Happy belated Ides of March!
On March 15, 44 B.C., Julius Caesar failed to beware the Ides of March and was assassinated by members of the Roman Senate.
The charismatic, forceful, willful general had been given dictatorial power in the Roman republic by voters sick of ineffective politicians. (Sound familiar?) The Senators were trying to save the Republic by committing tyrannicide, but the ensuring civil war resulted in the rise of Caesar Augustus, the end of the republic, and the establishment of an empire.
Dominic Selwood has written an absolutely compelling account of Caesar’s assassination and the impact it had on the world. The story of Julius Caesar is important to know, especially as our republic contemplates choosing a Caesar of our own.
From Dominic Selwood, The Ides of March: The assassination of Julius Caesar and how it changed the world – Telegraph:
Spurinna was a haruspex. His calling was vital, if a little unusual, requiring him to see the future in the warm entrails of sacrificial animals.
At the great festival of Lupercalia on the 15th of February 44 B.C., he was a worried man. While priests were running around the Palatine Hill hitting women with thongs to make them fertile, Spurinna was chewing over a terrible omen.
The bull that Julius Caesar, Dictator of Rome, had sacrificed earlier that day had no heart. Spurinna knew it was a terrible sign: a sure portent of death.
The following day, the haruspex oversaw another sacrifice in the hope it would give cause for optimism, but it was just as bad: the animal had a malformed liver. There was nothing for it but to tell Caesar.
In grave tones, Spurinna warned the dictator that his life would be in danger for a period of 30 days, which would expire on the 15th of March. Caesar dismissed the concerns. Although in his scramble for political power he had been made the chief priest of Rome (Pontifex Maximus), he was a campaign soldier by trade, and not bothered by the divinatory handwringing of seers like Spurinna.
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