else, but not for Pompey’s camp. We hear of him a few weeks later in Naples, then a charming city founded by Greek colonists and called variously Parthenope or Neapolis. But, uncommitted as ever, he did not cross over to join Pompey, and eventually Caesar gave him leave to travel abroad if he wished (there is no evidence that, in the event, he took up this permission). Interestingly, the bellicose Marcellus, who as consul had precipitated the fighting, belatedly remembered into which family he had married, began to regret his bold stand, and unobtrusively slid into neutrality.
What Gaius made of these fine judgments and cautious calculations is unknown. His health was delicate and he did not have the full-blooded Roman delight in soldiering. So it may be that he was less impressed than others by Caesar’s extraordinary military adventures in Gaul. It should be borne in mind that, unless in infancy, he had never met his great-uncle, who had left Rome for his governorship when Gaius was only four years old. If their paths did cross in his earliest years, Gaius would have had at most a dim memory of his celebrated relative.
At the very least, though, the boy would have known all about the sensational doings of the head of the Julian clan: they must have been a frequent, sometimes anxious topic of conversation among his relatives.
Letters arrived in Rome from Spain. After some early setbacks when he had been cornered by flash floods, Caesar had won a brilliant campaign of maneuver with minimum bloodshed. With the western arm of Pompey’s pincers put out of action, he returned to Rome, where he was voted dictator. He made sure that at last he won the much-disputed consulship of 48 B.C. , the prize for which he had set off the conflagration.
We may guess that Philippus visited Rome with Atia and Gaius and was present at Senate meetings as one of the few ex-consuls in Italy. So at some time during these eleven action-crammed days during the late autumn of 49 B.C. , a momentous but inevitably brief encounter may have taken place between a busy fifty-one-year-old man at the height of his fame and his powers and an unknown teenager in his fifteenth year. Caesar would have had no time to make a considered judgment of Gaius, except perhaps for noting that he seemed a bright boy who had promise.
Then Caesar was off again—down to Brundisium and overseas to seek out his great rival Pompey.
Rome reverted to its default setting of worried waiting. Once again, the news seesawed. Letters traveled unpredictably back to Italy through messengers dispatched by participants, whether by the northern land route or, once spring had set in, over the dangerous seas.
In mid-August of 48 B.C. , astonishing reports reached the city. Pompey’s army had been utterly defeated in a great battle near the town of Pharsalus in central Greece. Fifteen thousand of his legionaries were dead, against only two hundred of Caesar’s. The Republic’s commander in chief had survived, but promptly disappeared, presumably making his way eastward. Caesar followed. For the moment, no one knew where either man was.
In Rome, the immediate reaction was to accept that Caesar had become the first man in the state. He was awarded unprecedented honors and powers. In the middle of September, within a few weeks of the battle, Caesar was nominated dictator for a year (the usual limit was six months), and Mark Antony was proclaimed his deputy as magister equitum, master of the horse.
It emerged that Pompey had fled to Egypt, where he hoped that the boy pharaoh, Ptolemy XIII, would give him refuge and a base from which he might be able to recruit a new army in Asia Minor and raise the resources to pay for it. The king’s advisers, feeling that it was far too dangerous to become implicated in someone else’s civil war on what looked like the losing side, and wishing to ingratiate themselves with the winner, had the defeated general killed even before he landed on
What Gaius made of these fine judgments and cautious calculations is unknown. His health was delicate and he did not have the full-blooded Roman delight in soldiering. So it may be that he was less impressed than others by Caesar’s extraordinary military adventures in Gaul. It should be borne in mind that, unless in infancy, he had never met his great-uncle, who had left Rome for his governorship when Gaius was only four years old. If their paths did cross in his earliest years, Gaius would have had at most a dim memory of his celebrated relative.
At the very least, though, the boy would have known all about the sensational doings of the head of the Julian clan: they must have been a frequent, sometimes anxious topic of conversation among his relatives.
Letters arrived in Rome from Spain. After some early setbacks when he had been cornered by flash floods, Caesar had won a brilliant campaign of maneuver with minimum bloodshed. With the western arm of Pompey’s pincers put out of action, he returned to Rome, where he was voted dictator. He made sure that at last he won the much-disputed consulship of 48 B.C. , the prize for which he had set off the conflagration.
We may guess that Philippus visited Rome with Atia and Gaius and was present at Senate meetings as one of the few ex-consuls in Italy. So at some time during these eleven action-crammed days during the late autumn of 49 B.C. , a momentous but inevitably brief encounter may have taken place between a busy fifty-one-year-old man at the height of his fame and his powers and an unknown teenager in his fifteenth year. Caesar would have had no time to make a considered judgment of Gaius, except perhaps for noting that he seemed a bright boy who had promise.
Then Caesar was off again—down to Brundisium and overseas to seek out his great rival Pompey.
Rome reverted to its default setting of worried waiting. Once again, the news seesawed. Letters traveled unpredictably back to Italy through messengers dispatched by participants, whether by the northern land route or, once spring had set in, over the dangerous seas.
In mid-August of 48 B.C. , astonishing reports reached the city. Pompey’s army had been utterly defeated in a great battle near the town of Pharsalus in central Greece. Fifteen thousand of his legionaries were dead, against only two hundred of Caesar’s. The Republic’s commander in chief had survived, but promptly disappeared, presumably making his way eastward. Caesar followed. For the moment, no one knew where either man was.
In Rome, the immediate reaction was to accept that Caesar had become the first man in the state. He was awarded unprecedented honors and powers. In the middle of September, within a few weeks of the battle, Caesar was nominated dictator for a year (the usual limit was six months), and Mark Antony was proclaimed his deputy as magister equitum, master of the horse.
It emerged that Pompey had fled to Egypt, where he hoped that the boy pharaoh, Ptolemy XIII, would give him refuge and a base from which he might be able to recruit a new army in Asia Minor and raise the resources to pay for it. The king’s advisers, feeling that it was far too dangerous to become implicated in someone else’s civil war on what looked like the losing side, and wishing to ingratiate themselves with the winner, had the defeated general killed even before he landed on
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