)
[746] “He sprang from the noble family of the _Julii_, and, according to
an opinion long believed in, he derived his origin from Venus and
Anchises.
[746] “He sprang from the noble family of the _Julii_, and, according to
an opinion long believed in, he derived his origin from Venus and
Anchises.
Napoleon - History of Julius Caesar - a
31.
--The _auxilium_ was
the protection accorded by the tribune of the people to whoever claimed
it.
[728] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 100 _et seq. _
[729] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. (See, on an inscription raised by the
freedmen in honour of the dictator, and which has been discovered in
Italy, Mommsen, _Inscriptiones Latinæ Antiquissimæ_, p. 168. )
[730] Titus Livius, _Epitome_, LXXXIX.
[731] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 100.
[732] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 100. --In 574, the age required for the
different magistracies had already been fixed. (Titus Livius, XL. 44. )
[733] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 101. --Titus Livius, _Epitome_, LXXXIX.
[734] Aulus Gellius, II. 24.
[735] Cicero, _Familiar Letters_, III. 6, 8, 10.
[736] Titus Livius, _Epitome_, LXXXIX. --Tacitus, _Annals_, XI.
22. --Aurelius Victor, _Illustrious Men_, lxxv.
[737] Cicero, _De Oratore_, II. 39. --“A law which, among the ancients,
embraced different objects: treasons in the army, seditions at Rome,
diminution of the majesty of the Roman people by the bad administration
of a magistrate. ” (Tacitus, _Annals_, I. 72. )
[738] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 104.
[739] He waited the death of the dictator to rob the treasury of a sum
which he owed to the State. (Plutarch, _Sylla_, 46. )
[740] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 106.
[741] Sylla had taken the name of _Fortunate_ (_Felix_). (Mommsen,
_Inscriptiones Latinæ Antiquissimæ_, p. 168), or of _Faustus_, according
to Velleius Paterculus.
[742] “It cannot be denied that Sylla had then the power of a king,
although he had restored the Republic. ” (Cicero, _Speech on the Report
of the Aruspices_, 25. )
[743] The celebrated German author, Mommsen (_Roman History_, III. 15),
does not admit this date of 654. He proposes, under correction, the date
of 652, for the reason that the ages required for the higher offices of
State, since Sylla’s time, were thirty-seven for the edileship, forty
for the prætorship, forty-three for the consulship, and as Cæsar was
_curule ædile_ in 689, prætor in 692, consul in 695, he would, had he
been born in 654, have filled each of these offices two years before the
legal age.
This objection, certainly of some force, is dispelled by other
historical testimony. Besides, we know that at Rome they did not always
observe the laws when dealing with eminent men. Lucullus was raised to
be chief magistrate before the required age, and Pompey was consul at
thirty-four. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 14. )--Tacitus speaks on this
matter thus: “With our ancestors this magistracy (the questorship) was
the prize of merit only, for every citizen of ability had then the right
to aim at these honours; _even age was so little regarded, that extreme
youth did not exclude from either the consulship or the dictatorship_. ”
(_Annals_, XI. 22. )--In any case, if the opinion of M. Mommsen be
adopted, the birth of Cæsar must be referred to 651, not 652. For, if he
was born in the month of July, 652, he could only be forty-three years
of age in the month of July, 695; and as the nomination of the consuls
preceded by six months their entering into office, it would be in the
month of July, 694, when he would have attained the legal age, which
would bring the date of his birth to the year 651. But Plutarch
(_Cæsar_, 69), Suetonius (_Cæsar_, 88), and Appian (_Civil Wars_, II.
149) all agree in saying that Cæsar was fifty-six when he was
assassinated on the 15th of March, 710, which fixes his birth in the
year 654. On the other hand, according to Velleius Paterculus (II. 43),
Cæsar was appointed flamen of Jupiter by Marius and Cinna when scarcely
out of infancy, and at Rome infancy ended at about fourteen; and the
consulship of Marius and Cinna being in 668, Cæsar, according to our
calculation, would then, in fact, have entered on his fourteenth year.
The same author adds that he was about eighteen in 672, when he left
Rome to escape the proscriptions of Sylla, a new reason for retaining
the preceding date.
Cæsar made his first campaign in Asia, at the taking of Mitylene, in 674
(Titus Livius, _Epitome_, LXXXIX. ), which makes him twenty at the date
of his entrance into the service. According to Sallust (_Catilina_, 49),
when Cæsar was nominated grand pontiff in competition with Catulus, he
was almost a youth (_adolescentulus_); and Dio Cassius says the same, in
nearly the same terms. Doubtless they expressed themselves thus because
of the great disproportion in the age of the two candidates. The
expression of these authors, although unfitting, nevertheless agrees
better with our reckoning, which ascribes thirty-seven years of age to
Cæsar, than to the other, which gives him thirty-nine. Tacitus also, as
we shall see in a note to a subsequent page, when speaking of the
accusation against Dolabella, tends to make Cæsar too young rather than
too old.
[744] The family of the _Julii_ was very ancient, and we find personages
bearing this name from the third century of Rome. The first of whom
history makes mention was C. Julius Julus, consul in 265. There were
other consuls of the same family in 272, 281, 307, 324; consular
tribunes in 330, 351, 362, 367; and a dictator, C. Julius Julus, in 402;
but their filiation is little known. The genealogy of Cæsar begins in a
direct line only from Sextus Julius Cæsar, prætor in 546. We borrow the
genealogy of the family of the Julii from the _History of Rome by
Families_, by the learned professor W. Drumann (Vol. III. , page 120;
Kœnigsberg, 1837), introducing one variation only, explained in Note (4)
of page 290.
Sex. Jul. Cæsar, L. Jul. Cæsar.
prætor, 546. |
|
+-------------------------------+
| |
L. Jul. Cæsar, Sex. Jul. Cæsar,
prætor, 571. trib. mil. , 573.
|
+-------------------------------+
| |
L. J. Cæsar, Sex. J. Cæsar, C. Jul. Cæsar.
prætor, 588. Cos. , 597. |
| |
+----------------+ |
| | |
Sex. J. Cæsar, L. J. Cæsar. C. Jul. Cæsar.
prætor, 631. --Popillia. Marcia.
| |
+----------------+ +----------------------------------+
| | | | |
L. Jul. Cæsar, C. Jul. Cæsar. C. Jul. Cæsar, Julia. Sex. Jul. Cæsar,
Cos. , 664. Strabo. prætor. --C. Marius Cos. , 663.
Censor. ædil. cur. , 664. --Aurelia. |
--Fulvia. | |
| | |
+-------------+ +------------------------------+ |
| | | | | |
L. Jul. Cæsar, Julia. C. JUL. CÆSAR, Julia, maj. Julia, min. Sex. Jul. Cæsar,
Cos. , 690. --M. Antonius. Dictator. --L. Pinarius. M. A. Balbus. flam. Quirin.
| --P. Lentulus. --Cornelia. --+ --Q. Pedius. | |
| | | |
| | | |
L. Jul. Cæsar. Julia Atia Sex. Julius Cæsar.
--708. --Cn. Pomp. Mag. (moth. of Augustus). --708.
|
|
--Cn. Pompeius.
--Pompeia.
--Calpurnia.
The opinion most accredited with the ancients, on the origin of the name
of Cæsar, was that Julius slew an elephant in a fight. In the Punic
tongue _cæsar_ signifies “an elephant. ” The medals of Cæsar, as grand
pontiff, confirm this hypothesis; on the reverse is an elephant crushing
a serpent beneath its feet. (Cohen, _Consular Medals_, plate xx.
10. )--We know that some symbols on the Roman medals are a species of
canting heraldry. Pliny gives another etymology of the name of Cæsar:
“Primusque Cæsarum a cæso matris utero dictus, qua de causa et _Cæsones_
appellati. ” (_Natural History_, VII. 9. )--Festus (p. 57) thus expresses
himself: “_Cæsar_ a _cæsarie_ dictus est; qui scilicet cum cæsarie natus
est;” and page 45: “_Cæsariati_ (comati). ”--Finally, Spartianus (_Life
of Ælius Verus_, ii. ) sums up in these words the greater part of the
etymologies: “_Cæsorem_ vel ab elephante (qui lingua Mauroram _cæsar_
dicitur) in prœlio cæso, cum qui primus sic appellatus est, doctissimi
et eruditissimi viri putant dictum; vel quia mortua matre, ventre cæso
sit natus; vel quod cum magnis crinibus sit utero parentis effusus; vel
quod oculis cæsiis et ultra humanum morem viguerit. ” (See Isidore,
_Origines_, IX. iii. 12. --Servius, _Commentary on the Æneid_, I. 290,
and Constantine Manasses, p. 71. )
[745] Pliny, _Natural History_, VII. 53. --“Cæsar was in his sixteenth
year when he lost his father. ” (Suetonius, I.
)
[746] “He sprang from the noble family of the _Julii_, and, according to
an opinion long believed in, he derived his origin from Venus and
Anchises. ” (Velleius Paterculus, II. 41. )
[747] In fact, the _gens_ Marcia, one of the most illustrious patrician
families in Rome, reckoned among its ancestors Numa Marcius, who married
Pompilia, the daughter of Numa Pompilius, by whom he had Ancus Marcius,
who was King of Rome after the death of Tullus Hostilius. (Plutarch,
_Coriolanus_, I; _Numa_, 26. )
[748] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, vi. This passage, as generally translated, is
unintelligible, because the translators render the words Martii Reges by
_the Kings Martius_, instead of the family of Marcius Rex.
[749] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 10.
[750] “So Cornelia, mother of the Gracchi; Aurelia, mother of Cæsar;
Atia, mother of Augustus, all presided over the education of their
children, we are told, and made them into great men. ” (Tacitus,
_Dialogue concerning Orators_, 28. )
[751] “Ingenii magni, memoriæ singularis, nec minus Græce quam Latine
doctus. ” (Suetonius, _On Illustrious Grammarians_, 7. )
[752] “A sermone Græco puerum incipere malo. ” (Quintilian, _Institution
of Oratory_, I. i. )
[753] Claudius, addressing a foreigner who spoke Greek and Latin, said,
“Since thou possessest our two languages. ” (Suetonius, _Claudius_, 42. )
[754] Καἱ σὑ, τἑκνον! (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 82. )
[755] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 56.
[756] “Still quite young, he seems to have attached himself to the kind
of eloquence adopted by Strabo Cæsar, and he has even given, in his
_Divination_, several passages, word for word, of the discourse of this
orator for the Sardinians. ” (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 55. )
[757] Aulus Gellius, IV. 16.
[758] “For Cæsar and Brutus have also made verses, and have placed them
in the public libraries. Poets as feeble as Cicero, but happier than he,
in that fewer people knew what they had done. ” (Tacitus, _Dialogue
concerning Orators_, 21. )
[759]
Tu quoque, tu in summis, o dimidiate Menander,
Poneris, et merito, puri sermonis amator.
Lenibus atque utinam scriptis adjuncta foret vis
Comica, ut æquato virtus polleret honore
Cum Græcis; neque in hac despectus parte jaceres!
Unum hoc maceror et doleo tibi deesse, Terenti.
(Suetonius, _Life of Terence_, 5. )
[760] “Liberal to prodigality, and of a courage above human nature and
even imagination. ” (Velleius Paterculus, II. 41. )
[761] “He held, undeniably, the second rank among the orators of Rome. ”
(Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 3. )
[762] “Nam cui Hortensio, Lucullove, _vel Cæsari_, tam parata unquam
adfuit recordatio, quam tibi sacra mens tua loco momentoque, quo
jusseris, reddit omne depositum? ” (Latinus Pacatus, _Panegyricus in
Theodosium_, XVIII. 3. )--(Pliny, _Natural History_, VII. 25. )
[763] “Quamvis moderate soleret irasci, maluit tamen non posse. ”
(Seneca, _De Ira_, II. 23. )
[764] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 4.
[765] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 19.
[766] “To the external advantages which distinguished him from all the
other citizens, Cæsar joined an impetuous and powerful soul. ” (Velleius
Paterculus, II. 41. )
[767] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 15.
[768] “By his voice, his gesture, the grand and noble air of his person,
he had a certain brilliant manner of speech, without the least
artifice. ” (Cicero, _Brutus_, 75; copied by Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 55. )
[769] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 18.
[770] “From his first youth he was much used to horseback, and had even
acquired the facility of riding with dropped reins and his hands joined
behind his back. ” (Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 18. )
[771] “He ate and slept without enjoying the pleasure of either, and
only to obey necessity. ” (Velleius Paterculus, II. 41. )
[772] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 53. --(Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 18 and 58. )
[773] “And when,” says Cicero, “I look at his hair, so artistically
arranged; and when I see him scratch his head with one finger, I cannot
believe that such a man could conceive so black a design as to overthrow
the Roman Republic. ” (Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 4. )
[774] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 45. --Cicero said likewise, “I suffered myself
to be caught by the fashion of his girdle,” alluding to his hanging
robe, which gave him an effeminate appearance. (Macrobius, _Saturnalia_,
II. 3. )
[775] Dio Cassius, XLIII. 43.
[776] Velleius Paterculus, II. 41.
[777] Suetonius (_Cæsar_, 1) says that Cæsar was _designated_
(_destinatus_) flamen. Velleius Paterculus (II. 43), that he was
_created_ flamen. In our opinion he was created, but not _inaugurated_,
flamen. Now, as long as this formality was not accomplished, he was only
the flamen designate. What proves that he had never been _inaugurated_
is, that Sylla could revoke it; and, on another hand, Tacitus says
(_Annales_, III. 53) that, after the death of Cornelius Merula, the
flamenship of Jupiter remained vacant for seventy-two years, without any
interruption to the special worship of this god. So that, evidently,
they did not count the flamenship of Cæsar as real, since he had never
entered on his office.
[778] “Dimissa Cossutia . . . quæ pretextato desponsata fuerat. ”
(Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 1. )--This passage from Suetonius clearly indicates
that he was betrothed, and not married, to Cossutia; for Suetonius uses
the word _dimittere_, which means “to _free_,” and not the word
_repudiare_ in its true meaning; besides, _desponsata_ signifies
_betrothed_. --Plutarch says that Cornelia was the first wife of Cæsar,
though he pretends that he married Pompeia as his third. (Plutarch,
_Cæsar_, 5. )
[779] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 5.
[780] Velleius Paterculus, II. 41.
[781] “What an infamy to introduce into his house a pregnant woman, with
her husband still living; and to thrust from it, ignominiously and
cruelly, Antistia, whose father had just perished for the husband who
repudiated her! ” (Plutarch, _Pompey_, 8. )
[782] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 1.
[783] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 1. --Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 74.
[784] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 74.
[785] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 1.
[786] The vestals enjoyed great privileges: if they met by chance a
criminal on his way to execution, he was set at liberty. (Plutarch,
_Numa_, 14. )--Valerius Maximus (V. iv. 6) reports the following fact:
“The vestal Claudia, seeing that a tribune of the people was about to
drag her father, Appius Claudius Pulcher, with violence from his
triumphal car, interfered between the tribune and him, by virtue of her
right to oppose violence. ”--Cicero (_Oration for Cœlius_, 14) likewise
alludes to this celebrated anecdote.
[787] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 1.
[788] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 2.
[789] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 2. --Pliny, XVI. 4. --Aulus Gellius, V. 6.
[790] C. Cæsar, grand pontiff, in his discourse for the Bithynians, thus
expresses himself in his exordium:--“The hospitality which I have
received from King Nicomedes, and the bond of friendship which unites me
to those whose cause is under debate, do not permit me, Marcus Juncus,
to decline this office (_that of being the advocate of the Bithynians_);
for death ought not to efface from the memory of their kindred the
recollection of those who have lived, and we could not, without the last
degree of disgrace, abandon our clients, those to whom, after our
kindred, we owe our support. ” (Aulus Gellius, V. xiii. 1. )
[791] “Nothing damaged his reputation for chastity,” says Suetonius,
“except his sojourn with Nicomedes; but the opprobrium which resulted
from it was grave and lasting; it exposed him to the sneers of all. I
will say nothing of those well-known verses of Calvus Licinius--
. . . ‘Bithynia quidquid
Et pedicator Cæsaris unquam habuit. ’
I will be silent on the speeches of Dolabella and Curio the father, . . .
neither will I linger over the edicts in which Bibulus publicly exposed
his colleague by speaking of him as the _queen of Bithynia_. . . . M.
Brutus informs us that a certain Octavius, whose craziness allowed him
to say what he would, being one day in a numerous assembly, called
Pompey _king_, then saluted Cæsar by the name of _queen_. C. Memmius
also reproaches him for having mixed himself up with other debauchees to
present Nicomedes with cups and wine at table, and he quotes the names
of several Roman merchants who were among the guests. . . . Cicero
apostrophised him once in full Senate. Cæsar was defending there the
cause of Nysa, daughter of Nicomedes; he recalled the obligations which
he owed to this king. ‘Let us pass by all that, I beg you,’ cried
Cicero: ‘we know only too well what he has given thee, and what he has
received from thee. ’ On his triumph over the Gauls, the soldiers, among
other satirical verses which it was their custom to sing as they
followed the car of the general, repeated these, which are well known:--
‘Gallias Cæsar subegit, Nicomedes Cæsarem.
Ecce Cæsar nunc triumphat, qui subegit Gallias;
Nicomedes non triumphat, qui subegit Cæsarem. ’”
(Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 40. )
[792] Cicero, _Letters to Atticus_, II. 19.
[793] These reports, like other calumnies, were propagated by Cæsar’s
enemies, such as Curio and Bibulus, and repeated in the ridiculous
annals of Tanusius Geminus (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 9), the authority of
which Seneca despised. “Thou knowest that not much account is made of
these annals of Tanusius, and how they are designated. ” (Seneca,
_Epistle_ 93. )--Catullus (xxxvi. 1) gives us that term of contempt to
which Seneca alludes (_cacata charta_).
[794] “Marius had in his army a nephew, called Caius Lucius, who,
overcome by a shameful passion for one of his subordinates, offered him
an act of violence. The man drew his sword and killed him. Cited before
the tribunal of Marius, instead of being punished he was loaded with
praises by the consul, who gave him one of the crowns which were the
usual reward of courage. ” (Plutarch, _Marius_, 15. )
[795] “Cæsar was not vexed at being accused of loving Cleopatra; but he
could not bear that they should say he had been loved by Nicomedes. _He
swore it was a calumny. _” (Xiphilinus, _Julius Cæsar_, p. 30, Paris
edition, 1678. )
[796] Orosius, V. 23.
[797] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 3.
[798] Florus, III. 23.
[799] Appian, I. 107.
[800] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 3.
[801] Sallust, _Fragments_, I. , p. 363.
[802] Florus, III. 23.
[803] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 3.
[804] “The Romans regarded as honourable accusations which had no
private enmity as their motive, and they liked to see young men attach
themselves to the pursuit of the guilty, as generous dogs attack wild
beasts. ” (Plutarch, _Lucullus_, 1. )
[805] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 4. --Asconius, _Discourse for Scaurus_, XVI. ii.
245, edit. Schütz.
[806] Valerius Maximus, VIII. ix. § 3. --“Cæsar was twenty-one years of
age when he attacked Dolabella, in a speech which we still read to-day
with admiration. ” (Tacitus, _Dialogue on the Orators_, 34. )--According
to the chronological order which we have adopted, Cæsar, instead of
twenty-one, would have been twenty-three years old; but as Tacitus, in
the same citation, also errs, by two years, in making Crassus, who had
accused Carbo, nineteen instead of twenty-one, we may suppose that he
has committed the same mistake with Cæsar. In fact, Crassus tells his
own age in Cicero (_On the Orators_, III. 20, § 74): “Quippe qui _omnium
maturrime_ ad publicas causas accesserim, annosque natus _unum et
viginti_ nobilissimum hominem in judicium vocarim. ”--Crassus, the
orator, was born in 614; he accused Carbo in 635, the date given by
Cicero.
[807] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 3. --Asconius, _Commentaries on the Oration, “In
Toga Candida,”_ pp. 84, 89, edit. Orelli.
[808] _Dialogue on the Orators_, 21.
[809] Cicero, _Oration for Cluentius_, 59. The manuscripts of Cicero
bear _Cn. Decitius_.
[810] This island, now called _Fermaco_, is at the entrance of the Gulf
of Assem-Kalessi. Pliny and Stephen of Byzantium are the only
geographers who mention it, and the last tells us further, that it was
here that Attalus, the famous lieutenant of Philip of Macedon, was slain
by Alexander’s order.
[811] Polyænus, _Stratagems_, VII. 23.
[812] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 4.
[813] Velleius Paterculus, II. 41.
[814] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 2.
[815] Plutarch, _Crassus_, 8.
the protection accorded by the tribune of the people to whoever claimed
it.
[728] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 100 _et seq. _
[729] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. (See, on an inscription raised by the
freedmen in honour of the dictator, and which has been discovered in
Italy, Mommsen, _Inscriptiones Latinæ Antiquissimæ_, p. 168. )
[730] Titus Livius, _Epitome_, LXXXIX.
[731] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 100.
[732] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 100. --In 574, the age required for the
different magistracies had already been fixed. (Titus Livius, XL. 44. )
[733] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 101. --Titus Livius, _Epitome_, LXXXIX.
[734] Aulus Gellius, II. 24.
[735] Cicero, _Familiar Letters_, III. 6, 8, 10.
[736] Titus Livius, _Epitome_, LXXXIX. --Tacitus, _Annals_, XI.
22. --Aurelius Victor, _Illustrious Men_, lxxv.
[737] Cicero, _De Oratore_, II. 39. --“A law which, among the ancients,
embraced different objects: treasons in the army, seditions at Rome,
diminution of the majesty of the Roman people by the bad administration
of a magistrate. ” (Tacitus, _Annals_, I. 72. )
[738] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 104.
[739] He waited the death of the dictator to rob the treasury of a sum
which he owed to the State. (Plutarch, _Sylla_, 46. )
[740] Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 106.
[741] Sylla had taken the name of _Fortunate_ (_Felix_). (Mommsen,
_Inscriptiones Latinæ Antiquissimæ_, p. 168), or of _Faustus_, according
to Velleius Paterculus.
[742] “It cannot be denied that Sylla had then the power of a king,
although he had restored the Republic. ” (Cicero, _Speech on the Report
of the Aruspices_, 25. )
[743] The celebrated German author, Mommsen (_Roman History_, III. 15),
does not admit this date of 654. He proposes, under correction, the date
of 652, for the reason that the ages required for the higher offices of
State, since Sylla’s time, were thirty-seven for the edileship, forty
for the prætorship, forty-three for the consulship, and as Cæsar was
_curule ædile_ in 689, prætor in 692, consul in 695, he would, had he
been born in 654, have filled each of these offices two years before the
legal age.
This objection, certainly of some force, is dispelled by other
historical testimony. Besides, we know that at Rome they did not always
observe the laws when dealing with eminent men. Lucullus was raised to
be chief magistrate before the required age, and Pompey was consul at
thirty-four. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, I. 14. )--Tacitus speaks on this
matter thus: “With our ancestors this magistracy (the questorship) was
the prize of merit only, for every citizen of ability had then the right
to aim at these honours; _even age was so little regarded, that extreme
youth did not exclude from either the consulship or the dictatorship_. ”
(_Annals_, XI. 22. )--In any case, if the opinion of M. Mommsen be
adopted, the birth of Cæsar must be referred to 651, not 652. For, if he
was born in the month of July, 652, he could only be forty-three years
of age in the month of July, 695; and as the nomination of the consuls
preceded by six months their entering into office, it would be in the
month of July, 694, when he would have attained the legal age, which
would bring the date of his birth to the year 651. But Plutarch
(_Cæsar_, 69), Suetonius (_Cæsar_, 88), and Appian (_Civil Wars_, II.
149) all agree in saying that Cæsar was fifty-six when he was
assassinated on the 15th of March, 710, which fixes his birth in the
year 654. On the other hand, according to Velleius Paterculus (II. 43),
Cæsar was appointed flamen of Jupiter by Marius and Cinna when scarcely
out of infancy, and at Rome infancy ended at about fourteen; and the
consulship of Marius and Cinna being in 668, Cæsar, according to our
calculation, would then, in fact, have entered on his fourteenth year.
The same author adds that he was about eighteen in 672, when he left
Rome to escape the proscriptions of Sylla, a new reason for retaining
the preceding date.
Cæsar made his first campaign in Asia, at the taking of Mitylene, in 674
(Titus Livius, _Epitome_, LXXXIX. ), which makes him twenty at the date
of his entrance into the service. According to Sallust (_Catilina_, 49),
when Cæsar was nominated grand pontiff in competition with Catulus, he
was almost a youth (_adolescentulus_); and Dio Cassius says the same, in
nearly the same terms. Doubtless they expressed themselves thus because
of the great disproportion in the age of the two candidates. The
expression of these authors, although unfitting, nevertheless agrees
better with our reckoning, which ascribes thirty-seven years of age to
Cæsar, than to the other, which gives him thirty-nine. Tacitus also, as
we shall see in a note to a subsequent page, when speaking of the
accusation against Dolabella, tends to make Cæsar too young rather than
too old.
[744] The family of the _Julii_ was very ancient, and we find personages
bearing this name from the third century of Rome. The first of whom
history makes mention was C. Julius Julus, consul in 265. There were
other consuls of the same family in 272, 281, 307, 324; consular
tribunes in 330, 351, 362, 367; and a dictator, C. Julius Julus, in 402;
but their filiation is little known. The genealogy of Cæsar begins in a
direct line only from Sextus Julius Cæsar, prætor in 546. We borrow the
genealogy of the family of the Julii from the _History of Rome by
Families_, by the learned professor W. Drumann (Vol. III. , page 120;
Kœnigsberg, 1837), introducing one variation only, explained in Note (4)
of page 290.
Sex. Jul. Cæsar, L. Jul. Cæsar.
prætor, 546. |
|
+-------------------------------+
| |
L. Jul. Cæsar, Sex. Jul. Cæsar,
prætor, 571. trib. mil. , 573.
|
+-------------------------------+
| |
L. J. Cæsar, Sex. J. Cæsar, C. Jul. Cæsar.
prætor, 588. Cos. , 597. |
| |
+----------------+ |
| | |
Sex. J. Cæsar, L. J. Cæsar. C. Jul. Cæsar.
prætor, 631. --Popillia. Marcia.
| |
+----------------+ +----------------------------------+
| | | | |
L. Jul. Cæsar, C. Jul. Cæsar. C. Jul. Cæsar, Julia. Sex. Jul. Cæsar,
Cos. , 664. Strabo. prætor. --C. Marius Cos. , 663.
Censor. ædil. cur. , 664. --Aurelia. |
--Fulvia. | |
| | |
+-------------+ +------------------------------+ |
| | | | | |
L. Jul. Cæsar, Julia. C. JUL. CÆSAR, Julia, maj. Julia, min. Sex. Jul. Cæsar,
Cos. , 690. --M. Antonius. Dictator. --L. Pinarius. M. A. Balbus. flam. Quirin.
| --P. Lentulus. --Cornelia. --+ --Q. Pedius. | |
| | | |
| | | |
L. Jul. Cæsar. Julia Atia Sex. Julius Cæsar.
--708. --Cn. Pomp. Mag. (moth. of Augustus). --708.
|
|
--Cn. Pompeius.
--Pompeia.
--Calpurnia.
The opinion most accredited with the ancients, on the origin of the name
of Cæsar, was that Julius slew an elephant in a fight. In the Punic
tongue _cæsar_ signifies “an elephant. ” The medals of Cæsar, as grand
pontiff, confirm this hypothesis; on the reverse is an elephant crushing
a serpent beneath its feet. (Cohen, _Consular Medals_, plate xx.
10. )--We know that some symbols on the Roman medals are a species of
canting heraldry. Pliny gives another etymology of the name of Cæsar:
“Primusque Cæsarum a cæso matris utero dictus, qua de causa et _Cæsones_
appellati. ” (_Natural History_, VII. 9. )--Festus (p. 57) thus expresses
himself: “_Cæsar_ a _cæsarie_ dictus est; qui scilicet cum cæsarie natus
est;” and page 45: “_Cæsariati_ (comati). ”--Finally, Spartianus (_Life
of Ælius Verus_, ii. ) sums up in these words the greater part of the
etymologies: “_Cæsorem_ vel ab elephante (qui lingua Mauroram _cæsar_
dicitur) in prœlio cæso, cum qui primus sic appellatus est, doctissimi
et eruditissimi viri putant dictum; vel quia mortua matre, ventre cæso
sit natus; vel quod cum magnis crinibus sit utero parentis effusus; vel
quod oculis cæsiis et ultra humanum morem viguerit. ” (See Isidore,
_Origines_, IX. iii. 12. --Servius, _Commentary on the Æneid_, I. 290,
and Constantine Manasses, p. 71. )
[745] Pliny, _Natural History_, VII. 53. --“Cæsar was in his sixteenth
year when he lost his father. ” (Suetonius, I.
)
[746] “He sprang from the noble family of the _Julii_, and, according to
an opinion long believed in, he derived his origin from Venus and
Anchises. ” (Velleius Paterculus, II. 41. )
[747] In fact, the _gens_ Marcia, one of the most illustrious patrician
families in Rome, reckoned among its ancestors Numa Marcius, who married
Pompilia, the daughter of Numa Pompilius, by whom he had Ancus Marcius,
who was King of Rome after the death of Tullus Hostilius. (Plutarch,
_Coriolanus_, I; _Numa_, 26. )
[748] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, vi. This passage, as generally translated, is
unintelligible, because the translators render the words Martii Reges by
_the Kings Martius_, instead of the family of Marcius Rex.
[749] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 10.
[750] “So Cornelia, mother of the Gracchi; Aurelia, mother of Cæsar;
Atia, mother of Augustus, all presided over the education of their
children, we are told, and made them into great men. ” (Tacitus,
_Dialogue concerning Orators_, 28. )
[751] “Ingenii magni, memoriæ singularis, nec minus Græce quam Latine
doctus. ” (Suetonius, _On Illustrious Grammarians_, 7. )
[752] “A sermone Græco puerum incipere malo. ” (Quintilian, _Institution
of Oratory_, I. i. )
[753] Claudius, addressing a foreigner who spoke Greek and Latin, said,
“Since thou possessest our two languages. ” (Suetonius, _Claudius_, 42. )
[754] Καἱ σὑ, τἑκνον! (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 82. )
[755] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 56.
[756] “Still quite young, he seems to have attached himself to the kind
of eloquence adopted by Strabo Cæsar, and he has even given, in his
_Divination_, several passages, word for word, of the discourse of this
orator for the Sardinians. ” (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 55. )
[757] Aulus Gellius, IV. 16.
[758] “For Cæsar and Brutus have also made verses, and have placed them
in the public libraries. Poets as feeble as Cicero, but happier than he,
in that fewer people knew what they had done. ” (Tacitus, _Dialogue
concerning Orators_, 21. )
[759]
Tu quoque, tu in summis, o dimidiate Menander,
Poneris, et merito, puri sermonis amator.
Lenibus atque utinam scriptis adjuncta foret vis
Comica, ut æquato virtus polleret honore
Cum Græcis; neque in hac despectus parte jaceres!
Unum hoc maceror et doleo tibi deesse, Terenti.
(Suetonius, _Life of Terence_, 5. )
[760] “Liberal to prodigality, and of a courage above human nature and
even imagination. ” (Velleius Paterculus, II. 41. )
[761] “He held, undeniably, the second rank among the orators of Rome. ”
(Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 3. )
[762] “Nam cui Hortensio, Lucullove, _vel Cæsari_, tam parata unquam
adfuit recordatio, quam tibi sacra mens tua loco momentoque, quo
jusseris, reddit omne depositum? ” (Latinus Pacatus, _Panegyricus in
Theodosium_, XVIII. 3. )--(Pliny, _Natural History_, VII. 25. )
[763] “Quamvis moderate soleret irasci, maluit tamen non posse. ”
(Seneca, _De Ira_, II. 23. )
[764] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 4.
[765] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 19.
[766] “To the external advantages which distinguished him from all the
other citizens, Cæsar joined an impetuous and powerful soul. ” (Velleius
Paterculus, II. 41. )
[767] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 15.
[768] “By his voice, his gesture, the grand and noble air of his person,
he had a certain brilliant manner of speech, without the least
artifice. ” (Cicero, _Brutus_, 75; copied by Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 55. )
[769] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 18.
[770] “From his first youth he was much used to horseback, and had even
acquired the facility of riding with dropped reins and his hands joined
behind his back. ” (Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 18. )
[771] “He ate and slept without enjoying the pleasure of either, and
only to obey necessity. ” (Velleius Paterculus, II. 41. )
[772] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 53. --(Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 18 and 58. )
[773] “And when,” says Cicero, “I look at his hair, so artistically
arranged; and when I see him scratch his head with one finger, I cannot
believe that such a man could conceive so black a design as to overthrow
the Roman Republic. ” (Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 4. )
[774] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 45. --Cicero said likewise, “I suffered myself
to be caught by the fashion of his girdle,” alluding to his hanging
robe, which gave him an effeminate appearance. (Macrobius, _Saturnalia_,
II. 3. )
[775] Dio Cassius, XLIII. 43.
[776] Velleius Paterculus, II. 41.
[777] Suetonius (_Cæsar_, 1) says that Cæsar was _designated_
(_destinatus_) flamen. Velleius Paterculus (II. 43), that he was
_created_ flamen. In our opinion he was created, but not _inaugurated_,
flamen. Now, as long as this formality was not accomplished, he was only
the flamen designate. What proves that he had never been _inaugurated_
is, that Sylla could revoke it; and, on another hand, Tacitus says
(_Annales_, III. 53) that, after the death of Cornelius Merula, the
flamenship of Jupiter remained vacant for seventy-two years, without any
interruption to the special worship of this god. So that, evidently,
they did not count the flamenship of Cæsar as real, since he had never
entered on his office.
[778] “Dimissa Cossutia . . . quæ pretextato desponsata fuerat. ”
(Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 1. )--This passage from Suetonius clearly indicates
that he was betrothed, and not married, to Cossutia; for Suetonius uses
the word _dimittere_, which means “to _free_,” and not the word
_repudiare_ in its true meaning; besides, _desponsata_ signifies
_betrothed_. --Plutarch says that Cornelia was the first wife of Cæsar,
though he pretends that he married Pompeia as his third. (Plutarch,
_Cæsar_, 5. )
[779] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 5.
[780] Velleius Paterculus, II. 41.
[781] “What an infamy to introduce into his house a pregnant woman, with
her husband still living; and to thrust from it, ignominiously and
cruelly, Antistia, whose father had just perished for the husband who
repudiated her! ” (Plutarch, _Pompey_, 8. )
[782] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 1.
[783] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 1. --Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 74.
[784] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 74.
[785] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 1.
[786] The vestals enjoyed great privileges: if they met by chance a
criminal on his way to execution, he was set at liberty. (Plutarch,
_Numa_, 14. )--Valerius Maximus (V. iv. 6) reports the following fact:
“The vestal Claudia, seeing that a tribune of the people was about to
drag her father, Appius Claudius Pulcher, with violence from his
triumphal car, interfered between the tribune and him, by virtue of her
right to oppose violence. ”--Cicero (_Oration for Cœlius_, 14) likewise
alludes to this celebrated anecdote.
[787] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 1.
[788] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 2.
[789] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 2. --Pliny, XVI. 4. --Aulus Gellius, V. 6.
[790] C. Cæsar, grand pontiff, in his discourse for the Bithynians, thus
expresses himself in his exordium:--“The hospitality which I have
received from King Nicomedes, and the bond of friendship which unites me
to those whose cause is under debate, do not permit me, Marcus Juncus,
to decline this office (_that of being the advocate of the Bithynians_);
for death ought not to efface from the memory of their kindred the
recollection of those who have lived, and we could not, without the last
degree of disgrace, abandon our clients, those to whom, after our
kindred, we owe our support. ” (Aulus Gellius, V. xiii. 1. )
[791] “Nothing damaged his reputation for chastity,” says Suetonius,
“except his sojourn with Nicomedes; but the opprobrium which resulted
from it was grave and lasting; it exposed him to the sneers of all. I
will say nothing of those well-known verses of Calvus Licinius--
. . . ‘Bithynia quidquid
Et pedicator Cæsaris unquam habuit. ’
I will be silent on the speeches of Dolabella and Curio the father, . . .
neither will I linger over the edicts in which Bibulus publicly exposed
his colleague by speaking of him as the _queen of Bithynia_. . . . M.
Brutus informs us that a certain Octavius, whose craziness allowed him
to say what he would, being one day in a numerous assembly, called
Pompey _king_, then saluted Cæsar by the name of _queen_. C. Memmius
also reproaches him for having mixed himself up with other debauchees to
present Nicomedes with cups and wine at table, and he quotes the names
of several Roman merchants who were among the guests. . . . Cicero
apostrophised him once in full Senate. Cæsar was defending there the
cause of Nysa, daughter of Nicomedes; he recalled the obligations which
he owed to this king. ‘Let us pass by all that, I beg you,’ cried
Cicero: ‘we know only too well what he has given thee, and what he has
received from thee. ’ On his triumph over the Gauls, the soldiers, among
other satirical verses which it was their custom to sing as they
followed the car of the general, repeated these, which are well known:--
‘Gallias Cæsar subegit, Nicomedes Cæsarem.
Ecce Cæsar nunc triumphat, qui subegit Gallias;
Nicomedes non triumphat, qui subegit Cæsarem. ’”
(Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 40. )
[792] Cicero, _Letters to Atticus_, II. 19.
[793] These reports, like other calumnies, were propagated by Cæsar’s
enemies, such as Curio and Bibulus, and repeated in the ridiculous
annals of Tanusius Geminus (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 9), the authority of
which Seneca despised. “Thou knowest that not much account is made of
these annals of Tanusius, and how they are designated. ” (Seneca,
_Epistle_ 93. )--Catullus (xxxvi. 1) gives us that term of contempt to
which Seneca alludes (_cacata charta_).
[794] “Marius had in his army a nephew, called Caius Lucius, who,
overcome by a shameful passion for one of his subordinates, offered him
an act of violence. The man drew his sword and killed him. Cited before
the tribunal of Marius, instead of being punished he was loaded with
praises by the consul, who gave him one of the crowns which were the
usual reward of courage. ” (Plutarch, _Marius_, 15. )
[795] “Cæsar was not vexed at being accused of loving Cleopatra; but he
could not bear that they should say he had been loved by Nicomedes. _He
swore it was a calumny. _” (Xiphilinus, _Julius Cæsar_, p. 30, Paris
edition, 1678. )
[796] Orosius, V. 23.
[797] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 3.
[798] Florus, III. 23.
[799] Appian, I. 107.
[800] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 3.
[801] Sallust, _Fragments_, I. , p. 363.
[802] Florus, III. 23.
[803] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 3.
[804] “The Romans regarded as honourable accusations which had no
private enmity as their motive, and they liked to see young men attach
themselves to the pursuit of the guilty, as generous dogs attack wild
beasts. ” (Plutarch, _Lucullus_, 1. )
[805] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 4. --Asconius, _Discourse for Scaurus_, XVI. ii.
245, edit. Schütz.
[806] Valerius Maximus, VIII. ix. § 3. --“Cæsar was twenty-one years of
age when he attacked Dolabella, in a speech which we still read to-day
with admiration. ” (Tacitus, _Dialogue on the Orators_, 34. )--According
to the chronological order which we have adopted, Cæsar, instead of
twenty-one, would have been twenty-three years old; but as Tacitus, in
the same citation, also errs, by two years, in making Crassus, who had
accused Carbo, nineteen instead of twenty-one, we may suppose that he
has committed the same mistake with Cæsar. In fact, Crassus tells his
own age in Cicero (_On the Orators_, III. 20, § 74): “Quippe qui _omnium
maturrime_ ad publicas causas accesserim, annosque natus _unum et
viginti_ nobilissimum hominem in judicium vocarim. ”--Crassus, the
orator, was born in 614; he accused Carbo in 635, the date given by
Cicero.
[807] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 3. --Asconius, _Commentaries on the Oration, “In
Toga Candida,”_ pp. 84, 89, edit. Orelli.
[808] _Dialogue on the Orators_, 21.
[809] Cicero, _Oration for Cluentius_, 59. The manuscripts of Cicero
bear _Cn. Decitius_.
[810] This island, now called _Fermaco_, is at the entrance of the Gulf
of Assem-Kalessi. Pliny and Stephen of Byzantium are the only
geographers who mention it, and the last tells us further, that it was
here that Attalus, the famous lieutenant of Philip of Macedon, was slain
by Alexander’s order.
[811] Polyænus, _Stratagems_, VII. 23.
[812] Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 4.
[813] Velleius Paterculus, II. 41.
[814] Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 2.
[815] Plutarch, _Crassus_, 8.
