Ides of March

In the Roman calendar, the Ides of March fell on the 15th day of the Roman month of Martius. The word ides comes from a Latin word that means "to divide": The ides were simply the middle of the month.

The date is famous because Julius Caesar was assassinated on the Ides of March, 44 BC. Because of Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar and its line “Beware the Ides of March”, the Ides of March has had a sense of doom. But in Roman times the Ides of March was simply the normal way of referring to March 15.

Although the Roman calendar was eventually displaced by the modern days of the week around the 3rd century, the Ides continued to be used in a vernacular sense for centuries afterwards. When Shakespeare wrote the famous line "Beware the Ides of March!" in his play Julius Caesar in 1599, he did so in the reasonable assumption that his audience would know the date of Caesar's death and so have a good idea of what the Ides were.

The Ides of March are celebrated every year by the Rome Hash House Harriers with a toga run in the streets of Rome, in the same place where Julius Caesar was killed.

Assassination of Julius Caesar

The fear of Caesar becoming autocrat, thus ending the Roman Republic, grew stronger when someone placed a diadem on the statue of Caesar on the Rostra. The tribunes, Gaius Epidius Marcellus and Lucius Caesetius Flavius, removed the diadem. Not long after the incident with the diadem, the same two tribunes had citizens arrested after they called out the title Rex to Caesar as he passed by on the streets of Rome. Now seeing his supporters threatened, Caesar acted harshly. He ordered those arrested to be released, and instead took the tribunes before the Senate and had them stripped of their positions. Caesar had originally used the sanctity of the Tribunes as one reason for the start of the civil war, but now revoked their power for his own gain.

At the coming festival of the Lupercalia, the biggest test of the Roman people for their willingness to accept Caesar as king was to take place. On February 15, 44 BC, Caesar sat upon his gilded chair on the Rostra, wearing his purple robe, red shoes and a golden laurel and armed with the title of Dictator Perpetuus. The race around the pomerium was a tradition of the festival, and Mark Antony ran into the forum and was raised to the Rostra by the priests attending the event. Antony produced a diadem and attempted to place it on Caesar’s head, saying "the people offer this title of king to you through me." There was, however, little support from the crowd and Caesar quickly refused being sure that the diadem didn’t touch his head. The crowd roared with approval, but Antony, undeterred attempted to place it on Caesar’s head again. Still there was no voice of support from the crowd and Caesar rose from his chair and refused Antony again, saying, "I will not be king of Rome. Jupiter alone is King of the Romans." The crowd wildly endorsed Caesar’s actions.

All the while Caesar was still planning a campaign into Dacia and then Parthia. The Parthian campaign stood to bring back considerable wealth to Rome, along with the potential return of the standards that Crassus had lost over nine years earlier. An ancient legend has told that Parthia could only be conquered by a king, so Caesar was authorized by the Senate to wear a crown anywhere in the empire, save Italy. Caesar planned to leave in April 44 BC, and the secret opposition that was steadily building had to act fast. Made up mostly of men that Caesar had pardoned already, they knew their only chance to rid Rome of Caesar was to prevent him ever leaving for Parthia.

The Roman Senate traditionally met in the Curia Hostilia, which had been recently repaired from the fires that destroyed it years before, but the Senate had abandoned it for the new house under construction. Thus Caesar summoned the Senate to meet in the Pompey's Theater on the Ides of March. According to the Roman writer Plutarch, a few days before, the soothsayer Spurinna apparently warned Caesar, "Beware the Ides of March." Caesar disregarded the warning:

What is still more extraordinary, many report that a certain soothsayer forewarned him of a great danger which threatened him on the Ides of March, and that when the day was come, as he was going to the senate-house, he called to the soothsayer, and said, laughing, "The Ides of March are come"; to which the soothsayer answered, softly, "Yes; but they are not gone."

As the Senate convened, Caesar was attacked and stabbed to death by a group of senators who called themselves the Liberatores ("Liberators"); they justified their action on the grounds that they committed tyrannicide, not murder, and were preserving the Republic from Caesar's alleged monarchical ambitions. Among the assassins who locked themselves in the Temple of Jupiter were Gaius Trebonius, Decimus Junius Brutus Albinus, Marcus Junius Brutus, and Gaius Cassius Longinus; Caesar had personally pardoned most of his murderers or personally advanced their careers. Marcus Brutus was a distant cousin of Caesar and named as one of his testamentary heirs. There is also speculation that Marcus Brutus was an illegitimate child of Caesar's, since he had an affair with Servilia Caepionis, Brutus' mother; however, Caesar was 15 years old at the time Brutus was born. Caesar sustained 23 (as many as 35 by some accounts) stab wounds, which ranged from superficial to mortal, and ironically fell at the feet of a statue of his friend turned rival, Pompey the Great. Pompey had recently been deified by the Senate. His last words have been variously reported as:

Και σύ, τέκνον Βρούτε; (Kai su, teknon Vrute?) (Gr., "Even you, my child, Brutus?" – from Suetonius)
Tu quoque, Brute, fili mi! (Lat., "You too, Brutus, my son!" – a modern Latin translation of the Greek quotation from Suetonius)
Et tu, Brute? (Lat., "And (even) you, Brutus?" – from Shakespeare's play, Julius Caesar)

It has been speculated, by Colonel Luciano Garofano, commander of the carabinieri's forensic investigation centre in Parma in a Channel 5 documentary, that Caesar knew of the plot against his life, and allowed it to proceed, going so far as to dismiss his guard contingent in order to allow the conspirators to kill him. This theory hinges on Caesar's epilepsy, a condition attributed to him by several sources including Plutarch. Proponents of the theory suggest that Caesar deliberately arranged to be murdered by the Senate, to spare himself the indignity of increasing seizures as he aged, and to ensure his own legacy. While the public outrage over Caesar's murder did provide a favorable climate for Caesar's heir Octavian to take power, this theory is not currently backed by any evidence to give it credence and fails to account for his Parthian Campaign planning.^*

Detailed account

Here follows the most detailed account of Caesar's assassination, written by Nicolaus of Damascus a few years after the event and likely based on eyewitness reportings.

The Plan

"The conspirators never met openly, but they assembled a few at a time in each others' homes. There were many discussions and proposals, as might be expected, while they investigated how and where to execute their design. Some suggested that they should make the attempt as he was going along the Sacred Way, which was one of his favourite walks. Another idea was for it to be done at the elections during which he had to cross a bridge to appoint the magistrates in the Campus Martius; they should draw lots for some to push him from the bridge and for others to run up and kill him. A third plan was to wait for a coming gladiatorial show. The advantage of that would be that, because of the show, no suspicion would be aroused if arms were seen prepared for the attempt. But the majority opinion favoured killing him while he sat in the Senate, where he would be by himself since only Senators would be admitted, and where the many conspirators could hide their daggers beneath their togas. This plan won the day."

Bad Omens

"Before he entered the chamber, the priests brought up the victims for him to make what was to be his last sacrifice. The omens were clearly unfavourable. After this unsuccessful sacrifice, the priests made repeated other ones, to see if anything more propitious might appear than what had already been revealed to them. In the end they said that they could not clearly see the divine intent, for there was some transparent, malignant spirit hidden in the victims. Caesar was annoyed and abandoned divination till sunset, though the priests continued all the more with their efforts. One other omen was that Caesar's wife had a dream, the night before Caesar was killed, that he was lying on the ground dead and she begged him to not go to the Senate that day and Caesar agreed. But later Caesar decided to go when he informed a member of the senate to inform everyone he couldn't make it and the senator said, "Would you like me to tell them that their Caesar couldn't meet today because his wife had a bad dream?"

"Those of the murderers present were delighted at all this, though Caesar's friends asked him to put off the meeting of the Senate for that day because of what the priests had said, and he agreed to do this. But some attendants came up, calling him and saying that the Senate was full. He glanced at his friends, but Brutus approached him again and said, 'Come, good sir, pay no attention to the babblings of these men, and do not postpone what Caesar and his mighty power has seen fit to arrange. Make your own courage your favourable omen.' He convinced Caesar with these words, took him by the right hand, and led him to the Senate which was quite near. Caesar followed in silence."

The Final Attack

"The Senate rose in respect for his position when they saw him entering. Those who were to have part in the plot stood near him. Right next to him went Tillius Cimber, whose brother had been exiled by Caesar. Under pretext of a humble request on behalf of this brother, Cimber approached and grasped the mantle of his toga, seeming to want to make a more positive move with his hands upon Caesar. Caesar wanted to get up and use his hands, but was prevented by Cimber and became exceedingly annoyed.

"That was the moment for the men to set to work. All quickly unsheathed their daggers and rushed at him. First Servilius Casca struck him with the point of the blade on the left shoulder a little above the collar-bone. He had been aiming for that, but in the excitement he missed. Caesar rose to defend himself, and in the uproar Casca shouted out in Greek to his brother. The latter heard him and drove his sword into the ribs. After a moment, Cassius made a slash at his face, and Decimus Brutus pierced him in the side. While Cassius Longinus was trying to give him another blow he missed and struck Marcus Brutus on the hand. Minucius also hit out at Caesar and hit Rubrius in the thigh. They were just like men doing battle against him.

"While walking towards Pompey's Theatre, Caesar was walking with his bodyguard, whom he asked to leave him. When the man asked Caesar why he would walk alone on a day which he is believed to die, Julius replied "It is better to die once than to constantly live in fear.""

"Under the mass of wounds, he fell at the foot of Pompey's statue. Lying in a pool of blood, Caesar pulled his purple toga (purple is the color of royalty, and the toga is in honor of the Greek culture that inspired him) over his head. Everyone wanted to seem to have had some part in the murder, and there was not one of them who failed to strike his body as it lay there, until, wounded twenty-three times or more, he breathed his last."

External links

Ides of March - Infoplease.com

Roman calendar | Julius Caesar