Caesar’s Final Years in Rome

(46 – 44 BCE)

When the wars ended, Caesar returned to Rome not as a campaigning general but as the foremost citizen of a state whose traditional forms were no longer able to contain his power. He no longer lived among camps and marches but among decrees, embassies, and courts. Yet the soldier’s discipline never left him. Those who moved in his circle saw the same tireless energy that had carried him across Gaul, the Rhine, and the seas.

Ancient writers describe a man of unrelenting work. Suetonius reports that he often slept little, rose before dawn, read reports, and dictated to several secretaries at once. Plutarch notes that he could endure hunger, thirst, and fatigue with a soldier’s toughness. Meals in his house were brief; conversation was direct; and work returned even over wine. Dinner could turn into a council of state as scribes were called in and orders dictated. He ate plainly, partly from habit and partly because his health — never robust — required moderation. Wine he took sparingly. Those who had marched with him through sieges and winter crossings found it unsurprising that he worked as relentlessly in peace as in war.

Despite his power and the resentments it aroused, he refused heavy personal protection. Friends urged caution, reminding him what envy and hatred had done to other leaders. Suetonius preserves his answer: a life lived in constant suspicion was slavery; to walk openly was freedom; if assassins meant to strike, guards would not stop them. Death, he said, was nothing. Ancient accounts differ in detail but agree that he rejected barricading himself behind soldiers. In a city long accustomed to leaders who moved with armed escorts — Marius with his veterans, Sulla with bodyguards, Pompey with an array of lictors — Caesar’s openness startled contemporaries. Some saw courage, others fatalism, but it clearly signalled confidence.

Once back in Rome he began reorganising the state with striking speed. His method was direct: decree, action, and only limited debate. The Senate, long a narrow aristocratic body, he enlarged to about nine hundred members, drawing in Italians from municipalities, men from Cisalpine Gaul and Spain, and even a few whose fathers had been freedmen. Old families complained that dignity was being diluted and joked about a chamber now filled with outsiders, but the enlargement matched the scale of empire and gave Caesar a body more responsive than the ancient nobility.

Time itself was repaired. The Roman calendar, manipulated for politics and far out of step with the seasons, caused festivals to wander and months to slip. As Pontifex Maximus, Caesar — advised by the Alexandrian astronomer Sosigenes — fixed it to a solar year of 365 days with a leap day every fourth. The Julian calendar began in 46 BCE and, with minor later adjustments, still governs the Western year.

Rome’s physical state also drew his attention. The city had grown chaotic, its streets narrow, its insulae unsafe, fire and famine constant threats. He limited building heights, planned new roads, proposed draining the Pontine Marshes to reclaim land and reduce disease, ordered the expansion of the Forum, and began the Forum Julium as a new administrative centre. He projected a great harbour at Ostia to safeguard the grain fleet. Some works were started, many remained plans at his death, but the ambition was unmistakable.

His veterans, hardened by years of war, expected reward, and the poor of Rome clamoured for relief. Colonies became his answer. Carthage and Corinth were refounded, new settlements were planted in Spain, Gaul, and the East. Veterans received land mainly outside Italy, easing tension with domestic landowners; some poor citizens were resettled as well, reducing pressure on the city. Ancient sources present this as practical rather than revolutionary policy: a way to reward service, reduce unrest, and spread Roman presence.

Civil war had disrupted credit, inflation had hurt debtors, and some demanded sweeping cancellation. Caesar chose compromise. Debts were to be repaid but valued at pre-war property prices, easing burdens without destroying lenders. Suetonius notes this measure restored a measure of confidence. In the provinces, where governors had long enriched themselves by exploitation, Caesar issued stricter rules on taxation, punished abuses, and updated municipal laws across Italy. Court procedures were revised to reduce delay and corruption. How fully these reforms took hold before his death is debated, but the intent to regularise rule is clear.

Amid this reordering of state and city came an unsettling presence. Cleopatra arrived from Egypt with her young son Caesarion and lived across the Tiber in a villa provided by Caesar. Surrounded by Egyptian attendants and wealth, she fascinated the Roman public but worried the senatorial class. No decree acknowledged Caesarion as heir, but his very name stirred anxiety. Rome, long proud of having expelled kings, watched uneasily as a queen appeared in Caesar’s household.

Caesar also prepared an eastern expedition. Parthia, which had humiliated Rome at Carrhae and kept the eagles lost by Crassus, was the stated target. Ancient writers agree that preparations for such a war were under way in early 44 BCE: supplies gathered, roads improved, legions earmarked. Some later authors imagined that he hoped to push beyond Parthia into Armenia and further north or west, but how far the plans truly extended is uncertain. What mattered in Rome was the fear that a victorious return from the East would make him unassailable.

While he planned, honors multiplied. In early 44 BCE he was named dictator perpetuo — dictator for life — a title with no precedent. His statue stood among those of kings; a gilded chair awaited him in the Senate and at the games; his portrait appeared on coins, something no living Roman had done. He wore the laurel wreath constantly, partly to conceal baldness, partly as dignity. At the Lupercalia festival in February, Mark Antony publicly offered him a diadem. Caesar refused twice and the crowd cheered, but the gesture left unease: the thought of monarchy had entered public ritual.

Each honor could be seen as gratitude; together they looked like kingship. Among the old nobility resentment hardened into quiet alarm. Even some ordinary citizens, long won with gifts and games, sensed that the Republic’s balance was slipping. Friends urged Caesar again to keep a guard. He refused, saying fear was slavery and that death was nothing. To admirers this was fearlessness; to enemies, it was an opening.

Through the winter of 45–44 a conspiracy took shape. Ancient sources describe a diverse band: Gaius Cassius Longinus, once Pompey’s lieutenant; Decimus Brutus, trusted but feeling overlooked; Casca, embittered; Trebonius, pardoned but discontented; and others. Marcus Brutus, pardoned and favored, gave their effort a sense of principle because of his descent from the Brutus who expelled the kings. Motives were mixed: some feared the Republic’s end, some resented Caesar’s supremacy, some sought to restore personal standing. All believed that if Caesar marched east and returned victorious, opposition would be impossible. They chose to act before he left.

They met in private houses, under cover of ordinary gatherings, debating timing and method. Some urged that Antony also be killed to prevent swift revenge; Brutus opposed it, arguing the deed should appear as defence of liberty, not slaughter.

Caesar, trusting his clemency and accustomed to open life, made their task easier. He continued to walk and ride without special escort, to receive senators freely, and to attend the Senate in person. Ancient anecdotes tell of warnings — dreams, prodigies, and friendly cautions — but he dismissed them. More than once, Suetonius says, he remarked that a man should live without fear and that he had lived long enough.

By March 44 the Parthian preparations continued; Cleopatra still remained in her riverside villa; honors kept accumulating. Yet in private rooms daggers were being readied. The Republic could not face Caesar in battle; it would strike in the Senate. He behaved as though secure; his enemies acted as though time was short. The day approached.