There have been many threads here at ADI that have always been popular and called for tons of discussion of the late Republic in general and Caesar in particular.

But - for some reason - we all seem to shy away from this thread, which - when you consider that Caesar has been infamous in many quarters since his death, for the very REASON of what he did between 49 and 45 BC - seems odd.

Is it just that the whole subject of the Civil Wars makes us a bit uneasy as well as the Romans of his time? I know it does me. It's much harder, I think, to find the human being behind the man who crossed the Rubicon, fought Pompey, casually reorganized the Senate with his own supporters, probably scared hades out of poor Cicero by telling him to come to the Senate and being turned down flat, fought at Munda in the worst, perhaps, of all his battles, began to age, began to have fits, killed or saw die most of his contemporaries and almost all of his foes, etc.

I wonder what would have happened if there had never been the confrontation with Pompey, never a Civil War. Would Caesar be remembered? Perhaps, hehoped to be Consul a second time? It was the war and its preludes that gave him the ability to break out of the mold and become Dictator - what if no such opportunity had existed? Wars always create opportunities that weren't there before.


I know Caesar's end was endlessly fascinating, but surely much of what his reputation has been for the last aeons came from this 5-year period??

Anyone else wonder why so few posts on this thread?