Julius Caesar Essay

Rome is thought of as one of the greatest empires the world has ever seen. And the greatest ruler of the greatest empire, possibly the entire world, is Julius Caesar. Julius Caesar is known today to be a trustworthy, fair and brave leader, but you don’t become the greatest leader to ever live by not succeeding. He understood this and he was successful beyond measure.

Julius Gaius Caesar was born on July 12, 100 BC to the patrician parents of Gaius Caesar and Aurelia Cotta. Even though he was born patrician, he considered himself from a young age as part of the popularis in order to gain their support. This assisted him in gaining more support once he became a political power in the future. Caesar’s father died which made Caesar the head of the household at only 16 years old. And in order to benefit the household, Caesar got himself nominated as the High Priest of Jupiter and eventually married Cornelia when he was 18. Unfortunately, when Sulla declared himself dictator he demanded Caesar to divorce Cornelia and he refused to. This angered Sulla, so he seized Caesar’s land, his wife’s dowry and his priesthood. This forced Caesar to join the Roman military since he had no way to make money. He was very successful in the military and he was given the civic crown, an award, for saving a fellow soldier in battle. For his heroics, he was promoted to the military legate to Bithynia. Sulla soon died after this and Caesar returned to Rome. In Rome, he became a successful speaker as an orator, or lawyer. He was a natural born speaker and would later use his talent to his advantage.

In 75 BC, Caesar, beginning to shape into an eventual great leader, was kidnapped be pirates and was held for ransom. Caesar believed he could be ransomed for...

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...Caesar fell in love with Cleopatra and stayed with her for 9 more months. He eventually returned back to Rome to defeat his rivals of the Optimate faction in 46 BC at the Battle of Thapsus. Caesar had finally returned to Rome in triumph as a great power in politics and military.

Back in Rome, the new leader, Caesar, was named Dictator Perpetuus. As the new dictator, Caesar established many new reforms to help the Populare faction. He ruled without regard to the senate and tried to give himself more power. This made him very unpopular with the senate and the Optimate faction and they feared he would become too powerful. Then, on March 15, 44 BC, on the Ides of March, Julius Caesar was assassinated. Caesar was stabbed 23 times by many of the senators including Caesar’s old friend, Marcus Brutus. Caesar died at the base of a statue of none other than Pompey himself.