Caesar

by Adrian Goldsworthy

  The story that Caesar became Nicomedes lover persisted, but it is now impossible to say whether or not it was actually true. Caesar himself fervently denied this, on one occasion offering to take a public oath that there was not a fragment of truth in the allegation, although all this achieved was to increase the ridicule. In later life he was extremely sensitive about the subject, one of few that led him to lose his temper in public. At the time, his rapid return to the royal court had fired the rumours. Was this an indication of his infatuation, a sign of his naivety that such an action might be interpreted as it was, or a conscious decision to ignore the gossips when there was no truth in the rumours about him? The last is a distinct possibility given Caesar’s urge not to be confined by some of the rules that bound others. In the end we simply cannot know. Perhaps the nineteen-year-old did feel and succumb to an attraction to an older man–‘experimenting with his sexuality’ would probably be the fashionable modern euphemism. If so, then this was the only occasion on which this happened, for it is absolutely certain that homosexuality did not play a part in the rest of Caesar’s life. Given the nature of political debate at Rome, it was striking that the affair in Bithynia was almost the only insult of this sort that others were ever to hurl at him. Other rumours of a similar nature, including a scurrilous work by the poet Catullus, did not win widespread belief, though they clearly bothered Caesar himself. Caesar’s sexual exploits were a rich source of gossip and scandal, and earned him an extremely dubious reputation, but his frequent affairs were always with women. The lack of restraint he displayed in his relations with his female lovers makes it all the more unlikely that he also slept with men or boys, but that this was not commented upon by contemporaries. Caesar’s appetite for women was almost insatiable and his conquests–who often came from the most distinguished families–very numerous. The knowledge of this doubtless added further to the delight others took in repeating the accusation that the great womaniser had once played the woman himself for Nicomedes. Once again, whether or not the story was true mattered far less than that it struck a raw nerve and embarrassed Caesar. All in all, it is more than probable that there was no real truth in the story, although of course absolute certainty is impossible.12

  Caesar had married Cornelia when he was at most sixteen, but it is extremely improbable that this resulted in his first sexual experience, even if it most probably did for his bride. It was common for an engaged girl to live in the house of her future husband until they were sufficiently old to wed, so that Cossutia (whom Caesar forsook in order to marry Cornelia) may well have been numbered amongst the household of the Caesars for a year or two. However, it would have been most unusual for the couple to have anticipated their wedding, and Cossutia was probably anyway some years younger. Yet we should never forget that the Romans accepted slavery as a normal aspect of life, and that in any aristocratic house there would be large numbers of slaves who were literally the property of their owners. Household slaves were often chosen for their physical appearance, for their duties ensured that they would be highly visible to their masters and the latter’s friends. Good-looking house slaves invariably fetched high prices at auctions. Should a slave girl or woman–or indeed boy–attract the owner’s attention they had no legal right to resist, for in the end they were property and not human beings. It was assumed to be quite normal for aristocratic Romans to take pleasure with their slaves in this way, and rarely warranted special comment. That paragon of old-fashioned virtue, Cato the Elder, had regularly slept with a slave girl after the death of his wife. During the civil war Marcus Licinius Crassus had fled to Spain and was sheltered by one of his father’s clients. Living in a cave to evade detection by Marian agents, his host regularly sent him food and drink, but soon decided that such hospitality was insufficient given the youth of his ‘guest’, who was in his late twenties. Therefore he sent two pretty slave girls to live in the cave with Crassus and cater to the natural requirements of a virile young man. An historian who wrote much later in the century claimed to have met one of these slaves, who even in her old age had fond memories of those days. Slaves had no choice in such things, for the owner could use force if he chose and punish them or sell them on a whim. Yet doubtless some female slaves welcomed the attention of their master or their master’s sons and hoped to benefit from a more privileged position. If so then it was a dangerous hope, for they were likely to incur the jealousy of other slaves, as well as, perhaps, the owner’s wife if he were married. It was so normal for owners to make love to their slaves that it seems very likely that Caesar’s first sexual experiences were with female slaves owned by the family. Like many other young men he may also have visited the more expensive brothels with which Rome was so plentifully supplied, for again this was to a fair extent viewed as normal and acceptable. It is tempting to read a note of incredulity into Caesar’s statement in his Gallic War Commentaries that the German tribesmen thought it ‘a most shameful thing to have carnal knowledge of a woman before they were twenty years old’.13

  THE STUDENT AND THE PIRATES

  Sometime after the fall of Mytilene, Caesar transferred to the staff of the governor of Cilicia, Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus, who was operating primarily against the pirates that infested the area. However, in 78 BC the news of Sulla’s death reached the eastern provinces and prompted Caesar to return to Rome. The city was once again facing the threat of civil war, as the consul Marcus Aemilius Lepidus came into conflict with the main body of the Senate. Lepidus was soon engaged in raising an army to seize power by force just as Sulla, Cinna and Marius had done. Caesar is said by Suetonius to have contemplated joining the rebels, and even to have been offered great incentives by Lepidus. However, he soon decided against siding with the consul, doubting both the latter’s ability and ambition. This may simply be one of a number of stories invented in later years under the assumption that Caesar was always aiming at revolution. Yet in itself it does not seem unreasonable. Caesar had suffered at Sulla’s hands and, although he had escaped execution and in the end been pardoned, he had little reason to feel a great affection for a Senate packed with the dictator’s supporters. We should also remember that he had grown up in the years when Rome had been stormed three times by legions supporting ambitious senators. It was a real possibility that this might occur again, and if so, then it was better to be associated with the winning side than the losers, so it may simply have been a question of opportunism, deciding whether or not it was advantageous to join with Lepidus.14

  In the end Caesar chose a more conventional political path, appearing for the first time as an advocate in Rome’s courts. The seven courts established by Sulla in his codification of earlier practices were each presided over by a praetor and had a jury drawn from the Senate. Trials were very public affairs, held either on raised platforms in the Forum or sometimes in one of the grand basilicas, and in either case open to public view. Roman law had no concept of the State prosecuting an individual, and charges had always to be brought by an individual, though he might be acting on behalf of others or indeed an entire community. During their term of office magistrates were not subject to prosecution, but all were aware that they were vulnerable to being attacked in the courts once they had laid down imperium. In theory the fear of subsequent prosecution was intended to prevent their abusing their office. There were no professional lawyers as such, for although a class of prosecutors (accusatores) existed, they came from outside the aristocracy and were not highly esteemed. Instead the parties would usually be represented by one or more advocates who were normally men pursuing a career in public life. Their status and auctoritas greatly added to the force of the case they made. Appearing on someone’s behalf in court was an important way of cementing political friendships or placing other men under an obligation, and also of being seen by potential voters.

  In 77 BC Caesar prosecuted Cnaeus Cornelius Dolabella for extortion during his term as proconsul of Macedonia. Dolabella had gone out to his province after his consuls
hip in 81 BC and had won a triumph for his military exploits. He was a supporter of Sulla, as is indicated by his electoral success under the dictator, but it would be a mistake to understand the court case as motivated by this connection. Caesar was not seeking to attack the Sullan regime, but was simply choosing a prominent man to prosecute. The trial of an ex-consul, and a man who had triumphed, was bound to attract more public interest than that of someone more humble, and offered to place the young prosecutor in the limelight, if only for a short time. The case was most likely inspired by complaints made by some of the provincial communities in Macedonia who had suffered under Dolabella’s rule. As non-citizens they could not bring charges against him themselves, so instead had to go to Rome and persuade a Roman to take the case on for them. Why they chose Caesar is unknown, but it may have been the result of some tie of friendship with the community leaders, perhaps inherited from his father or an earlier ancestor. It is more than likely that Dolabella had abused his power to enrich himself, for such behaviour was all too common amongst Roman magistrates in this period. Men spent lavishly to win election at Rome and frequently went to their province desperate to pay off their massive debts. Governors were not salaried, although they received modest expenses, but they were the supreme power in their province, able to bestow or withhold favours to provincials or businessmen. The temptation to take bribes was great, as was the urge to confiscate as plunder anything they desired. The poet Catullus would later give ‘How much did you make?’ as the first question a friend asked him after his return from a junior post on the staff of a provincial governor. The difficulty for provincials of using the law against their rulers, since they had to travel to Rome and find advocates, further encouraged corruption on a massive scale. In 70 BC the orator Cicero prosecuted a particularly notorious governor of Sicily, who is supposed to have declared that a man needed three years in a post–the first year to steal enough money to make himself rich, the second to provide the money to hire the best legal defence team, and the third to accumulate the bribes for the judge and jury to ensure that he escaped justice.15

  Something of the odds usually stacked against the provincials were evident at Dolabella’s trial. His prosecutor was Caesar, twenty-three years old, of little achievement and from a poorly connected family. The proconsul was defended by Rome’s leading orator, Quintus Hortensius, and the very distinguished Caius Aurelius Cotta. The latter was a cousin of Caesar’s mother, but it was not uncommon for relations to represent opposing parties in court. This was considered to be entirely proper, allowing them both to honour or create new obligations to other senators, and did not indicate any bad blood between the advocates. Caius had been one of the men who persuaded Sulla to pardon Caesar and was to win the consulship for 75 BC. Cicero later recalled watching Hortensius and Cotta in action at this and other trials:

  In those days there were two orators who so surpassed all the rest that I craved to emulate them–Cotta and Hortensius. One was relaxed and gentle, phrasing his sentences readily and easily … the other ornate and passionate …. I saw too in cases where both were on the same side, as for Marcus Canuleius, and on behalf of Cnaeus Dolabella the ex-consul, that although Cotta was the principal advocate, even so Hortensius played the greater part. The bustle of the Forum needed a powerful orator, a man of passion and skill, and with a voice that carried.16

  Caesar was therefore facing one of the most formidable teams then active in the courts. This was not surprising since acting for the defence was considered to be a more honourable role than prosecution. Prosecutors were essential to allow the legal system to function, but their success often meant the ending of the career of another senator. A governor found guilty of extortion in theory faced the death penalty, for Rome had few prisons and tended to punish all serious crimes with execution. In practice the condemned man was allowed to flee the city with all his movable possessions and go into comfortable exile. Massilia (modern Marseilles), the old Greek colony on the coast of Gaul and now part of the Roman province of Transalpine Gaul, was one of the favourite locations for this. Yet for all its consolations such exile was permanent, for the man could never return to Rome. Prosecution was therefore an aggressive action and defence was held to be more honourable. By the standards of the senatorial aristocracy it was better to support a friend facing charges, even if he were guilty, than to seek to end another man’s career. Almost always the defending counsels were older, more experienced men who had long since proved their skills in the courts. It was considered worthier for such men to demonstrate their loyalty to political allies. Prosecution was usually left to the young and ambitious, who hoped to win the fame that would assist them in climbing the political ladder.

  When the case came to trial Caesar delivered a speech that greatly impressed onlookers. Caesar subsequently published a version of this speech–a not uncommon practice, which Cicero was to follow throughout his career. Although it has not survived, we know from ancient commentators that it was widely admired. It may well have been this speech that showed how much Caesar had been influenced by the rhetorical style of Caesar Strabo–in another of his published speeches he actually copied a substantial section of one of the latter’s orations. The words of a speech were only part of the performance–for performance it was as Cicero admitted when he compared the gifted orator to a famous actor (see the opening quote, page 61). How the orator stood, how he dressed and held himself, letting his toga fall in just the right way, his expressions, the power and tone of his voice were all vital aspects of an advocate’s job. During the trial Caesar impressed the crowd watching proceedings as well as those taking part, while the publication of the speech helped to build on the reputation he had won. His voice was a little high pitched, but his delivery evidently gave it force and power. He did well out of his first appearance as an advocate, even though the prosecution ended in failure with Dolabella’s acquittal. The outcome was probably not unexpected, since most governors charged with extortion were exonerated. As usual the defence had been composed of men with far greater experience and auctoritas than the prosecution with the almost inevitable result. The fame won by Caesar was probably little consolation to the Macedonians who had persuaded him to undertake the case, but they had at least demonstrated their capacity to bring a former governor to trial, even if he had escaped conviction.17

  Caesar did a little better in his next appearance in the same court, although once again the accused evaded punishment. This was the trial of Caius Antonius in 76 BC for his rapacity while serving in the war against Mithridates. The court was presided over by the praetor Marcus Licinius Lucullus, the brother of Lucius who had been the only senator to accompany Sulla on his march on Rome in 88 BC. Caesar made a very good case against a man whose guilt seems to have been patent, but Antonius appealed to the tribunes of the plebs, prompting one or more of these to veto the proceedings. As a result the trial broke up without delivering its verdict and Antonius escaped, although his subsequent career proved extremely chequered–he was expelled from the Senate by the censors in 70 BC, restored in 68 and even managed to reach the consulship in 63, holding office jointly with Cicero. Although once again the provincials had seen a corrupt Roman official go unpunished, Caesar had further added to his reputation. However, Suetonius claims that his activities had incurred the hostility of influential men, notably the associates of Dolabella, prompting him to decide to go abroad in 75 BC, ostensibly to study.18

  Caesar travelled first to Rhodes, where he planned to study with Apollonius Molo, the most distinguished teacher of oratory of his day. Apollonius had been sent to Rome by the Rhodians as part of an embassy a few years before, when he had been permitted to address the Senate in Greek–the first person ever to be granted this privilege. By the early first century BC it was common for young Roman aristocrats to round off their education by attending the famous schools of philosophy and rhetoric in the Greek East. In rather a similar way to Caesar, Cicero had left Rome for further study after being active i
n the courts for a couple of years. In his case he spent time in Athens and in several cities of Asia Minor in 78–77 BC, before also going to Rhodes to learn from Apollonius. Cicero describes him as: