Agrippa

 

BATTLE OF ACTIUM 31 BC, DEFEAT OF ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA

 

Power sharing relationship 27 BC -14 AD

 

Accepts title, ‘Augustus’ and Princeps first citizen of Rome

 

ten year grants of proconsular imperium; 5 year grants of tribunician power, sacrosanctitas

 

PRINCIPATE (princeps – first citizen of Rome)

 

JULIO-CLAUDIAN DYNASTY 27 BC - 79 AD

 

AUGUSTUS = LIVIA

TIBERIUS = Vipsania, Julia

CALIGULA

CLAUDIUS = Drusilla, Agrippina the Younger

NERO

 

Robert Graves, I, Claudius

 

27 BC- 14 AD - pax romana - 200 years of peace and prosperity throughout the Roman Mediterranean world