Julius Caesar's Bellum Civile and the Composition of a New Reality

Ayelet Peer

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317110019
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Ancient History
• Index: History

In his Commentarii de Bello Civili Julius Caesar sought to re-invent his image and appear before his present and future readers in a way which he could control and at times manipulate. Offering a new interpretation of the Bellum Civile this book reveals the intricate literary world that Caesar creates using sophisticated techniques such as a studied choice of vocabulary, rearrangement of events, use of indirect speech, and more. Each of the three books of the work is examined independently to set out the gradual transformation of Caesar's literary persona, in step with his ascent in the 'real' world. By analysing the work from Caesar's viewpoint the author argues that by adroit presentation and manipulation of historical circumstances Caesar creates in his narrative a different reality, one in which his conduct is justified. The question of the res publica is also a key point of the volume, as it is in the Bellum Civile, and the author argues that Caesar purposely does not present himself as a Republican, contrary to commonly held views. Employing detailed philological analyses of Caesar's three books on the Civil War, this work significantly advances our understanding of Caesar as author and politician.

Part I
Bellum Civile I

Illae autem, paribus quas fulgere cernis in armis, concordes animae nunc et dum nocte prementur, heu quantum inter se bellum, si lumina uitae attigerint, quantas acies stragemque ciebunt

These, however, whom you see shining in equal armour, souls harmonious now, as long as they are covered by night. Oh, what a great war among them, if they shall reach the light of life. What battles and carnage they will incite

Virgil, Aeneid 6.826–9

Chapter 1
The Six Opening Chapters

All divine and human laws are confused¹

The first six chapters of the Bellum Civile vividly depict the panic-stricken senate-meeting and the chaotic developments in Rome during the first stages of the war, before Caesar left Gaul. This short yet detailed exposition sets the tone for the entire book, in content but also in rhetoric and style.² Here Caesar employs many of the literary methods which will later feature throughout the Bellum Civile: specific vocabulary, manipulation of facts and chronology, distinctive figures of speech and so on. In these six chapters Caesar defines the balance of power from the beginning and attempts to direct the readers’ assessment of subsequent events, especially in regard to his role in the outbreak of hostilities and the conduct of the Pompeians. By carefully wording and arranging his narrative, Caesar wishes to implant specific notions and concepts in his readers’ minds.

If the Bellum Gallicum carried its readers into the heart of Gaul, the Bellum Civile thrusts them into the centre of Rome and the midst of a tempestuous senate-meeting – even, as some scholars claim, the middle of a sentence.³ Yet this abrupt beginning is a trademark of Caesar’s narrative technique, aimed to catch the readers’ immediate attention. Caesar does not simply narrate the developments of the civil war: he composes a new narrative of the conflict. The Bellum Civile was planned and implemented to pursue specific objectives. Thus it is redundant and irrelevant to linger in the opening chapters on the causes which led to the senate-meeting or the intricate political circumstances surrounding it (and of course Caesar is careful not to implicate himself in the proceedings). Yet Caesar does not omit the content of his letters entirely: he summarizes his demands in the subsequent chapters.⁴ From a literary point of view, there is no real lack of information in the narrative. Caesar deliberately chose to conceal his demands at the beginning, to reinforce the fact that they were not given a proper treatment at the meeting. He discloses them when it is more suitable for him as the narrative progresses.

There is a perfect correlation between Caesar’s narrative technique (manifest in the abrupt opening) and the narrated content: he throws his readers into immediate confusion, make them experience first-hand what the senators felt – letters refused a fair reading, total commotion, armed soldiers nearby – this is the atmosphere in which the senate was forced to assemble and decree. It is not, as Caesar would have his readers see, the proper order of things: in fact, there is no order at all.⁵

The vividness of the report would be most effective if, as I maintain, it was written and circulated in close proximity to the actual events of 49 bc. Caesar is confident that his readers vividly recall the chaotic atmosphere in Rome, and he aims to evoke this feeling of alarm generated by the senate and the Pompeians: by highlighting the uncertainty and fear, his swift and almost peaceful seizure of Italy would be perceived as blessed salvation. This is the line that Caesar follows throughout BC I, and I shall return to it in the following chapters.

Caesar’s portrayal of the senate session not only enables him to present his cause better, it also reveals from the outset his resentment – even scorn – for the current senate, especially at the early stages of the war. The work undoubtedly emits a formidable anti-senate message. Caesar believed that the senate, which in his view mostly consisted of his rivals, was a weak and meek body, dysfunctional and indecisive. During the session the Pompeians spoke first: their views were hostile to Caesar, while his adherents spoke in favour of a peaceful settlement to the conflict. Caesar specifically emphasizes how the feeble senators were being coerced to vote against him by the vociferous consul and the terror of Pompey’s army camped nearby. He conveys this same idea three times (BC I 2.6, 3.1, 3.4–5), but this is not a sign of unrevised or hasty writing. It is the deliberate underlining of what he believes is be a crucial point. This is the heart of his indictment of Pompey, the inimici Caesaris and the senate as a whole. If the Pompeians succeeded in terrorizing the feeble senators, what would become of the powerless people? Caesar’s self-designated role as the people’s guardian could only be understood in the light of this senate-meeting Furthermore, in addition to the pressure Pompey imposed on the weaker senators, the additional gathering of the senate in the evening (after it has already dispersed) also indicates that the political procedure was unlawful, since, as Welch comments, ‘ancient politics had to happen in the daylight.’⁶ Caesar alludes here to a common Pompeian practice of nocturnal movement which will recur throughout the narrative.⁷ Welch argues that, according to Cicero, ‘the res publica was about light’,⁸ and therefore the deliberate night gatherings of Pompey and his followers carries significant meaning.

Caesar’s mastery of literary design is clearly exhibited in BC I 5. The first four chapters reveal a turbulent senate session and another nocturnal meeting with Pompey. Yet while these rapid developments occurred in Rome Caesar himself was patiently waiting in Ravenna, seemingly unaware of the escalation of events in the senate and having no inkling of what was happening until the tribunes fled to him.⁹ Caesar wants his readers to believe that they know more than he did at the time. He places the readers as eyewitnesses to the events and then uses them to point a finger at the senate and Pompey’s conduct. Caesar begins his composition of the new reality by manipulating knowledge. This is the same Caesar who was all-knowing during his Gallic campaign, privy to the most intimate manoeuvres in the enemy camp. Now he wants his readers to believe he was completely unaware of the turmoil in Rome and was taken by surprise.¹⁰ To enhance his point Caesar performs an interesting inversion of convention. Celeritas was most associated with Caesar during his Gallic campaigns, and it was also a feature of his seizure of Italy.¹¹ However, in these first six chapters it is the Pompeians who hurtled into action while Caesar himself sat still and waited. Yet whilst his celeritas brought victory and successful battles, the celeritas of the Pompeians is associated with violence and coercion. Caesar employs vocabulary that illustrates their eagerness to make war.¹² They hurriedly convened the senate in the evening, soldiers were summoned and soon the whole city was full of armed forces as the Pompeians allotted provinces and commands (BC I 3). All these harsh and rash actions of the Pompeians contrast starkly with Caesar’s patience and lenience.

Ultimately, it was the Pompeians’ rapid, even thoughtless, actions that forced Caesar (as he would have his readers believe) to cast aside his inactivity and resume his own celeritas to save his own and the tribunes’ lives (BC I 7). The Pompeians’ actions had a snowball effect: their hasty conduct compelled the tribunes to flee (another rapid action) and as a result Caesar himself was forced to act quickly to answer what he considered a threat to his person, yet his celeritas was eventually what turned the scales.¹³

As part of his indictment of the senate, Caesar digresses from the narrative in chapter 5 to issue a fiery defence of the tribunes.¹⁴ Significantly, he inserts this brief rhetorical backing of their office before he mentions their flight to him.¹⁵ Only after condemning the senate for acting illegally against the tribunes does he mention the senatus consultum ultimum (SCU): the ‘last resort of the senate’, basically declaring a state of emergency which was issued against him by the senate as a result of the vehement senate meeting in Rome. This decision declared Caesar as the republic’s enemy, a hostis, against whom the consuls ought to fight. Caesar thus links the offence against the tribunes with the SCU and places himself and the tribunes as equally injured by the senate. He explicitly claims that the SCU was issued against his command and the illustrious men, the tribunes (BC I 5.4).

Caesar’s choice of words is also interesting. He argues that an SCU was only passed when there was a threat of arson or when the safety of all was in jeopardy through the audacity of a few (paucorum audacia). This phrase was deliberately placed at this point. What Caesar really intends here is for his readers to understand that an SCU should have been decreed against the Pompeians, whose outrageous conduct he has unfolded in the previous chapters. This phrase further alludes to Caesar’s more famous statement about the factio paucorum, which he uses at Brundisium (BC I 22). Again we see how Caesar plants an idea by means of his specific vocabulary, which will be repeated later in the narrative, creating a consistent and cohesive account.

The final expository chapter (BC I 6) serves as a summation of the Pompeians’ preparations for war. We see an escalation in Caesar’s description of their wrongdoing: whereas previously they had hurt the people’s representatives, the tribunes, by forcing them out of the city, they now trampled on the legitimate rights of the Roman people regarding the assignment of commands. Caesar pays special attention to describing the novelty of the Pompeians’ actions and their disregard for the mos maiorum: three times he reiterates the theme that the Pompeians were acting in a new fashion,¹⁶ unlike the tradition (superioribus annis). The first statement refers to their disrespect for the popular assembly, the second to the consuls leaving the city, and the third to the lictors held by private people in the city and in the Capitolium (BC I 6.7). Caesar ends the chapter with a clima...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• Part I: Bellum Civile I
• Part II: Bellum Civile II
• Part III: Bellum Civile III
• Conclusion
• Appendix: Writing and Publication of the Bellum Civile
• Bibliography
• Index