There's a lot of legislative activity in this period. Some is responding to immediate pressing problems, money supply and debt relief. But there are longer term planning as he takes on the power of nomin in magistrates. A big senate means lots of opportunities for patronage. And so just one final point, is a whole range of measures to make caesar look distinctive within roman politics.
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the life, work and reputation of Julius Caesar. Famously assassinated as he entered the Roman senate on the Ides of March, 44 BC, Caesar was an inspirational general who conquered much of Europe. He was a ruthless and canny politician who became dictator of Rome, and wrote The Gallic Wars, one of the most admired and studied works of Latin literature. Shakespeare is one of many later writers to have been fascinated by the figure of Julius Caesar.
With:
Christopher Pelling
Regius Professor of Greek at the University of Oxford
Catherine Steel
Professor of Classics at the University of Glasgow
Maria Wyke
Professor of Latin at University College London
Producer: Thomas Morris.