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It's September in the year 52 BC. We're in the heart of Gaul, a vast territory that in today's terms covers France and much of the Low Countries. Atop a steep hill sits the Iron Age settlement of Alesia. It's known as an oppidum, a fortified town. The defenses here are massive. It's perhaps the most impregnable stronghold in the entire land. Covered on three sides by a thick forest,
the open front looks out across the rolling ground of what will one day become Burgundy. Arrayed against the fortress are ten Roman legions of Julius Caesar's conquering army. The Romans would normally have tried to storm Alesia, using the latest weapons of war to smash down its walls. But there are 80,000 of Gaul's finest warriors holed up inside. It's a tough nut to crack. Instead, the Romans have waited it out,
laying siege, knowing that Alesius' grain supplies will eventually become depleted. Outside the walls are piles of rotting corpses, the women, children, and elderly, mouths deemed unworthy of feeding by the defenders. Thirty days on, starvation is rife. It's just a matter of time before the warriors capitulate. The main gate opens. Out comes a solitary white horse. Upon it is a man dressed in his finest armor.
He wears a long mustache and braided hair. His name is Vercingetorix, chief of the Arvernians, leader of the united Gallic tribes. The horse ambles towards the Romans. Vercingetorix is so hungry he's barely able to keep his balance. The legionnaires watch in absolute silence. Before him sits Caesar. He reclines in a big chair. Not unlike a throne, he looks almost bored.
It's an affected theatrical display of power. The horse halts a few yards short. Vesenghetorix struggles to dismount. He staggers forward and draws his sword, prompting Caesar's bodyguards to spring to his defence. Caesar stays them. He knows what's coming. Vesenghetorix lays his weapon at Caesar's feet and falls to his knees. Caesar nods his acceptance. The once proud king is led away.
Though there will be sporadic outbreaks of resistance here and there, the province of Gaul has been subjugated. From start to finish, Caesar's campaign in Gaul lasts nearly ten years. It racks up over a million dead. A genocide by any other name. He will enslave a million more.
It's one of those chilling facts that the Roman gladius sword probably killed more human beings until you come along to the AK-47 in the 20th century. Caesar is utterly immoral, really, about his attitude towards atrocity or kindness. It is a purely pragmatic decision. He looks at the situation and thinks, "If I spare these people, if I'm nice to them, will that bring me an advantage and win the war?" It isn't about right and wrong. It's about the end result. The fall of Alesia is a pivotal event.
Julius Caesar has transformed Rome from a Mediterranean force into a continental superpower. He is, though others will stake their claim, the greatest Roman general of them all. Vercingetorix, meanwhile, will be thrown in a cell. There he will languish for six more years. When the occasion befits, he will be paraded naked through the streets of Rome before being ritually strangled.
This is part two of the Julius Caesar story. And this is Real Dictators. When we were last in Caesar's company in 59 BC, he was Consul of Rome. At age 41, he detained the highest post in the Roman Republic. Charming, charismatic, he was a hit with the plebs. His antics have gained him enemies, however. The Senate exists in a state of paranoia about the rise of a populist leader.
Caesar had little regard for the political system. He ran Rome in cahoots with a pair of oligarchs, the multi-billionaire Crassus and the warlord Pompey. They'd styled themselves the Triumvirate. Even now, with Caesar out of office, yomping through Gaul, the Triumvirate still calls the shots. Caesar is in trouble, though. There are charges of corruption hanging over him. The likes of his great rival Cato are just itching to bring him down.
His appointment as a provincial governor has added an extra year to his immunity from prosecution. But after that, as ever, Caesar's triumvirate bodies have worked the oracle. As the freshly minted propraetor, pro-consul of Gaul, he's had his term and his amnesty extended to an unprecedented five years. Cis Alpine Gaul, Gaul south of the Alps, is a cushy number.
It's essentially Northern Italy, a home from home. Technically speaking, Caesar is in charge of Illyricum too, which corresponds to present day Croatia, though that territory won't get much of a look in. Heavily Latinized, Cisalpine Gaul is a good base, close enough to Rome to keep tabs on things, somewhere to figure out his next move. For aside from his legal issues, Caesar needs to clear his debts.
The good news is that across the mountains, in Transalpine Gaul, lies a wild land ripe for conquest, for taxing, plundering and extorting. Professor David Gwynne: "And what he emphasises is the Gallic menace. The Gauls are a dangerous people, they're too close to Italy. It's in Rome's interests to subdue them." For the Romans, there's unfinished business with these untamed Celts.
In 390 BC they sacked Rome. There's something of the bogeymen about them. They're physically bigger than the Romans, rough and ready, hairy, and they worship pagan gods. They set great store in their high priests, the Druids. Their land is thick with mountains and dense forests. Gaul is bounded to the west by an ocean.
to the east by the river Rhine, which separates its natives from an even scarier bunch of savages, the Germans. And as for the north, no one dare contemplate. It's the edge of the world. In the south, within the Roman orbit, there is trade in raw materials, wine and slaves. But the further north you go, the more perilous it becomes. That said, there is no concept of Gaul as a nation.
It's a collection of tribes, some of whom have more contempt for each other than any invader. In terms of military technology, they're not in the same league. However much that Caesar may be itching to have a crack at them, he needs a pretext, a casus belli. It's with some relief, then, that in March 58 BC, Caesar gets word of a massive migration taking place. The Helvetii people,
of what is modern-day Switzerland, have had enough of being harassed by a German tribe called the Suebi. They've abandoned their homeland, all quarter of a million of them, and are trekking across country to start afresh in Gaul's maritime west. Not only is this an exodus on an unprecedented scale, but the Helvetii are cutting across nominal Roman turf, that of a client tribe called the Aedui. Trespassers will be prosecuted.
Leading four legions north, Caesar instigates a clash with the Helvetii at what is today's Seine River. After a series of engagements, he has, by June, secured victory at the Battle of Bibracta. The Helvetii are no match for a war machine that can march an astonishing 90 miles a day. Caesar pushes on, and by September has defeated the Suebi too, shoving them back over the River Rhine.
He's laying down a marker to the rest of Gaul and secured its eastern frontier. Julius Caesar, General Julius Caesar, is back in business. Caesar is a superb general and remarkably both a superb battlefield general and a superb wider tactician and strategist. Not everybody manages both. Caesar does.
And because Gaul is made up of a whole series of independent tribes, you can try and break them down individually. Caesar's got 40 to 50,000 soldiers, and these are very well-equipped soldiers who will become absolute veterans in the course of almost a decade. Caesar returns to northern Italy for the winter. The treasure, taxes, and booty are rolling in. In spring, as the new campaign season begins, he ramps up the invasion.
He expands his army to eight legions, supplementing it with foreign mercenaries, Cretan and Numidian archers, slingers from the Balearic Islands. Within a year, Caesar slashes his way to the northeast, poised for a dust-up with the most fearsome tribe of all, the Belgae. It's a tough slog, and there are reverses along the way. But at Cebes, Caesar's men win a hard-fought victory.
By 56 BC, Caesar overcomes the last Gallic holdout. In modern-day Brittany, in a naval campaign, he beats the seafaring Veneti. In Rome, Julius Caesar is awarded a 15-day supplicatio, the biggest victory knees up ever. His opponents and the Senate are forced to grin and bear it. Not that Caesar can attend personally. Returning home will void his immunity from prosecution. But in some ways Caesar is best out of it.
Rome is fast sliding into anarchy with open corruption, mob violence and political murders. Unseen, Caesar remains a legend. There's a wistful recollection of the old days. Yes, he ruled as a strong man. Sure, he broke a few rules, but there was order. The streets were safe. At least the chariots ran on time. If Caesar can't go to Rome, then Rome will come to him.
In 56 BC, in the off-season, Caesar retires to Lucca, the southernmost town in Cisalpine Gaul. He is joined there by Crassus and Pompey. The three men re-pledge the triumvirate. Amy Russell is associate professor of classics at Brown University.
He would have been constantly writing letters to people at Rome, constantly trying to make sure that his voice was being heard. And he also had plenty of proxies on the Roman political stage. He sends back every year a few people to kind of be his eyes and ears in Rome and also his voice. And also, every winter, people from Rome are coming out to see him. In some ways, it's sort of foreshadowing what's going to happen under the Empire, that there's going to be this kind of movable court where people come to see you rather than the other way around.
Plans are hatched. Pompey and Crassus, who have already served a term as joint consuls, will attempt a rerun. In return for Caesar's endorsement, they will grant him a further five-year extension on his governorship of Gaul. Afterwards, Crassus will be awarded the lucrative governorship of Syria. Pompey will be given Spain. Once again, they're carving up the Roman Republic. If they'd have smoked back then, they would have whipped out some very big cigars.
The consular race is scarred by violence, but Caesar's influence pays off. Pompey and Crassus secure the consulship again, and Caesar gets more time in Gaul. He will boldly and baldly go where no Roman has gone before. Gaul's frontier in the east had been relatively secure, but by 55 BC, the Suebi and other German tribes have resumed their raiding. They must be taught a lesson.
Pushing them back over the Rhine again, Caesar finishes them off in spectacular fashion. Near present-day Koblenz, he has his sappers construct one of the greatest ever feats of military engineering: a 400-meter bridge, built in just 10 days, using massive wooden piles driven into the riverbed, where the water is up to 10 meters deep. It's a marvel of military logistics. It also allows Caesar to cross into Germania at his leisure.
After a punitive 18 days of looting and pillaging, Caesar retreats and has the bridge destroyed, just because he can. There's little point of glory, if, back in Rome, the public remains unaware of it. Caesar appreciates the value of PR, especially when he can't set foot in a republic proper to tell the people about it himself. Great generals have always had their exploits documented, their pet writers in tow to puff them up.
Caesar, by contrast, decides to pen his own appraisal. As it turns out, he's not just a skilled propagandist, but quite a beautiful writer. His series of seven books, Commentaries on the Gallic Wars, will become an influential work on warfare, lauded by the likes of Napoleon.
Though Caesar makes inevitable exaggerations, usually when it comes to numbering the enemy dead, he is smart enough to realize that there are plenty of men in the field, eyewitnesses, to contradict any claim too outlandish. Dr. Adrian Goldsworthy
He deliberately makes them quite sort of impersonal and he's incredibly modest about it all. Whereas people like Pompey, his great rival, left accounts written by others of charging sword in hand, striking down enemy leaders, Caesar doesn't. He leaves it to your imagination. We get some valuable insights. Caesar's emphasis on supply trains, on never deploying the same tactics twice, on the importance of adaptability to conditions.
and the sage advised that wars are won as much at the conference table as they are on the battlefield. His literary prowess does not go down well with his opponents, who now include the great Cicero. They object to the fact that Caesar's writings include something deemed unprintable, the mention of Roman defeats. Awards and all exposés is the last thing they need, especially when spun by a writer so accomplished that he's also had time to publish a study of Latin grammar.
Let's not forget that these are chronicles of horrific war crimes, right? Both in our modern sensibility and indeed in ancient sensibilities, right? He was massively criticized and even threatened with prosecution for what he did in Gaul. And by adopting this kind of sort of dry style that seems to be associated with these formal commentaries, they're managing to convince you that this is a factual, trustworthy reporter.
By putting himself in the third person, he takes himself out of the narrative. But we've got to remember, it's always still Caesar crafting these things. Caesar, by his own admission, conducts mass slaughter of whole tribes, including 8,000 German civilians at the Rhine. He executes Gallic leaders. He has the entire ruling council of the Veneti beheaded. After battling the townsfolk of Uxellodunum, fearful that he may be coming across as a bit too soft...
He has all the captured warriors' hands cut off, and he's not done yet. When he was in the far north, Caesar had become aware of contact between the local tribes and an island across a stretch of sea. The inhabitants, fellow Celts, have long been trading with the mainland in gold, tin, and something Caesar has a particular fondness for, pearls. The existence of this island is not a complete mystery.
It had been charted by the Greek explorer Pythias back in the 4th century BC. He had called it Bretonique, the island of Britain. With its white cliffs visible across the straits, mounting an expedition is a tantalizing prospect. Though as before, Caesar needs a motive. When he uncovers evidence that the Britons have been supplying military support to the Gauls, he has it. In the summer of 55 BC,
The timing seems perfect to mount an invasion. Caesar will use the fleet that had sailed against the Veneti. The ships are brought round the coast to Portus Ittius, probably present-day Boulogne. Caesar has gained good intelligence from local sailors. Putting an army ashore, however, remains a big logistical undertaking. On a reconnaissance voyage, a tribune identifies a port to be stormed: Dubris, Dover.
But the presence of this strange vessel alerts the locals. Caesar has lost the element of surprise. By the time an invasion fleet has been assembled, summer is also turning to autumn. Caesar has failed to take into account something that has kept the island safe over the ages: its weather. On August 23rd, when the fleet sets sail, the channel is already beginning to chop up. The expeditionary force is a light one,
Two legions, about 10,000 men, transported in around 80 vessels. Quite agile, but their cautious advance across the rough water gives the Britons plenty of time to assemble their warriors on the clifftops. They are an extraordinary sight, these savages, covered in tattoos, painted blue with woad. The ships decide to outrun them, moving around the Kent coast. With Dubris no longer viable, an alternative landing ground is found.
The shallow beach is somewhere near present-day Deal. The problems mount up. The deep bottom galleys prove impractical for staging an amphibious assault. Caesar's squaddies have also been spooked by the boys in blue. And now they'll have to jump into the water in full combat gear. As legend has it, the standard-bearer of the 10th Legion takes the initiative, imploring his troops as he takes the plunge. "Jump down, soldiers, unless you want to give up your eagle to the enemy."
Everyone will know that I, at least, did my duty to the Republic and my commander." Spurred on, Caesar's army establishes a beachhead. After a handful of skirmishes, they set up camp. The Britons fight using horse-drawn chariots, an alien concept. Tactics will have to be rethought. The Roman assault force is ill-equipped to fight on through the winter. After twenty days, with the autumnal equinox upon them, Caesar calls it quits.
the Romans sail back, though not before spinning the expedition as a tremendous success. "It's not a full tilt invasion. The Romans have very little sense of how much is in Britain and as they'll rapidly learn, frankly not much. Certainly not enough to make it worth a big campaign. But his first campaign is so short that he feels he has to come back again to make more of a statement." Over the winter, a massive shipbuilding program takes place
By spring 54 BC, Caesar can draw upon 800 ships, purpose built for the task, and he will take twice as many men, plus 2,000 cavalry. As ever, the channel presents its challenges. This time, the shallow-bottomed landing boats prove unstable on the high seas. Squalls inflict considerable damage. The sheer scale of the armada, though, intimidates the locals, and they back off.
Caesar's force makes anchorage off the Isle of Thanet. Properly equipped, and with a regular supply line from the continent, the Roman army disembarks and advances inland. The Britons mount a heroic resistance, but they're beaten back. As in Gaul, the might of the Roman army induces the usual capitulations and offers a friendship from tribes wanting to get one over on their neighbours. Eventually Caesar fords the River Thames somewhere around what is now Brentford,
He pushes north to defeat the powerful warlord Cassivellaunus in present-day Hertfordshire. Southeast Britannia has been pacified. The mission this time has lasted six months, though as before, the stay is not intended to be permanent and there never were any pearls. Again, the autumnal equinox marks the time for withdrawal.
Does he conquer Britain, as later British historians would sometimes say? No, of course he doesn't. But he does establish at least a Roman influence on Britain. And it's very popular back in Rome. After all, he is the first man to project across what the Romans do refer to as the ocean, although, let's face it, you can see from one side to the other at certain places. So it's not a major part of his campaign, but he was proud of it. It was projecting Roman power.
Professor Neville Morley. The broad point is Caesar is actually quite a daring, decisive commander. He takes risks, undoubtedly. Most of them seem to pay off. He's also clearly driven to do things which people sort of haven't done before.
He retires from Britain and it's going to be nearly a century before the Romans attempt another conquest and actually succeed in it. Having pushed the limits of the Roman world beyond anything remotely conceivable, there is wild celebration back in the capital.
You get these votes of public thanksgiving, which suspends all formal business at Rome. Everybody goes and sacrifices and prays. Caesar gets more for the landings in Britain than any Roman generals got for any victory before that. It's the sort of excitement of the moon landing. It's that level.
You'll find even a generation later, you get stories told about Britain that are very similar to the sort of post-Columbus New World stuff of, you know, men who didn't have heads but had faces in their chests, you know, that were half-beast. And that's even after there's been contact. There's still this sense that this is really exotic and very weird. It's while in Britain that Caesar receives a letter. It informs him that his beloved daughter, Julia, also Pompey's wife, has died during childbirth.
Caesar and Pompey are not just heartbroken, they've also lost the one thing that had bound them together. Meanwhile Crassus, whose soldiering days seemed long over, has decided, after a rush of blood to the head, to lead an army against the Parthians, the civilization that spans modern-day Iran and Iraq. The triumvirate is beginning to creak.
The Romans have no conception yet of just how powerful the Parthian Empire is. It is effectively a match for the Romans. And Crassus only has a relatively small army, and it's taken apart at the Battle of Cari, and Crassus is killed. So there's no triumvirate. Now there's just two people. You give two Roman warlords a piece of rope, and they will pull it in opposite directions. While Caesar is in Gaul,
Other parts of Roman society, particularly people like Cato the Younger and Cicero, are actually actively trying to break the first triumvirate up. They don't like it because it's trying to control Rome. What they're really trying to do is break Pompey away from Caesar because they know that they can work with Pompey. Pompey doesn't threaten force against the Roman Senate. They aren't so sure that's going to be true of Caesar. Caesar too has taken his eye off the ball. While he's been in Britain, the Gauls have been mobilizing.
Enter Vercingetorix, who has the strategic sense to see that the Romans can only be defeated with a coordinated effort, rather than fighting as individual tribes. He convenes a grand coalition. Soon the Gauls are in open revolt. Caesar is wintering in Italy when news of the rebellion breaks. He has left scattered forces throughout the country, and they are now vulnerable.
He leads men north, shoveling their way through alpine snowdrifts. For the first time, Caesar as a general is under threat. A confrontation with Vercingetorix at Gergovia, in central Gaul, leads to the unthinkable: a major Roman defeat. With more Gauls now rallying to the cause, Vercingetorix has got Caesar right where he wants him.
Vercingetorix's plan is to retreat to the fortress of Alesia, tempting Caesar to follow him and lay siege. While the Romans are engaged, he has planned for a second, larger force to attack the Romans in the rear. One of the key facets of Roman military success, as we know, has been its engineering. Caesar's army have become dab hands at building ramps against fortifications, even mining underneath enemy positions. They have an awesome array of hardware,
huge battering rams and catapults, assault towers. They even have field artillery, like the deadly Karo Ballista, a cranked spring-loaded gun that can launch high-velocity missiles. But Caesar also has good intelligence. He knows of Vercingetorix's plan. So instead of storming Alesia, Caesar instructs his engineers to do something else: build a wall. In a staggering feat of ingenuity,
The Romans complete an eleven-mile encirclement of Alesia, a fortification complete with battlements and towers. It is guarded with a twenty-foot moat, with walls of stakes and hidden pits, a fortress outside a fortress. Vesemgeterix is now walled up inside, sealed off from the relief column and is lumbering up. Outdoing himself, Caesar then has another wall constructed outside the first,
There are now a combined 23 miles of fortifications in two concentric rings. One to keep Vercingetorix in, the other to keep the second Gaul army out, with Caesar holding the middle ground in between. Crucially, the Roman camp has enough supplies to outlast those inside Alesia. All Caesar has to do is wait. Caesar shows no mercy.
When Vercingetorix sends out his women, children and elderly, assuming they will be granted safe passage, Caesar denies them. They simply die of starvation outside their own walls. The outer Gallic army, by Caesar's estimates, is up to 250,000 strong. So in reality probably less than that, though still vast. But enduring constant attacks from either side, the Romans stand fast. Then on the 30th day,
In a sense, Vercingetorix actually did Caesar a favour. By pulling almost everybody left who wanted to fight together, it actually saved time in beating them. Because after Vercingetorix falls and is taken back as a prisoner, there's no one left to lead a Gallic resistance. And effectively, from this point on, Gaul has become a Roman Republican territory. It's by no means a stable territory at this point.
but it will in fact effectively remain Roman until 406 AD, so for more than 400 years. As ever, Caesar's victory is greeted with wild jubilation by the Roman public. Meanwhile, among his naysayers, Cato, Cicero, and a new senatorial ringleader, Marcellus, it presents another opportunity to bring him down. Caesar presented his raids on Britain as an extension of the Gallic Wars.
but they were never conducted with official senatorial sanction. To the Senate, Julius Caesar is a rogue operator, throwing the corruption charges and the war crimes, and that's quite a rap sheet. And Pompey is still jealous. For his own glorification, he has built a massive memorial to himself, a huge public theater, and yet the people still clamor for Caesar.
The announcement by Caesar that, job done, he wishes to return home and become consul again, is not exactly music to Pompey's ears.
So actually it's now just Pompey and Caesar, and that's much more unstable than Pompey, Caesar and Crassus. I mean, it's not at all clear what Caesar's motives are. Does he actually want to make himself supreme overlord? Is he actually quite happy if he's left in peace in Gaul to carry on capturing people? Quite possibly he'd fancy then finishing the conquest of Britain or something like that.
Is he afraid of prosecution? Once he steps down from his command, he's a private citizen, one of his enemies can bring a court case and suddenly the whole thing falls apart. Pompey has already manipulated his way into becoming a sole consul. He sees himself as the protector of the Roman people. A law has been passed stating that no consul can serve again for another ten years. It should, in theory, prevent Caesar from ever returning to power.
But Caesar has done his maths. If he runs in 49 BC, taking up the post in 48 BC, the requisite decade since his previous stint will have elapsed. Both sides endlessly debate whether Caesar has any right to return to Rome and seek office, even after a decade out of the game. Caesar has no time for the endless machinations. If he can't return to Rome as a legitimate political candidate, then he will return as a rebel.
And so, Caesar moved south with a small force, a single legion, the Legio XIII Gemina. The river Rubicon has little significance as a waterway. About 50 miles long, it rises in the Apennine Mountains and flows out to the Adriatic. Its name comes from the word "rubius", "red", due to the iron deposits in its bed. Politically, however, it's hugely important.
for it marks the boundary between Cisalpine Gaul and the Roman Republic. To cross it in military uniform, let alone with an army, will make Caesar an enemy of the state. He will be committing treason. On the morning of January 10th, 49 BC, Caesar stands before a small wooden bridge and ponders a while before walking across the river. This simple action will give us two expressions: crossing the Rubicon,
meaning to pass the point of no return. And a second one that comes from the word Caesar utters: "Allea iacta est" – the die is cast. The conservative group in the Senate have decided that Caesar is an absolute menace. They also think Pompey is an absolute menace. But they do in the end decide to ally with Pompey.
Caesar then decides, you know, the only way of dealing with this is actually to break the rules completely. He crosses the Rubicon in the famous phrase, and he crosses it with only one legion. This is not actually a full-blown invasion of Italy with all his forces, but it is symbolic. This is a civil war that's looming, not about principle.
It's not about two different visions of a state, like the American Civil War or the English Civil War. This is a Roman Civil War. It is selfish and it is quite simply because Pompey will not accept an equal and Caesar will not accept a superior. A law gets passed. It's the only type of law the Senate can pass itself directly, the "Senatus Ultimum Consultum." It ordered Caesar to lay down his arms and become a private citizen.
What is Caesar going to do? He went to his soldiers. Will you fight for my dignitas? We have conquered the Gauls together. We have done all this good for the Roman state. Now they are betraying us. Will you fight for me? Yes, they will. He's now a public enemy unless he can win the civil war and give himself authority. The reaction of Pompey and the Senate, the optimates, is to beat a tactical retreat.
Caesar's force, though small, is fast moving, well equipped and battle-hardened. It must be confronted only when conditions are favourable. When Caesar enters Rome for the first time in nearly ten years, he finds it an empty city, insomuch as any opposition has now fled. A state of emergency has been declared. Assuring that he means no harm, he leaves his deputy, Mark Antony, in charge, while he hot-foots it after Pompey. Pompey withdraws to the port of Brundisium,
Guindisi then departs for Greece and the east, his old power base. Caesar's troops try to block him, but don't pursue him to sea. In any potential long war of attrition, Caesar knows he must take apart Pompey's armies piece by piece. Pompey still has troops in Spain. Caesar will clean up there first. While Caesar can march into Rome, he has a major legitimacy problem. The legitimate government's basically gone with Pompey.
One person who hadn't was Cicero, who really didn't want to see a civil war. And Caesar goes to see Cicero because Cicero would be enormously useful to Caesar. Cicero is a respected conservative and the greatest orator Rome ever had. But Cicero in the end decides, no, I've got to go with Pompey. Caesar is the aggressor. And that's the way it's remembered in Roman history. Caesar's the aggressor.
The Ilerda Campaign of April to August 49 BC is in modern terms a lightning war, a blitzkrieg. Pompey has left two of his most capable deputies there, Afranius and Petraeus. His loyalists also hold the key port of Massilia, modern-day Marseille. But Caesar's shock troops have already secured the key passes through the Pyrenees. He marches three legions to the frontier in just 27 days.
After defeating Pompey's army in present-day Catalonia, he can now turn his attention to Pompey himself. With a compliant, popularist Senate now in control in Rome, Caesar returns to be appointed dictator. This is a key moment. The days of the triumvirate far behind him, Caesar alone is now the man in charge. As we've heard, the Roman concept of a dictator does differ from our modern understanding.
In Rome, one is appointed to the position for a set period of time. It's a role handed down by the Senate and certainly not intended to be permanent. But as we shall see as the story unfolds, handing Julius Caesar dictatorial authority will prove much easier than taking it back from him. Caesar's pursuit of Pompey is known as the Macedonian Campaign. In November 49 BC, he crosses the Adriatic Sea to the Illyrian coast.
landing in the strategic port of Dyrrhachium in what is now Albania. There he besieges Pompey, though when Pompey breaks out, Caesar is forced east into the open ground of Thessaly. The showdown comes on the plain of Pharsalus on August 9th, 48 BC. The once brilliant general Pompey, now 58, is plagued by a stomach ulcer. Till Caesar went after him, he hadn't seen action in 12 years.
That said, he is still a formidable opponent. At Pharsalus it takes two hours for the armies to wheel into position. Due to the confusion, same uniforms, same language, and with many of the men known to each other, passwords are issued for means of identification. Caesar goes with his ancestral goddess, Venus. Pompey's choice for his troops is Hercules. With the fate of Rome at stake, the Venusians win the day.
The showdown amid the cornfields will, by Caesar's own estimation, result in the deaths of 15,000 of Pompey's men, with another 24,000 captured. Pompey himself has already escaped, but several of his lieutenants are now in Caesar's care. As Romans rather than barbarians, and with one eye on a softening of his image, Caesar treats them leniently. One whose life he spares is a certain Marcus Junius Brutus,
child of his old mistress, Sevillea, quite possibly even his own son. It will prove one of history's great ironies. He is different in his attitude to the Roman opponents in the Civil War. You know, this clemency he breeds is something new and is something different. And later on, after his murder, Antony and Octavian, the men who become Caesar Augustus, they point out, look, Caesar was nice and pardoned everybody and they stabbed him to death. So we're not going to make that same mistake.
Pompey still has his supporters in the eastern Mediterranean, including Egypt. With his new wife, Cornelia Metella, and a handful of loyal officers, he sets sail for Alexandria. The great port city laid out by the Greeks is second only to Rome as a metropolis. It has a population of around half a million. Its great lighthouse, the Pharos, is one of the wonders of the ancient world. It's also fabulously wealthy, a good place to reboot a campaign.
Arriving in Alexandria's great port, Pompey has sent a message of welcome by the boy king, Ptolemy XIII. But as he steps ashore, to the horror of those watching from the deck, Pompey is set upon and stabbed to death. It's an extraordinary twist. Pompey's head is cut off and taken away to show to the king. His body lies on the beach until his party are given permission to come on land and bury it. Caesar has been hot on his tail.
Just three days later, he too pitches up in Alexandria, completely oblivious as to Pompey's brutal demise. On landing, he is greeted by an emissary of the king, who presents him with a gift: Pompey's embalmed head and his signet ring. So he follows Pompey to Egypt to discover that one of the greatest men in all Roman Republican history has been murdered on the orders of a 13-year-old. Caesar is devastated.
For all their rivalry, he had never wanted it to end like this. For a great warrior like Pompey to be murdered in such a tawdry fashion. Caesar was famously sentimental. It suggested one of the reasons for his popularity of the people is actually he's prepared to show emotion. And so yes, may genuinely have been devastated at the death of Pompey, but it is also kind of a good image. Unlike Pompey, Caesar has arrived with 4,000 troops.
But it's still a tricky situation. He cannot openly display his displeasure. King Ptolemy, it seems, had got word of Caesar's ascendancy and had merely wanted to please him. The last thing he must do is offend his hosts. Caesar is offered Ptolemy's hospitality and he accepts. Egypt, it turns out, is in a state of flux too. Ptolemy XIII was just ten when he became king.
He's advised by a scheming eunuch named Pothinus and his army commander Achillas. Technically, Ptolemy rules alongside his older sister, who is also technically his wife, though the king's advisors have shunted the queen out of the picture. Factionalism is now rife. The threat of civil war hangs, one of the reasons that Ptolemy had wanted to curry favor with Caesar. It turns out the queen has been trying to make contact with Caesar herself.
Though ensconced in Ptolemy's palace, he is inaccessible. She must resort to subterfuge. One night she leaves with a male servant and, in disguise, is rowed across the harbor in a small boat. Hiding in a laundry bag, the strapping servant carries her, unchallenged, all the way into Caesar's bedchamber. As the drawstring is pulled, the bag falls down to reveal, standing before Caesar, the most beautiful woman he's ever seen.
She is 20 years old, she is Queen of Egypt, and her name is Cleopatra. Next time on Real Dictators, in the final part of the Julius Caesar story. With his lover Cleopatra secure on the throne, Julius Caesar departs Egypt. After a quick military victory in Asia Minor, he utters the immortal line: "I came, I saw, I conquered." With Pompey's allies crushed, he returns to Rome.
Caesar's rule will prove popular with the masses. But, his increasing megalomania will become a concern. Sworn to oppose autocracy, the Senate will hatch an audacious assassination plot. That's next time on Real Dictators.
