In fact, the soothsayer warned Caesar a month earlier to beware a 30-day period ending in the Ides of March, that is, the times from February 15 to March 15. It’s not quite true that a soothsayer warned Caesar to “Beware the Ides of March!” as Shakespeare says. On the morning of the Ides Caesar suddenly decided not to go to the senate meeting, probably because of rumors of conspiracy. Caesar even had Decimus at his side at a dinner party the night before his assassination. Of all the conspirators only he had Caesar’s trust. (Credit: Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)Īs a past master at ambush, Cassius might have come up with the plan to surprise Caesar in the Senate. The Death of Caesar, painted by Jean-Léon Gerome. He rewarded Decimus in other ways, but the slight still smarted. No doubt the dictator liked to dole out his favors slowly to keep his men on their toes. He wanted the distinction of a triumph or formal victory parade in Rome, but Caesar denied it, although he granted the privilege to lesser generals. Decimus’s letters suggest a man who cared more about honor than about liberty. All of this was too much for Roman traditionalists.īut ambition rather than political principle turned Decimus against Caesar. Her young son was, she claimed, Caesar’s illegitimate child. she lived in Caesar’s villa on the outskirts of Rome. He even took a queen as his mistress, Cleopatra of Egypt. Now, Caesar was Rome’s first dictator for life-a king in all but name. In practice, Rome teetered for decades on the brink of military dictatorship. In theory Rome was a constitutional republic. Many Romans feared the power that Caesar amassed. Why, then, did Decimus raise a dagger against Caesar only nine months later? After more than four years of hard fighting, Caesar returned to Rome triumphant in 45 B.C., with Decimus at his side. A grateful Caesar named Decimus acting governor of Gaul while Caesar went off to challenge his enemies elsewhere. Once again, Decimus won a victory at sea, this time on Gaul’s Mediterranean coast. It was civil war and Decimus chose Caesar. Later, his enemies in the Roman senate tried to strip Caesar of power but he fought back. (Credit: The Print Collector/Print Collector/Getty Images) Julius Caesar laying siege to Alesia, Gaul, 52 BC. Decimus won an important naval battle off Brittany and served with Caesar in the siege at Alesia (in today’s Burgundy) that sealed Rome’s victory in Gaul. In his mid-twenties Decimus joined Caesar’s forces that were fighting to add Gaul (roughly, France and Belgium) to Rome’s empire. “I waged war against the most warlike peoples, captured many strongholds and destroyed many places.” He did all that, he wrote, to impress his men, to serve the public, and to advance his reputation.ĭecimus warmed to Caesar, a great commander and a war hero to boot. “My soldiers have experienced my generosity and my courage,” Decimus wrote. Then Caesar came along and offered Decimus the chance to restore his house’s name.ĭecimus was a soldier at heart, educated but rough and ambitious, as his surviving correspondence shows. But Decimus’s father had a mediocre career and his mother dabbled in revolution. His grandfather extended Rome’s rule to the Atlantic, in Spain. He always fought for Caesar, never against him, and so he held a place in Caesar’s inner circle.ĭecimus belonged to the Roman nobility, the narrow elite that ruled both Rome and an empire of tens of millions of people. Caesar pardoned Brutus and Cassius and rewarded them with political office but he didn’t trust them. Only when he started winning the war did they defect to his cause. In fact, they opposed Caesar during his bloody rise to power in a civil war. (Credit: Fototeca Gilardi/Getty Images)ĭecimus was closer to Caesar than either Brutus or Cassius was. Brutus and other conspirators after killing Julius Caesar.
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