Julius Caesar and Caesars Revenge - Research Paper Example

Teacher Julius Caesar Julius Caesar is perhaps one of the most well known figures in ancient history. His legacy still lives on today, and he has been the subject of countless courses in military history, theatrical drama, and the recounting of historical living and culture. Born 100 years before Christ, Casear lived much of his 56 years of life focused on turning the Roman Republic into the powerful Empire that we remember and know of today. Julius Caesar is believed to be a direct descendent of the Trojan Princ Aeneas. Given the auspicious nature of his birth, historians remark that he truly ushered in a new era in Roman history. This is born out by the tremendous gains that Roman civilization made during his reign, even though much of it came on the heels of a dictatorial style of leadership (Barret, p. 608). This paper will demonstrate the historical relevancy of Julius Caesar, his accomplishments, and the lessons to be learned from ancient civilization and culture. Even from an early age, Caesar was extreme popular within Rome. In addition, he developed a political acumen that would serve him well for his entire career, and garner the support he needed to push Rome into a new era of modernity for the time. One of his primary contributions to the growth of the Roman Empire rests in his ability to expand the regions that Rome had influence over, in addition to establishing more of an imperial type of system. These concepts would serve as the model for territorial expansion throughout much of the world for much of the next millennium. It is important to note that Caesar was not always a person of privilege. While he was born into a family of aristocrats from Rome, history tells us that his family was of relatively minimal means. The father of Julius Caesar actually died when Caesar was only 16 years old, and he remained very close to his mother. As a result of his relatively poor upbringing, however, Cesar spent much of his youth in unstable surroundings. He would remark later in life that even Rome contributed his own sense of instability, as the country was truly is a relative state of constant disorder, even though it was already of enormous stature within the region. Roman had begun to discredit their own nobility, and they were not focused enough on territorial expansion to truly be able to deal with it enormous size and influence throughout the ancient world. In essence, this reveals a truth that we realize even today. The larger a country grows, the more organization and focus is required to drive future growth and maintain stability within society. As Caesar was grown up, however, neither of these concepts were in place throughout Roman society, which likely contributed to his desire to enter politics in the first place. By the time his father had died, Julius Caesar had already made a concerted decision to align himself with the nobility of Rome, even though popular opinion at the time was against this decision. He ended up marrying Cornelia, who was daughter of a nobleman. This ended up causing the Sulla, the current dictator in Rome, to become quite angry with Caesar to the point of ordering him to get a divorce or suffer the potential consequence of losing all of his property. Perhaps showing his own personal resolve, even at an early age, Caesar refused to heed to warning and directive issued by Sulla. In doing so, he ascribed himself to the Roman military, going first to the ancient area of Asia, and then eventually settling in Cilicia. Caesar remained sired away in the military until Sulla eventually died. One that even happened, Julius Caesar went back to Rome and immediately began his career in politics. His first role was that of a prosecuting advocate. It bears mentioning that even at this time, the Roman judicial system was morphing itself into a system that encompassed many of the virtues of justice that Western society today has incorporated into its own judicial system. Early in his career, he developed a hunger to pursue more study in the area of philosophy, so he relocated to Rhodes temporarily. While he was traveling through the region, however, he was kidnapped by pirates. Even this unfortunate event, however, illustrates how Julius Caesar may have been destined to be the leader that would eventually lead a revitalized Roman empire. While in captivity, Caesar actually tricked his captors into raising the level of the ransom they were demanding for his release. Subsequent to this, he then worked to organize the navy in the region to actually attack, capture, and execute the pirates (Kermode, p. 167). This illustrates his skills in negotiation, which would go down as one of his greatest attributes. It was, perhaps, the earliest signs of diplomacy that would serve as a model for other regional empires to gradually expand their territory through a combination of both negotiation and military prowess. Upon his release, Caesar began to gradually become emboldened in his actions to extend his political reach throughout the Roman Empire. This is perhaps best illustrated in the year 74 BC when, on his own initiative, he organized a private army, independent of Roman forces, to fight of Mithradates VI Eupator. He was King of Pontus and had declared war on Rome. This further began the process of endearing Caesar to the hearts, minds, and soul of the Roman people. After the aforementioned relatively minor military incursion, Caesar finally returned to the city of Rome and set out to work with Pompey. As we know, Pompey was a former lieutenant for the dictator Sully, but he did not have the same disdain for Caesar. In fact, Pompey actually changed political ideology and began siding with the nobles as well after Sully’s death. It was not long after this alliance with Pompey that Caesar was formally elected to position of quaestor, which was a base form of political office. This was in about 68 or 69 BC, and he would then continue on moving up in politics by going on to serve in numerous other governmental positions under the leadership of Pompey (Retief & Cilliers, p. 26). About the time he was getting settled in with political life under Pompey, Caesar suffered personal tragedy when his wife died. About two years later, in about 67 BC, he ended up marrying a distant relative of Pompey, Pompeia. They did not remain married very long, however, as they were divorced in the year 62 BC. Even though he was going through this personal period of turmoil at the time, he continued to rise to prominent position of power with the Roman empire. His first major political appointment was to the position of governor in the Roman province of Spain. Even during this time, he maintained his alliance with Pompey, who is his own right was growing in popularity. This alliance actually resulted in him booming elected to the position of consul in 59 BC, which was an extremely powerful position within the Roman Empire (Mandel, p. 535). Thus began the ruling influence of Julius Caesar that would eventually result in him becoming the head over the entire Roman Empire. From the early years of his political rise to power, Julius Caesar developed a keen sense of being able to forge alliances that would serve his best interests, both at the current time and into the future. To demonstrate this, he began to align himself with Marcus Licinius Crassus, at the very time he was still developing a strong partnership with Pompey. Crassus was a Roman general and politician who, like Pompey, had served Rome under the rule of Sulla. In essence, Caesar was gaining support from opposite ends of the aisle that would eventually greatly aid him as he would move up the chain of command within the Roman Empire. This is not dissimilar to the modern day alliances that politicians the world over continue to forge in order to solidify their strong base of support and power. His new alliance to Crassus proved to be particularly beneficial to Caesar, as his immense wealth helped Caesar rise to power within the Roman Empire. It is rumored, in fact, that Crassus is the wealthiest man to ever call Rome home. In time, Crassus would offer his own personal financial and political support to Julius Caesar. Again, this is similar to the rise that many politicians in the Democratic world experience to this day. Money does, in a way, buy power. This principle was certainly demonstrated within the life of Julius Caesar. In a strange twist of events, Crassus and Pompey had begun to develop a strong political rivalry over the years that began to intensify. Each called Julius Caesar a friend, however, so whoever would come out on top would still benefit Caesar, so he was really in a no-lose situation. Rather than gain an enemy, however, Caesar ended up negotiating a truce between the two, eventually convincing both Crassus and Pompey that would be much better off as allies, and so would Rome. A partnership, then, was forged between all three of them. This partnership would become known in history as the First Triumvirate. As Caesar was the architect of this alliance, it gave him immense power that would serve him well as he strove to have further domination throughout the Roman Empire (Aune, p. 22). As Caesar began to ‘test the waters’, he did initially make some unpopular choices, but in the end it would be revealed that he had a purpose behind nearly every decision that me made. For example, not long after the Great Triumvirate had been formed, he attempted to bribe Pompey’s soldiers into certain actions by granting them ownership over public land. This was an unpopular move, but Caesar had a plan. He ended up paying some of the soldiers from Pompey’s army to stage an actual riot, which resulted in a rather chaotic scene. In the end, Caesar’s plan was adopted and embraced. It was long after this that Caesar become the governor of Gaul, which is modern day region of France and Belgium (Smith, p. 82). This position enabled him to begin to build a larger and more powerful military. In addition, it was during this same time that he began certain social campaigns and initiatives that would start his rise to power and gain him the notoriety that he still is known for today. It was during the eight year period from 58 to 50 BC that Caesar conquered the entire region around Gaul, all the way to the Rhine River. At the same time he began to extend the geographical area of his rule, he began to show a ruthless side with all enemies who came into contact with him. Up until this point, history reveals that Caesar was quite cunning and crafty, but this was largely viewed behind the scenes. It was during his governorship in Gaul, however, that he showed little hesitation to use extreme violence and brutal means to accomplished his desired goals and objectives. One example of this rests in his patience to wait until the water supply of the opposition was dried up, killing off many of them. Those who did survive would quickly discover that Caesar himself had ordered their hands to be cut off. Caesar always kept his sight on eventually become the leader of all of Rome. Even while he wash conquering Gaul, for example, we know that he was closely monitoring the political situation in Rome, even going to the expense of hiring some political agents to maintain his own active involvement in Roman politics. These individuals would directly represent Caesar’s interests in all important matters affecting the empire. It was during this time, however, that Pompey began to grow leery of Caesar’s growing stature and political influence. At the same time, however, Crassus was becoming more skeptical of Pompey, so the three leaders appeared headed for another period of infighting, but that was temporarily averted at a conference in Luca back in 56 BC. The decisions reached during this conference, among other things, ranted Caesars rule over the territories for another five years, with Crassus getting five more years in Syria and Pompey five years in Spain (Beard, p. 396). Within three years, however, Crassus was killed during a fight in Syria and Pompey began to once again have his same concerns about the rising influence of Caesar. These events eventually gave rise to the Julius Caesar we know today, which is largely considered to be that of a dictator. Over time, the partnership between Caesar and Pompey deteriorated to the point that Caesar actually when to war against him in 49 BC. He did this by personally leading his troops across the River Rubicon during the winter month of January. Pompey at the time was increasingly aligning himself with the nobility, while Caesar had been gradually gaining momentum on the other side. As a result, the nobility became increasingly critical of Caesar and viewed his as a threat to national security, so the makings of a civil war were certainly on the wall. Pompey’s troops, however were easily outmatch by Caesar’s, and Pompey was eventually killed in Egypt. At that time, Caesar became aligned with Queen Cleopatra of Egypt, even having a son with her (Coppellia, p. 230). He eventually returned to Rome where he was installed a dictator for life, considered to be the father of the country, and he began on an ambitious plan of reforming Rome into the great Empire that historians are still studying to this day. In the end, Caesar only served one year as the official dictator of the Roman Empire as he was assassinated. Many, then, might wonder why someone who actually ruled for such a short period of time is still so widely discussed in the scheme of world history, particularly in terms of Roman civilization and the great leaders of both the ancient and modern worlds. The reality is that Caesar did more in his one year in power over the Empire than men who rules for decades before him. For example, he relieved the debt that the country had incurred, and he began to reform the Senate in the Empire by addicting to its numbers and making it more public so that everyone was aware of what was taking place in the seat of government. This policy of openness and transparency is one that continues throughout many of the national governments in existence in the modern era. In addition, he worked to reform the Roman calendar and to reorganize the manner in which local governments were structured. At the same time, be bought Carthage and Corinth back to life, and granted the right of Roman citizenship to countless foreigners who resided within the Roman Empire itself. All the while, he shed much of the ruthlessness that got him his position of power, becoming quite benevolent to the people, event to the point of offering positions of power within the government to the very individuals he defeated on his rise to power. His benevolence, however, was not to be confused with him becoming soft as he worked hard to solidify his grasp on power within the Empire, bestowing himself with certain titles and accolades that would demand respect of all who came into contact with him. Roman coins ended up bearing his image, and he spoke first at all assembly meetings. He did gradually, however, begin to lose popularity within the very Senate that he worked to reform. In the end, Brutus ended up killing Caesar, thus ending his relatively short rule. Works Cited Aune, M. G. “Julius Caesar”. Early Modern Literary Studies, 15.1 (2010): 10-25. Barret, Anthony A. “Julius Caesar: Julius Caesar”. Biography, 33.3 (2010): 608. Beard, Mary. “Caesar, Julius”. Biography, 32.2 (2009): 397. Coppellia, Kahn. “Julius Caesar”. Shakespeare Quarterly, 51.2 (2010): 230. Kermode, Frank. “Julius Caesar”. The Review of English Studies, 2.6 (2011): 166-168. Mandel, G. “Julius Caesar and Caesar’s Revenge, Yet Again”. Notes and Queries, 59.4 (2012): 534-536. Retief, Francois and Cilliers, Johan. “Julius Caesar”. South African Medical Journal, 100.1 (2010): 26. Smith, Clyde. “Julius Caesar”. History, 30.2 (2002): 82. Read More