History UsefulNotes / JuliusCaesar

[[caption-width-right:350:The Tusculum portrait, possibly the only extant {{sculpture|s}} of Caesar made in his lifetime.]]

Caesar is a controversial figure and historians to this day are divided about him. The Republic he overthrew was extremely corrupt and increasingly ineffective, while he provided strong, stable and popular leadership. He was merciful to his (Roman) enemies and widely respected for his many talents even by opponents like Creator/{{Cicero}}, who, in his invective-filled orations known as the Philippics, told Mark Antony that he was no Caesar. When he died he was either about to take personal power as the dictator, or possibly reform the Republic to accommodate its new responsibilities and peacefully and moderately end the spiral of factional wars that had gone on for a hundred years at that point. It is one of the great {{What If}}s of history as to what he would have done. The impact and importance of his legacy in Western civilization are indisputably immense: for the next two thousand years after his death, rulers would invoke and wear his name as a title and honorific. All five Emperors of the first dynasty had the name "Caesar" as part of their regnal name, and the word for "emperor" in many languages is based on it ([[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaiser "Kaiser"]] in German, "Kaisar" in Hindi, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar "Csar"]] in Slavic languages), although Caesar himself was not an Emperor. Not bad for what seems to have originally been [[IronicNickname the Roman equivalent of the Aussie tradition of calling the bald guy "Curly"]].[[note]]"Caesar"="hairy". While it's not clear if the first member of the gens Julia to be called "Caesar" (who exactly that would be is murky) was hairy or bald, his descendants definitely tended to be bald, which knowing the Romans is probably why this cognomen stuck. (They loved this kind of joke.)[[/note]]

His real climb to power began in 63 BC. He began with a well-followed political theater show trial of the Senator Gaius Rabirius [[note]]Long story as short as can be made -- Rabirius was charged with complicity in the death of the former Tribune Lucius Apeulius Saturninus, who had been killed around 40 years earlier during the chaos surrounding the tumultuous consulates of Marius and Cinna. Caesar had Rabirius charged using the antiquated "Perduellio" offense (a form of capital high treason that involved the convicted being thrown off the Tarpeian Rock, his properties torn down to the ground and any and all public mourning of the convicted was formally banned). Caesar's object in the trial had nothing to do with the death of Saturninus or even securing a conviction and punishment of Rabirius. He instead, given the tensions that were rising over the looming Catilinarian affair, wanted to put [[Creator/{{Cicero}} Marcus Tullius Cicero]] and the rest of the ''optimates'' in the Senate on notice should they take the NuclearOption of instituting the Senate Final Decree in dealing with Lucius Sergius Catilina. Rabirius had been an ''optimate'' and was one of the youths who had ripped tiles off the roof of the Senate House to throw at Saturninus and the other prisoners being held in trust by Marius, and later rumors had Rabirius parading Saturninus' head at a dinner party. In fact, once it was clear that Caesar had made his point, and just before the jury would have returned the condemnation of Rabirius, one of Caesar's flunkies raised the red flag on the Janiculum Hill (an antiquated sign that the city was under attack and all public business had to cease and all eligible males had to assemble for militia service), after which Caesar quietly dropped the charges.[[/note]]

* Caesar, played by Creator/ToddLasance, is a regular character in ''[[Series/{{Spartacus}} Spartacus: War of the Damned]]'', where he fights in the army of Marcus Crassus against Spartacus' slave uprising. He's introduced as a low-ranking politician with a famous name, as well as a cunning soldier, favors AnythingThatMoves, and a rival both of Crassus' son, Tiberius and the rebel Gannicus. [[DoomedByCanon Which was unfortunate for them.]]

* Caesar is present in ''Anime/CodeGeass''' [[AllThereInTheManual alternate history]]. Like our timeline, he does venture to the the British Isles twice. Unlike in our timeline, Caesar is unable to keep Roman influence and authority there and thus is the start of the Series' Britannia.
** One of the characters in Akito the Exiled, Julius Kingsley, is named after Caesar himself.

* Caesar is present in ''Anime/CodeGeass''' [[AllThereInTheManual alternate history]]. Like our timeline, he does venture to the the British Isles twice. Unlike in our timeline, Caesar is unable to keep Claudius' possessions in the British Isles and helps to kickstart Britannia's own start.
** One of the characters, Julius Kingsley, is named after Caesar himself.

The Senate bestowed unto Caesar a series of honours, partly because he was so merciful -- unlike Sulla, almost none of his enemies were proscribed, indeed most were pardoned, and Caesar restricted violence and denial of quarter to non-Roman barbarians like the Gauls (who were AcceptableTargets). He began a series of reforms to alleviate the plight of the poor, built many famous buildings, while also reviving an old project of Gaius Gracchus, the rebuilding of Carthage, together with Corinth, both destroyed and famously salted a century before.

Caesar is a controversial figure and historians to this day are divided about him. The Republic he overthrew was extremely corrupt and increasingly ineffective, while he provided strong, stable and popular leadership. He was merciful to his (Roman) enemies and widely respected for his many talents even by opponents like Creator/{{Cicero}}, who, in his invective-filled orations known as the Philippics, told Mark Antony that he was no Caesar. When he died he was either about to take personal power as the dictator, or possibly reform the Republic to accommodate its new responsibilities and peacefully and moderately end the spiral of factional wars that had gone on for a hundred years at that point. It is one of the great {{What If}}s of history as to what he would have done. The impact and importance of his legacy in Western civilization are indisputably immense: for the next two thousand years after his death, rulers would invoke and wear his name as a title and honorific. All five Emperors of the first dynasty had the name "Caesar" as part of their regnal name, and the word for "emperor" in many languages is based on it ([[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaiser "Kaiser"]] in German, "Kaisar" in Hindi, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Csar "Csar"]] in Slavic languages), although Caesar himself was not an Emperor. Not bad for what seems to have originally been [[IronicNickname the Roman equivalent of the Aussie tradition of calling the bald guy "Curly"]].[[note]]"Caesar"="hairy". While it's not clear if the first member of the gens Julia to be called "Caesar" (who exactly that would be is murky) was hairy or bald, his descendants definitely tended to be bald, which knowing the Romans is probably why this cognomen stuck. (They loved this kind of joke.)[[/note]]

Caesar is a controversial figure and historians to this day are divided about him. The Republic he overthrew was extremely corrupt and increasingly ineffective, while he provided strong, stable and popular leadership. He was merciful to his (Roman) enemies and widely respected for his many talents even by opponents like Creator/{{Cicero}}, who, in his invective-filled orations known as the Philippics, told Mark Antony that he was no Caesar. When he died he was either about to take personal power as the dictator, or possibly reform the Republic to accommodate its new responsibilities and peacefully and moderately end the spiral of factional wars that had gone on for a hundred years at that point. It is one of the great {{What If}}s of history as to what he would have done. The impact and importance of his legacy in Western civilization are indisputably immense: for the next two thousand years after his death, rulers would invoke and wear his name as a title and honorific (for example, the German word for "emperor" is [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaiser "Kaiser"]], pronounced just like Julius' surname; Slavic [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Csar "csar"]] (pronounced (and sometimes transliterated as) "tsar") is short for "caesar"). Not bad for what seems to have originally been [[IronicNickname the Roman equivalent of the Aussie tradition of calling the bald guy "Curly"]].[[note]]"Caesar"="hairy". While it's not clear if the first member of the gens Julia to be called "Caesar" (who exactly that would be is murky) was hairy or bald, his descendants definitely tended to be bald, which knowing the Romans is probably why this cognomen stuck. (They loved this kind of joke.)[[/note]]

Caesar is a controversial figure and historians to this day are divided about him. The Republic he overthrew was extremely corrupt and increasingly ineffective, while he provided strong, stable and popular leadership. He was merciful to his (Roman) enemies and widely respected for his many talents even by opponents like Creator/{{Cicero}}, who, in his invective-filled orations known as the Philippics, told Mark Antony that he was no Caesar. When he died he was either about to take personal power as the dictator, or possibly reform the Republic to accommodate its new responsibilities and peacefully and moderately end the spiral of factional wars that had gone on for a hundred years at that point. It is one of the great [[WhatIf What Ifs]] of history as to what he would have done. The impact and importance of his legacy in Western civilization are indisputably immense: for the next two thousand years after his death, rulers would invoke and wear his name as a title and honorific (for example, the German word for "emperor" is [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaiser "Kaiser"]], pronounced just like Julius' surname; Slavic [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Csar "csar"]] (pronounced (and sometimes transliterated as) "tsar") is short for "caesar"). Not bad for what seems to have originally been [[IronicNickname the Roman equivalent of the Aussie tradition of calling the bald guy "Curly"]].[[note]]"Caesar"="hairy". While it's not clear if the first member of the gens Julia to be called "Caesar" (who exactly that would be is murky) was hairy or bald, his descendants definitely tended to be bald, which knowing the Romans is probably why this cognomen stuck. (They loved this kind of joke.)[[/note]]

He took up legal advocacy (like most aspiring politicians of the time) and became famous for his oratory and ruthlessness in the courts. Shortly afterward he sought to improve his oratory further and sought out Cicero's teacher Appollonius in Rhodes. On the way, he was captured by pirates, and infamously acted high-handedly with his captors, demanding they ask for a higher ransom and promising to hunt them down and kill them all once he was freed. The pirates [[SarcasticConfession thought he was joking]], until he actually came back and had them all crucified.

* [[RaceLift Ramzy Bédia]] played him in the 2020 French comedy ''Brutus vs Caesar''.

* ''TabletopGame/TheRepublicOfRome'': Caesar is a playable Statesman, albeit only in the Late Republic deck (his gens, the Julii, is playable as a generic Family card from the start, however). He has by far the best individual stats of all the Statesmen in the game, matched only by Scipio Africanus and Pompey, is one of the few Statesmen who start out with any Popularity among common folk (the others being the Gracchi, Cicero, and again Pompey), and his special ability allows him to promote two legions to VeteranUnit status in every battle (as opposed to the usual one).

* A big case of TheOtherDarrin in the ''Franchise/{{Asterix}}'' live-action films, which all are a comedic take on the character based on the comic books:

** Played by Creator/VincentCassel in ''Asterix and Obelix: The Middle Kingdom'' (2023).

* Played by Creator/TimothyDalton in the ''Series/{{Cleopatra}}'' mini-series.

Gaius Julius Caesar (13[[note]][[DependingOnTheWriter or]] [[WritersCannotDoMath 12]][[/note]] July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC) was born in the month [[UsefulNotes/{{Augustus}} his successor]] would rename after him, July (then called ''Quintilis''), in the year 100 BC, to a minor aristocratic family that nonetheless traced its line back to the foundation of Rome, as well as [[Myth/ClassicalMythology the goddess Venus]] and the hero [[Literature/TheAeneid Aeneas]]. Caesar's father died when he was 16, making Caesar the head of the household (paterfamilias), and within a year he'd attained the position of Flamen Dialis[[note]]High Priest of Jupiter, who lived under a series of religious injunctions, most famously being forbidden to ride a horse, touch iron, touch a corpse, spend the night outside the City, or become Consul; in compensation he got a unique hat and a seat in the Senate [[/note]], for which he had to break off his engagement to a plebeian girl and marry Cornelia, the daughter of four-time consul, the populare Lucius Cornelius Cinna, who at that time was allied with Caesar's uncle Marius in a nasty factional fight with the Optimate-backed Sullans. Marius had died about a year before Caesar became a high priest, but he did approve his nephew's nomination, though historians note that there is next to no evidence of any other connection or bond Caesar might have had with "The Third Founder of Rome".

* Adaptations of the [[Theatre/JuliusCaesar Shakespeare play]]:
** In 1950's ''Julius Caesar'', he's played by Harold Tasker.
** In 1953's ''Film/{{Julius Caesar|1953}}'', he's played by Louis Calhern.
** In 1970's ''Film/{{Julius Caesar|1970}}'', he's played by Creator/JohnGielgud, who played Cassius in the 1953 film.

As dictator he chased Pompey to Egypt, where Caesar was horrified at his enemy and ex-Son-in-Law's fate. Citing a treaty by the old Ptolemaic King that made Egypt a client of Rome, Caesar saw fit to interfere in an ongoing civil war in favor of UsefulNotes/CleopatraVII Philopator. They became lovers until his death and she claimed him as the father of her son Caesarion.

Both Crassus and Pompey were former supporters of Sulla and had profited from the dictator's proscriptions, judicial murders, and purges. At the time, Caesar was the least powerful--a forty-year-old politician whose only achievement was winning a few elections, compared to Pompey, a self-proclaimed military prodigy who expanded Rome into Judea, followed by Crassus, who suppressed the Spartacus Rebellion. Caesar shared the Consulship with Bibulus, whose ineffective attempts to oppose the Triumvirs' agenda led to their term being jokingly called the Year of Julius and Caesar (Romans referred to a year by the Consuls' names). After establishing their authority and passing agrarian reform laws that both helped themselves and benefited the poor, Caesar again went on military campaign as governor of Cis-and Transalpine Gaul and Illyria, conquering most of Gaul (France) and entering Germania across several years of campaigning, with a failed attempt to grab Britannia. While there his daughter Julia--Pompey's (very) young wife--died of illness. Within the same period, Crassus had died on the campaign against the Parthians, and the Optimate (or Conservative) faction, allied with Pompey, ordered Caesar to disband his army and declared his governorship over, at the same time refusing to allow him to stand for a second consulship. They then declared him [[{{Outlaw}} an enemy of the state]].

The public attention from this trial and his vigorous dissents in the Catalinarian Conspiracy debates got himself noticed by the public, and he was elected Pontifex Maximus--chief priest of Rome--a huge gamble that would have ruined him if he failed, as he poured all his money into his campaign, whereas while in office he could not be prosecuted for his debts. As he told his mother before going to the polls, he would return as Pontifex Maximus or not at all. By this point he had become a major player in the Populares, a faction consisting of a loose coalition that traced its legacy to the doomed Gracchi brothers and their policies of distributing land and grain to help the plight of the urban poor and disenfranchised provinces, and of providing regular pay for the army whose low-level soldiers were from the same class as the Roman proletarii. Some of them were sincere reformers, while others were ambitious careerists and opportunists interested in a system that allowed them more room to maximize gains from trade with Rome's colonies.

* A young Julius Caesar (and a highly fictionalized one) is played by Creator/JohnGavin in ''Film/{{Spartacus}}''.
* Due to his prominent historical role in it, Caesar shows up in all of the depictions of the end of Ptolemaic Egypt during UsefulNotes/CleopatraVII's rule (since it also leads to his death).

* Creator/MichelSerrault impersonated a gay Caesar in ''Film/DeuxHeuresMoinsLeQuartAvantJesusChrist'' (1982).

The most famous [[AncientRome Roman]] in history. Brilliant general, orator, politician and writer. Had nothing to do with [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caesar_salad the salad]], [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Caesars the pizza franchise]], the hotel in UsefulNotes/LasVegas, or (probably) [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caesarean_section the surgical procedure]].