Memories of Caesar

By J.L. Starr

Sunday, July 13th, is the birthday of Gaius Julius Caesar. As our BL RAG readers already know, the month of July was named in his honor. [note: since some believe his birthday fell on the 12th, we'll run this one day early.]

And who was Caesar? He was a decorated soldier, a brilliant general; a scholar, legal advocate, and statesman; priest and husband; father of Julia Caesaris, and father-in-law to the much older Pompey the Great; renowned writer and orator; conqueror of Gaul; Pontifex Maximus; consul and later dictator of Rome for life; companion for a time of the Egyptian Pharaoh Cleopatra VII Philopater (who bore him a son, Ptolemy XV Philopator Philometor Caesar [Caesarion]); he was also the father of our modern day calendar¹.

Most people know of his later years, his military conquests, and his place in the fall of the Roman Republic. This piece delves a bit into Caesar's earlier years.

Gaius Julius was born two days before the Ides of Quinctilis in or around the year 654 A.U.C.² to Gaius Julius Caesar and Aurelia Cotta. The Julia gens, or clan, of which newborn Gaius was a member by direct familial lines, claimed to be the heirs of Iulus, son of Aeneas from Troy, who was descended from the goddess Venus. Aeneas was also said to be an ancestor of Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome.  After the fall of Troy, Aeneas' son founded the city of Alba Longa, which lies southeast of Rome, and Aeneas served as its first king. 

With such ancestry, the Julia was considered one of the oldest and noblest patrician families in Rome: a family with the blood of kings running through its veins. This ancestral trait was to cause Caesar many problems later in his political life--his detractors often accused him of seeking to become the King of Rome, an anathema to Romans of all classes.

His cognomen, Caesar, was most likely not due to a caesarian section, as his mother survived his birth, and lived many years afterward--she raised Caesar's daughter after the death of his first wife. Apparently one of his ancestors, however, did come into the world this way. The term Caesar also indicates a healthy head of hair and some believe Caesar favored this definition; he was known in later years to comb his hair forward to hide his receding hairline.

Julius Caesar was a contemporary of Gaius Marius (his uncle by marriage), Lucius Cornelius Sulla, Marcus Tullius Cicero, Publius Claudius Pulcher (Clodius), Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (Pompey the Great), and Caesar's despicable and implacable foes, Marcus Porcius Cato (the Younger) and Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus.

Young Caesar was at one time the Flamen Dialis, a priest of Jupiter, who by the dictates of the office was forbidden to leave the city for more than one day, look upon a standing army, touch iron, or view a corpse-- all contrary duties for a man who was destined to be a general as great as (or greater than) the immortalized Alexander III of Macedon.

As another requirement of this priesthood, Caesar was ordered to marry another patrician, Cornelia Cinna Minor, and unlike a typical Roman marriage, he was to marry Cornelia in confarreatio (for life). Cornelia later bore him a daughter, Julia, who would one day become the wife of Gnaeus Pompey, sealing an alliance between Caesar, Pompey, and Marcus Licinius Crassus (the first Triumvirate).

Without this marriage to Cornelia, Caesar might not have had the opportunity to pursue what was later to prove a glorious military career, as Lucius Cornelius Cinna, Cornelia's father, had been proscribed by Sulla, which in effect caused Cinna's daughter to be stripped of her patrician status.  As the wife of the Flamen Dialis must be a patrician, Caesar was ordered to divorce her³, but he refused, which put his own legal status as a high priest in jeopardy as well as putting his life into danger. Because of this refusal, and due to his relationship to Marius and Cinna, Caesar was removed as Flamen Dialis, proscribed, and stripped of his inheritance (although later Sulla lifted this proscription after Caesar's mother and the Vestal Virgins pleaded his case).

Freed of his Flaminate burdens, and seemingly pardoned by Sulla, Caesar joined the military, and won the Civic Crown (one of the legions' highest awards) in the siege of Mytilene. This military honor, by an earlier Sullan decree, allowed Caesar automatic membership in the Senate. His accomplishment was soured somewhat by a rumor that arose in the same time frame, however. It was during this period of military service that stories of a homosexual liaison with Nicomedes IV, the king of Bithynia, surfaced. This rumor was used to some effect later on by his enemies ("...he's a man for every woman; and a woman for every man..."). 

After his first campaign as a soldier, and after the death of Sulla, Caesar returned to Rome and took up a legal career as an advocate, where he prosecuted Gaius Antonius Hybrida for plundering Greece as a legate under Sulla, and for allegedly torturing members of the local populace. Despite losing the case on Hybrida's appeal to the tribune of the Plebs, Caesar garnered praise for his oratory from none other than the master, Marcus Tullius Cicero. To perfect his rhetoric, Caesar traveled to Rhodes to study under Cicero's previous teacher, Appolonius Molon.

It was during this period as a private citizen that Caesar was captured by Cicilian pirates and ransomed. He demanded that the pirates double his ransom (which they did) and joked that he would crucify every one of the kidnappers upon his release. After his ransom was paid, Caesar did just that: he raised a fleet and hunted the pirates down, crucifying them in Pergamon, against the wishes of the Roman governor.

As stated earlier, Caesar had been stripped of his inheritance by Sulla and was (until his time in Gaul) perpetually in debt. That did not stop him from moving up the ladder politically, but it threaten him with financial ruin throughout his early career. He compounded his monetary woes further as an aedile by borrowing heavily to finance public works and spectacular games. 

At the death of the Pontifex Maximus, Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius, Caesar ran for the post and won, which allowed him to move to a much better residence called the Domus Publica near the Forum (Caesar until that time lived in Suburba, where citizens of the lowest classes resided).  One of his duties as Pontifex required that he periodically adjust the calendar to keep the seasons aligned. Later in life he used this authority to great effect when he introduced what we now know today as the Julian calendar. 

Despite his growing political fame, Caesar nevertheless remained deeply in debt. He managed to evade his creditors (and the accompanying prosecutions) long enough to draw a lot to govern Hispania Ulterior (Spain and Portugal) where he might make his fortune and repay his creditors; but it was only through the financial intervention of Marcus Crassus that Caesar was permitted leave Rome unprosecuted, allowing him to embark upon the next phase of his storied career.

***

And at this juncture it is time to call a halt. A few bits and pieces have been recollected and shared here to pay simple honors to a great man's life. Happy Birthday, Gaius Julius Caesar.

¹The Gregorian calendar in use today is derived from the Julian calendar.

²Dates are approximate. A.U.C is the ab urba condita (roughly translated as 'from the founding of the City' [i.e. Rome]). The year 654 A.U.C. would roughly coincide with what we refer to as the year 100 BC.

³Despite the marriage being confarreatio, divorce was in this case considered legal, although the consequences of it would be highly unfavorable to the former wife.

This is intended specifically for entertainment purposes and as a tribute to a man who is arguably the West's greatest general.

Notes on sources: Other than the spellings, most of this is from memory of readings from Livy, Sallust, Suetonius, Cicero, and Appian, among others. To avoid complete embarrassment and refutation I did go back and spot check enough to feel confident that the piece closely follows the ancient sources. Comments are open, however. Feel free to point out any disparities or errors. JLS  

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