Gallic Wars [58-50 BC]

Great warriors are naturally connected with wars. Today I would like to present a brief portrait of a man who certainly has his position in the history of the military. It is Iulius Caesar, a man who conquered Gaul, defeated the Germans, won many battles of the Civil War and ended the history of Ancient Egypt. In the history of antiquity, only such men as Alexander the Great, Scipio Africanus or Trajan can probably compete with him. So let's look at this man, who hardly knew defeat and kept a cool head in the worst situation. At the same time, however, he was a man of much greater qualities in virtue than later Napoleon, it is a mistake to compare him to Hitler, Caesar always had a dimension that made him a great figure in history and put him above many cold dictators.

Gaius Iulius Caesar came from an old patrician family. He himself, with the pride of a true Roman, derived his family from the semi-legendary Roman kings to the gods. As for Caesar's mother Aurelia, she came from the plebeian, but very respected family of Aurelia.

Caesar again tried to become Pompey's right hand, doing everything he could to ensure that Pompey did not establish close relations with the Senate in order to strengthen Caesar's position. Caesar supported the proposal to allow Pompey to run for consulate in his absence. However, the brave Cato prevented him, who was then almost killed.

Interestingly, the only record of a participant in Caesar's campaign in Gaul is the Notes on the Gallic War , which was written by none other than Caesar himself, and then historians such as Plutarchos used it. However, because I do not want to deal for a long time with the analysis of this work, which is interesting for historians, but for laymen and admirers of history, I will just say so much that Caesar was not completely objective, but he could not be subjective and invent, because among soldiers had its people senators, Cicero and Catón.

After returning from Britain, Caesar faced the most difficult of all the trials he had survived in Gaul. At the end of the year 54 BC a great Gaelic uprising began.

The dice were really thrown. Interestingly, we have records of the entire Civil War only from Caesar's Notes on the Civil War and Cicero's correspondence. Immediately after crossing the Rubicon on January 10, 49 BC the first Roman fortress of Arminium fell, where Caesar sent his troops ahead. It turned out that Pompey did not have an army with which to stop Caesar.

After returning from Rome from Thaps and Utika, Caesar mainly made sure to make a good impression and influence public opinion in a certain way. He also appeared before the people in the Senate, emphasizing that he had no tyrannical intentions and highlighting his efforts to increase prosperity at the expense of conquered territories.

In the elections for 44 BC Caesar and Marcus Antonius were elected consuls. In 44 BC Caesar became dictator 4 times and consul 5 times. His position seemed indisputable. The new honors bestowed on him by the Senate corresponded not only to royal majesty but simply to religion. In an atmosphere of endless honors and resolutions, in a situation of general servility, talk of Caesar and the royal wreath became more and more widespread, with the dictator's closest persons providing reasons for similar errors with their almost provocative behavior.