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Authors: Craig Smith
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the smoke of centuries. Behind it was the Capitoline, with Jupiter’s gleaming white temple pre-eminent at the top of the hill.
Caesar was propped up on one elbow in the traditional manner of the dead; the effect suggests a fellow reclining on his couch at a feast. He was wearing a senator’s toga with the broad purple stripe and holding a drinking cup. This is the Roman way of bidding our world farewell and certainly not the worst of our customs. Brave and careless, yet honouring the amenities of life, we leave the light of day.
Caesar’s co-consul, Mark Antony, delivered the funeral oration. He began his address with the usual tropes. He spoke of Caesar’s kindnesses to his friends and family. Eventually he turned to the matter of Caesar’s long and honoured service to Rome. I did not listen closely, for although Antony was a skilled speaker I soon found myself thinking about Caesar at my bedside: the touch of his hand on mine, his assurance that I was much needed.
A rumble in the crowd brought me out of my reflections. Once more I awakened to the terror of the mob. I could see nothing at first. Antony was quoting the oath that men had taken to serve Caesar: ‘…a sacred oath given freely before gods and men!’ Then he named the men who had taken that oath: Gaius Trebonius, Cassius Longinus, Junius Brutus...
He continued naming the assassins, and as he did he walked over to Caesar’s corpse. He pulled the toga away, exposing the stab wounds, more than twenty in all. ‘Look and see how these men kept their sacred promises.’ And touching the wounds, he cried again, ‘Look and weep, Romans!’
It was a call to battle, and the plebs answered with a roar.
Our captain called to us to get around Dolabella and take him up to the Capitoline, which was the closest fortification. He might as well have asked us to fly. We could not move. I could hear the plebs tearing into shops and looting goods. The Curia was soon put to fire. The old senate house was not the site of Caesar’s murder, but that fact bothered no one. The senate house was handy and had long symbolised everything the plebs hated about their overlords. Once it was ablaze, the pressure of the mob shifted.
With swords drawn we were able to evacuate along the Via Sacra up the Capitoline’s slopes and safely beyond the crush of the mob. As the road lifted us above the Forum I caught a glimpse of the melee from high ground. I could see both basilicas along the Forum’s perimeter had already been trashed and set on fire; here and there the bodies of senators and equites were already down. Those men who had been hemmed in by the crowd or were too witless to escape when they had the chance were presently pursued by gangs of plebs. It did not matter if a man belonged to the assassin’s league or Caesar’s; a purple stripe that morning was enough to mark a man as an enemy of Rome.
Looking down at the Forum from the porch of the Temple of Jupiter we watched the mob destroy everything within reach. Despite the chaos, neither Antony nor Dolabella appeared anxious to summon Lepidus. To be honest, I think the consuls rather enjoyed the fulsome slaughter.
When they had seen enough and finally sent for him, Lepidus stormed into the city with every man he had. By late afternoon, the fight was over. Next morning hundreds of corpses of men, women, and children littered the Forum and streets beyond; pleb thugs had fallen over murdered aristocracy. The corpses of children were stiff in the arms of their rigid mothers. The shops were charred from fire. And ten thousand legionaries stood at attention throughout the city, even as squads of cavalry patrolled the streets.
It was at this point that a great many of the senators decided it might be a good idea to spend a few weeks at their country villas. Those actually guilty of murdering Caesar applied to the consuls for permission to leave Italy altogether.
Rome: April, 44 BC
For the moment Mark Antony’s coalition
Caesar was propped up on one elbow in the traditional manner of the dead; the effect suggests a fellow reclining on his couch at a feast. He was wearing a senator’s toga with the broad purple stripe and holding a drinking cup. This is the Roman way of bidding our world farewell and certainly not the worst of our customs. Brave and careless, yet honouring the amenities of life, we leave the light of day.
Caesar’s co-consul, Mark Antony, delivered the funeral oration. He began his address with the usual tropes. He spoke of Caesar’s kindnesses to his friends and family. Eventually he turned to the matter of Caesar’s long and honoured service to Rome. I did not listen closely, for although Antony was a skilled speaker I soon found myself thinking about Caesar at my bedside: the touch of his hand on mine, his assurance that I was much needed.
A rumble in the crowd brought me out of my reflections. Once more I awakened to the terror of the mob. I could see nothing at first. Antony was quoting the oath that men had taken to serve Caesar: ‘…a sacred oath given freely before gods and men!’ Then he named the men who had taken that oath: Gaius Trebonius, Cassius Longinus, Junius Brutus...
He continued naming the assassins, and as he did he walked over to Caesar’s corpse. He pulled the toga away, exposing the stab wounds, more than twenty in all. ‘Look and see how these men kept their sacred promises.’ And touching the wounds, he cried again, ‘Look and weep, Romans!’
It was a call to battle, and the plebs answered with a roar.
Our captain called to us to get around Dolabella and take him up to the Capitoline, which was the closest fortification. He might as well have asked us to fly. We could not move. I could hear the plebs tearing into shops and looting goods. The Curia was soon put to fire. The old senate house was not the site of Caesar’s murder, but that fact bothered no one. The senate house was handy and had long symbolised everything the plebs hated about their overlords. Once it was ablaze, the pressure of the mob shifted.
With swords drawn we were able to evacuate along the Via Sacra up the Capitoline’s slopes and safely beyond the crush of the mob. As the road lifted us above the Forum I caught a glimpse of the melee from high ground. I could see both basilicas along the Forum’s perimeter had already been trashed and set on fire; here and there the bodies of senators and equites were already down. Those men who had been hemmed in by the crowd or were too witless to escape when they had the chance were presently pursued by gangs of plebs. It did not matter if a man belonged to the assassin’s league or Caesar’s; a purple stripe that morning was enough to mark a man as an enemy of Rome.
Looking down at the Forum from the porch of the Temple of Jupiter we watched the mob destroy everything within reach. Despite the chaos, neither Antony nor Dolabella appeared anxious to summon Lepidus. To be honest, I think the consuls rather enjoyed the fulsome slaughter.
When they had seen enough and finally sent for him, Lepidus stormed into the city with every man he had. By late afternoon, the fight was over. Next morning hundreds of corpses of men, women, and children littered the Forum and streets beyond; pleb thugs had fallen over murdered aristocracy. The corpses of children were stiff in the arms of their rigid mothers. The shops were charred from fire. And ten thousand legionaries stood at attention throughout the city, even as squads of cavalry patrolled the streets.
It was at this point that a great many of the senators decided it might be a good idea to spend a few weeks at their country villas. Those actually guilty of murdering Caesar applied to the consuls for permission to leave Italy altogether.
Rome: April, 44 BC
For the moment Mark Antony’s coalition
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