The Rise of History’s Greatest Emperor: An Untold Story - Alex Petkas

0:00 Why is learning about Roman history useful

0:02 or instructive at helping us in the modern world?

0:05 Why should anybody care?

0:07 I think that So, when I was starting my podcast,

0:15 I had I'd been doing it for a couple

0:16 of months with a kind of hunch on this question.

0:20 And I wasn't really able to articulate it to my satisfaction.

0:25 But it a friend of mine a few months

0:28 in recommended that I read this book by Nietzsche.

0:32 One of his early books that and I'd read some Nietzsche before.

0:37 It's called On the Advantage and Disadvantage of History for Life.

0:43 And Nietzsche talks in there about how history can sort of drain the life

0:50 out of you and turn you into a kind of crippled shell of a person.

0:57 It can kind of get you in this state where you question all of your decisions.

1:04 It can kind of overload you with knowledge and cause you

1:08 to retreat into the the cloister or the library or, you know,

1:13 be a kind of opiate for a life that is not fulfilling.

1:18 But he says that and and he quotes Goethe

1:21 at the beginning of that that book that something like Goethe said,

1:26 I hate all knowledge that does not quicken and enliven me.

1:32 Like away with it.

1:33 And and history can be very quickening and enlivening.

1:37 And the way that Nietzsche frames it is um the most like

1:40 enlivening approach to history is embodied by one of his favorite authors,

1:46 Plutarch, this this great ancient philosopher who was also

1:50 one of history's most widely read and entertaining biographers.

1:54 And um and Plutarch embodies this mode of reading history

2:00 or mode of like approaching any number of subjects really,

2:04 not really not just history,

2:06 kings and battles, but like art history or like engineering,

2:11 um statuary, and he calls it monumental the monumental approach to history.

2:17 Where you're looking not so much for precise facts,

2:23 um although the facts kind of matter for the story.

2:26 You're looking for examples of greatness.

2:29 You're and you're looking for those examples,

2:31 and this is me interpreting Nietzsche a little bit,

2:34 but I I think of history as a kind of a source for finding your true self.

2:45 For like you're kind of looking for yourself.

2:47 You're looking for somebody who's trying to do

2:49 something um that is the that represents

2:54 a version of the greatest thing that you could do with your own life.

2:58 And so it's about like finding resonance for uh for achievement.

3:03 And I I think this is what the greats tend to get out of history.

3:06 There's a lot of stories of this happening.

3:08 Um Julius Caesar and the statue of Alexander is a famous one.

3:12 So I that's what I look to history for and it's

3:16 where I've gotten a lot of my own inspiration.

3:19 Um and I I think it's about um ultimately about like emulation imitation.

3:26 And there's there's a lot of philosophy around

3:28 this that we could dig dig into a little deeper.

3:31 Isn't it crazy that we think about history as being one thing

3:34 or at least the uninformed amongst us think about history as being one thing,

3:38 but I found out recently that ancient Egypt had their own Egyptologists

3:44 because Egypt was so old that 2500 BC was studying 5000 BC.

3:52 Yeah.

3:53 So the same thing that people of history

3:55 were learning from people from their history.

3:57 Yeah, and uh I I studied for a little while

4:02 with this great scholar when I was in grad school and he

4:05 said um he was a specialist in the late Roman world

4:08 like um 4th century AD and it's uh he would always say,

4:14 you know, "Late antiquity is a very old world."

4:18 And and it is because they have been they are

4:23 in the in the 4th century AD they're as far

4:25 away from Homer as we are from Charlemagne, you know?

4:29 It's crazy to think I mean the world hasn't changed as much

4:32 for them as it has for us since that that time period.

4:35 But even Plutarch, who's a kind of model for for so many things for me,

4:39 he's he's a Greek philosopher in living

4:42 in the Roman Empire in the reign of um Hadrian,

4:45 Trajan, so you know, Roman peace about 100 AD is like his, you know, apogee.

4:51 He's studying and doing the biographies of figures that lived um 500,

4:56 700, down to around 100 to 200 years before him.

5:01 So, it's all really old and they already kind

5:03 of have this deep conception of um what history is,

5:06 what what it's for and and uh and a sense of tradition and like, you know,

5:11 I think we we can learn a lot from the way that they approach their own history,

5:13 which is often very different from the way

5:15 that we approach them or we approach our own history.

5:17 Hm.

5:18 What about Julius Caesar?

5:19 What can we learn about living a good life from him?

5:22 Well, to to come back to this example that uh

5:26 probably my favorite story about Caesar and it's a famous story

5:30 so people might have heard of it but uh maybe

5:33 they haven't like kind of grasped the true meaning of it.

5:37 So, Caesar is a young man in um sort of mid-career, early 30s.

5:44 He's gotten a job as a quaestor and um that's like for for what he gets

5:50 sent sent off for his tour of duty one year to Spain which is a Roman province.

5:56 And a quaestor is like a chief of staff the paper

6:01 guy for like a Roman governor a consul or a proconsul

6:06 and at one of one of his leisure moments Caesar

6:09 is going around with his friends in a a temple.

6:14 And the temple it's a temple to Hercules and a temple

6:18 in antiquity is kind of like a museum that's like

6:21 where you would put great statues and art and you

6:26 know dedications and you know gold and stuff on the walls.

6:29 And he's going in there they're like touring the museum as it were Caesar

6:34 and his buddies and you know his buddies kind of keep moving on and they

6:37 realize they look back Caesar is is not with them and he's he's standing

6:41 in front of a statue of Alexander the Great in this temple of Hercules.

6:45 And and they're like Caesar are you coming what wait a sec are you crying?

6:52 Cuz he's weeping in front of the statue of Alexander the Great.

6:56 And he looks to them and he says do you

6:57 not think it is a matter for tears that when Alexander

7:01 was my age he was the ruler of so many great

7:05 peoples and yet I have done nothing worthy of great renown.

7:11 [gasps]

7:10 And this is only one of two instances that we know of where Julius Caesar cried.

7:17 The Romans weren't really into crying as much as the Greeks.

7:22 I think they were they were a little bit

7:23 more open I think they were about like us.

7:26 The Greeks are crying all the time.

7:27 I mean if you read Homer you know Achilles is you know bawling

7:31 and throwing ash on himself when his buddy Patroclus dies in the Trojan

7:35 War and in the Odyssey it's like it's like every single time somebody

7:39 mentions the word Troy like everybody just bursts out in tears and you know,

7:44 his family's always crying for him cuz they don't know where

7:47 he's where he is and Odysseus is always crying about everything.

7:50 But the the Romans were a little bit more restrained.

7:52 So so I think for for Julius Caesar to cry there,

7:56 it it's something happened that was really significant for him.

8:01 And how I read that is Caesar I mean,

8:06 he's he's already had a pretty promising career so far.

8:11 Um some some great stories already have

8:13 happened from from early in in his youth.

8:15 He's uh he's a quaestor, which is not nothing.

8:17 Um he's got the Roman Medal of Honor equivalent,

8:21 the the civic crown for risking his life to save a fellow citizen.

8:26 But he's kind of looking back on his 20s

8:30 and he's thinking I've just been screwing around the whole time.

8:35 This is what I have to do.

8:36 He's he's like he's realizing in this moment what what his destiny is.

8:42 Or or if you want to not use the word destiny,

8:45 he's realizing like what he should be doing.

8:48 And and that's the moment where it it kind of hits him.

8:51 It's painful to realize that you haven't been living the life to the to the full

8:57 extent of what you should be doing and are capable of doing.

9:00 Mhm.

9:00 And I think that's a that's a really powerful moment for um it it it it

9:05 kind of like encapsulates how is what why

9:09 I think it's uh resonates with me so much.

9:12 That's how we need to be approaching history.

9:14 That's how we need to be approaching the greats.

9:15 Like you you need to be looking for that moment of resonance

9:19 with somebody that just like cracks you open and like ah, I realize it.

9:24 Now, personally, I don't have that with Julius Caesar himself.

9:26 You know, I'm not trying to do the Julius Caesar thing.

9:29 And it's not every Roman who's great who

9:33 had that kind of thing with Alexander the Great.

9:35 I mean, that that says a lot about a man that he

9:37 really sees himself as like somebody who needs to emulate Alexander.

9:43 Um But but do you know, you can definitely learn from that lesson

9:46 of like trying to find that that unique

9:49 resonance with somebody who kind of tells you what you're supposed to be like.

9:52 And I think that Caesar had this like depth to him that that illustrates also.

9:58 What does that tell us about Caesar's ambition, level of ambition?

10:02 Yeah.

10:03 Well, off the off the charts for sure.

10:05 But I think that you can also understand a lot

10:10 about Caesar's ambition from looking earlier in his childhood.

10:14 So, um And and there's a great story on this, but I

10:18 kind of got to give the context like laying out um Caesar's world.

10:25 So, he grows up in Rome and and he's from this great family, on the one hand.

10:31 So, he's got on his mom's side,

10:34 the the the Anky Marky go back to the King Ancus Marcius.

10:40 It's the Marky family that go back to King Ancus Marcius,

10:42 who's just it's quasi-mythical Roman king from the 6th century BC,

10:48 you know, 500 years of history on his mom's side.

10:52 And then on his dad's side, they're they're the Julius clan.

10:55 And they go all the way back to the mythic founder of Rome,

11:00 Aeneas, who was the son of Venus and a mortal.

11:04 And so, they you got 1,200 years on that side.

11:06 So, they've got some real blue blood.

11:10 But, they're kind of they haven't really

11:13 accomplished a lot in the past few generations.

11:15 They're not one of the like power elite families.

11:18 Um Uh like the Metelli or the Cornelii.

11:23 There's there's like other families that are

11:24 a lot more prominent than the Julius family.

11:26 And they they live in a kind of seedy part of Rome, the Suburra.

11:31 And he grows up in this kind of dirty part of town.

11:35 I mean, I know you worked in the kind of event and the nightclub world.

11:39 Like, Caesar would have been like a kid hanging out in the street

11:42 playing dice with his buddies outside of outside of a bar.

11:46 This the Suburra was a kind of place that you you

11:50 didn't really want to live if you had a better option,

11:53 but, you know, every young aristocrat on a summer night like to go visit.

11:58 There's like brothels and And so,

12:00 he's in contact with the the the underbelly of Rome,

12:05 and his family has is aligned on the what

12:10 you would call the Roman left of politics.

12:13 There's there's two main you can call them factions or kind of political styles,

12:18 but there's two kind of main poles in Roman politics.

12:21 And on the one hand, there are the optimates,

12:24 the the kind of oligarchic or aristocratic faction,

12:29 um who stand for the ancient prerogatives

12:32 of the Senate and the you know, the tradition.

12:36 They they tend to monopolize the priesthoods.

12:38 They're all about what family are you from, who you're marrying,

12:42 and so-and-so's great-great-grandfather was a consul, who are you?

12:47 That whole attitude.

12:49 And they're they're they're very much for the status quo.

12:54 And on the other hand,

12:55 you have the populists who are about things like land reform,

13:00 redistributing public lands.

13:02 They're really into merits and promoting talented outsiders.

13:07 And and Caesar has really strong connections there because his um his aunt

13:15 is married to one of the greatest populist figureheads in Roman history,

13:20 this guy Gaius Marius, who was an outsider himself to the Roman power elite,

13:24 but kind of forced his way in by talent.

13:27 He wins a number of wars for them.

13:30 And so he grows up with Gaius Marius as his uncle.

13:34 And Marius, you know, made a big fortune in his career like from starting

13:40 very low and then he kind of married into respectability,

13:43 which is Caesar's family represents kind of poor respectability.

13:46 And and then [clears throat] there is Caesar

13:51 loses his dad when he when he's a teenager.

13:55 This is dad like drops dead tying his shoes one day, kind of a freak thing.

14:02 Maybe he had a heart attack.

14:03 And Caesar's probably early teens at that point.

14:06 And his dad actually looked like he was on a good track.

14:09 He he been a praetor, hadn't been consul.

14:13 Praetor is the second highest office, consul is the highest.

14:16 And he died just before he got a shot to run for consul.

14:21 So Caesar like had a father figure but lost him.

14:25 And then So I imagine Gaius Marius might have been

14:29 kind of like a father figure to to Julius Caesar.

14:31 I mean we don't know a lot about that.

14:33 But um what what happened up happening is Caesar

14:41 promising young man 16 years old he is he

14:47 he gets a great opportunity to marry the daughter

14:52 of one of the most powerful men in Rome.

14:55 Who is Marius's colleague, his associate, this guy Cinna,

14:59 who has a run for he's he's consul for like 3 years and also a populist,

15:04 also kind of against the oligarchic establishment.

15:08 And right around the time that this is

15:11 happening this incredibly bloody war breaks out.

15:15 Civil war between the optimates and the populists.

15:18 And it's very complicated, we can go into the details if you want,

15:21 but essentially Marius dies toward the beginning of the war,

15:24 Cinna dies a little a little further in, and the the Optimates

15:30 led by a man named Lucius Cornelius Sulla win this war.

15:35 Just like blood running through the the whole like every valley in Italy.

15:39 I mean, tens of thousands,

15:41 maybe more than 100,000 Roman citizens, Roman allies killed.

15:45 It's It's just horrific.

15:46 It's It's I'd probably worse than than the civil

15:49 war that he ends up fighting later in his life.

15:51 But, um so Caesar is married to Cinna's daughter.

15:58 And when Sulla comes like marches into Rome after winning the civil war,

16:03 he was you know, came like invaded Italy from a foreign campaign.

16:07 He comes into Rome and he gets elected dictator.

16:10 He kind of forces himself to be elected dictator,

16:12 which is like a temporary office at Rome.

16:15 And he's uh he's kind of mopping up.

16:18 He um does famously the this campaign called the proscriptions,

16:26 which is basically a purge of all of his enemies.

16:29 Never been done in Roman history.

16:31 They'd never had a civil war before.

16:33 They for 400 years they'd had civic more more or less civic concord.

16:37 And um there'd been some incidents uh in the previous generation,

16:41 but nothing like this.

16:43 Sulla posts the names of all the people from the leadership classes of Rome.

16:51 The rich Some of the richest men, the most influential, well-connected,

16:55 grand family men from the populace faction that he

16:58 blames for um picking this fight and starting the war.

17:04 And if your name is on that list in the proscriptions, you know,

17:08 posts them in the Senate,

17:09 you have a bounty on your head and your entire estate is confiscated.

17:16 State property now.

17:18 And there's more than a thousand names that end

17:20 up getting put up in those proscription lists.

17:23 So, heads roll, people are tossing heads in front of the feet

17:27 of Sulla as he's sitting in his like consular throne.

17:30 Uh they're collecting their reward.

17:33 Um it's a it's just this reign of terror for a few months.

17:37 And Sulla is also calling other kinds of stuff.

17:40 I mean, he's rewriting the constitution as a dictator.

17:43 He's trying to make sure that the populace to just

17:45 keep their head underwater for generations that nothing like this war

17:50 could ever happen again because his enemies and the kind

17:53 of principles that they represent will just be so hamstrung and handcuffed.

17:58 But, uh one of the things that he does is he approaches younger

18:04 men in Rome and kind of test their loyalty by making them get divorces.

18:11 Pompey is another promising young man around this time

18:15 who ends up being Caesar's friend and rival.

18:18 He's a few years older.

18:19 And he goes to Pompey, Sulla Sulla, and he says,

18:21 "Pompey, you know, you've been a loyal servant.

18:24 Uh you brought me a legion in the Civil War.

18:27 You you you you sided with me early.

18:29 Uh I'm very grateful for that.

18:31 But, you know what?

18:31 You're married to the wrong woman.

18:33 I have a better one for you." And Pompey says, "Yes,

18:37 sir." And he he divorces his his former

18:39 wife and he marries whoever Sulla picks for him.

18:43 And then Sulla uh reme- remember this is a guy who okay, a subordinate of Sulla,

18:51 a friend of his, wanted to run for consul after Sulla becomes the dictator.

18:55 You know, there's still elections going on.

18:56 There's still offices um that need filling.

19:00 This guy comes to Sulla and he says, "Hey,

19:01 Sulla, I want to you know, we won the war.

19:04 I I I I want to run for consul." And Sulla's like,

19:07 "Um you know, you haven't even been praetor.

19:10 This this would be This would be a bad look.

19:12 I don't think this is your year.

19:14 You should stand down.

19:15 And the guy says, "Thank you for your advice.

19:17 I'm going to run anyway." And so one day,

19:21 Sulla is sitting in in like one of his curule chairs there

19:25 in one of the public buildings looking out over the forum and watches

19:29 as the men that he ordered to do the deed go up

19:32 to this guy and murder him in broad daylight in the forum.

19:38 Because he he defied Sulla and he tried

19:41 to you know run for office when Sulla said no.

19:44 So this is the kind of guy you're dealing with.

19:45 Now Sulla comes to Caesar.

19:48 Caesar's 18 years old and he says, "Caesar,

19:52 you're married to the daughter of one of my late worst enemies, Cinna.

19:59 He's you know and you can understand his perspective.

20:02 You know, Cinna was a symbol of everything that Sulla wanted to crush.

20:06 And um and he says, "You need to divorce her." [gasps]

20:12 And Caesar says, you know, "Thank you very much for your advice.

20:16 You know, go screw yourself." And he and he they skips town.

20:20 [laughter] He says no.

20:21 And so and so Caesar is running through the mountains of central Italy.

20:26 He's on the run.

20:27 Sulla's got guys hunting him down.

20:30 This goes on for several weeks.

20:32 Caesar gets dysentery and you know,

20:35 Oregon Trail style and he just he gets caught

20:39 and manages to bribe the people who catch him to not

20:43 bring him back to Sulla but to bring him back

20:45 to his his family to like his relatives and friends.

20:48 And then they go and they they go and plead with the dictator, Sulla.

20:53 Jeez, you know, this was really out of line on the part of Caesar.

20:57 He's a young hothead.

20:58 You understand.

21:00 You know, he'll be good.

21:02 We'll make sure that he behaves himself.

21:03 He's only a kid.

21:05 Don't worry.

21:05 Please can you please spare him?

21:07 You know, cuz Sulla wants to execute him, obviously.

21:10 I mean, he's got an image to uphold, right?

21:12 Like And Sulla relents, and he says, "Very well,

21:17 but you are fools if you don't see many a Marius in that boy." [sighs and gasps]

21:23 And so uh Caesar gets off.

21:27 Now, why did he do that?

21:30 Like, what does that say about him and and what he's got in mind for his future?

21:36 All right.

21:37 One explanation is Caesar's a showman.

21:40 He's a natural showman.

21:41 He knows if he can defy the dictator and get away with it,

21:46 people are going to be talking about this for his entire life.

21:49 They're going to talk about it all around town.

21:52 And sure enough, you know, we're still talking about it today.

21:54 Like, it worked as a as a kind of PR stunt.

21:58 On the other hand, he knows that um this girl is is a symbol

22:07 of of his um all of his populist connections that have mostly been decapitated.

22:14 Like, everything that Caesar had had like aspired to.

22:18 You know, think you think as a teenager, you know,

22:20 you got a great career ahead of you, you know,

22:21 you're you know the top guys in this party, like the the trajectory's clear,

22:26 and it's all just been like liquidated, turned to blood.

22:31 And she's like one of the last living symbols of that.

22:34 And he knows that if he um he knows the kind

22:38 of like he's kind of calling his shot in a way.

22:41 He's he's he's he's seeing a uh career for himself on the populist side,

22:46 on the kind of uh revolutionary, if you will, side of Roman politics.

22:50 And he's sort of building building a career with this clairvoyance

22:54 about where he's headed for the rest of his life, already there at age 18.

22:58 Mhm.

22:59 [gasps]

22:59 And I think that one final piece of this is

23:01 it had a lot to do with just family, you know,

23:04 and who he was and he didn't want to be pushed around

23:06 by anybody and he was willing to die rather than to let that happen.

23:11 And the fact that he I think one of the the final things that this illustrates

23:16 about Caesar is Caesar was for all this you could criticize about the guy,

23:20 he was incredibly loyal to the people

23:23 that that were close to him, to his friends.

23:27 Loyal to a fault and he was loyal to this to this wife

23:32 uh Cornelia all the way up to her death.

23:36 I and I can't prove this and I wouldn't even try,

23:39 but Caesar was famously good with the ladies and uh you know slept with a lot

23:45 of senators' wives and so forth and had a lot of girlfriends on the side,

23:49 but we don't know of any specific cases

23:51 where he did that with while he was married

23:54 to his first wife Cornelia and she ends

23:56 up being the the mother of his only daughter.

24:00 Uh his only child child up until the very end, Julia.

24:04 Uh but I think that it was it was something about proving loyalty to that woman.

24:08 But I think you see in that you know to answer

24:10 your question about you know what are his ambitions like?

24:13 They're grand already.

24:14 You can see that in in him as a young man.

24:16 He he like he knows he's destined for for something big.

24:20 He's smart, talented, handsome and so forth um and uh and he was just going

24:27 to he was going to ride that horse as long as he could.

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25:48 What was that story about Caesar and the pirates?

25:50 That was when he was young, right?

25:51 Yeah, yeah, that's another great story.

25:52 Another another kind of like flash of his brilliance.

25:55 uh he's off cavorting in Asia uh Asia Minor as a young man,

26:00 and um this is before Pompey cleans up the seas from the pirates,

26:04 and so he gets um captured by pirates, as one does during those times.

26:10 And he um I think he's like on a study trip, actually, uh at the time.

26:17 So, it's it's he's very young, like 20, 23.

26:22 And the uh the pirates want to ransom him.

26:27 And uh Caesar says, "What you're asking is insulting.

26:33 Like, you're asking 20 million sesterces.

26:36 You need to double it.

26:37 Like, you don't know what you've got on your hands here." [laughter]

26:41 Um because I think partly because to kind of troll them,

26:45 partly because he is uh he knows that if he gets ransomed for more money,

26:50 it's going to make a better story,

26:51 and people are going to think more of him cuz like,

26:54 you know, the Greek word for honor is um is timē.

26:58 It means price.

26:59 You know, it's it's the pri- it's literally the price that you

27:04 your comrades would be willing to ransom you for if you got captured.

27:10 [laughter] Like, it's it's quantifiable.

27:11 It's very quantifiable.

27:12 Like in Homer, you know, uh it's the we think of honor as this abstract thing,

27:16 but it's like, how much are you really worth?

27:18 You know, you can put a number on that.

27:19 So, Caesar kind of gets that.

27:21 He basically bids on his own auction.

27:23 Yeah, right.

27:26 [laughter] And and uh and the funny thing about that story is uh well,

27:29 there's a lot of funny things, but you know,

27:30 while he's there with the pirates, Plutarch,

27:33 um who's his greatest biographer, uh says, uh you know,

27:37 Caesar would sort of um he was he would joke around with them,

27:41 and he would uh write compositions.

27:44 He's like, you know, rocking around in the hole there writing speeches,

27:48 and he would he would declaim them in front of the pirates,

27:51 and he'd make them laugh and cry,

27:53 and then he would just say, "You people have no taste.

27:55 I can't believe that I'm I'm hanging out with you." [laughter]

27:58 And they would say, "Oh, Caesar." And then he said, "You know,

28:01 someday uh I'm going to come back after after you ransom me,

28:05 and I'm going to execute every single one of you." And they said, "Ah,

28:11 [laughter] oh, Caesar's kid.

28:11 We love this kid.

28:12 Pour him another drink." You know, and then that's exactly what he does, right?

28:17 He gets ransomed, and um and he uh the the local governor that um that is

28:24 responsible for that part of the sea is um uh I I think he No,

28:30 what he he raises a a fleet with his own funds, and he goes and he, you know,

28:35 he he knows where these guys hide out, their little cove,

28:37 and he captures the pirates, and he brings them to the governor,

28:41 and the governor is sort of doddling.

28:44 He doesn't really have a great plan for these pirates,

28:46 and so he Caesar goes and he crucifies all of them uh to make a statement.

28:51 But, you know, because they were such uh kindly hosts to them,

28:54 he does them the the courtesy of having

28:57 their throats slit before they get crucified,

29:00 so they don't, you know, have to be there in agony for several days dying.

29:04 He gives them a short death.

29:05 So, he you know, I think it you know,

29:06 perfect combination of his his winning charm,

29:10 his deep sense for the political stakes of every single thing that he does,

29:15 you know, raising his price, making a scene, and making a statement by you know,

29:21 fulfilling his promise to in in the most cold-blooded way possible.

29:25 Why did he become so popular?

29:27 What was What were the levers that he was pulling on?

29:30 Well, before he becomes a commander at least,

29:33 Caesar is uh just a really stylish guy.

29:37 He He has a flair for fashion, you know,

29:40 he wears his his toga a little differently than than everybody else.

29:44 It's a little looser.

29:46 Uh you know, it's kind of like you know, when I was in high school,

29:50 a lot a lot of kids would like let their pants sag down.

29:53 It was like the cool look.

29:54 Yeah, well, this Caesar's doing that.

29:56 Like, let's let's let our toga sag a little bit.

29:58 Uh but it but it was it was like, you know,

30:00 it was stylish and classy and and kind of um And And you know,

30:06 the older men at Rome would say, "Oh,

30:08 that's effeminate." Um but Caesar knew that it would draw draw attention,

30:14 and he could pull it off.

30:16 And um one of the ways that he attracts attention is

30:19 by prosecuting uh corrupt governors when he's just in his 20s,

30:25 you know, he he does these sort of um sort of publicity

30:29 stunt DA like young DA prosecuting the um whatever city councilmen.

30:35 And he he loses, I think,

30:37 most of these, but he makes a statement of of what he stands for.

30:41 And And I think he knows from a very

30:43 early age that he's kind of an anti-establishment figure.

30:46 Sulla has dies soon after he becomes a dictator.

30:49 And And like in his youth um

30:52 Sulla basically firmly established the Optimate oligarchy.

30:57 And everybody in power now in Rome was like a buddy of Sulla.

31:01 And they they have no serious challengers.

31:04 They're corrupt.

31:05 They're fat.

31:06 They're slow.

31:07 Uh they're plundering the provincials.

31:08 And Caesar kind of takes a stand for justice like throughout his early career.

31:13 And um in one of these one of these cases he

31:17 um there was a there was a riot 30 years earlier.

31:23 This is funny.

31:24 And um and and some populist leaders,

31:26 you know, people from Caesar's faction got murdered.

31:29 Saturninus was the the most Well,

31:32 there was a riot in the forum and then they they arrested the guys.

31:36 They put them in the Senate house.

31:37 And then people snuck up to the roof in the night.

31:40 They they removed the the roof tiles and they like hurled these like

31:43 roof tiles down on uh Saturninus and his buddies and they killed them.

31:48 So uh there was some violence in the streets in Rome that the generation before.

31:52 And so Caesar picks one of the last surviving men to have

31:58 been vaguely implicated in this riot as somebody with you know,

32:04 blood on his hands metaphorically

32:06 for the for the death of Saturninus and his associates.

32:09 Um and the guy is like this emaciated old old gentleman um Rabirius.

32:17 And he says, you know, uh we're going to we're going to hold

32:20 you responsible for your crimes 30 years ago.

32:23 Like Rome is Rome is a place of justice.

32:25 And uh they basically, you know,

32:27 long story short, they get they get him convicted.

32:31 And in the special court that they call the punishment is crucifixion.

32:38 Like, so they're going to publicly execute this like 80-year-old

32:42 man who probably doesn't even know what day it is.

32:46 And there's some last-minutes uh political shenanigans by Rabirius's friends.

32:53 They like raise this flag and they you know

32:56 oh they there's a kind of like political chicanery

32:58 where you can say the omens are bad

33:00 and and it kind of calls off the whole thing.

33:02 And Caesar I think he kind of expected them to do that.

33:04 Um but uh it the point was about the statement, you know,

33:09 that oligarchs, aristocrats,

33:12 and the establishment can't get away with murder anymore.

33:15 Not in this town anymore.

33:17 I think that was a big piece of why he was popular before he ever led an army.

33:22 Now when he started leading armies, that's a whole different story.

33:24 Like he was a master at getting um like winning the respect of his soldiers.

33:31 He's always fighting in the front lines.

33:33 There's many stories about this.

33:35 Um the incredible loyalty that that his soldiers in particular had for him.

33:40 Um but you know you know he's kind of a playboy in his in his youth

33:44 and uh he just was was a fun guy to be around.

33:46 He's always giving gifts.

33:48 He's um he's in debt all the time up to his ears

33:53 and he somehow always finds a way to pay off his creditors.

33:57 Um uh he he was just a a really magnetic guy to be around.

34:02 What was the loyalty that he generated in his loyal warriors followers?

34:06 Well, so one instance of this is uh in the Civil War that illustrates this is

34:13 uh this guy Granius Petro is um a guy we wouldn't know his name otherwise,

34:20 but he's uh a quaestor in Caesar's army and uh gets he's ship captain.

34:28 Gets gets his ship captured by Caesar's enemies in the civil war

34:33 and um and so he's brought aboard the ship with his fellow sailors uh

34:41 and and the the enemy commander the Optimates commander says uh Granuis Petro

34:48 you know we're going to we're going to be nice to you guys.

34:50 Now normally since you you all are traitors what we

34:53 should do is slit your throats and throw you overboard.

34:57 But we're going to be very kind you know

34:59 Caesar's a kind man we know he's the enemy

35:01 of the state and tyrant and lawless but we're going

35:04 to we're going to not let him morally outclass us.

35:07 We're just going to sell you in the slave market all of you.

35:11 [gasps] Um and hopefully you'll get ransomed maybe.

35:12 But Granuis Petro you however may go free.

35:16 He's the he's their leader.

35:18 And uh but you have to go and tell Caesar what we did here and tell him

35:23 that his war effort is futile that he

35:25 should surrender to the lawful government of the Republic.

35:29 And Granuis Petro says it is the custom of Caesar's

35:33 soldiers to give mercy but not to receive it.

35:37 Then he pulls out a dagger and he stabs himself

35:39 to death right in front of the the enemy consul.

35:44 That's the kind of loyalty that Caesar had.

35:46 Like this guy would rather die than you

35:49 know be ashamed by letting his enemy spare him.

35:53 Um another great instance uh I mean

35:57 the Caesar's soldiers had this incredible endurance.

36:01 Throughout all of his campaigns they're willing

36:03 to fight for him to the to the death.

36:06 You know stories about soldiers getting shot in the eye

36:10 shot in the arm shot in the leg taking

36:12 hundreds of blows and then they don't leave the fight

36:14 they just have to be dragged away by their companions.

36:17 Uh one instance again later from Caesar's career his um he's fighting

36:21 this this great um kind of trench war siege war with um with Pompey.

36:29 There's like a 17-mi wall that he's built around

36:34 Pompey's camp to wall him into the coast in Greece,

36:36 and Pompey's built another counter wall.

36:38 So, that is this dragging, dragging long siege warfare,

36:41 and the supplies are getting choked.

36:42 Caesar cuts off the water to Pompey.

36:44 The animals are starving and dying in Pompey's camp,

36:47 but Caesar is even in worse straits because they've

36:49 eaten They know he's got a 20,000, 30,000 men.

36:53 They're They're eating the all the food in the area.

36:56 They're like running out of food,

36:57 and they're having to go and collect weeds and bake them into these horrible,

37:04 disgusting cakes and just eat them.

37:06 And at some point, Pompey's guys having a food

37:11 and water personally even though the animals are dying.

37:13 They call over to Caesar's men across the wall.

37:15 They say, You know, "Hey, Roman.

37:18 Getting hungry over there?" And Caesar's soldiers

37:23 catapult over some of these horrible loaves

37:26 of nasty food that they're eating just to show what they're willing to eat.

37:31 They're willing to like starve to death before giving up the fight.

37:36 And one of these these cakes, you know, imagine like a cow patty.

37:40 Yeah, one of these cakes is brought to Pompey,

37:42 you know, his his enemy, the commander.

37:44 And he says, "Good god, we are fighting with beasts." [laughter]

37:51 And And And they go to Caesar, and they say,

37:53 "We would rather eat tree bark than surrender."

37:56 And how was he able to generate that?

38:00 Mhm.

38:00 He fights in the front lines with them all the time.

38:03 He's He risks his life right up right up there with the centurions.

38:09 He knows all the centurions in his army by name.

38:11 There's like one centurion for every 80 men, and he's got an army of 30,000.

38:18 He remembers their names.

38:19 He like takes the time to do that.

38:21 He um he also uh is he's very generous with with gifts and he

38:32 what what what he'll do is he'll eat the same food that they eat.

38:35 I don't know if he ate those cow patties,

38:37 but I imagine he did because he had this habit of like if

38:40 if the if the olive oil was rancid and there was good olive oil,

38:44 but the the troops were eating the bad olive oil,

38:46 he would eat the bad olive oil.

38:48 If his uh if his troops are sleeping in the there, you know,

38:53 he's always going around uh like lightning speed blitzing around

38:58 campaigns and often they have to stay in weird places,

39:01 you know, if his officers are sleeping on the ground, he'll sleep on the ground.

39:04 He'll give a good the one bed uh we'll give it to the weakest of us,

39:08 which is not me, you know.

39:09 Uh so he's he's always there with them.

39:12 Um but he's also he is very lavish with these guys, too.

39:15 Like he he his his um what he does he does

39:24 amass a lot of money when he's conquering Gaul, for example, [gasps]

39:28 but it's always only to give it to his friends,

39:33 to give it to the people of Rome, to do something with it,

39:35 to it's all he always sees money as a tool and and riches

39:38 as a tool and gifts as a tool uh to to to like win

39:43 to bind people closer to himself cuz this is this is where his real

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40:58 What was the relationship between him and Pompey?

41:01 Because you said previously they were sort

41:03 of loosely affiliated and then they do the triumvirate.

41:06 So, instead of trying to beat them,

41:09 he actually decides to do that thing with Crassus and Pompey.

41:13 What's the arc of his big enemies across his life?

41:19 Yeah.

41:18 So, Pompey is They're they're friendly for most of their career.

41:23 And Pompey is a kind of moderate populist.

41:27 Pompey mostly wants to in his early career, he's a he's fights for Sulla,

41:34 but soon after Sulla dies, you know,

41:36 Pompey doesn't He's not really into politics that much.

41:39 He mostly wants to just get himself sent off as commander of Rome's armies

41:46 to fight all kinds of wars cuz that's I think that's his happy place.

41:50 Pompey is a excellent administrator.

41:54 He's great at logistics.

41:56 I think he's he's kind of a big guy, too.

41:59 And so, Caesar helps him a lot in his early

42:02 career to get these extraordinary commands is what they call them.

42:05 Like, Pompey doesn't hold office until he's 35.

42:09 And usually, to to consul, which is what he becomes,

42:12 you would have to have like you know, a a whole sequence of offices.

42:16 But Pompey's just he's just a golden boy.

42:19 Pompey is um he's he's got this combination

42:24 of charm and he's got this boyish look.

42:27 He's got this little quiff in his hair.

42:30 He kind of looks like Alexander and he

42:31 kind of models himself off of Alexander the Great.

42:33 I mean, Caesar and Pompey both are like Alexander uh Alexander stands.

42:39 And um but he's also got this ruthlessness to him, too.

42:45 Uh they called him the kid butcher when he was younger.

42:49 And the Romans just love

42:50 this combination of cold-blooded forcefulness, brutality even,

42:56 you know, in a controlled way, and then boyish charm uh which Pompey had.

43:00 But the way that they really get in um

43:06 in into cahoots in the first Triumvirate is So,

43:11 even though Caesar's kind of friendly with Pompey,

43:13 helps him out here and there he's not like really tight with Pompey.

43:22 Who he is tight with is Crassus, the richest man in Rome,

43:26 another fascinating figure that I did a did a biography on on the Cost of Glory.

43:31 He uh Crassus finances Caesar's career.

43:36 He's basically the one holding the note

43:39 for all of Caesar's colossal political debts.

43:43 Um and it there comes a point when Caesar

43:45 is ready to run for consul that Crassus has

43:49 a problem and Pompey has a lot of problems

43:52 that they can't get solved in the Senate and in politics.

43:56 Pompey's just come back from this glorious Eastern campaign.

43:59 He's defeated this general Mithridates.

44:01 He's uh he's essentially conquered Judaea uh

44:06 and he's he's defiled the temple in Jerusalem.

44:10 Um but he's come back glorious with a bunch of soldiers that need rewards.

44:15 He wants to settle his soldiers.

44:17 He wants the Senate to ratify all of the arrangements,

44:22 the treaties that he made,

44:23 you know, appointing a client king here,

44:26 you know, getting a city constitution ratified there.

44:28 And he's got a lot of a lot of interest in that, like, materially,

44:33 you know, people um sending him money

44:36 and promising to support him in war or politics.

44:40 So, Pompey has a lot of needs

44:41 and and it's it's all getting blocked by the Senate.

44:43 He's just not that great at the political game.

44:46 His And And by this point,

44:49 Pompey is sort of an outsider from the from the Optimates,

44:52 from the from the kind of establishment conservatives,

44:56 um who are blocking Pompey.

44:57 They think he's getting too powerful.

44:59 Caesar's nobody at this point.

45:00 I mean, yeah, he's a promising young politician,

45:03 but he's not he's not like a powerful man.

45:05 Uh so, we we talk about the Triumvirate,

45:07 uh but it's it's Caesar brokering a deal

45:10 with Pompey and then Crassus on the other hand has some tax breaks he wants

45:14 for his um basically his uh portfolio companies,

45:18 who are equestrian tax collectors.

45:21 And um they can't get it through the Senate.

45:23 Both Pompey and Crassus are outsiders to the Optimates establishment.

45:30 The main guy who's the kind of figurehead

45:32 of the of the conservative is this young guy Cato,

45:36 who becomes who's a stoic, famously becomes Caesar's worst nemesis.

45:41 And Caesar basically comes to these with these two um big shots,

45:45 the two big fish in Rome, Pompey and Crassus,

45:48 richest man and then the most glorious general.

45:50 He says, "You guys hate each other.

45:53 You've hated each other for a long time.

45:54 You've always been trying to smile in public when you're next to each other,

45:58 but then stab each other in the the behind the scenes.

46:01 But look, you both have needs.

46:05 I can I can I can fix them.

46:07 I can fix this.

46:08 I can get your legislation passed, Pompey.

46:10 I can get your legislation passed, Crassus.

46:13 Support me in the consulship.

46:15 And I'm going to ask for a favor down the line.

46:17 But let's not worry about that right now.

46:19 And they say, "All right." And so it's basically the triumvirate

46:23 is Caesar brokering this deal between these two top guys,

46:25 which is a great It's a great strategy,

46:27 I think, if you're if you're like down here and there's men up

46:31 here that have a need to help find a way to help them out.

46:33 And and the and the the biggest thing

46:35 that's blocking each of them really is each other.

46:38 Like Crassus is like pushing the Senate to not ratify Pompey's legislation.

46:45 Pompey is going to use his clients to kind of push against Crassus.

46:47 So you know, making peace between the two of them.

46:50 Um and and it was a pretty good relationship for a long time.

46:53 And And once once Caesar gets elected consul, his dear dear daughter, Julia,

46:59 his one child up to that point, he marries her off to Pompey the Great.

47:05 And he becomes Pompey's father-in-law, even though he's a younger man somewhat.

47:10 And by all accounts, that marriage was not just a political marriage,

47:14 but became a very loving relationship.

47:17 Um and so uh you know, they had this long connection uh long before the Civil

47:24 War that made them mortal enemies of each other,

47:27 which I think is what makes it kind of even more tragic and bitter.

47:31 Mhm.

47:32 And then how do Pompey and Caesar end up at war?

47:36 Well, that's you know, a long story, I guess.

47:41 But in sum, when Caesar How it all happens,

47:46 how how this breakdown happens is when

47:50 Caesar goes off when he finishes his consulship,

47:53 he gets Pompey and Crassus to support him to have himself sent off to Gaul.

48:03 So far, you know, Caesar hasn't had his Alexander moment.

48:06 This is his chance to do some real world-changing conquest.

48:13 And uh he spends the years 59 is the first triumvirate,

48:17 so he spends the years 58 through 52 conquering Gaul.

48:22 And um Rome controls a little strip along the coast.

48:26 Gaul is France, of course.

48:28 Um but but the Gauls, the Celts uh is the other name for them,

48:34 they are not just a kind of you know,

48:37 peaceable farmer, unsuspecting society of, you know,

48:42 "We just we just want to like live our our peaceful lives.

48:45 Why are these Romans coming and conquering us?" I mean,

48:47 this is a confederation of war incredibly warlike

48:51 tribes who have threatened Rome on many occasions.

48:55 And um just in the previous generation,

48:58 there was a great Gallic invasion that stopped by Gaius Marius.

49:02 And um and so the and and they and in several centuries earlier,

49:07 the the Gauls like actually sacked the city of Rome,

49:10 like taken it the only time that ever happened up to that point.

49:13 So there's a real threat there, arguably.

49:17 And uh you know, we could get into how Caesar conquered Gaul,

49:20 but how Pompey and Caesar fell out with each other

49:25 is it's a long story that basically while Caesar's away,

49:30 he he is absent from the city of Rome and from Italy for um 7 years,

49:37 well, really 8 years um uh uh before the conflict between them breaks out.

49:44 And while he's away, Crassus dies,

49:48 and Crassus was a kind of fulcrum balancing out Caesar and Pompey.

49:53 Um, he got dies on this great Persian expedition,

49:56 this campaign to invade not Iran,

49:59 but the Iraq where the there were the Persians were in charge.

50:03 Um, so that that was uh the kind of like last you know,

50:07 when you have three men, they can kind of balance each other out.

50:10 But when it becomes two men,

50:12 there's there's a polarity there that can really be inflamed.

50:17 And this is exactly what the establishment people see, people like Cato see.

50:23 Caesar has always been a revolutionary in their opinion.

50:27 He's always been trying to make a grab at supreme power.

50:30 They you know, they they they had their eye

50:31 on him since he was since he was a young man.

50:33 Sulla was right about this kid.

50:35 There is many Marius's in him.

50:37 And they you know, Pompey has has been an outsider,

50:41 but they they see sort of late in the game after Crassus

50:44 dies that if they can kind of court Pompey into the establishment.

50:49 He's always wanted their approval, you know?

50:51 Pompey has always just wanted to be

50:53 this glorious general welcomed by the blue bloods,

50:56 the great families, and they never really had it.

51:00 And so they see their chance, Cato and company.

51:04 Like let's make Pompey a respectable man.

51:05 Let's make him our shield,

51:08 our shield against Caesar because Caesar's going to come back at some point,

51:11 and he's going to come back richer

51:13 and more powerful and more glorious than ever,

51:16 and he's going to just push us around in politics.

51:18 And and maybe maybe maybe he's going to try

51:21 to take over the thing and make himself a monarch,

51:24 which I think was a self-fulfilling prophecy.

51:25 Like that wasn't really his intent at that point.

51:27 But basically they say, Caesar, it's like 51 BC at this point.

51:34 Caesar's been in Gaul for 8 years.

51:36 He's got uh so many well-trained legions.

51:41 Um, and uh and basically his enemies are saying,

51:47 "You can't We're not going to let you come

51:49 back except under circumstances where you will face accountability,

51:56 prosecution potentially,

51:58 for all of the bad things you did in your earlier career,

52:01 including when you were consul.

52:03 And they basically, you know, long story short,

52:05 they kind of play Pompey and see They especially kind of get into Pompey's

52:10 head and play him off of Caesar uh in this gradual shift of alliances.

52:17 And importantly, importantly, Caesar's daughter, Julia, Pompey's, you know,

52:23 the love of Pompey's life by all accounts, she dies in childbirth in 54.

52:29 And um that was like the link that held them tether.

52:33 final tether that held them together.

52:35 Um and after that, the Civil War Cuz otherwise,

52:38 there would have been some leverage over Caesar.

52:41 Yeah.

52:41 We have your daughter.

52:42 Oh, yeah.

52:43 That I hadn't thought about that.

52:44 But I I think they couldn't have gotten Pompey's head because, you know,

52:48 they would have had a Caesar's grandson,

52:51 Pompey's son, would have would have bound them together.

52:53 It was a boy that was born uh that died soon after his mother died.

52:58 Um so I I I think that it it wasn't

53:00 an an obvious fit for Pompey to be um their shield, their man.

53:06 He'd always been an outsider and uh Caesar

53:09 could have kind of kept him kept him loyal.

53:11 It's very hard when you're in France and this is all happening in Rome.

53:15 Mhm.

53:15 But Caesar has a lot of lieutenants really, you know,

53:18 men of letters trying to kind of keep

53:20 the peace and keep up his contacts in Rome.

53:22 But like if he had been able to be there in person,

53:25 he believed he could have he could have

53:27 settled the seas and won Pompey back over.

53:30 And this is one of the things after the war

53:32 broke out that he kept trying over and over again.

53:34 Like, "Let's just meet.

53:35 The Civil War.

53:35 Let's just meet.

53:35 Yeah, the Civil War.

53:37 Let's just meet.

53:37 Let's uh let's work this all out." But he didn't want to.

53:40 Yeah, Pompey didn't want to at that point.

53:42 He'd already hardened his heart.

53:44 He was supposed to be Pompey was supposed

53:45 to be one of the greatest generals ever, right?

53:47 And he did he not outnumber Caesar as well?

53:50 Yeah, he greatly did.

53:51 He had Pompey was brilliant in the Civil War.

53:54 He defeated Sertorius.

53:56 He he conquered the the pirates in like 3 months earlier in his career.

54:02 I mean, he's a brilliant administrator.

54:05 Um some people think he's overrated as a general.

54:07 I mean, he was really good, but I think Caesar was a better general.

54:11 But but Pompey had evidently but he he definitely had by all

54:17 by the look of it all the advantages

54:18 when Caesar invades Italy crosses the Rubicon.

54:21 Um you know, Pompey has a lot of legions on paper,

54:26 but they're they're fresh recruits.

54:28 What's the story of crossing the Rubicon?

54:30 Yeah.

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55:37 join.whoop.com/ modern wisdom.

55:41 I mean, it's something that I've heard people say all the time,

55:45 to Rubicon moment, crossing of the Rubicon.

55:48 I've no idea what that means.

55:49 I don't know the story.

55:50 I don't understand why it's significant.

55:52 I don't know what it's supposed to symbolize.

55:55 Yeah, so there's a kind of complicated build-up, a standoff, you know,

56:01 everybody's always kind of ratcheting up their demands as Caesar's like,

56:04 I want to come back to Rome don't without prosecution.

56:08 And the Senate's like, over our dead bodies.

56:11 Uh, here, you know, concessions going back and forth, being rejected.

56:15 And so, as this is all going on, Caesar's getting his getting his armies ready.

56:21 He doesn't want to fight a civil war.

56:23 I think he's, you know, he and he always said that and I I think it's right.

56:26 Cuz he's just come back from Gaul.

56:27 Yeah, he's just come back from Gaul.

56:29 He's seven-year campaign, eight-year campaign, straight into a civil war.

56:32 Right.

56:33 Basically, he's he's at war from 58 BC until 45 BC almost constantly.

56:40 I mean, the energy of the man.

56:44 [sighs and gasps] And and he's got two advantages.

56:47 So, so basically, he's got I think he's got 10 legions at this point,

56:51 something like 40,000 men,

56:52 but they're all kind of strung out over Gaul in forts.

56:54 They're they're not close.

56:55 He's got one legion with him on the border,

56:58 the legal border between Italy and um, basically northern Italy,

57:04 what we call northern Italy today was what they would call Cisalpine Gaul.

57:09 It's it's it's not like Italy proper.

57:12 And if you uh, lead an army into Italy without disbanding it,

57:19 it's like technically an act of war.

57:22 Like you're Consuls are supposed to disband

57:24 their armies before they reenter Italy.

57:27 And so, the border between Cisalpine Gaul and Italy proper is the Rubicon River.

57:35 It's this insignificant stream near Ravenna in northern

57:39 Italy on the Adriatic coast and um and so Caesar's camped at Ravenna and he

57:49 is negotiating with the with the Senate.

57:52 Envoys going back and forth, back and forth.

57:54 It's not looking good.

57:55 Caesar doesn't want to fight a war, but he's going to be ready.

57:58 You know, he's not he's not about to pretend like this couldn't happen.

58:01 I think Pompey wasn't really ready for it.

58:03 But so he's got one legion there with him at Ravenna.

58:09 Not a lot of men.

58:11 400 and I 4,500 men or so.

58:16 And at at at this final moment,

58:19 the negotiations break down and the Senate declares him a public enemy.

58:23 They say Caesar is is is you know, he's not responding to our demands.

58:29 We've had enough.

58:30 They officially basically declare war on him.

58:34 And the moment he gets that advice the very next day.

58:38 Actually, he was um he knew what he was going to do the next day,

58:43 but he pretends like nothing's happening on that day.

58:47 He's just going to going to go about his business in Ravenna.

58:49 He goes to the gladiatorial shows.

58:51 He inspects his troops.

58:53 He has dinner with his friends.

58:54 It's just a normal day, no big deal.

58:57 But he secretly sends the order out to his troops

58:59 to muster and he finds his way to the Rubicon.

59:04 He apparently like gets lost in the woods cuz it's dark.

59:07 I mean there's there's all these kind of elaborate tales about this.

59:10 And one of the ancient sources, not Plutarch who's a little bit more sober,

59:15 one of the ancient sources, Suetonius I think it is,

59:17 says, you know, you know, as he stood there before the Rubicon,

59:21 he saw a great winged figure blowing a trumpet.

59:26 It's like the gods are like calling him to war.

59:29 It's like the Valkyries or something.

59:32 Um but what he [clears throat] says is um he's there with his officers and he

59:38 knows if he crosses that river that uh

59:43 it's he's he's declaring war back on the Senate.

59:49 [gasps] Um and so he says, "Let the die be cast." And the the famous words

59:55 is actually a quote from one of his favorite dramas or a comedy from Menander.

1:00:01 Like let the die be cast.

1:00:02 As as one does when one is entering upon uh

1:00:06 a highly risky thing with uncertain results as Plutarch says.

1:00:09 Mhm.

1:00:09 And so he crosses the the Rubicon very quickly and within

1:00:15 [snorts]

1:00:14 a day he is just blitzed down and captured a city

1:00:20 in in Italy proper and he just he has one

1:00:24 of his advantages as I was saying is he loves

1:00:27 to be underestimated and he's really good at getting himself underestimated.

1:00:32 Um and they didn't think he would do it.

1:00:35 And he he only uh goes into Italy with one

1:00:40 legion and the the Senate has like 10 legions in Italy.

1:00:45 I mean, he's vastly outnumbered.

1:00:46 But everybody else arrives really quickly.

1:00:48 The other advantage is he's really fast.

1:00:51 And so he blitzes through Italy and pretty soon Pompey um

1:00:55 and the Senate decide they've got to they've got to get out of there.

1:00:57 They got to think rethink their grand strategy and they [clears

1:01:00 throat] they they go to Greece to basically muster up and um

1:01:04 collect a bunch of ships and a bunch of troops

1:01:06 in the east and come back and reinvade Italy and destroy Caesar.

1:01:09 But but it doesn't work out that way.

1:01:11 Why?

1:01:12 Well they were hoping they knew that Caesar didn't have any ships.

1:01:19 Basically, he doesn't have troop transports.

1:01:21 So he's not able to cross over and catch them and take the war to Greece.

1:01:26 He's not able to draw on his great advantage, which is speed.

1:01:29 And they're hoping to uh essentially kind of blockade Italy and starve him out.

1:01:34 Rome, if you blockade Rome,

1:01:37 the people will starve quickly because they're getting the majority

1:01:41 of their grain from places like Sicily, North Africa,

1:01:46 uh not yet Egypt, but it's a you know

1:01:49 the the biggest city in the world at that point, at least in the West.

1:01:52 Million people maybe.

1:01:54 And uh you can't get that much grain in from the countryside on carts, you know?

1:01:58 So, they bring it in on ships.

1:01:59 So, they're hoping to basically starve the people

1:02:02 of Rome and make Caesar really unpopular.

1:02:04 Um and so, uh you know, he doesn't have ships, he can't go catch them.

1:02:08 So, there's also um Pompey's got guys in Spain that start up a uh they,

1:02:16 you know, holding out against Caesar and you know,

1:02:18 Caesar's only controls Italy and Gaul.

1:02:21 And he [snorts] So, he has to go fight a war

1:02:23 in Spain first before he can go catch Pompey in Greece.

1:02:26 And uh you know, basically by by leaving um

1:02:31 by leaving Italy rather than settling it then and there,

1:02:34 his enemies are essentially saying they're willing to make this a world war,

1:02:39 which is exactly what happens.

1:02:41 There's There's a war fought in Spain first.

1:02:44 Caesar comes and he and he um defeats them in Greece.

1:02:48 Then he uh goes to Egypt.

1:02:51 There's another war there, then there's another war in Asia Minor,

1:02:54 then there's in the war in North Africa,

1:02:56 and then there's the final kind of embers of the war in Spain.

1:02:59 I mean, he he he visits every single province

1:03:02 in the Roman Empire and carries war to almost all of them.

1:03:06 Wow.

1:03:06 Yeah.

1:03:07 You mentioned Egypt.

1:03:08 What's the story of Caesar and Cleopatra?

1:03:10 Yeah.

1:03:12 Well, so um fast forward, you know, the Caesar's first campaign is in Spain,

1:03:19 his second campaign in the Civil War is um is

1:03:24 in Greece where he defeats Pompey at the Battle of Pharsalus,

1:03:28 which is the really should have been the the last battle,

1:03:31 should have been the decisive battle.

1:03:33 And uh um Pompey flees and makes his way to Egypt.

1:03:39 They don't know where he went for a for a while,

1:03:41 um but Caesar finally figures out he's gone to Egypt because

1:03:45 Pompey has friends there and as soon as he gets on shore,

1:03:50 actually doesn't ever ever reach the shore.

1:03:53 He he basically comes up with his warships and the Egyptians say,

1:03:58 "Oh yes, we're really glad to see you, Pompey.

1:04:01 Uh come come come ashore.

1:04:02 We've got the whole reception ready for you.

1:04:05 Just get in this little boat and you know,

1:04:08 there's there's reefs that a big ship like yours

1:04:11 would would probably founder on, so just trust us.

1:04:14 We're going to get you in this little boat

1:04:15 and take you to shore." And and and uh you know, Pompey gets on the boat.

1:04:22 He he probably knows what's going to happen,

1:04:25 but he's he has no hope at this point.

1:04:27 He's just crestfallen.

1:04:28 He's he's dispirited.

1:04:30 He thought he was going to win against Caesar.

1:04:32 It was an upset victory at Pharsalus and um

1:04:35 I think it just kind of shattered him.

1:04:37 And I think there's the I'm trying to remember exactly how they framed it.

1:04:41 There's a moment where the the boat captain is like, "Come on, Pompey.

1:04:44 There's nothing to be worried about.

1:04:45 You can trust us." Um and Pompey said,

1:04:50 you know, "If I were worried about my life,

1:04:54 I would not get in this boat." Like I mean, I think he knew.

1:05:03 Because on that boat, they murdered him in front of the eyes of his son,

1:05:09 in front of the eyes of his wife, in front of the eyes of all of his friends.

1:05:11 Once they get a little away from the the warship, he never makes it to shore.

1:05:15 They murder him.

1:05:16 Who's they?

1:05:17 The Egyptians.

1:05:18 So, who is they?

1:05:21 What's going on in Egypt right now is there's a civil war happening.

1:05:25 Egypt is ruled by at this point by uh the Ptolemies,

1:05:31 who are a Greco-Macedonian ruling class.

1:05:35 Their capital is Alexandria,

1:05:36 which is a great Greek city founded by Alexander the Great.

1:05:39 He's He's He's everywhere, isn't he?

1:05:42 And so, uh there's a conflict going on between

1:05:46 these two like teenage uh one is a teenager,

1:05:50 one's a 20-year-old like siblings of the pharaoh who died.

1:05:54 You know, it's funny to think of these Greeks as pharaohs,

1:05:57 but that's what they would have called them in Egypt.

1:05:59 And um Pompey was hoping that all the favors he

1:06:03 did for them earlier would ingratiate him to the Egyptian regime.

1:06:10 But, they basically saw Caesar won at Pharsalus.

1:06:14 He's probably going to be the winner in this war,

1:06:16 even though it might go on for a while.

1:06:18 What would What would make Caesar really happy is if we

1:06:22 just killed Pompey and presented Caesar with Pompey's head hm and said,

1:06:27 "Hey, we did you a favor.

1:06:28 And if we did that, you know, if if we let Pompey live,

1:06:34 he's probably going to try to raise an army and try

1:06:36 to use Egypt as a base and drag on the war,

1:06:40 and we're going to have Roman troops just ripping this place of our own war.

1:06:44 In the middle of our own war, it's going to be just a total mess.

1:06:48 Hm.

1:06:48 So, they kind of nip it in the bud.

1:06:51 [gasps] And um I I I kind of made sense.

1:06:54 I think what it would would have made

1:06:55 more sense is for them to just arrest Pompey,

1:06:58 because Caesar wanted Pompey alive, actually.

1:07:01 He kept on pardoning his enemies during the civil war.

1:07:03 he wanted to pardon Pompey.

1:07:04 He pardoned enemy after enemy.

1:07:07 Domitius um Petr- Petraeus.

1:07:11 I mean, you could list names and names.

1:07:13 He's always sparing his enemies.

1:07:15 Some would say that he was too kind

1:07:17 to his enemies cuz they end up assassinating him.

1:07:20 We'll get to that maybe.

1:07:21 But and Caesar also knows that if Pompey, if he captures Pompey and spares him,

1:07:28 if he if he could just get in the same room face-to-face

1:07:31 with this man that he hasn't seen in the better part of 10 years.

1:07:37 They could work something out.

1:07:39 Mhm.

1:07:39 He could convince Pompey to get the troops to stand down,

1:07:42 to get everybody to to stand down.

1:07:44 There's no way that this war could carry

1:07:46 on if Pompey and Caesar come to an agreement finally.

1:07:51 That's what he really wanted.

1:07:53 He wanted to make peace.

1:07:54 He didn't He didn't want to fight this war, but you know,

1:07:56 he was willing to fight it if they if they wanted to fight it with him.

1:07:59 And so, you know, when he lands ashore

1:08:01 they present him with the signet ring of Pompey.

1:08:05 This has a great I think it had a a lion on it.

1:08:08 It was unmistakable.

1:08:10 And then they give him the head of Pompey.

1:08:13 Just in case you weren't sure.

1:08:14 Just in case you weren't sure whose ring that is.

1:08:17 [laughter] Came from the hand of the head of Pompey.

1:08:18 is?

1:08:18 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:08:19 Oh.

1:08:20 Do Do you know?

1:08:21 Do you want to guess?

1:08:23 [laughter] There it is.

1:08:25 [gasps] And that's the second time that that he's said to have cried.

1:08:28 Yeah.

1:08:29 Why why did of Rome.

1:08:31 Um He I think he cried because this was his friend.

1:08:36 Mhm.

1:08:36 It really was his friend and he all his Well,

1:08:42 the cynics will say that they were crocodile tears.

1:08:47 The tears were secretly happy.

1:08:49 I think that's totally false.

1:08:50 Like he really wanted Pompey alive and I think he did

1:08:52 still kind of hold out hope that they would you know,

1:08:55 be able to come to an agreement.

1:08:56 Of course, Caesar would be the the big man now

1:08:58 and Pompey would be kind of his his career would be over.

1:09:01 Let's be frank.

1:09:02 Um after losing a civil war, maybe he could go into dignified exile,

1:09:06 but this was the father of his of his son before the son died.

1:09:09 This was the the man who who took care of his daughter.

1:09:13 Like they had this really personal relationship.

1:09:17 [gasps] And so Caesar was actually quite pissed and he uh he ended

1:09:23 up killing all the men who who called the hit on Pompey.

1:09:27 And why?

1:09:27 Yeah, because they were basically um the the sibling

1:09:33 of the rival Ptolemies that's controlling Alexandria is this kid Ptolemy.

1:09:40 Ptolemy the 13th, I think.

1:09:43 He's like 15.

1:09:46 And it's it's actually he's kind of he's he's being kind of ruled

1:09:52 by this this um general that he has and this this court eunuch.

1:09:58 You know, as as one has in Egypt.

1:10:00 One one one needs eunuchs to do things and you know,

1:10:03 one of them was the kind of chamberlain and was

1:10:05 kind of pushing the kid around and calling the shots.

1:10:09 And um and so the way that the war goes basically

1:10:14 s- Ptolemy and Cleopatra are it Cleopatra's the other the other sibling.

1:10:21 Forgot to mention that.

1:10:22 Uh she's off in the wilderness, who knows where she is when Caesar arrives.

1:10:28 Caesar is welcomed with kind of you know,

1:10:30 fake smiles by the Egyptians who just want the Romans gone.

1:10:34 They're Ro- Egypt has been um it's [snorts] not a Roman province,

1:10:38 it's important to understand.

1:10:40 It's a Roman client kingdom.

1:10:42 They're independent, they have their own tradition,

1:10:46 they want to keep it that way.

1:10:48 Alexandria is the most glorious city in the Mediterranean.

1:10:51 Rome might be bigger, but it's a dirty place.

1:10:54 Alexandria is a city of marble and culture.

1:10:57 They've got the library, they've got, you know, Alexander's tomb there.

1:11:02 [gasps]

1:11:01 Uh and they just want the Romans to kind of leave them to their own devices.

1:11:05 Maybe be allies, but basically, they want Caesar gone as soon as possible.

1:11:10 And Ptolemy represents the kind of uh [sighs and gasps]

1:11:15 more Egyptian independence um party in in in Egypt and Alexandria.

1:11:22 He's He's loved by the people, actually.

1:11:24 Cleopatra was actually the unpopular one.

1:11:28 And that's exactly the kind of person that Caesar likes to support.

1:11:31 Um because haha the story [clears throat] is

1:11:35 um he's been there for a couple of weeks.

1:11:38 This is after he went to go and find Pompey Yeah.

1:11:41 finds head and hand Yeah.

1:11:44 and sticks about.

1:11:45 Yeah.

1:11:45 He's He's sticking around in Egypt and Alexandria.

1:11:48 Um trying to figure out what he's going to do.

1:11:51 There's a war going on there.

1:11:52 And anytime the Romans see a war amongst people on the fringes,

1:11:57 they see an opportunity to come in and intervene.

1:12:00 And uh that's a way to kind of extend

1:12:02 your power and maybe end up controlling the place directly.

1:12:05 Egypt is the most by far the richest um kingdom,

1:12:10 land, area in all of the Mediterranean.

1:12:13 Why?

1:12:13 What have they got?

1:12:14 They So the for one thing, they've got the Nile, which, you know,

1:12:16 you can like eat an apple and spit

1:12:18 the seeds on the ground and just get wonderful fruit.

1:12:21 I mean, it's incredibly fertile cuz of the flooding of the Nile.

1:12:24 They've also got uh very, very rich mines,

1:12:29 like mineral resources in the in the eastern desert, especially.

1:12:32 So, you know, porf- exotic marble,

1:12:36 porphyry, gems, you know, agate, amethyst, emerald.

1:12:39 I don't know what the difference between any of these things is, frankly,

1:12:42 but um and they've got a lot of gold, too, in those mines.

1:12:46 There's still gold in Egypt.

1:12:47 They're still mining gold there.

1:12:49 So, it's incredibly rich.

1:12:51 It's you know, Alexandria's a city of marble and gold.

1:12:53 Um and it ends up later becoming Rome's breadbasket.

1:12:57 You know, just you can feed the entire you

1:13:01 can feed a lot of people from from the Nile.

1:13:04 Um So and and Rome is kind of like

1:13:07 wanted you know Pompey wanted to intervene in Egypt.

1:13:11 There was another conflict with the fat

1:13:15 king that died father of Cleopatra and Ptolemy

1:13:19 and people were hoping to pluck that cherry but it just never worked out.

1:13:24 Like Egypt is kind of despite it's kind of incredible

1:13:27 that Egypt was still independent at that point because Rome

1:13:30 the Roman greedy Roman uh governors had just been circling

1:13:35 it like vultures and they just hadn't had their chance yet.

1:13:38 Now Caesar has a chance, you know.

1:13:41 Um but they don't want that to happen.

1:13:43 So Cleopatra enters the story at this point.

1:13:47 Caesar's in the royal palace.

1:13:50 And um and I don't know if you've seen

1:13:53 that movie with Elizabeth Taylor the Cleopatra movie but No.

1:13:57 Uh so the way that they portrayed in the movie is not

1:14:01 that far off but basically Caesar's there in in a study in the library

1:14:07 or in in the in the palace and a servant comes in with a rug

1:14:12 and he's like Caesar we have a gift for you and he

1:14:16 says all right well what's in what's in the rug and he

1:14:18 tries to threatens to poke at it but basically Cleopatra sneaks herself

1:14:23 in on a little on a little raft and is carried in as though

1:14:30 she's a mattress as like a rolled up mattress is is what Plutarch says.

1:14:34 Like someone's got a yoga mat in their but it's secretly Cleopatra.

1:14:37 Yeah yeah.

1:14:38 And then and then you know it's presented to Caesar as a gift.

1:14:42 Show it to chat chat GPT this image.

1:14:44 I want to see what it looks like.

1:14:45 Yeah yeah yeah it's it's it's a great scene from from the Cleopatra movie.

1:14:48 It's a rug in the in the movie.

1:14:51 Which is a great movie and the most expensive movie ever when it was made.

1:14:55 No way.

1:14:56 Actually, yeah.

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1:16:13 Okay, so she gets carried in.

1:16:14 So, she gets carried in and uh you know, she knows how to make an interest, too.

1:16:21 From that moment, Caesar sees like, "All right,

1:16:24 this is this is another show person like myself." She's 20 years old.

1:16:29 So, she's the oldest of the siblings.

1:16:31 Um speaks all kinds of languages.

1:16:35 Obviously, she knows she's a native Greek speaker.

1:16:37 She speaks Egyptian and Latin and you know, Syrian and and on and on.

1:16:44 She's very, very charming and clever.

1:16:48 She might not have led with her looks,

1:16:50 but you'll hear stories that Cleopatra was actually kind of ugly and she was,

1:16:55 you know, more of a great conversation part.

1:16:58 But she was she was beautiful.

1:16:59 Like she Maybe she wasn't like a a 10, but she was an eight, at least.

1:17:04 Um Yeah, that's a great image.

1:17:07 See if you can do Cleopatra Elizabeth Taylor rug scene.

1:17:12 See if that turns up some results.

1:17:14 Mhm.

1:17:14 Um And um And sh- she had a knack for power.

1:17:21 Like she knows how to play the heartstrings of a man.

1:17:25 She's uh um She's got She knows Caesar's weakness.

1:17:32 Caesar has his weakness for smart, high-status women.

1:17:35 Mhm.

1:17:36 He's on his third wife now, but she's back in Rome.

1:17:39 Yeah, yeah.

1:17:40 You want to play it?

1:17:41 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:17:42 The rug is such a delicate [music] weave.

1:17:44 If I may untie it for you.

1:17:46 Turn it over first.

1:17:49 But the rug is now right side up.

1:17:50 I understand, but I wanted the wrong side up.

1:17:53 Or should I flip it over with my sword?

1:17:54 No, no, no.

1:18:01 I find one can tell more about the quality

1:18:03 of merchandise by examining the uh backside first.

1:18:13 [music]

1:18:12 All hail Cleopatra, kindred of Horus and Ra,

1:18:15 beloved of the moon and sun, daughter to Isis, [music]

1:18:19 and of upper and lower Egypt, queen.

1:18:28 A damsel.

1:18:30 [sighs and gasps] [laughter] So, yeah, she knows how to make an entrance, right?

1:18:40 It was something like that.

1:18:40 That's not far off.

1:18:43 And um and she also knows how to play the kind

1:18:46 of wound I mean I think Elizabeth Taylor does that really well.

1:18:50 [gasps] My back.

1:18:50 Oh, oh, let me help you up, madam.

1:18:53 Um and so basically Cleopatra wins him over very quickly.

1:18:59 And uh because she does this she's she's sort

1:19:02 of on the losing side of the war currently.

1:19:05 Um but Caesar says we can we can reconcile you you guys.

1:19:11 I'll be your mediator.

1:19:12 And you know Ptolemy hates this idea

1:19:16 or his rather his eunuch and his general hate

1:19:19 this idea because they know like It's nice

1:19:21 that the eunuch has got such say here.

1:19:25 Yeah, let's listen to the guy that chopped his dick off.

1:19:27 Yeah, well, you know, he's a very learned man, you know, he has other talents.

1:19:30 got nothing else to do.

1:19:31 Right.

1:19:33 Um and you know, off I think I don't know if how they did this in Egypt,

1:19:37 but often like it would be the parents that did it to like It's an offering.

1:19:41 Yeah, promote the kid and yeah, there's there's something really

1:19:46 You got to do it with the second one.

1:19:47 If you do it with the first one,

1:19:48 you like we don't have another one, that's the end of the bloodline.

1:19:50 Yeah, yeah.

1:19:51 Okay.

1:19:51 Um but if he does well, you know,

1:19:54 he could he could do great things for his nephews at least.

1:20:00 [laughter] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:20:00 Yeah.

1:20:01 There's no way to make that a good deal.

1:20:03 Uh so uh anyway, Caesar uh basically offers to moderate between

1:20:10 them and the offer is uh rejected and long story short,

1:20:16 he ends up picking Cleopatra and uh Ptolemy ends

1:20:20 up Who's [cough and clears throat] the younger brother?

1:20:23 brother.

1:20:23 Yep.

1:20:23 Yeah, he ends up uh sort of getting his hand forced by his um by his general

1:20:30 Achilles and and the eunuch and they try

1:20:34 to have another like coup attempt against Caesar.

1:20:38 Caesar defeats them and the boy is um apparently

1:20:43 drowned in the Nile in a boating the younger brother.

1:20:45 Yeah, yeah, like not not like he's murdered but there

1:20:48 was a battle and he was just not found.

1:20:51 Probably drowned in the Nile.

1:20:53 Um it was um tight family with the Ptolemies then.

1:20:57 I mean they are always trying to murder each other and and one up

1:21:00 each other and and and sure enough like Cleopatra has this younger sister too,

1:21:05 Arsinoe, and she tries to revolt and Caesar crushes her as well and actually

1:21:10 captures her and takes her back to Rome and uh marches her in the triumph.

1:21:15 Was there any suggestion that Cleopatra and Caesar got it on?

1:21:19 Oh, more than a suggestion.

1:21:20 Like they become lovers, like for real.

1:21:23 And they have a kid, too.

1:21:25 Which is a fascinating to think about the ramifications of this.

1:21:31 But so, yeah, basically Caesar's never going to turn

1:21:35 down a uh a good offer from a high-status woman.

1:21:39 And you know, she's a living goddess by Egyptian tradition.

1:21:43 She Daughter of Isis.

1:21:45 Daughter of Isis.

1:21:46 Not just daughter of Isis but living embodiment of Isis.

1:21:49 Like just like she said, there's a kind of uh you know,

1:21:54 fully god but fully human sort of thing going on with with the pharaohs.

1:21:59 Uh son of son and kind of like divine avatar of Amun-Ra.

1:22:05 Or is it Osiris [clears throat] Osiris with the pharaohs.

1:22:09 So, anyway, she's worshipped as a divinity while she's alive.

1:22:12 There's great um reliefs like so she she gets portrayed

1:22:17 as a Greek to her Greek subjects as the Ptolemies do.

1:22:20 Like, you know, looks like a normal human kind of classical statue face.

1:22:24 And then there are reliefs of her portrayed

1:22:26 as like an Egyptian hieroglyphic lady, too.

1:22:29 Might be worth pulling up.

1:22:30 I want to see I want to see this.

1:22:32 Cleopatra Egyptian relief, something like that.

1:22:37 A really interesting place, uh uh you know, Ptolemaic Alexandria.

1:22:41 Mhm.

1:22:42 [gasps] Um It's blending two things together.

1:22:44 It feels like the phasing out of the old world and the phasing

1:22:47 in of what would sort of become this what then would be more cosmopolitan.

1:22:51 Mhm.

1:22:51 What then would be built more around rhetoric, philosophy,

1:22:55 what then would have been seen as modern and sort of this sort of passing

1:22:59 off of but you've got the both of them are happening at the same time.

1:23:02 I guess it There you go.

1:23:04 That's her and I think that's her and her brother Oh, that's her son, Caesarion.

1:23:08 That So, there is Cleopatra on the left um

1:23:12 and the other one is the son of Julius Caesar.

1:23:16 That's their kid, Caesarion.

1:23:17 No way.

1:23:17 That image on the left, open that up, Jared.

1:23:21 There you go.

1:23:23 Wow.

1:23:24 Yeah, so that's proper 3,000 BC looking

1:23:28 Right, like that you could that could be like scratched into a pyramid.

1:23:32 You wouldn't know the difference.

1:23:33 yeah, yeah.

1:23:33 Yeah.

1:23:34 Oh god, and there's a guy in the bottom corner.

1:23:36 Yes.

1:23:36 Look at how huge that is.

1:23:38 Really big.

1:23:38 Holy[ __] And that's the son.

1:23:41 That's the you know, illegitimate son of Cleopatra and Not that illegitimate.

1:23:45 I mean, he's 15 ft tall.

1:23:48 Yeah, exactly.

1:23:48 What was he called?

1:23:49 Caesarion is was his nickname, Little Caesar.

1:23:53 Yeah.

1:23:54 Yes, he started a great pizza chain and didn't go [laughter] so well.

1:23:58 And then he became a pizza magnate.

1:24:01 Saw where the real money was.

1:24:02 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:24:03 Yeah.

1:24:03 Yeah.

1:24:03 Um but he His His His official name was I think like Ptolemy the 14th.

1:24:09 Yeah.

1:24:09 Like every single freaking person in that dynasty is named

1:24:13 Ptolemy if they're a boy or either Cleopatra or Arsinoe.

1:24:19 And there's not a lot of names.

1:24:20 I think that might have something to do with this idea that like you know

1:24:23 you know you continue to be the embodiment

1:24:25 of the same god through the generations.

1:24:27 So you like have to take on that dynastic name.

1:24:29 Dali's story, Salvador Dali?

1:24:31 I don't know if I do.

1:24:32 So his parents had a son about a year

1:24:38 or so year and a half before Dali was born.

1:24:40 No, sorry, 2 years before Dali was born uh who was also called Salvador.

1:24:44 And they uh that son died and then they

1:24:48 had another son and called him the same name.

1:24:51 And when he was aged two,

1:24:54 took him to his dead brother's grave and said, "This is who you are.

1:24:57 This is you.

1:24:58 You are the reincarnation of your dead brother." Wow.

1:25:02 I mean it's just you.

1:25:03 It's you again.

1:25:04 So that was the start of his life.

1:25:05 He's Dali's[ __] fascinating.

1:25:07 But yeah, that was how he was sort of brought

1:25:09 into the world as this weird um recreation of a dead baby.

1:25:16 That is amazing.

1:25:18 Yeah, cool, eh?

1:25:19 All right, so Mhm.

1:25:20 What was Caesar's last night like?

1:25:22 You mentioned he's accumulated a bunch of enemies,

1:25:25 but maybe not shaking the Etch A Sketch enough to actually get rid of them all.

1:25:29 Keeps pardoning them.

1:25:30 He's maybe erroneously deciding to be uh uh forgiving.

1:25:34 Mhm.

1:25:35 What does the final day of Caesar's life look like?

1:25:40 So um the lead up to this is important because Caesar is uh

1:25:46 you know you know he [clears throat]

1:25:49 he knows that there are assassination plots.

1:25:53 There were even assassination plots 18 months earlier when he got back

1:25:56 to Rome finally from the African campaign where he uh defeated Cato and friends.

1:26:04 [gasps] And Cicero mentions this in a speech.

1:26:05 He gives a speech in front of Caesar.

1:26:06 He's like, "Caesar uh um I have heard it is it has been said

1:26:12 that you you tell people I have lived

1:26:14 long enough either for nature or for glory.

1:26:19 Because he knows about assassination attempts and he dismisses them.

1:26:22 He says, "You know what?

1:26:23 If they want to kill me, I've had a good run." Mhm.

1:26:26 How old is he at this point?

1:26:27 He is So, this is 46 when he gets back, so he would be 54.

1:26:33 Born in 100 BC.

1:26:34 Mhm.

1:26:35 And 44 is is the Ides of March when he dies.

1:26:38 So, that's [clears throat] that's how old he ends up being.

1:26:40 But, I mean, you know, that that's pretty old for a Roman.

1:26:45 Like, he's had a pretty good run so far.

1:26:48 And but he dismisses these these uh these um plots.

1:26:55 And you know, the information just keeps coming in surer and surer.

1:26:59 People are trying to kill you, Caesar.

1:27:01 Can you please up your security detail?

1:27:06 Can you please give yourself a bodyguard?

1:27:09 Like, we're begging you.

1:27:11 His friends are begging him and he says, "Not going to do that.

1:27:14 That's what tyrants do." And sure enough, like,

1:27:18 this is the kind of classic mold of how tyrants seize power.

1:27:21 Pisistratus of Athens, I mean, you can multiply a lot of examples.

1:27:24 You get a bodyguard first.

1:27:25 You say, "Oh, no, there's threats against my life.

1:27:27 I need a bodyguard, citizens.

1:27:28 I just want to be your servant." And [snorts]

1:27:30 and and then that's how you seize power.

1:27:32 And Caesar knows that that's the pattern.

1:27:34 He's not going to do it.

1:27:35 And And it comes to the point where people

1:27:37 are continuing to bring in names of potential conspirators.

1:27:43 And Caesar says, "I've had it.

1:27:46 Anybody bringing me more talk about an assassination

1:27:50 plot is going to face consequences." He's like,

1:27:52 "You're going to get fired if I hear another about you bringing me

1:27:56 an assassination plot." He doesn't want to He doesn't want to hear it.

1:27:59 And I think that's because he didn't want to rule over a subjugated,

1:28:08 you know, cowed populace.

1:28:10 He wanted to rule over free Romans.

1:28:14 Mhm.

1:28:13 Um and he didn't want a police state.

1:28:15 He didn't want He wanted people to feel free

1:28:18 to say what they whatever they wanted to say.

1:28:20 Uh this is clearly demonstrated by a lot of his actions.

1:28:23 You know, people are criticizing him,

1:28:25 they're making jokes about at Caesar's expense.

1:28:27 You know, there's certain lines that you don't cross.

1:28:29 Um but he doesn't want to um up his security detail the very last night.

1:28:38 Thir- the 14th of March he you know,

1:28:43 it's a normal day of business, busy day at at work.

1:28:46 And he's got this in- credible, crushing burden of the you know,

1:28:51 cases to hear and petitions and laws needing passing.

1:28:54 And he's also preparing for this great expedition to Parthia.

1:29:01 He's going to avenge Crassus.

1:29:02 Crassus was killed by the Parthians,

1:29:04 they captured Roman eagles about 10 years earlier.

1:29:07 So, he's he's just trying to get get through the next 3

1:29:10 days to get out of town and go back to I mean,

1:29:16 Caesar was good at politics, but I think better at war.

1:29:19 I think he's better at war.

1:29:20 Yeah.

1:29:20 Or he's equally as good at war.

1:29:22 It's probably a happier place for him.

1:29:23 Even in BC times, people were still drowning in admin, is what you're saying?

1:29:28 Oh, yeah.

1:29:28 I mean, like the load that he's carrying.

1:29:32 Oh, yeah.

1:29:33 It's it's a universal problem.

1:29:35 Once they invent writing, you know, it's it's over.

1:29:37 __] game over.

1:29:38 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:29:38 It's the email inbox of ancient Rome.

1:29:40 Yeah.

1:29:41 And it's funny you should mention email.

1:29:43 So, um on the last night Caesar is having dinner.

1:29:49 As you know, he he has a like formal dinner every night.

1:29:52 There's like nine seats at a typical Roman feast.

1:29:55 You you circle around on couches around a central

1:29:58 table and you everybody kind of lies down.

1:30:00 It's it's weird, but that's how they did it.

1:30:03 Mhm.

1:30:03 And uh Horrible for the digestion.

1:30:05 It's horrible for the digest- digestion,

1:30:06 but one advantage is everybody has to have the same conversation.

1:30:10 Cuz you're all pointed toward the center of the circle.

1:30:13 Yeah, as opposed to an elongated table.

1:30:15 Yeah, so This group over there is speaking like that and this group Yeah.

1:30:18 It's interesting.

1:30:19 I remember um was it Who is it that suggested that the size

1:30:25 of glasses of wine were getting too big around the table?

1:30:29 Was it maybe Aristotle?

1:30:31 Mhm.

1:30:31 And he made a special kind of cup

1:30:34 and if you overfilled the cup the entire thing drained.

1:30:38 Oh, yeah.

1:30:39 Basically, his problem was that he wanted to have these really

1:30:41 interesting conversations at dinner and people were just getting too drunk.

1:30:45 This is before coffee came around

1:30:46 and there's this interesting story which you probably and all

1:30:49 I before neutronic I mean they should have had the neutropic toothpicks.

1:30:52 Um You there's that big transition was it in sort of the Middle

1:30:58 Ages in uh the UK where Britain started to go from just

1:31:03 having alehouses to having uh coffee shops as well and this is

1:31:07 a boon in uh innovation because people aren't just pissed all the time.

1:31:13 They're just not drunk as much.

1:31:15 They're stimulated and they're going and getting stuff done.

1:31:17 Anyway, I think it's Aristotle that had this issue.

1:31:20 And his problem was I want to go

1:31:22 to dinner and have all of these interesting conversations,

1:31:24 but everybody drinks their wine so fast

1:31:27 that the the conversation degenerates into nothingness.

1:31:31 So, his suggestion was to his host to make the cup smaller.

1:31:35 He says people will drink the same number,

1:31:37 but they'll not realize that they're having less.

1:31:39 Just And it's supposed to be I think it's like an Aristotelian cup.

1:31:43 Jared, do a chat GPT search.

1:31:46 What was the ancient cup that was made to ensure people didn't overfill it?

1:31:54 Uh maybe Aristotle.

1:31:56 And it's this interesting this interesting point that okay, well,

1:31:58 if we reduce it down it means

1:31:59 that the conversational quality will be a bit better.

1:32:01 But I suppose if you're sat

1:32:02 in a you're probably thinking of the Pythagorean cup.

1:32:05 Pythagoras.

1:32:06 Yeah, also called the cup of greed or greedy cup.

1:32:08 It's a special drinking cup from ancient Greece designed

1:32:10 so that if you fill it past a certain level, it empties completely.

1:32:13 Hm.

1:32:14 Isn't that cool?

1:32:15 That's brilliant.

1:32:15 Oh, it's cuz it's a siphon.

1:32:16 Yeah, that's right.

1:32:17 a hidden siphon inside the central column.

1:32:19 If you pour wine below the mark line, the cup works normally.

1:32:22 If you pour above the line, the siphon activates and the entire cup

1:32:25 drains out through the bottom of the stem.

1:32:27 For someone who tries to take more than their fair share,

1:32:30 they end up with nothing.

1:32:31 Legend says Pythagoras used it to teach

1:32:33 moderation and fairness among workers or students.

1:32:35 And the lesson is greed causes you to lose everything.

1:32:39 Isn't that[ __] cool?

1:32:40 So Greek.

1:32:40 That's sick.

1:32:41 Moderation.

1:32:42 Yeah.

1:32:43 Wise man Pythagoras.

1:32:44 Well, you know, it's funny because I mean it

1:32:46 and and Plato's symposium that that they decide to pour

1:32:51 the the wine they pour water in the wine

1:32:54 often for moderation so that you don't you drink less.

1:32:57 But they wanted to pour the wine really

1:32:58 really light that night because they they're all

1:33:00 got smashed the night before and they want

1:33:01 to have like a chill conversation that night.

1:33:04 But Cato, Caesar's nemesis, was actually known to be a bit of a tippler.

1:33:10 Like he would he would often show up to the Senate kind of [snorts]

1:33:15 smelling of wine.

1:33:16 Yep.

1:33:17 And but that would be because he liked

1:33:19 to drink for a long time having philosophical conversations.

1:33:23 And it was it was this kind

1:33:25 of conversation that that was happening Caesar's last night.

1:33:29 So Caesar is at the house of Lepidus and he invites

1:33:36 a number of people to the to be among the nine.

1:33:40 Lepidus is good good trusted friend of his.

1:33:43 And one of them is Decimus Brutus.

1:33:46 This is not the the Brutus that appears in Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar,

1:33:50 you know, "And you too, Brutus." It's a different Brutus.

1:33:53 But actually was the Brutus that was is

1:33:55 to Caesar in in point of fact historically, funny enough.

1:33:58 So, did Shakespeare get that confused?

1:34:00 Well, he Was he amalgamate the two on purpose?

1:34:02 Plutarch gets it confused.

1:34:03 This is like one of the one of the kind

1:34:05 of flaws of Plutarch's um biography of Caesar.

1:34:09 He thinks that um Marcus Brutus who is actually not I mean close to Caesar,

1:34:16 he is um because he's the son of Caesar's favorite girlfriend, Servilia.

1:34:21 Mhm.

1:34:22 But Decimus Brutus was a lot closer to him

1:34:25 because he was a a lieutenant of his in Gaul.

1:34:27 I mean they're distantly related, these two Brutuses,

1:34:30 but they're not close or anything.

1:34:32 But Decimus was like naval commander against the Veneti.

1:34:36 He's been brilliant in the Civil War.

1:34:39 Crucial in the Battle of Marseille.

1:34:41 And And in fact, Decimus Brutus was in his will as a second.

1:34:47 Decimus is one of the men who who stabbed him the very next day.

1:34:50 He's sitting there with him at dinner the night before.

1:34:54 And they're they're they're sitting there having their conversation as one does.

1:35:01 As as you know, a lot of final night scenes of uh you know,

1:35:06 great Romans and great Greeks are like these like philosophical conversations.

1:35:11 And I think that's because they had them a lot actually.

1:35:14 It's very normal.

1:35:15 And so Like [clears throat] the Last Supper of Jesus,

1:35:18 that's I mean there were maybe a few additions,

1:35:20 but he was probably speaking like that mostly.

1:35:23 Yeah, like all right, here we go again.

1:35:24 Just Tuesday.

1:35:27 [gasps] So, Caesar is sitting there as the conversation's going on.

1:35:30 I find this really fascinating.

1:35:33 He's he's he's doing his clearing his inbox actually.

1:35:38 Cuz he's a busy guy,

1:35:39 one has to, and his secretary's sitting there kind of feeding

1:35:43 him letters that need to go out that he needs to sign.

1:35:46 And so he's writing sincerely on them, you know, signing his name.

1:35:50 But the way you do that in Latin the custom is you write vale.

1:35:55 Farewell.

1:35:57 So all through the night he's writing farewell,

1:36:00 farewell, farewell on these letters.

1:36:03 And that's what you would have done typically?

1:36:05 That's what you would have done to say goodbye.

1:36:07 Uh but but I mean the fact that he's like filling out letters during dinner.

1:36:11 Mhm.

1:36:11 I mean this guy has got a[ __] ton of work to do.

1:36:14 And he's just trying to get it's brainless.

1:36:16 He's just kind of Yeah.

1:36:17 Yeah.

1:36:17 Yeah.

1:36:17 Whatever.

1:36:18 Yes.

1:36:18 Go on Cassius.

1:36:19 Yes.

1:36:20 And um But I find that striking.

1:36:23 But at some point in the night she proposes

1:36:27 a theme for the philosophical conversation that's going on.

1:36:31 Decimus is sitting right there.

1:36:33 What is the best kind of death?

1:36:37 And the conversation goes this way and that way.

1:36:42 Somebody brings up the example of Cyrus the Great,

1:36:45 the great king of Persia who founded the Persian Empire.

1:36:49 Um Xenophon says, doesn't he that Cyrus made all

1:36:52 these arrangements before his death that he wanted to be

1:36:55 buried in this way and this should happen and so

1:36:57 forth after he was um after he was gone.

1:37:00 And of course Caesar had read this book, Xenophon's Cyropaedia.

1:37:04 And Caesar's turn comes to him and he says, that sounds horrible.

1:37:09 I don't want a long slow death.

1:37:11 The best kind of death is one that comes sudden, swift, and unexpected.

1:37:20 You know, what is Decimus thinking at that at that moment?

1:37:23 But that that's well attested that that's what

1:37:26 the conversation was about at some point that night.

1:37:28 Prophetic.

1:37:29 Yeah, [sighs] man.

1:37:30 And then you know, he goes home late and bad dreams.

1:37:34 You know, if you've heard the read [snorts] the Shakespeare play,

1:37:38 there's all these omens.

1:37:39 You know, his wife has this dream that she's She gets him up

1:37:42 in the middle of the night that like wind blows open the shutters and you know,

1:37:45 he has to get up and shut them and calm down Calpurnia.

1:37:50 And she had this dream that she was like holding the bloody

1:37:53 Caesar like looking at their house as it's like burning and collapsing.

1:37:59 There's all these you know, birds are acting weird.

1:38:02 So the story goes you know, a lot of these omens typically happen

1:38:06 around great events in the ancient sources, but you know, who knows?

1:38:09 I mean I mean the the the murder of a guy like Julius Caesar really is

1:38:13 a kind of like if if ever a death is a rip in the fabric of reality,

1:38:17 you know, like that that comes pretty close.

1:38:21 Um so that was how he spent his last night.

1:38:23 It's a very unsettled night.

1:38:25 And what about the next day?

1:38:27 So it's I think Caesar was um I mean he has a reputation for dismissing omens.

1:38:38 He did this when he was consul.

1:38:40 You know, his enemies are trying to obstruct him

1:38:42 in in the um in the assemblies and they're they're saying,

1:38:47 "Oh, I saw a bird flying the wrong way." And "I heard thunder.

1:38:51 I heard thunder." It's a blue sky and he's like "I didn't hear you though.

1:38:55 Let's get on with business." You know,

1:38:57 he just ignores omens for most of his career.

1:38:59 Sometimes the omens are bad and he's like,

1:39:01 "Let's fight the battle anyway." And he wins.

1:39:04 But all these you know, his wife is saying, "I had a bad dream.

1:39:08 I don't have a good feeling about this." And ancient omens I

1:39:12 think are often kind of uh it's a system that's in place.

1:39:19 So before you you go into a campaign you uh before you go into battle,

1:39:25 you sacrifice to the gods.

1:39:26 You know, you cut open a piglet or a whatever it is and you read the entrails.

1:39:32 Or you get the sacred chickens out and you see how are the sacred chickens

1:39:36 want to eat their their uh their feed or are they staying in their cage?

1:39:40 You know, it's what does this mean?

1:39:42 And it's kind of like opening up a space for intuition.

1:39:46 The generals often have to make decisions.

1:39:48 Leaders often have to make decisions that could be the right decision,

1:39:54 but to have to explain why you're making that decision

1:39:57 is um would would would undermine the project somehow.

1:40:03 Like you don't you want to have a way of explaining intuition.

1:40:06 That's That's how I a lot of anthropologists explain.

1:40:09 I think it's really compelling.

1:40:10 Um but so I think his wife had a bad feeling.

1:40:14 I think he had a bad feeling at some point.

1:40:16 He was apparently kind of un like I had this stomach issues.

1:40:22 It's unspecified, but he felt like out of sorts that morning.

1:40:27 Mhm.

1:40:27 And he was supposed to go to the Senate.

1:40:28 There was some business, some important business at hand.

1:40:33 A dispute between Mark Antony and uh Dolabella, blah blah blah.

1:40:38 And he's like maybe I don't want to go to the Senate today.

1:40:40 I'm feeling out of sorts.

1:40:41 My wife is telling me to stay home.

1:40:44 Uh he goes, you know, down the street.

1:40:47 He He lives in the Forum.

1:40:48 The Senate's meeting about a mile away.

1:40:51 He goes down the street to a buddy's house

1:40:53 and to say hi and they they do a little sacrifice.

1:40:57 And that sacrifice contains bad omens.

1:41:01 We don't know the details, but like he's it's really striking.

1:41:04 So he he decides to just stay home that day.

1:41:08 And who shows up at his door?

1:41:10 But Decimus Brutus.

1:41:12 The guy he was having dinner with last night.

1:41:14 He says, "Caesar, I heard that you are listening

1:41:18 to the the ravings of a of a woman.

1:41:23 I mean, I've never heard Caesar to be um bothered by omens in his career.

1:41:28 Think of all the battles that we've won after bad omens.

1:41:30 Like, come on, Caesar.

1:41:31 Let's The Senate's counting on you.

1:41:32 They They all cleared their schedules.

1:41:33 They're busy men, and you you really trying

1:41:36 to make them feel like Rome is the same Rome.

1:41:40 This is a whole other issue that, you know,

1:41:42 he is kind of becoming this monarchic figure in Rome.

1:41:45 Uh he's going to getting accused of wanting to make himself king.

1:41:49 He's getting accused of wanting to make himself a god,

1:41:52 which is not entirely off base.

1:41:54 We could get to that, but So, you know, Decimus makes some good arguments.

1:42:01 Come on, soldier up.

1:42:02 He's a fellow soldier.

1:42:04 And so Caesar reluctantly at first, but you know,

1:42:07 he kind of allows himself to be persuaded by Decimus.

1:42:10 And it's funny, you know, I mean,

1:42:11 whenever Caesar goes anywhere in Rome, the crowds, the throngs,

1:42:15 people are saying, "Caesar, kiss my baby." Or "Can you,

1:42:20 you know, cancel my debt?" Blah, blah, blah.

1:42:22 But uh and this is again well attested.

1:42:25 This happens in in Shakespeare's play,

1:42:27 but, you know, apparently he had a client,

1:42:30 uh like a friend of his whose house he had stayed at in Asia once.

1:42:34 And the young man, the son of the house, was in Rome studying philosophy.

1:42:42 And probably was connected with the other Brutus, Marcus Brutus,

1:42:47 who was one of the ringleaders of the assassination.

1:42:50 And this kid, I forget what his name is,

1:42:53 comes up to Caesar and like Caesar knows him and he passes a letter to Caesar.

1:42:58 He says, "Caesar, you have to read this urgently." [gasps]

1:43:01 Uh Caesar's probably being carried on a litter,

1:43:03 but he gets the letter to Caesar.

1:43:05 Apparently, Caesar has this in his hand and plans to read it,

1:43:09 but this would have been Basically, the guy was trying to tell him about

1:43:14 the plot that was very much in action that day.

1:43:18 Underway.

1:43:19 That was underway that he was walking right into.

1:43:21 So, Brutus went to try and encourage Caesar

1:43:24 to leave the home to sort of question

1:43:26 his agency and sovereignty and belief in himself to to him of what he'd done

1:43:31 in the past in an attempt to get him out of the house so that he

1:43:34 could be carried through so that he

1:43:36 could arrive at the place for the assassination.

1:43:39 Well put.

1:43:39 Yeah.

1:43:40 So that was you know the Senate meeting that they were

1:43:44 that they ended up doing the deed at murdering him in the Senate.

1:43:49 And uh and there you know the two Brutus's

1:43:51 the one that he was with dinner with the night

1:43:53 before was the um the guy who got him to come the guy that's in his will.

1:44:01 Incredible.

1:44:03 And so he yeah he gets to the Senate house once again the omens are bad.

1:44:07 You know as you always sacrifice and do some whatever you do before

1:44:13 going into the Senate to kind of inaugurate the meeting consuls usually do this.

1:44:17 I think Caesar's consul that year.

1:44:19 Um and uh omens are bad but he goes in anyway.

1:44:25 Yeah.

1:44:26 And and he's he's in the Senate house.

1:44:28 Uh and and it's his throne as dictator

1:44:34 is right under the statue of Pompey the Great.

1:44:40 Because the place that they're actually meeting is not the old

1:44:43 Senate house which burned down a couple of years earlier.

1:44:46 It's this new complex um that that Pompey built

1:44:50 with the spoils of his war in the East and it's like

1:44:53 a little basement or not basement it's like a a room

1:44:56 off the complex that Pompey built for the Senate to meet in.

1:45:00 In the forum?

1:45:00 In uh so it's it's outside the pomerium it's on it's in the Campus

1:45:04 Martius now so it's um I forget what that part of Rome is called um

1:45:09 but basically it was an area that wasn't very built up so you could plant

1:45:14 this massive you know stone complex with multiple

1:45:17 buildings pretty easily uh in this unclaimed land.

1:45:21 So he had actually walk from the forum it

1:45:23 was like a it's probably a 20 minute walk.

1:45:25 Yeah.

1:45:26 Um but [clears throat] it that is where the Senate is now officially meeting.

1:45:32 And of course there was a statue of Pompey as conqueror,

1:45:35 you know, in this prominent place in the Senate house,

1:45:37 and it's it's in front of the statue of Pompey the Great that the petitioners

1:45:41 come up or that the assassins come up pretending to have some urgent business.

1:45:47 "Please, my brother is in exile.

1:45:50 Caesar, can you get him pardoned?" No, this is not the time.

1:45:54 Please, Caesar, and Brutus comes up, and Decimus comes up,

1:45:57 the other Brutus, and Cassius comes up.

1:45:59 Caesar, this is a worthy friend of yours.

1:46:02 We we we we beg you.

1:46:03 Please, you know, you you must spare.

1:46:05 And then that's when they have him distracted.

1:46:08 They grab his robe, and he at some point before he actually gets stabbed,

1:46:11 he's like They're grabbing him.

1:46:13 He's like, "What's going on here?

1:46:14 This is violence." And uh And that's I think

1:46:18 when he realizes at least when the first blow struck.

1:46:22 Every man that's surrounding him, it's 15 or 20 guys, probably.

1:46:26 There was a There were more people in on the plot,

1:46:28 but some are holding the doors,

1:46:30 you know, keeping the perimeter to make sure uh the But yeah.

1:46:38 And uh and they did the deed.

1:46:40 And you know, after they kill him, um after they stab him,

1:46:48 there is that moment that is in Plutarch where he turns to Brutus,

1:46:53 the the more famous one, his uh And this is Remember,

1:46:58 like he's the son of Caesar's like top girlfriend, Servilia.

1:47:03 And he had a relationship with this kid.

1:47:05 Like he was looking out for his career.

1:47:07 Uh he was promoting him.

1:47:09 The kid fought on Pompey's side in the Civil

1:47:11 War for for some family reasons, but he spared him.

1:47:14 So many of these men he spared.

1:47:18 [gasps] And some of them are his trusted like long-term loyalists.

1:47:21 It's not just former enemies that were spared that were resentful.

1:47:25 It's former loyalists.

1:47:28 And uh and he says to to Brutus, "You too, child." Kai su technon.

1:47:34 Uh et tu Brute as as Shakespeare says.

1:47:38 Um and then they, you know, he bleeds out.

1:47:41 Who knows how long it takes, but amazingly, the Senate clears out.

1:47:47 Pandemonium.

1:47:48 I mean, to kill Julius Caesar like this is this is like a a horrifying

1:47:55 idea because it it it really threatens

1:47:57 to plunge the Republic back into civil war again.

1:48:00 He's the lid holding it all down.

1:48:02 This is why Cicero told him that he needs

1:48:05 to have a bodyguard because so much is at stake.

1:48:07 If you get killed now, we're all screwed.

1:48:10 That's That's what Cicero was saying 18 months earlier,

1:48:13 and he was very much correct.

1:48:16 And uh but the Senate house clears out.

1:48:20 He's just there alone on the floor.

1:48:23 And nobody wants to go approach him

1:48:25 and and and draw close because they're afraid that, you know,

1:48:29 one of the assassins will see them and implic- you know,

1:48:33 they Nobody knows like what is what is

1:48:35 the potential risk of me tending to Caesar's body?

1:48:38 And so he just lies there for I become cowards.

1:48:41 Yeah.

1:48:41 Yeah.

1:48:43 Um and then eventually some of Caesar's slaves go in there.

1:48:47 They can only find three men.

1:48:49 It takes four men to hold a a litter.

1:48:51 They can only find three guys to carry Caesar's body back to his house.

1:48:56 Uh and it starts to rain on their way back, and the streets are lined.

1:49:00 People see his his like arm hanging out.

1:49:03 Um and he's brought back to Calpurnia.

1:49:07 So [gasps] still gets me.

1:49:10 I mean, I think I think that you can you can say a lot about Caesar,

1:49:12 but I I do think that he um he he managed to identify his own success,

1:49:24 his own legacy, with what he saw as the flourishing of Rome.

1:49:31 You know, it wasn't just about his own glory.

1:49:33 Or it was, but to the extent that he felt like he

1:49:37 was the man most responsible for whether the state survived and flourished.

1:49:43 And uh so I you know But that's not how his enemies saw it, was it?

1:49:50 What convinced them that he needed to go?

1:49:53 Well, they saw that after the [clears throat] Civil War,

1:50:00 Caesar was unquestionably not just the the the first among equals,

1:50:07 not just the first man in Rome, but like something was changing.

1:50:12 You know, Caesar had fought fought all of his career to end

1:50:16 corruption and the the stranglehold

1:50:19 of the the establishment oligarchy over offices.

1:50:23 I mean, there was incredible wealth inequality

1:50:26 and this is kind of like tight click

1:50:29 of people that control everything and they get

1:50:31 to abuse the provincials at will if they're,

1:50:34 you know, the typical way that you uh rise up in Rome

1:50:39 is by winning elections and then going out and uh being governor.

1:50:43 And usually it's very expensive to get elected.

1:50:47 And then you have to go into debt and you recoup your money

1:50:50 by by robbing the Greeks or the Gauls

1:50:54 or the Spaniards and taking bribes and stuff.

1:50:58 It's a system that highly incentivizes corruption.

1:51:01 And Caesar wanted to change that, among other things.

1:51:05 And um and and I think he eventually

1:51:10 decided that this whole game that we've been

1:51:13 playing at Rome for 450 years since the Republic

1:51:19 was founded since they drove out the kings.

1:51:22 You got to remember the Romans have been inoculated against

1:51:24 kings much in the same way we are as Americans.

1:51:27 Like America was founded by us rejecting King George the III.

1:51:31 Rome was the Republic rather was founded by driving

1:51:34 out Tarquin the proud who was this brutal,

1:51:38 you know, corrupt tyrant in their eyes.

1:51:41 And then that it was a a collective government.

1:51:43 You have elections for office, you know,

1:51:46 you have assemblies to vote on laws and all this stuff.

1:51:48 That's what the Republic is to them.

1:51:50 That's what Rome is to them.

1:51:52 And uh And this is also the game

1:51:56 that people like Decimus Brutus, his friend Brutus,

1:52:00 the other Brutus Cassius uh basically everybody

1:52:05 in the Republic every everybody in the leadership class has

1:52:08 had been playing had been I've been expecting

1:52:11 to play for their whole lives which is you know, this is how you get honor.

1:52:16 You get honor by service to the Republic.

1:52:17 You get honor by winning elections.

1:52:19 You get honor by winning wars.

1:52:21 But now Caesar is basically trying to kind of transition

1:52:28 the political system into um something resembling a monarchy.

1:52:33 Hm.

1:52:34 Doesn't want to call it a king a kingship.

1:52:36 Doesn't want to call himself king, but he he's really deliberately taking all

1:52:42 the authority into himself because I think he sees

1:52:45 that his legacy depends on if if he releases

1:52:50 power he's kind of a control freak you might say.

1:52:54 If he lets go then it's all going to kind of dissolve again.

1:52:58 That people are going to undo his legislation and um they're

1:53:03 going to go back to revert to the way the things were.

1:53:06 And this is one of the reasons why he

1:53:07 just feels like he has to hold on to power.

1:53:09 Um but what it what it puts him in this uncomfortable position uh for is

1:53:19 every honor na- in the past used to be given by the Roman people.

1:53:26 You used to have supreme responsibility as a consul.

1:53:29 If you're going to command Rome's armies,

1:53:32 uh you are the guy who wins the victory.

1:53:35 If you win the consulship, it's because the people of Rome elected you consul,

1:53:39 and so on and so on.

1:53:40 Honor is granted by the state.

1:53:44 And now it seems clear Caesar's been handing out offices basically.

1:53:50 Like he's been picking the consuls, he's been picking the praetors.

1:53:53 He's been drafting the laws and getting the Senate to rubber stamp them.

1:53:59 All the honor flows from this one man.

1:54:02 And how is that not slavery in the eyes of a proud Roman?

1:54:06 Like you the the most Aristotle talked about the most difficult thing that a uh

1:54:13 politician has to do and their most important

1:54:15 duty as of a statesman is to correctly, wisely distribute honors.

1:54:21 Cuz this is for a guy like Caesar and for a guy

1:54:24 like Decimus for for any of these these, you know,

1:54:26 super uh Chad Roman uh statesman uh aspirants,

1:54:34 the thing the the prize that you're playing for is not wealth,

1:54:38 in at least it shouldn't be.

1:54:41 It's not it's not pleasure,

1:54:42 it's not like fame as such or status as such, it's honor.

1:54:46 That's That's what Aristotle would say.

1:54:48 That that the highest form of the statesman, the great-souled man,

1:54:53 is one who desires great things,

1:54:57 considers himself worthy of them, and is correct in that judgment.

1:55:02 And that means um um [clears throat] being worthy of of great things.

1:55:08 But what are the greatest things to desire?

1:55:10 I mean, this is a question that's perplexed philosophers.

1:55:13 But Aristotle says a good life.

1:55:15 What is it What is a good life?

1:55:16 What is worthy of desire?

1:55:17 Uh What is it What is it?

1:55:19 Um What does it mean to be worthy of something?

1:55:24 And Aristotle says the highest thing that you

1:55:25 can desire of external goods is honor.

1:55:30 The price that you would be paid for a ransom, no?

1:55:32 Yeah.

1:55:33 Yeah, essentially.

1:55:35 And uh you know, it you can desire virtue, you can desire inner peace,

1:55:39 you can desire wholeness, you can desire wisdom,

1:55:43 but those are all internal goods.

1:55:46 But But of of the things that you can kind of strive for, it's honor.

1:55:51 And so, this is the highest prize that that um

1:55:54 an ambitious man could like you know, make a career on.

1:55:59 You know, pursue virtue.

1:56:01 You need to be virtuous to be really worthy of honor, etc.

1:56:05 Um But And you know, for for a great souled man,

1:56:08 even honor is maybe a small prize because like honor can be corrupted, right?

1:56:14 Mhm.

1:56:15 Um corrupt people get get voted honors all the time.

1:56:19 Uh so, I don't think that's a problem Caesar had solved.

1:56:22 He's a brilliant brilliant statesman,

1:56:24 legislator, politician, brilliant with people,

1:56:26 but like to get a whole political class of ambitious young men.

1:56:34 I mean, all the guys that kill him are like late 30s, early 40s.

1:56:37 They're like in their prime, and they still got a lot of gas left,

1:56:41 and they're seeing the whole game has been just screwed.

1:56:47 Like I was raised to want honor,

1:56:50 and honor is is what the people of Rome give you.

1:56:53 And now I'm I'm supposed to like do all of this stuff that I was going to do,

1:57:00 command armies, uh you know, pass laws.

1:57:05 I'm going to all do it as Caesar's employee.

1:57:08 Right.

1:57:09 Right?

1:57:10 Never a boss.

1:57:11 Never a patron, always a client.

1:57:13 I think that was intolerable for them.

1:57:14 It was like a meaning crisis for them.

1:57:16 But the the situation that they did put themselves into is

1:57:19 that for the rest of time they would be seen as an assassin.

1:57:22 Yeah.

1:57:23 I mean, I guess maybe it's preferable to be

1:57:27 a powerful assassin than a peaceful subordinate maybe in Roman times.

1:57:34 Or at least in their version of this philosophy.

1:57:37 Yeah.

1:57:38 You know, like it's an interesting blend to to think that it would be

1:57:41 better to be mutinous and a rebel against somebody that was a great leader,

1:57:47 but may have pushed the power too far compared with being a part of an existing

1:57:56 structure that had sort of raised Rome up to be a really great empire.

1:58:02 [snorts] Yeah, at the very least they saw more meaning

1:58:04 in that path than the other path at the time.

1:58:07 There was more self-determination.

1:58:09 Yeah.

1:58:09 Which is super important.

1:58:10 They had a lot more agency.

1:58:12 I mean, it's very understandable.

1:58:14 Dante still puts them in the ninth circle of hell.

1:58:19 [laughter] Betraying a friend.

1:58:22 __] Yeah.

1:58:23 Alex, you absolutely rule, dude.

1:58:25 This has been so much fun.

1:58:27 It's so great.

1:58:28 And I there's, you know,

1:58:30 literally 2,000 years of history that we could go through.

1:58:32 Before we close, I got you a little gift.

1:58:34 Oh, thank you.

1:58:35 Um you know, I don't know how much of a Roman Empire fan you are,

1:58:39 Chris, but I'm trying to make you one.

1:58:41 Okay.

1:58:42 So, um this is a coin that I got from Kinser Coins, uh which I recommend.

1:58:49 It's It's Hadrian.

1:58:51 You're You're a northern Brit, right?

1:58:54 Yep.

1:58:54 I've been to Hadrian's Wall many a time.

1:58:56 I figured I figured and you know,

1:58:58 if you look at this He's got a nice little beard.

1:59:01 I mean that I see a little resemblance there as a matter of fact.

1:59:05 It says it says on there Hadrianus Augustus Hadrian Augustus.

1:59:11 And um Dude, this is so cool.

1:59:14 It says COS on the other side that means consul.

1:59:16 So it was minted when he was a consul.

1:59:18 And is that are those stars?

1:59:20 Are those that I think they're stars.

1:59:22 On the what would be the bottom The yeah, this is uh What is on the back?

1:59:28 It's someone stood in a toga?

1:59:30 Yeah, I think that this is Roma.

1:59:34 Roma Like it's she's the the goddess

1:59:39 that embodies like the divine tutelary goddess of Rome.

1:59:42 I can't believe you got me that.

1:59:44 Yeah.

1:59:44 Dude, that is so[ __] cool.

1:59:47 Hadrian is is the last emperor that Plutarch lived under.

1:59:51 He was so he's kind of special to me.

1:59:54 Not to be emulated in everything, you know, Hadrian had a Yeah,

1:59:58 he he did he did a lot of things Greek style.

2:00:01 He but he was a great he was a great fan of the Greeks,

2:00:03 the patron of the Greeks.

2:00:04 So um this is so good.

2:00:06 Thank you so much.

2:00:07 This honestly is I could have sat and listened to you for the rest of the month.

2:00:12 Uh where should people go?

2:00:13 You've got so much stuff going on.

2:00:14 Yeah, Cost of Glory podcasts wherever you get your podcasts um Spotify.

2:00:21 I'm on YouTube, too.

2:00:22 We're trying to make more videos to the audio content and you

2:00:25 can go to costofglory.com and I'm I do other stuff beside the podcast.

2:00:29 and stuff, right?

2:00:30 Yeah, yeah, we run retreats um in Greece and Rome and go and reenact?

2:00:35 Is this larping?

2:00:35 Are they reenacting?

2:00:37 We haven't We haven't done a larp battle yet.

2:00:40 Uh we've gotten some demand from that and we've gotten

2:00:42 You're really tapping into the uh men think

2:00:44 about the Roman Empire once every 30 minutes thing.

2:00:46 Yeah, we're trying to crank that up.

2:00:48 [laughter] It's not enough.

2:00:49 I want to get it up to every 15.

2:00:50 Never enough.

2:00:50 Yeah.

2:00:51 Yeah, can you ever forget it?

2:00:52 Oh man, this is so good.

2:00:54 Dude, today's been unreal.

2:00:55 I appreciate you coming.

2:00:56 I can't wait to have you back on.

2:00:57 Yeah.

2:00:58 Anytime.