Caesar's assassination. Justifiable?

[Longshanks]

Do you consider the assassination of Julius Caesar a justifiable act? Was it a heroic killing of a tyrant that wanted to be king, or the craven murder of a reformer that threatened the old oligarchy?

[Colovion]

a link to get us started (http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/H/history/guide03/part11.html)

Had I been Brutus I don't think I would have done anything different. I mean I know that we all mourn the loss of Caesar - probably largely to do with Mr. Shakespeare's tragedy ---- see? the word itself makes you feel bad about Caesar dying).

In the end, he was a dictator in a society that didn't care for them all that much (yet).

[Al Khalifah]

Caesar was a man before his time and a visionary of what Rome would later be. He established enfranchisement as a way of bringing other peoples' loyalty to Rome and used soldiers from other cultures to compensate for weakness in the Roman military machine, such as his Germanic cavalry.
Unfortunately the aristocrats in Rome didn't like seeing the power they had historically regarded as their right in the hands of one man, who could dispense it at his will (though real power can never truly be given).
The assasination was not justified but is perfectly understandable. To say Caesar was harming democracy would hardly be a justification for the assassination, since the assassins only wanted his power for themselves. They believed in democracy only as long as it gave them the result they wanted - the same families had held power in Rome since its foundation as a republic and were effectively responsible for the prevention of the spread of democracy by blocking measures to enfranchise new peoples as citizens. It was an understandable killing because powerful people do not like to see ceilings placed on how far their influence can go.

In short, the greed of the assassins was the reason for the assassination, not the good of the people under Rome's dominion.

[nokhor]

good question. the assasins removed caesar because he was a threat to the old system but the old system had produced men like caesar and pompey and marius and sulla. and the assasins, like caesar didn't produce a long term solution because another one like caesar arose after his death. so i'd say they were treating the symptom and not the disease.

[Watchman]

"Justified" ? What's justification to do with it, except of course beyond the rhetoric of the culprits ? A power struggle is a power struggle, regardless of the propaganda the participants throw around. The Roman emperors generally died of unnatural causes anyway; if I recall correctly, exactly two died a natural death...


Caesar was a man before his time and a visionary of what Rome would later be. He established enfranchisement as a way of bringing other peoples' loyalty to Rome and used soldiers from other cultures to compensate for weakness in the Roman military machine, such as his Germanic cavalry.Uhh... and old Julius lived when ? First century BC ? Rome had been assimilating conquered peoples and recruiting them into the army since the very beginning - that's what made it possible for them to lose an army after army to Hannibal and Spartacus and other military disasters, raise some new ones and come back for more.

Mercenaries are something everyone used anyway. Caesar wasn't exactly a pioneer in that regard either.

[Pindar]

If one accepts that republicanism is superior to monarchy or dictatorship, even oligarchic republicanism, then the assasination was justified.

and Parthia was lucky.

[Mouzafphaerre]

-
The assasination triggered the events resulting in Octavianus founding the empire to save the republic. :charge:
-

[caesar44]

Caesar was a man before his time and a visionary of what Rome would later be. He established enfranchisement as a way of bringing other peoples' loyalty to Rome and used soldiers from other cultures to compensate for weakness in the Roman military machine, such as his Germanic cavalry.
Unfortunately the aristocrats in Rome didn't like seeing the power they had historically regarded as their right in the hands of one man, who could dispense it at his will (though real power can never truly be given).
The assasination was not justified but is perfectly understandable. To say Caesar was harming democracy would hardly be a justification for the assassination, since the assassins only wanted his power for themselves. They believed in democracy only as long as it gave them the result they wanted - the same families had held power in Rome since its foundation as a republic and were effectively responsible for the prevention of the spread of democracy by blocking measures to enfranchise new peoples as citizens. It was an understandable killing because powerful people do not like to see ceilings placed on how far their influence can go.

In short, the greed of the assassins was the reason for the assassination, not the good of the people under Rome's dominion.

agree with every word !!!
people often think that rome in the first century bce was a democratic repulica and bad caesar killed it ....
the facts are these - rome at that time was aristocratic oligarchy against the commons who were poor and so on , caesar who was really a unique man saw that the old system had to be gone to save the empire
he who was an aristocrat produced lows for the commons who loved him for that
brutus and his oligarchic friends wanted to conserve the old system and for that they killed the greatest man rome ever produced !!!
now we must not judged caesar with a modern point of view , back then there was no real democracy in the world so caesar managed to break an oligarchic government for a peoples dictatorship that could not came with out the people desire

heil caesar !!! the man who gave his name to emperors !

[Somebody Else]

Gaius Julius occupies a shifting place in my mind - sometimes I admire him for his skill in manipulating the politics of Rome, others I deplore his ideals - he was doing what he did purely for personal advancement within Rome.

His nephew on the other hand, I have a great deal of respect for him - he reorganised the empire in such a way that those with ambition would not expend all their enegy, and the resources of Rome, against each other (sometimes by having them killed, but that's the way things were).

I don't believe there were all that many Roman politicians who ever really believed in helping the people - they may have appeared to in order to gain support, but those that truly believed in helping the proles, the Gracchi, Livius Drusus, were recognised as traitors to their class, and quickly dealt with.

[Al Khalifah]

Rome had been assimilating conquered peoples and recruiting them into the army since the very beginning
Very slowly. In Caesar's day, not even all of Italy had Roman citizenship. The Gracchi lost all of the vast power they had accumilated in Rome about 50 years before because they proposed full citizenship for the Latin allies of Rome (essentially the same blood as the Romans). Barely any of the other peoples in the Roman Empire were citizens in Caesar's day and Caesar was the first to recruit non-citizens to the army en-mass (a progression started by his close relative Marius). Plus, if you lived outside of Latinium, voting rights were of little use to you anyway because you had to go Rome to vote. The 'native' Romans were xenophobic and oligarchic.
Rome was not a Republic before Caesar, Rome wasn't a Republic after Caesar. His assassination essentially transfered the ultimate power of Rome from a very small group of people to a single person.

I remeber seeing a programme from Britain a while ago about how Caesar was aware that there was an assassination plot against him and he knew when it was likely to occur, yet he went to the senate anyway. The suggestion of the programme was almost that Caesar planned his own death, perhaps because the troubles of trying to drag Rome through the necessary reforms to survive as an Empire became too much for one man. Caesar certainly wasn't planning on staying in Rome and languishing in his own eminence anyway. Before the assassination Caesar had made the copious plans and preparations for Rome's greatest ever campaign against the Parthians, most likely trying to emulate his icon Alexander. Such a campaign would've been lengthy and the conditions would be extremely hard on Caesar and most likely he would've died on campaign succesful or not at his age.

[Stefan the Berserker]

The assasination of Caesar was justified, the thing that was not is the lacking of plan behind it. His Fellows were still alive and filled his Position, together with no restauration of the Republic to save it.

However if Rome should have stayed a Republic, it would have required a Reformation they have simply not done. They should have created small Parilaments for the Provinces rise Elections for Tribunes from those, aka introduce some Federalisation. The Fusion of Militery and political Power of the roman Provincegouvanors made them so dangerous and destructive for the Empire, like Caesar himself made abuse of his Power in Gaul.

[Al Khalifah]

Cicero said after the assasination that it was a good dead but one half done.

By this he meant the assasins should also have killed Mark Anthony whom Cicero correctly believed would take the reigns of power after Caesar's death. Cicero constantly criticised the abuses of power being comitted by Mark Anthony in his Philippics, although he actively supported the rise to power of Octavian because he believed that Octavian could be manipulated by himself. However when Anthony proscribed Cicero, Octavian did nothing.

[nokhor]

the romans never solved the problem of a peaceful transfer of power. caesar and augustus may have transferred it from an oligarchy to a monarchy but the romans continued to be politically unstable at the top. if it was a stable dynasty, then you only had the murders because of court intrigue or the wars between various heirs to the throne. otherwise it was anybodys game as the successful governers and army commanders fought each other for it. they tried many expedients, primogeniture, adoption, college of equal emperors, a junior and a senior emperor. but it all failed.

i believe that the true reason behind the fall of the roman empire wasn't barbarian invasions or lead plumbing but rather this incessant political instability at the top. how many times did thousands and thousands of romans die fighting other romans, not to mention the maimed that survived and the countless civilians casualties and the roman cities that were sacked by roman troops in their endless wars against each other? whats amazing is that not only did they manage to survive like this for so long, but that they even managed to expand with this faulty system and thrive culturally too.

[caesar44]

if caesar was not there he must have been invented
what the oligarch government had in mined
atjanuary of 49 ? that they could ignore the people desire for a new gracchi ? that caesar will disband his troops and go home , leaving his clients for their bad fate ?
what they had in mind in march 44 ? "o we will kill the tyrant and that's it and
our beloved republica will survive..."
they really thought that they can ignore caesar's veterans ?
caesar's popular reforms , caesar's heir ? caesar's popularity among the commons ?
the murder was a fattalic
mistake ! caesar in 5 years could smash the thracians defeat the parthians for years to come , established a
provincial government , free the italics from the oligarch etc'
even if brutus had a magnificent
program for the after caesar period including the murder of antonius and even of octavianus do you realy think that
no general could emerge and take the government ? marius did it cinna did it sulla did it pompey did it and even cassius himself could done it (you can look at his rule in the east in 43 - 42 to see the tyrannical potential of him)