Rubicon: The Triumph and Tragedy of the Roman Republic (18 page)

Caesar’s own ambitions were one day to consume the entire Republic. His father must have had some influence in fostering them. There were certain things in Rome that it took a man to teach. The young Gaius’ most valuable lessons would have come not at his mother’s feet but standing beside his father as he greeted political allies, or strolling across the Forum, or overhearing gossip at a senator’s banquet. Only by breathing in the subtle scents of power at first hand could a boy hope to develop a nose for the Republic’s manifold complexities. Caesar’s father was well connected, and his name would have opened many doors. In return he would also have held an open house himself. The Romans had little concept of private space. The town house of an aristocrat was less a domestic retreat than a stage on which he could pose and be admired, a projection in stone of how he wished to be seen. Distant from the centres of power the Julians’ mansion may have been, surrounded by the taverns and slums of the sloping Subura, yet it would still have provided Caesar’s father with a formidable headquarters. Suitors and clients would have thronged its hallway. The relationship of such dependants to their patron constituted yet another cross-current that had to be mastered by the aspirant politician. Exploited properly, the support of clients might prove
crucial to his ambitions. A Roman aristocrat was always careful to look after his own. The more influential he became, the more clients would inevitably be drawn to his flame. After 92
BC
, the year in which Caesar’s father became a praetor, his retinue would have begun to mark him out as a figure of consequence. But would it have been large enough to satisfy the expectations of his eight-year-old son?

These were immense. To an extent that was regarded as excessive even by Roman standards, Caesar never let slip a chance to insist on the respect due to his ancestry. His descent from Venus had been drummed into him from his earliest years. His family mansion wore the appearance of a shrine to the Julian name. Beyond a portico designed to echo the features of a temple, the walls of the atrium were hung with forbidding images, the wax death-masks of magistrates, bearing witness to the honours won by the family in the past. Painted lines connected the portraits, reaching backwards into time, towards a Trojan hero and, beyond him, a goddess. Foreign observers were in no doubt about the effect of such a spectacle on an impressionable child. ‘It would be hard to imagine a more impressive scene for a youth who aspires to win fame and practise virtue.’
⁶
The Romans themselves described children’s spirits as blazing like flames at the sight.
⁷
Correspondingly, however, an heir to a great mansion who proved himself unworthy of its heritage was a figure of scorn. ‘It is dreadful when men can walk by it and say, “Venerable old house, dear oh dear, what a let down your current owner is!”’
⁸
In Caesar’s case, contemplation of his family’s ancient glories could only have emphasised its recent honour-famine. His father might have been a praetor, but he was not a consul. He might have been followed by a retinue of clients whenever he walked through the Forum, but he could not call on entire cities or even provinces filled with his clients, as the very greatest families could. Pompey’s, for instance,
arriviste
though it
may have been, was able to mobilise a swath of territories in eastern Italy. The treacherous and brutal Strabo had been an exemplary parent. It was by studying a eulogy of his father’s achievements that Pompey had first learned to read. By contrast, we know nothing of the youthful Caesar’s reading, only what he wrote. The themes of these compositions must have been recognised by his contemporaries as significant, else the memory of them would not have been preserved. One was written ‘in praise of Hercules’,
⁹
greatest of the Greek heroes, the secret son of Jupiter, whose achievements ultimately won him immortality. Another told the story of Oedipus.

Whatever Caesar’s precise views of his father may have been – and it is perilous to argue from silence – one thing is certain: a far more impressive role-model was readily to hand. Following his year as praetor, Caesar’s father was appointed to the governorship of Asia. This was a plum posting. Only some strong string-pulling behind the scenes could have fixed it. Mithridates was yet to launch his invasion, but Marius was already angling for some form of Eastern command. The sudden elevation of his in-law had the general’s fingerprints all over it. As first the Italians’ revolt and then civil war engulfed the Republic, Marius continued to serve as the patron of his Julian relations. Just before his death, during his bloodstained seventh consulship, he planned to shoehorn the young Caesar into the priesthood of Jupiter, a post that demanded a patrician and had been left vacant by the forced suicide of its previous incumbent. Since Caesar was only thirteen, the office had to be kept on hold for him, but already, just a child, he had been sucked directly into the vortex of the civil war.

In 84 Caesar’s father died – of what we are not told. In the same year Caesar himself set aside his
bulla
, draped his body in the heavy folds of a grown man’s toga and officially came of age. The consul Cinna, Rome’s strongman following Marius’ death, now moved
fast. Caesar’s priesthood was officially confirmed. The sixteen-year-old must already have cut an impressive figure, because Cinna also offered him the hand of his daughter, Cornelia. Caesar was engaged at the time, but no young man was going to miss out on the chance of having the Republic’s supremo as his father-in-law. Marriage in Rome was a typically unsentimental business. Love was irrelevant, politics was all. Upper-class women, especially if they proved fertile, were prized stakes in the dice game of advancement. Because girls were far more likely to be exposed at birth than boys, there was a permanent lack of eligible fiancées. ‘Spinster’ is another modern word, like ‘baby’, with no equivalent in Latin. So keen were fathers to cash in on their daughters’ marriageability that girls would typically come of age some three or four years before their brothers. The moment a girl had celebrated her twelfth birthday she could expect to be veiled behind the traditional saffron of a bride. If a wife remained her father’s ward – and most wealthy women did – then her loyalty to her husband might at best prove shallow. Marriages could be formed and broken with dizzying speed, for a sudden reversal of alliances might require an equally sudden divorce. For as long as Caesar had Cornelia as his wife he could be confident of Cinna’s favour. A man did not need to love his wife to prize her all the same.

When Cinna was lynched at the hands of his mutinous soldiers, however, Cornelia must suddenly have begun to seem like a liability. Once Sulla had annihilated the Marians and obliterated the last remnants of Cinna’s regime, she was transformed into something even worse. As Marius’ nephew and Cinna’s son-in-law, Caesar was hardly likely to recommend himself to the new dictator. Even so, his name did not feature on the first proscription lists. Protégé of the Marians though he was, Caesar also had close links to Sulla. The multiform character of the Republic frequently bred contradictory loyalties. The world of the aristocracy, in particular, was a small
one, and the complex web of marriage alliances could end up entangling even the bitterest rivals. Caesar’s mother came from a family who had provided Sulla with some of his most influential supporters. It was an association that was to save Caesar’s life.

Rather than having him killed, Sulla contented himself with depriving the young priest of Jupiter of his office, and demanding that he divorce Cornelia. Caesar, astonishingly, refused. It was this near-suicidal act of defiance that led to him fleeing Rome with a price on his head. Only the continued intercession of Aurelia’s relatives finally persuaded Sulla to pardon the impudent youth. The dictator gave way with a resigned shrug and a warning that the boy had an abundance of Mariuses inside him. If Caesar resembled anyone, however, it was not Marius. The refusal to divorce Cornelia had required not only bravery, but loyalty, a strong measure of patrician hauteur and a willingness to trust to his own luck. These were qualities that Sulla, of all men, could certainly appreciate – appreciate and mistrust.

It must have been evident to Caesar that he would never be entirely safe while Sulla remained alive. He decided to head abroad, but this was not simply a retreat into exile. Now that the fast-track to political pre-eminence had been closed to him, Caesar needed to make a splendid name for himself by more conventional means. As the priest of Jupiter he would have been forbidden to ride a horse, see armed troops or even leave Rome for more than two days at a time. For a man like Caesar, a brilliant horseman, a regular at weapons practice on the Campus, restless with energy and brio, such archaic taboos would have proved stifling. His entire education had taught him to regard glory as his birthright. Now, thanks to Sulla, he had the chance to follow his desires.

They led him to Asia. Caesar travelled there as a staff officer. A political career was impossible for any Roman who had not first served as a soldier and seen at least some action. The East promised
Caesar plenty. Mithridates, the great survivor, was licking his wounds and rebuilding his power. On the Aegean island of Lesbos, the city of Mytilene still held out against the savagery of Sulla’s peace terms. Everywhere there was military and diplomatic confusion. It was a situation tailor-made for a young man on the make.

Caesar appears to have made an immediate splash. Back in Rome his hyper-fashionable dress sense had raised the eyebrows of Sulla, who had commented disapprovingly on the young man’s habit of wearing his belt too loosely. In the courts of Eastern kings, however, stylish dressers were much admired, and the provincial authorities were quick to realise that the patrician dandy would be ideally cut out for diplomatic missions. Caesar was accordingly dispatched to Nicomedes, the King of Bithynia – who was indeed charmed by his Roman guest. Too charmed, perhaps. Nicomedes was believed to have demonstrated his appreciation of Caesar by taking him as a lover, a scandal that was to provide Caesar’s grateful enemies with gossip for decades. All the same, whatever it may have taken, his mission was a success. Not only had he kept Nicomedes sweet, but he had managed to borrow much of Nicomedes’ fleet. Sailing it to Lesbos, he joined in the assault on Mytilene, where he acquitted himself with conspicuous bravery. For having saved a number of fellow citizens in battle, he was awarded a particular honour, the civic crown, a wreath of oak leaves that served as a public token of his valour. From now on, whenever Caesar entered the Circus to watch the games, even senators would have to rise to their feet to salute him. In this way he would become a familiar figure to the people, and his name widely known. His deed would be bruited throughout Rome. This was an honour of which every citizen dreamed.

But if military glory was the surest way to win the people’s hearts, Caesar was far too clear sighted to imagine that it was sufficient on its own. Even though by now it was 80
BC
and Sulla had laid
down his dictatorship, Caesar did not hurry back to enjoy the acclamation of the Circus. Instead he remained in the East, serving with the army, studying how provincial administration worked and winning a reputation among his superiors as a safe pair of hands. Only in 78, once Sulla was safely dead, did he finally return to Rome. In a city still terrified of the dead dictator’s shadow, Caesar was like a splash of colour. ‘He had a talent for being liked in a way remarkable in one of his youth, and since he had an easy, man-of-the-people manner, he made himself hugely popular with the average citizen.’
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Effortlessly charming though Caesar was, this was still a statement of political intent. Crowd-pleasers marked themselves out as
populares.
Marius had been one, Sulpicius too. Sulla’s entire political programme had been an attempt to scotch the
popularis
tradition – the tradition to which Caesar regarded himself as heir.

It did not take long for him to lay claim to it publicly. The year after his return from the East he launched an audacious prosecution of one of Sulla’s former officers. The regime established by Sulla still held a firm grip on power, and the officer was predictably acquitted, but Caesar’s performance proved so effective that it established him overnight as one of the most admired orators in Rome. Already a war hero, seasoned in the practical politics of diplomacy and the provinces, Caesar was now also a public figure. He was not yet twenty-four.

The sheer range of Caesar’s abilities, and the energy with which he developed them, marked him out as a man with a brilliant future. Greatness clearly beckoned. Even so, exceptional as he was, Caesar was not an aberration. The Republic had bred him, and it was the Republic that had channelled all his ambitions and aspirations. Despite the anarchy of the previous decade, the Romans’ loyalty to their civic traditions remained unshaken. They were weary of civil war. Family honour and personal conviction might have stamped Caesar as an enemy of Sulla’s settlement, but he was
not prepared to oppose it by unconstitutional means. That attempt had already been made. No sooner had Sulla’s ashes been scattered on the wind than one of the consuls had launched an uprising against the entire Sullan regime. The revolt had been speedily and brutally put down. Had Caesar joined it, as he had been invited to do, then his career would surely have been finished. All would have been lost on a single throw. Caesar was not interested in such odds. Instead, as generations of the aristocracy had done before him, he readied himself for the ascent to the top, the steady advance from post to ever more senior post. None of his youthful achievements had any value save as foundations for such an attempt. The Republic had always given free rein to the desire of its citizens for glory. Far from shattering it, this was what had raised it to its world-conquering greatness. Caesar’s early career appeared to indicate that, despite the traumas of civil war and dictatorship, nothing had really changed.