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Caesar’s ambition, talent, determination and his much vaunted good fortune led him on as he rose to supremacy, and prevented him from ever giving up or backing down. Had he been born in another, less troubled age, his reputation might easily have been far less controversial. He could have been another Scipio Africanus, winning unambiguous glory by saving Rome from defeat by a foreign foe.
For all his faults, Caesar was undoubtedly a patriot and a very able man.
Whatever the rights and wrongs of his actions, it is hard to imagine that in any way his life could have been more dramatic.
Caesar the general has been widely admired down the ages. His Commentaries were rediscovered and began to be published again in the late fifteenth century. In the coming centuries as more organised states began to develop increasingly sophisticated professional armies, military thinkers often turned to Caesar’s writing for inspiration.
Until comparatively recently the Commentaries, along with other ancient texts, continued to play a significant part in the education of officers in Western countries. Napoleon often claimed to have been inspired by Caesar and even during his exile on St Helena produced a critique of the latter’s campaigns.
Much of the iconography and language of Napoleon’s empire was overtly Roman, and drew particular inspiration from Caesar and his heirs.
As a military leader Caesar has been widely admired, though sometimes with some critical reservations, but attitudes to him as a statesman have been far more mixed from the very beginning.
Authors such as Livy seem to have been very uncertain about how to view Caesar and his deeds, and certainly did not eulogise him. Given that many of his contemporaries had struggled to make up their mind about Caesar this is perhaps unsurprising.
In many ways the uncertainty about Caesar and how to judge him began with the Romans, who admired his great conquests, but deplored other aspects of his life and career and continued to revere some of his opponents. This uncertainty continued and has allowed many different Caesars to be depicted over the centuries.
Shakespeare was not the first playwright to take Caesar as a subject, and he was certainly not the last, many, including Voltaire, writing plays or operas looking at some or all of his life. The assassination has probably attracted most attention due to its inherent drama, and after that the affair with Cleopatra with all the hints of the exotic East and eroticism.
Caesar did a lot in his life, and the period in which he lived was very eventful and well documented, so that such attempts to cover all of his career have been almost as rare in novels as on celluloid.
Historical facts are only one concern to dramatists, scriptwriters and novelists alike, and have to be balanced against the demands of storytelling. Some have been far more faithful than others, but it would be unreasonable for an historian to criticise too much any deviations from the recorded fact (which itself is problematic at times) in works of fiction. Between them they have presented many different views of Caesar, but then it should also be noted that over the last two centuries serious historians have depicted his character, aims and importance in very different ways.
There are some things we do not know and are unlikely ever to know. The aim has been to treat each episode in his life without assuming the inevitability of subsequent events. Some aspects of his character, for instance his emotions in public and private life, his beliefs and particularly his ambitions in his final years, remain mysterious. They can be guessed at, but not known,
Over two thousand years later his story still fascinates. One thing is certain – these will most certainly not be the last words written about Caius Julius Caesar.
