What Kind of Family Was Julius Caesar Born Into

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Vincenzo Camuccini'due south depiction of the death of Julius Caesar / Getty Images, Creative Eatables

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Caesar fabricated politics and power his life's ambition.

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By Dr. Sarah Midford (left) and Dr. Rhiannon Evans (right)
Midford: Lecturer, School of Humanities
Evans: Senior Lecturer, Aboriginal Mediterranean Studies
La Trobe University

Posterity volition be staggered to hear and read of the armed services commands you have held and the provinces you accept ruled … battles without number, fabulous victories, monuments and shows and triumphs.

Cicero, Pro Marcello 28

Introduction

The Tusculum portrait, mayhap the merely surviving sculpture of Caesar made during his lifetime. / Photograph past   Ángel Chiliad. Felicísimo, Archaeological Museum, Turin, Italy, Wikimedia Commons

Gaius Julius Caesar was built-in on the twelfth Quintilis 100 BCE (Before the Common Era). After his death, that month was named 'July' in his accolade and the Rome into which he was built-in was transformed forever. During his lifetime, Julius Caesar changed his world. When he was born, Rome was ruled by a senate composed of the patrician elite.[ane] Past the time he died, Rome was ruled by Caesar and he had started a chain reaction that led to the demise of the Roman Republic and the instigation of imperial rulership.

Throughout his life, Caesar did non simply seize opportunities that presented themselves; he also created his own opportunities and forged his own path to power and celebrity. Caesar was an intelligent, aggressive and charismatic man. He was clever enough to ensure he was popular with the people and fortunate enough to be born a member of the Roman elite. This winning combination allowed him to craft a position for himself that inverse his world and the earth effectually him, and established an enduring legacy which lasted for millennia.

In the years after his decease, Caesar's smashing-nephew (and afterwards adopted son) Octavian ensured that his uncle'southward name would live forever by quashing the terminal of Caesar's opponents to become the kickoff emperor of Rome. In 27 BCE, Octavian was alleged princeps and used his adoptive father's name as a title to get Imperator Caesar Divi Filius Augustus (Emperor Augustus, son of the divine Caesar). Every subsequent emperor of Rome followed his pb and took the name Caesar, whether or not they were his descendant.

Even after the Roman Empire fell, Caesar'southward name lived on in the titles of new rulers spread throughout Europe, the Middle East, Africa and the Asian continent. Whether pronounced Kaiser, Qaysar or Tsar, Caesar's proper noun has endured for more than than 2 thousand years, and
with it his legacy of ability and conquest live on.

In order to become the human being we remember today, Caesar spent 8 years exploring the outer limits of the known earth and conquering Gaul.

The extent of the Roman Republic in 40 BC after Caesar's conquests / Prototype by Tataryn77, Wikimedia Commons

Because Caesar visited numerous lands in his travels, conquering many of them, his journey is part of the history of many modern European nations, including the Britain, France, Kingdom of belgium and Germany. To ensure that people long afterwards his death would go on to admire his achievements, Caesar recorded his journeys and conquests in his Gallic War.[2]

The Gallic War provides a record of Caesar'southward conquests for his contemporary Romans and their descendants. This text testifies to Caesar's great military prowess and also provides the earth's first written document about the Gauls, Germani and Britanni. Caesar documented the complex interactions between these peoples and the ethnographic differences he perceived between the Roman people and those who lived on the border of, and beyond, Rome'due south borders. The text as well provides us with an insight into the author himself. The structure and content of The Gallic State of war reveal Caesar'south interests and priorities and are a record of exactly what the commander wanted preserved for posterity.

The Gallic War is non the just record of Caesar'southward conquests in Gaul. Written accounts of Caesar's triumphal processions to celebrate his victories provide important information near the fashion Caesar wanted his conquests to exist remembered. Although nosotros know many details about Caesar'south triumphal processions, existing records are inconsistent and incomplete. Hence, nosotros have filled cognition gaps about Caesar's triumphs with information from triumphal processions celebrated earlier in the republican menstruum. These two knowledge sources let us construct a rich and detailed representation of his triumph.

Both Caesar's written and processional accounts of his successful campaigning in Gaul were designed to promote the prowess of the armed services commander and lend him enough popular favour to win political office. Central to this book are Caesar's own account of Gaul and the Gauls, equally well as the way Gaul was 'displayed' in the backwash of his campaigns. The themes of people, mapping and boundaries run throughout and highlight the significant aspects of conquest for the Roman people.

Early on Life

Unfortunately we know almost null of Caesar's early on life. History has preserved two biographies, one by Suetonius and the other by Plutarch, just both of these are missing the first few chapters and start with Caesar's early adult life. We practice know that Caesar was built-in into the patrician Julian clan (the gens Iulia) and that his aunt Julia was married to the extremely successful armed forces commander Gaius Marius. We also know that Caesar grew up in the poor district of Subura located very shut to the Roman forum, which was the abode of prostitutes, foreigners, poor labourers and tradesmen. Throughout his life, Caesar used this humble home and his relationships with the ordinary Roman people who lived as his neighbours to increase his popularity. The gens Iulia claimed beginnings from Venus through the Trojan prince Aeneas' son Iulus (also known equally Ascanius). It is interesting to note that, despite their pedigree, Caesar's family were not politically inclined. This, of form, changed when Caesar made politics and ability his life'south ambition.

Wedlock and Politics

Portrait of a flamen. Marble, ca 250-260 CE / Louvre Museum, Wikimedia Eatables

In 85 BCE, Caesar'southward father died and Caesar became paterfamilias at sixteen years of age. A year subsequently, Caesar entered political life equally the Flamen Dialis (the High Priest of Jupiter). In the same year he married his first wife, Cornelia, daughter of the Marian supporter Lucius Cornelius Cinna. He remained married to Cornelia for sixteen years until she died in child-nascence in 69 BCE. Cornelia was the mother of Caesar's daughter and only surviving legitimate kid, Julia Caesaris, born in 76 BCE. Julia later married Caesar's then political ally, and later political enemy, Pompey the Dandy, earlier dying in childbirth in 54 BCE (while Pompey and Caesar were still allied).

Caesar's wedlock to Cornelia cemented his ties to the Marian faction, which was at war with
Cornelius Sulla in the late 80s BCE. After defeating Marius, Sulla marched on Rome and installed himself as dictator, a political manoeuvre that Caesar later emulated. Sulla wanted to restore the Roman republic after a menstruum of elite contest had dismantled many of its checks and balances.

Caesar's political alignment forced him into exile during Sulla'southward dictatorship, but his allies in Rome petitioned for Caesar's pardon. Sulla eventually conceded to these pleas just warned his supporters of the appetite he recognised in the young Caesar, asking them to remember their efforts to save this human when he obliterated the aristocracy that they had worked and then hard to preserve, for 'they were stupid if they could not run into that this boy contained many Mariuses' (Plutarch, Life of Caesar, 1.4). Caesar fulfilled Sulla's prophecy when he became Rome's perpetual dictator in 44 BCE, and the Roman Senate was forever relegated to the 2d almost powerful institution in Rome.

Caesar married twice more than. In 68 BCE, he married Pompeia, the daughter of Quintus Pompeius Rufus and Cornelia (Sulla's daughter). The wedlock ended in divorce when Pompeia was caught up in a scandal at the Bona Dea festival in 62 BCE. This women-simply festival was gate-crashed by Publius Clodius Pulcher (dressed in women's clothing), who attempted to seduce Pompeia. Whether or not Clodius was successful, Caesar divorced Pompeia under the premise that the wife of Caesar could never be under suspicion. In 59 BCE, Caesar married for the third and last time. Calpurnia, the girl of Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus, outlived Caesar and did not remarry later on his death. Neither Pompeia nor Calpurnia bore a child to Caesar.

Climbing the Political Ladder

The Roman cursus honorum, drawn past Muriel Gottrop / Wikimedia Commons

In his early political career, Caesar followed a adequately traditional career path. After serving in the military, he progressed up Rome's political ladder, the cursus honorum.

He was elected quaestor in 69 BCE and aedile in 65 BCE, the earliest he could legally concord either position. In 63 BCE, Caesar was elected Pontifex Maximus (Chief Priest). This honour was commonly awarded to someone much older and farther up the political ladder than Caesar,
and the position gave him keen symbolic authority. In 62 BCE, Caesar was elected praetor,
and the following year he was awarded command of his first army and the governorship of
Further Kingdom of spain.

Upon his render to Rome, Caesar formed the Showtime Triumvirate with Pompey the Great and Marcus Licinius Crassus. The triumvirate was an unofficial political alliance between the three near powerful men in Rome at the fourth dimension. Its existence was unconstitutional, and it was kept underground for many years as the 3 men manipulated Roman politics to suit their personal agendas. One perk of the Triumvirate was Caesar's ballot to the consulship in 59 BCE.

Later on his first consulship, Caesar was given command of his second army and the provincial governorship of Cisalpine Gaul, Illyricum and Transalpine Gaul. Suetonius tells us that the Senate awarded Caesar only Cisalpine Gaul and Illyricum, merely that the pressure of the common
people forced them to add Transalpine Gaul every bit well (Suetonius, Deified Julius Caesar, 22.1). These provinces came with four legions, and it was with these men that Caesar spent the next eight years conquering Gaul and exploring the outer limits of the known globe.

Notes

1. Traditionally, and until the early on get-go century, the Senate was a body of around 300 men. During Sulla's dictatorship, the numbers were increased to between 500 and 600 and included 300 previously equites (Appian, Civil Wars, 1.11.100; Cicero, Letters to Atticus, 1.fourteen.5). In 45 BCE, the Senate had 900 members later Caesar rewarded his supporters with admission (Cassius Dio, 43.47.2; Suetonius, Deified Julius Caesar, 41.1).

2. The Gallic State of war is divided into viii books (1 per year, with Book 8 roofing two years); each book is farther subdivided into brusk capacity, and each chapter into curt subchapters, usually a sentence or ii long. As a result, Latin scholars tin can be very precise virtually which sentence they mean! So The Gallic War 1.ane.1–ii refers to The Gallic War Volume 1, Affiliate 1, sentences one and 2. Notation that a lot of translations give only book and chapter number; in hard copy editions, this is usually at the top of the folio.

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Originally published past La Trobe University under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives iv.0 International license.

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