Caecilius Bucilianus, [1] [2] also spelled Bucolianus, [3] was a Roman senator who was one of the assassins of Julius Caesar on March 15, 44 BCE. [1] [4] Along with Marcus Junius Brutus, Publius Servilius Casca, and others, Bucilianus attacked Caesar during a meeting of the Senate in Rome. [5] He struck Caesar either in the back [5] or the back of the head. [6]
The conspirators of the assassination were made up of both Caesar's opposers (Pompeians; on the side of Pompey) and former supporters (Caesarians); some sources say Bucilianus likely was a Pompeian, [7] while another refers to him as Caesar's former friend. [3]
Most sources say Bucilianus' brother was a fellow senator and conspirator in the assassination, [1] [5] [8] while another does not include him in the list of conspirators. [7] Most say his brother's name was also Caecilius, [1] [5] while one source says his brother's name is unknown. [8]
The Battle of Pharsalus was the decisive battle of Caesar's Civil War fought on 9 August 48 BC near Pharsalus in Central Greece. Julius Caesar and his allies formed up opposite the army of the Roman Republic under the command of Pompey. Pompey had the backing of a majority of Roman senators and his army significantly outnumbered the veteran Caesarian legions.
Marcus Tullius Cicero was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, writer and Academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the establishment of the Roman Empire. His extensive writings include treatises on rhetoric, philosophy and politics. He is considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists and the innovator of what became known as "Ciceronian rhetoric". Cicero was educated in Rome and in Greece. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the Roman equestrian order, and served as consul in 63 BC.
Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, and subsequently became dictator from 49 BC until his assassination in 44 BC. He played a critical role in the events that led to the demise of the Roman Republic and the rise of the Roman Empire.
Marcus Antonius, commonly known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman politician and general who played a critical role in the transformation of the Roman Republic from a constitutional republic into the autocratic Roman Empire.
Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, known in English as Pompey or Pompey the Great, was a general and statesman of the Roman Republic. He played a significant role in the transformation of Rome from republic to empire. Early in his career, he was a partisan and protégé of the Roman general and dictator Sulla; later, he became the political ally, and finally the enemy, of Julius Caesar.
Marcus Junius Brutus was a Roman politician, orator, and the most famous of the assassins of Julius Caesar. After being adopted by a relative, he used the name Quintus Servilius Caepio Brutus, which was retained as his legal name. He is often referred to simply as Brutus.
Gaius Cassius Longinus was a Roman senator and general best known as a leading instigator of the plot to assassinate Julius Caesar on 15 March 44 BC. He was the brother-in-law of Brutus, another leader of the conspiracy. He commanded troops with Brutus during the Battle of Philippi against the combined forces of Mark Antony and Octavian, Caesar's former supporters, and committed suicide after being defeated by Mark Antony.
Servilia was a Roman matron from a distinguished family, the Servilii Caepiones. She was the daughter of Quintus Servilius Caepio and Livia, thus the maternal half-sister of Cato the Younger. She married Marcus Junius Brutus, with whom she had a son, the Brutus who, along with others in the Senate, assassinated Julius Caesar. After her first husband's death in 77 BC, she married Decimus Junius Silanus, and with him had a son and three daughters.
Marcus Porcius CatoUticensis, also known as Cato the Younger, was an influential conservative Roman senator during the late Republic. His conservative principles were focused on the preservation of what he saw as old Roman values in decline. A noted orator and a follower of Stoicism, his scrupulous honesty and professed respect for tradition gave him a political following which he mobilised against powerful generals of his day, including Julius Caesar and Pompey.
Publius Cornelius Lentulus Spinther was a Roman politician and general. Hailing from the patrician family of the Cornelii, he helped suppress the Catilinarian conspiracy during his term as curule aedile in 63 BC and later served as consul in 57 BC. Denied the opportunity to invade Egypt the following year, he nevertheless won some victories in his province of Cilicia and celebrated a triumph over it in 51 BC.
Lucius Marcius Philippus was a politician and senator in the late Roman republic. He was governor of Syria from 61 to 60 and later served in the consulship of 56 BC. He was also step-father of the emperor Augustus.
Caesar's civil war was a civil war during the late Roman Republic between two factions led by Gaius Julius Caesar and Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (Pompey), respectively. The main cause of the war was political tensions relating to Caesar's place in the republic on his expected return to Rome on the expiration of his governorship in Gaul.
De vita Caesarum, commonly known as The Twelve Caesars or The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, is a set of twelve biographies of Julius Caesar and the first 11 emperors of the Roman Empire written by Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus. The subjects consist of: Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius, Vespasian, Titus, Domitian.
The Alexandrian war, also called the Alexandrine war, was a phase of Caesar's civil war in which Julius Caesar involved himself in an Egyptian dynastic struggle. Caesar attempted to mediate a succession dispute between Cleopatra and Ptolemy XIII and exact repayment of certain Egyptian debts.
Quintus Caecilius Metellus Celer was a Roman politician who was consul in 60 BC and in the next year opposed Pompey, Caesar, and the so-called First Triumvirate's political programme. He was a member of the powerful and influential plebeian noble family, the Caecilii Metelli. Prior to 62 BC, he was an ally of Pompey and had served as urban praetor in 63, augur by 63 BC, possibly aedile in 67 BC, and plebeian tribune in either 72 or 68 BC.
Quintus Caecilius Metellus Nepos was an ancient Roman politician during the Late Republic. He was a son of Quintus Caecilius Metellus Nepos and served as tribune of the plebs in 62 BC, consul in 57 BC, and the governor of Hispania Citerior from 56–55 BC.
Julius Caesar was assassinated by a group of senators on the Ides of March of 44 BC during a meeting of the Senate at the Curia of Pompey of the Theatre of Pompey in Rome where the senators stabbed Caesar 23 times. They claimed to be acting over fears that Caesar's unprecedented concentration of power during his dictatorship was undermining the Roman Republic. At least 60 to 70 senators were party to the conspiracy, led by Marcus Junius Brutus, Gaius Cassius Longinus, and Decimus Junius Brutus Albinus. Despite the death of Caesar, the conspirators were unable to restore the institutions of the Republic. The ramifications of the assassination led to his martyrdom, the Liberators' civil war and ultimately to the Principate period of the Roman Empire.
The career of Julius Caesar before his consulship in 59 BC was characterized by military adventurism and political persecution. Julius Caesar was born on 12 July 100 BC into a patrician family, the gens Julia, which claimed descent from Iulus, son of the legendary Trojan prince Aeneas, supposedly the son of the goddess Venus. His father died when he was just 16, leaving Caesar as the head of the household. His family status put him at odds with the Dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla, who almost had him executed.
The last words of the Roman dictator Julius Caesar are disputed. Ancient chroniclers reported a variety of phrases and post-classical writers have elaborated on the phrases and their interpretation. The two most common theories – prevalent as early as the second century AD – are that he said nothing or that he said, in Greek, καὶ σύ, τέκνον.
Caesar's invasion of Macedonia occurred as part of Caesar's civil war, starting with his landing near Paeleste on the coast of Epirus, and continuing until he forced Pompey to flight after the Battle of Pharsalus.