Julius Caesar is probably the most famous Roman of all.
Julius Caesar is probably the most famous Roman of all.
He was born in July 100BC into an aristocratic family fallen on hard times. From his earliest years he was determined to succeed in the murky world of Roman politics.
Caesar spent the first 20 years of his adult life in a series of minor political and military posts. Then, in 61 BC, he was made Roman governor of Spain.
On his return to Rome a year later he formed an alliance with Rome’s two leading men, the general Pompey and the rich businessman Marcus Crassus.
The three pledged to help each other’s careers. The link was further strengthened when Pompey married Julia, Caesar’s only child.
In 59BC Caesar was elected to be one of the two annual consuls, the magistrates who effectively ran the Roman republic.
But the bully-boy tactics used by Caesar’s supporters during the elections caused uproar.
There were calls for his prosecution, but Pompey and Crassus used their influence to get Caesar appointed governor of Gaul.
At that time, the Roman province of Gaul covered only a small part of southern France.
But during the next eight years Caesar launched a series of relentless military campaigns that brought the whole of France, Belgium, Holland and parts of Germany under Roman control.
In 55 and 54BC he launched expeditions to Britain. These missions were not serious attempts at invasion (the invasion proper would come in 43AD) and on both occasions he returned to Gaul after only a few weeks.
The military conquests won Caesar fame and a vast fortune in loot.
After Crassus was killed on a military expedition in 53BC relations became increasingly strained between Pompey and Caesar.
To make matters worse, the senators in Rome backed Pompey in a bid to get rid of Caesar once and for all.
In 49BC the Senate told Caesar to quit his army in Gaul and return to Rome.
Caesar realised he faced arrest if he obeyed, so he led his army into Italy — starting a civil war.
Pompey was ill-prepared for it and had to flee Italy with his supporters.
Caesar pursued them to Greece, where he defeated Pompey in battle. Pompey fled to Egypt, only to be murdered by aides of King Ptolemy XIII.
Caesar arrived soon afterwards and met the king’s sister Cleopatra.
The two became lovers and Cleopatra had a son, Caesarion, by Caesar. He appointed her joint ruler of Egypt.
Caesar was appointed dictator of Rome by the Senate in 47BC, with Mark Antony as his deputy.
He mopped up the last of his opponents in Africa and Spain before returning to Rome in 45BC as sole ruler of a huge empire.
But his enemies, a group of 60 senators led by Cassius and Brutus, were not yet vanquished.
On March 15, 44BC — known as the Ides of March — they struck.
Caesar was stabbed 23 times as he arrived for a meeting of the senate and fell dying beneath a statue of Pompey.
