The Ides of March—a Day of Murder That Forever Changed History

The Ides of March—a day of murder that forever changed history The assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 B.C still resonates as a day of infamy. Here's how the plot unfolded.

Julius Caesar's bloody assassination on March 15, 44 B.C., forever marked March 15, or the Ides of March, as a day of infamy. It has fascinated scholars and writers ever since.

For ancient Romans living before that event, however, an ides was merely one of several common calendar terms used to mark monthly lunar events. The ides simply marked the appearance of the full moon.

But Romans would soon learn to beware the Ides of March. That iconic phrase came to represent a day of abrupt change, setting off a ripple of repercussions throughout Roman society and beyond.

By the time of Caesar, Rome had a long-established republican government headed by two consuls with joint powers. Praetors were one step below consuls in the power chain and handled judicial matters. A body of citizens forming the Senate proposed legislation, which general people's assemblies then approved by vote. A special temporary office, that of dictator, was established for use only during times of extreme civil unrest.

The Romans had no love for kings. According to legend, they expelled their last one in 509 B.C. While Caesar had made pointed and public displays of turning down offers of kingship, he showed no reluctance to accept the office of “dictator for life” in February of 44 B.C. This action may have sealed his fate in the minds of his enemies.

Caesar had pushed the envelope for some time before his death. “Caesar was the first living Roman ever to appear on the coinage,” Josiah Osgood, a historian at Georgetown University told Nat Geo in 2004. Normally, the honor was reserved for deities. He notes that some historians suspect that Caesar might have been attempting to establish a cult in his honor in a move toward deification.

The plot's conspirators, who termed themselves “the liberators,” had to move quickly as Caesar had plans to leave Rome for a campaign against the Parthians. Two days before his departure, he was summoned to the Senate for what would be a fateful meeting. The conspirators gathered around Caesar and stabbed him to death as the rest of the Roman Senate watched in horror.

What did Brutus have to do with it all? Whether or not Caesar was a true tyrant is debated still to this day. It is safe to say, however, that in the mind of Marcus Brutus, who helped mastermind the attack, the threat Caesar posed to the republican system was clear.

Brutus was famously portrayed in William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar as a tragic hero, while Caesar was written as an unequivocal tyrant. In the play, Caesar sees Brutus among the crowd of assassins and says of the betrayal with his dying breath, "Et tu, Brute?"

Brutus's involvement in the murder is made tragic given his close affiliations with Caesar. His mother, Servilia, was one of Caesar's lovers. And although Brutus had fought against Caesar during Rome's recent civil war, he was spared from death and later promoted by Caesar to the office of praetor.

Brutus, however, was torn in his allegiance to Caesar. Brutus's family had a tradition of rejecting authoritarian powers. Ancestor Junius Brutus was credited with throwing out the last king of Rome, Tarquin Superbus, in 509 B.C. Ahala, an ancestor of Marcus Brutus's mother, had killed another tyrant, Spurius Maelius. This lineage, coupled with a strong interest in the Greek idea of tyranicide, disposed Brutus to have little patience with perceived power grabbers.

The final blow came when his uncle Cato, a father figure to Brutus, killed himself after losing in a battle against Caesar in 46 B.C. Brutus may have felt both shame over accepting Caesar's clemency and obligation to do Cato honor by continuing his quest to “save” the republic from Caesar, Osgood speculated.

It is this moral dilemma that has caused debate over whether or not Brutus should be branded a villain. Plutarch's Life of Brutus, Osgood noted, is quite sympathetic in comparison to surviving documents naming other enemies of Caesar and his successors.

Shakespeare's Julius Caesar was based on Plutarch's account of Brutus. The poet Dante, however, took a different stance: Brutus, in killing the man who spared him, was doomed to the lowest levels of hell.

Scholars disagree on just who was the on the side of good. But in the end, the Roman public turned against the assassins—and the legacy of power Caesar established lived on through his heir Octavian, who later became Rome's first emperor, also known as Imperator Caesar Augustus.

His wife Calpurnia fancied in her sleep that the pediment of the house was falling down, and her husband stabbed on her bosom; immediately upon which the chamber doors flew open. On account of these omens, as well as his infirm health, he was in some doubt whether he should not remain at home, and defer to some other opportunity the business which he intended to propose to the senate; but Decimus Brutus advising him not to disappoint the senators, who were numerously assembled, and waited his coming, he was prevailed upon to go, and accordingly (51) set forward about the fifth hour. In his way, some person having thrust into his hand a paper, warning him against the plot, he mixed it with some other documents which he held in his left hand, intending to read it at leisure. Victim after victim was slain, without any favourable appearances in the entrails; but still, disregarding all omens, he entered the senate-house, laughing at Spurinna as a false prophet, because the ides of March were come, without any mischief having befallen him. To which the soothsayer replied, “They are come, indeed, but not past.”

LXXXII. When he had taken his seat, the conspirators stood round him, under colour of paying their compliments; and immediately Tullius Cimber, who had engaged to commence the assault, advancing nearer than the rest, as if he had some favour to request, Caesar made signs that he should defer his petition to some other time. Tullius immediately seized him by the toga, on both shoulders; at which Caesar crying out, “Violence is meant!” one of the Cassii wounded him a little below the throat. Caesar seized him by the arm, and ran it through with his style 95; and endeavouring to rush forward was stopped by another wound. Finding himself now attacked on all hands with naked poniards, he wrapped the toga 96 about his head, and at the same moment drew the skirt round his legs with his left hand, that he might fall more decently with the lower part of his body covered. He was stabbed with three and twenty wounds, uttering a groan only, but no cry, at the first wound; although some authors relate, that when Marcus Brutus fell upon him, he exclaimed, “What! art thou, too, one of them? Thou, my son!” 97 The whole assembly instantly (52) dispersing, he lay for some time after he expired, until three of his slaves laid the body on a litter, and carried it home, with one arm hanging down over the side. Among so many wounds, there was none that was mortal, in the opinion of the surgeon Antistius, except the second, which he received in the breast. The conspirators meant to drag his body into the Tiber as soon as they had killed him; to confiscate his estate, and rescind all his enactments; but they were deterred by fear of Mark Antony, and Lepidus, Caesar’s master of the horse, and abandoned their intentions.

Suetonius.

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