Maximum extent of the Roman empire, ca. 14 AD.
Caesar
“Veni, vidi, vici”
(”I came, I saw, I conquered”)
Born of an obscure aristocratic family fallen out of favor, Caesar_s rise to dominance was swift. He spent his youth in minor public offices, but by 59 BC, he had been made consul and governor of Illycrium and Gaul. He joined forces with Crassus and Pompey and formed the first triumvirate.
In the Roman Pepublic, the road to power was paved with military conquest, and he lost no time. In a series of fairly brilliant campaigns, Julius added a considerable amount of territory to the Roman Empire in northern France, Belgium, and even southern Great Britain, subjugating the Celts in all these territories. But during his period of conquest, the Triumvirate dissolved. After the death of Crassus in 53 BC, Pompey was appointed sole consul. In 49 BC, The Senate declared Julius an enemy of the state and demanded that he hand over his generalship and province. Caesar, however, saw a different destiny in the stars.
In 49 BC, Caesar ordered his troops across the Rubicon River, which separated his province from Italy. This open act of aggression both initiated the start of the Roman Civil War and planted the seeds of the greatest empire of the western world.
Pompey fled from Rome and within three months, Caesar ruled of all Italy. In 48 BC, Caesar defeated Pompey at Pharsalus in Greece. Shortly thereafter Pompey was assassinated by the Egyptians among whom he had sought refuge. Caesar then turned his forces towards Asia Minor in a conquest that was so swift that Caesar described it in three words: “Veni, vidi, vici” (”I came, I saw, I conquered”).
Caesar returned to Rome and was appointed dictator. Caesar’s absolute power, imperium for life (which made him imperator, or Emperor, of Rome), was resented by aristocratic Romans, proud of their Republican tradition. In 44 BC, on the Ides of March (March 15), a group of conspirators, led by Gaius Cassius Longinus and Marcus Junius Brutus, assassinated Caesar as he entered the Senate in his usual manner: with no bodyguards or protection. He was stabbed 23 times. After his death, a great comet passed through the skies over Rome. The Romans were deeply superstitious. Even those who had opposed and murdered him were troubled by the response from the heavens which, “blazed forth the death of princes.”
The conspirators felt that they were striking a blow for the Republic, fully confident that the Republic would magically reconstitute itself. Their dreams, however, disappeared in a brutal civil war that would last for thirteen years. At the end of the war, the Roman Republic would come to a shattering end and never again appear on the stage of history, replaced by the imperial Roman Empire.
