Ides of March
(Sic Semper Tirannis)
(Menarini - Capelli)
from the album "Roma S.P.Q.R."

Caesar: The ides of March are come. Soothsayer: Aye, Caesar, but not yet gone... William Shakespeare (1564-1616), Julius Caesar Act III, Scene I             Edward John Poyneter's (1836-1919) illustration of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar Act II, scene 2, of Calphurnia, Caesar's wife, begging him not to go to the Senate House on the Ides. (1883)

Notes

(1) Men willingly believe what they wish.

(2) The expressiom "See you at Filippi", means that, sooner or later, there will be a redde rationem, a showdown. It comes from Shakespeare's Julius Caeasar drama; these are the words, indeed, that Caesar's ghost says to Brutus in act IV. The episode comes from Plutarch(46-119) "Parallel Lives". Exaclty in Filippi, a Macedonian city, northwest of the nearby island, Thasos, in year 42 A.C., the army of Octavianus and Antony defeated the forces of Brutus and Cassius, Caesar murderers. Brutus, as preannounced by Caesar's ghost, died during the battle. Noticeably, in Shakespeare's drama, after the announcement of the ghost, Brutus just replies, quietly: "See you there, so". He lacked in loyalty, but not in courage, at least in Shakespeares's opinion.

(3)Apparently... the phrase that Caesar pronounced before crossing Rubicone river to head in direction of Rome to start the Civil War against Pompeus and, someway, to change the history of Rome and of the World, was not in latin, but in greek! Anerriphtho kybos is, indeed, a quote from the Arrhephoros ("The Bearer of Ritual Objects"), a comedy written by Menander (342/41 – c. 290 BC). Or so it says Plutarch. Moreover, Anerriphtho kybos is usually translated as Alea iacta est (The dice is cast) but it should be translated, more correctly, Jacta alea esto that means "Shall the dice be cast ". Something like: "Whatever will be, will be". I find it very suitable for the character of Caesar, a man that was never scared by the future nor hesitated for fear of dying or being defeated.

(4) Proditionem amo, sed proditorem non laudo. "I love betrayal, but I don't praise the traitor" C.J.Caesar

(5) Caesar, as most of cultured romans, liked to speak greek, so it's not surprising that even his las words - according to Svetonius chronicles - were said in this language: Kai su, teknon. In latin it would sound as: "Tu quoque brute fili mi", that means: "You too, Brutus, my son?" Brutus was, indeed, an adopted son of his, and second in line of succession, after Octavianus.

(6) I left this sentance vague, intentionally. Whose scent will miss the dying emperor? Caesar had the (probalbly deserved) fame to be a great, insatiable, lover. Coming back from their campaigns, his soldiers used to sing a barracks song in which they warned both wives and husbands to get a safe place to hide, because he was back in town. In the song, he was appealed as the "bald seducer", definition that Caesar himslef didn't like too much, but only because it mentioned his baldness. Condition that he deeply disliked and tried unsuccessfully to hide with a complicated hairdo carryover. It's important to remind that between romans in Caesar's times, bisexuality was not cosidered a "vice" nor expecially deprecated, it was, on the contrary quite "normal", moreover talking about soldiers. The chronicles don't talk too much about Caesar's love affairs mainly because, for the parameters of romans historians they were both unrelevant and, all togherher, boring.
Very different thing was the affair with Cleopatra, roman patricians were not bothered by the existence of a concubine even if she was so cumbersome to obscure the role of the official wife, but by the fact that they feared to become the servants of a foreign queen, since Caesar seemed seriously decided to nominate as universail heir Ptolomaeus Philopator Philometor Caesar, also named Caesarion (little Caesar), the very same son he had had with the Queen of Egypt (see note 7). Caesarion was his only recognized male son (he had just one other living heir, Julia (76-54BC), daughter of his second wife Cornelia(97-69BC)) and, even if he was trying to hide it, the emperor was getting old and having serious health troubles. He had seizures since his youthness, but the episodes were getting every year more frequent (modern historians have thought about a slowly growing brain tumor or about the consequences of a childhood head trauma), Cleopatra was way younger than him, Caesarion just a little child, so it was more than possible that Rome would have to face a child emperor controlled by a regent mother, moreover a stranger, queen of a conquered kingdom.
The terrible destiny of Caesarion after his father's death is a reminder of the cold cruelty of "realpolitik", the young prince disappeared from history at the young age of 17, sentenced to death by Octavianus Augustus, who had succeded his uncle (and adoptive father) Caesar and ws determined to avoid at any cost any possible dynastic claim.

(7) Caesar arrived in Egypt to stop the dynastic feud between Tolomeus (Ptolemy XIII Theos Philopator 62 BC – 13 January 47 BC) and his elder sister Cleopatra(Cleopatra VII Philopator 69 Bc-30BC). The Roman general met her in 48BC when she was just 21 y.o. and immediately felt in love with the young princess. It's famous, even if not certain, the scene of their first encounter, when she arrived half naked and wrapped in a carpet that was unrolled at the feet of Caesar. Contemporaries say that her charm was more in her personality than in her phisical aspect. This is not surprising, she had been exhiled in Rome with her father between 58 and 55BC, she was of Greek/Macedonian heritage, descending from Tolomeus I (367-282 BC), friend and general of Alexander the Great and she spoke eight languages, including Egyptian, being the first of the Tolomaic family to learn that idiom. She joined to the exhuberance and vitality of her young age, the culture of Rome and Greece and the ruthlessness and decadence of generations of pharaons. A mix to which no Roman general could resist... They left Alexandria together for a cruise on the Nile, during which Cleopatra got prgnant. Before leaving Egypt to go back to Rome, Caesar - to be sure that his son and his lover were not endangered - ordered to his soldiers to kill er brother Tolomeus simulating an accidental drowning.

Poster of the 1963 "Kolossal" Cleopatra with Liz Taylor (1932-2011), Rex Harrison (1908-1990)(Caesar) and Richard Burton (1925-1984) (Antony). Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz (1909-1993)

(8)Veni, vidi, vici. I came, I saw, I won. So Caesar wrote to his frend Amantius after the extraordinary victory reported against the army of Farnace II (97BC-47BC), king of Pontus (whose kingdom was situated more or less in modern Cappadocia). The battle was fought on the 2nd of August 47 a.C. nearby the city of Zela, now Zile, Turkey.
The whole campaign had lasted less than a week.

 

 

The Dying Gaul, also called The Dying Galatian (Italian: Galata Morente)
is an ancient Roman marble semi-recumbent statue now in the Capitoline Museums in Rome.
It is a copy of a now lost sculpture from the Hellenistic period (323-31 BC)

 

"Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres, quarum unam incolunt Belgae, aliam Aquitani, tertiam qui ipsorum lingua Celtae, nostra Galli appellantur. Hi omnes lingua institutis legibus inter se differunt. Gallos ab Aquitanis Garunna flumen, a Belgis Matrona et Sequana dividit. Horum omnium fortissimi sunt Belgae, propterea quod a cultu atque humanitate Provinciae longissime absunt minimeque ad eos mercatores saepe commeant atque ea quae ad effeminandos animos pertinent important proximique sunt Germanis qui trans Rhenum incolunt, quibuscum continenter bellum gerunt. Qua de causa Helvetii quoque reliquos Gallos virtute praecedunt, quod fere cotidianis proeliis cum Germanis contendunt, cum aut suis finibus eos prohibent aut ipsi in eorum finibus bellum. Eorum una pars, quam Gallos obtinere dictum est, initium capit a flumine Rhodano, continetur Garunna flumine Oceano finibus Belgarum, attingit etiam ab Sequanis et Helvetiis flumen Rhenum, vergit ad Septentriones. Belgae ab extremis Galliae finibus oriuntur, pertinent at inferiorem partem fluminis Rheni, spectant in Septentrionem et Orientem solem. Aquitania a Garunna flumine ad Pyrenaeos montes et eam partem Oceani quae est ad Hispaniam pertinent; spectat inter occasum solis et Septentriones. "

Commentarii de Bello Gallico (Commentaries on the Gallic War), incipit.
Caius Julius Caesar - 58–49 BC