1535944

[SUSANNA KEENE.FTW]

Suicide.

Mark Antony (who had long been Caesar's right-hand man and was
consul along with Caesar in 44) soon took charge of matters,
leaving Lepidus to depart for Gaul. Antony was in nominal
control of state affairs, but virtually everyone was on
eggshells. Antony wielded a good deal of power as consul and as
Caesar's second in command, but enjoyed little personal
authority and dared not assert himself too strongly, lest he
meet a fate similar to that of Caesar. The Senate, on the other
hand, was concerned about popular reaction to Caesar's death,
particularly on the part of Caesar's veterans. Most
importantly, the official constitutional machinery, although it
had continued to operate during the turbulent years 49-44, had
been a virtual dead letter under Caesar's rule: his death
created a vacuum in which no one quite knew how to behave. An
uneasy truce was arrived at. An official amnesty was granted to
the conspirators, but Antony's speech at Caesar's funeral --
along with the generous gifts to the plebs included in the
terms of Caesar's will -- so stirred the urban mob that a riot
ensued and the conspirators fled Rome in fear
for their safety. [Caesar's funeral is the occasion for the
famous speech in Shakespeare's play: "I have come to bury
Caesar, not to praise him...."] Antony then quickly retrieved
Caesar's private papers from his widow and employed them to
govern in Caesar's name, claiming to find there Caesar's plans
for Rome's future. This charade soon wore thin with the Senate,
all the more so due to Antony's high-handed manner and his
wanton extravagance.

Octavian and Antony. When Caesar's will was read, however,
Antony received a nasty shock. In it Caesar named as his chief
heir a virtual unknown by the name of *C. Octavius, adopting
him (posthumously) as his son. Octavius was Caesar's
grand-nephew on his sister's side, a rather sickly 18-year-old
with only limited political and military experience. Upon his
adoption, Octavius became *C. Julius Caesar Octavianus (or, in
English, simply Octavian). Antony might well have expected
little trouble in dealing with a youth of so little experience,
few political connections, and virtually no personal authority.
Unfortunately, Antony failed to recognize that in Octavian he
was dealing with a
natural born politician. Octavian never was an imposing figure
physically, and he owed his military victories largely to the
skill of his able lieutenants. In the political realm, however,
he was without peer, rising from a virtual unknown in 44 B.C.
to become the first of the Julio-Claudian emperors by 27 AD.
Tensions immediately arose between Octavian and Antony, as each
vied for the right to employ Caesar's substantial financial
resources, to call upon the loyalty of his troops, and, above
all, to invoke the authority of Caesar's name. On the one hand
was Antony, Caesar's second in command who had served him so
ably since the 50s, who had been named magister equitum under
Caesar, and who had been appointed priest (flamen) in Caesar's
honor; on the other was Octavian, who could claim to be
Caesar's son and heir. Tensions between the two soon reached
the boiling point, only to be checked by senior officers in
command of Caesar's troops, who were united by their common
loyalty to the dead Caesar and were unwilling to fight against
one another in the name of Caesar's bickering heirs. By the
middle of 44 B.C. an uneasy truce was established between
Antony, Octavian, the Senate, and those involved in Caesar's
assassination.

Unfortunately Antony, while an able commander, was no Caesar
when it came to the delicate art of politics. In 44-43 he soon
alienated virtually all of the other factions listed above,
uniting them against him. He began by foolishly attacking the
orator and statesman Cicero, a leader of the senatorial faction
(the optimates). These personal attacks led Cicero to denounce
Antony in a series of damning speeches, known as the
*Philippics.

Not content with alienating Cicero and the Senate, Antony
renewed his attacks against Octavian, charging him with plots
against his (Antony's) life. Octavian saw that his position in
Rome was far from secure and withdrew to central Italy, where
he began to raise troops on his authority as Caesar's son and
heir.

At the end of 44, Antony stepped over the line altogether. As
consul in 44 he had been assigned the province of Macedonia for
43. Antony realized, however, that departing from Rome at this
particular juncture would be political suicide and so passed a
law that awarded him a five-year command in Cisalpine Gaul and
Gallia Comata (Gaul proper) instead.

This would allow him to keep tabs on affairs in Rome and had
the added advantage of providing him with an army camped just
north of Italy. (Clearly Antony had the precedent of Caesar's
own career in mind.) The threat now posed by Octavian led
Antony to speed up his plans: he decided to proceed
to Cisalpine Gaul and assume command of his new provinces
early. At this point the Senate was still unwilling to defy
Antony too openly, but it did direct the current governor of
Cisalpine Gaul, D. Junius Brutus Albinus (who had been involved
in the conspiracy against Caesar), to maintain his position.
When matters reached a crisis the Senate, at Cicero's urging,
turned to Octavian for help. Octavian had his own forces; more
importantly, he could invoke the name of Caesar, thus
undercutting Antony's claims to represent Caesar's legacy.
Cicero hoped that the young Octavian would be malleable -- a
tool that the Senate could employ and then discard at its will.
The plan was to have Octavian support the consuls for 43 (A.
Hirtius and C. Vibius Pansa) in driving Antony off, then to
have Octavian surrender his troops to Brutus, the lawful
governor of the region. The first part of the plan worked:
Antony was compelled to retire further into Gaul, where he
joined up with Lepidus (see above). Unfortunately for Cicero
and the Senate, however, Octavian was neither
malleable nor stupid. He realized that, were he to surrender
his troops to Brutus, he would not only lose an important
bargaining chip but, given Brutus' association with Caesar's
murder, would fatally undermine his claims to be Caesar's loyal
son. As it happened, through one of those twists of fate
that seem to occur so often in Roman history, the two consuls
Hirtius and Pansa had been killed in the battle against Antony:
Octavian saw a vacuum and marched south with his forces,
determined to fill it. Confronted with Octavian's troops, the
Senate was compelled to allow him to run for the office
of consul, to which he was duly elected for the year 42. His
adoption by Caesar was officially ratified and Caesar's
assassins outlawed: thus Octavian could assume the role of the
loyal son attempting to avenge his father's murder and continue
his father's work in "reforming" the state. (The leaders of the
opposition to Caesar, M. Junius Brutus and C. Cassius Longinus,
had already fled to the East, planning, like Pompey earlier, to
raise troops and challenge Antony and Octavian.)

The Second Triumvirate. Suddenly Octavian was no longer a
youthful outsider but a major force with which to reckon. He
realized, however, that his own position vis a vis the Senate
was far from secure and decided to make common cause with his
former enemy, Antony. Thus, in 43, Octavian,
Antony, and Lepidus were officially appointed as a panel of
three (a triumvirate) to govern Rome with consular authority
for a period of five years for the purpose of restoring
constitutional order. This alliance is known as the *Second
Triumvirate. Through a curious twist of fate, Caesar -- who
originally had been viewed as a dangerous, power-seeking
popularis and a traitor -- now became the beloved leader whose
legacy was being threatened and in whose name Octavian, Antony,
and Lepidus must seize control of state affairs.

Despite its official standing, the Second Triumvirate was in
reality a military junta. Following the precedent of Sulla, its
first order of business was to pay back its political enemies
and raise some much-needed cash (necessary if the junta's
troops were to be kept happy). Proscriptions were held in which
some 300 senators and 2000 equites were dispatched, as much for
their property as for their political sympathies. The most
famous victim was Cicero, whose head and hands were cut off and
hung from the speaker's platform (the Rostra) in the forum.
[The Triumvirate also raised taxes, aiming first (as was the
Romans' wont) at wealthy and "extravagant" women. This policy
led to a woman named Hortensia presenting a public speech in
the forum in which, we are told, she sounded the now familiar
theme of no taxation without representation (i.e., without
granting women the franchise).]

The next order of business, once matters had been settled in
Rome, was to deal with the forces of Brutus and Cassius in the
East. The official line was that these forces were traitors to
Rome, led by Caesar's assassins. Viewed objectively, however,
they represented one of the last hopes of the Roman Republic,
fighting a cause that was utterly unrealistic -- the days when
the traditional constitutional machinery could cope with the
economic, social, and political realities in Rome were long
past -- but noble nonetheless. The final confrontation occurred
in 42 at *Philippi in Macedonia (see Map 3 in Dudley), where
Brutus' and Cassius' forces were quickly defeated in a series
of
battles by the combined forces of Antony and Octavian. The
victory led to an immediate rise in Antony's fortunes: never
much of a general, Octavian had presented a poor showing at
Philippi, losing one important battle and spending a good deal
of the time sick in his tent. For the moment, at least, Antony
was very much the senior partner among the triumvirs.

With their enemies subdued both at Rome and abroad, the two
leading members of the Triumvirate soon returned to their old
personal rivalries. Lepidus was quickly gotten out of the way:
accused of treason, he was deprived of his provinces and
allowed to remain a member of the Triumvirate only on
sufferance. The other two triumvirs divided Rome's holdings
between them: Octavian got Spain, Antony Gaul. Antony, however,
had larger ambitions. Encouraged by his success at Philippi, he
revived Caesar's plans for a grand military campaign in the
East. His intentions clearly were to follow the precedent set
by Sulla, Pompey, and Caesar himself: to win power, fame, and
money through a series of military triumphs abroad and then
return to Rome and oust his political rivals once and for all.
In 41, therefore, he set out for the East, where he soon became
entangled with the Egyptian Cleopatra.

Cleopatra VII left three children by Marcus Antonius: the twins
Alexander Helios and Cleopatra Selene, born in 40 B.C. and
Ptolemy Philadelphus, born in 36 B.C. In 33 B.C. Antonius
designated Alexander to be king of Armenia and overlord of
Parthia and Media. He designated Ptolemy to be ruler of all
Egyptian possessions in Syria and Cilicia and overlord of all
client-kings and dynasts west of the Euphrates, as far as the
Hellespont. After the death of Antonius, both boys were taken
in by Augustus's sister Octavia to be raised with her own
children. They appear soon after in Augustus's Triumph in Rome
and thereafter disappear from history. Speculation is that
both died in childhood. Cleopatra Selene was married in 29
B.C. to Juba II, a Roman client-king who ruled over Numidia
c30-25 B.C. and over Mauretania 25 B.C.-cA.D. 23 when he died
in his mid-70s. Cleopatra had long before predeceased him,
though the date is not known. They had two (known) children:
Ptolemy succeeded his father as king of Mauretania in A.D. 23.
In 40, he was called to Rome to appear before the Emperor
Caligula. Tacitus reports he had the misfortune of presenting
himself wearing such a sumptious purple robe that in envy
Caligula had him put to death. One simply did not appear
before Caligula wearing better duds than the boss. Although
Ptolemy was certainly of a marriageable age, no wife or
children are known, and none succeeded him as king. Ptolemy's
sister Drusilla was married to Marcus Antonius Felix. Nothing
has survived in recorded history to point to any issue of this
marriage.

Octavian, by contrast, was given the thankless task of dealing
with affairs in Italy, particularly the necessity of finding
land for his and Antony's veterans. Antony clearly hoped that
Octavian would become embroiled in Italian politics,
squandering both his time and, more important, his popularity
with the masses. In the end, this was a poor strategy on
Antony's part. Not only did his own military ventures not fare
well, but, by leaving Octavian in Rome, he allowed his rival to
ply his considerable political skills in waging a propaganda
war against Antony.

At first, however, Antony's plan appeared to succeed.
Octavian's problem was to find land for his and Antony's
veterans; his solution was to confiscate land throughout Italy.
The Italian cities were outraged, and this sense of outrage was
encouraged by Antony's wife Fulvia and his brother L. Antonius,
who incited a civil war. The rebels were suppressed through a
combination of Antony's delay in supporting them and the
brutality of Octavian's reprisals (particularly against the
city of Perusia, in the so-called Perusine War). Antony
eventually returned to Italy in 40, landing at Brundisium, but
by then Octavian had not only secured Italy but had seized
Gaul. War nearly broke out between Antony and Octavian, but
their troops refused to fight against one another. At last a
deal was cut: Antony was to pursue his ambitions in the East,
while Octavian was granted the western half of Rome's empire.
To cement the deal, Antony married Octavian's sister *Octavia
(Fulvia having died of natural causes in the meantime).

Antony accordingly returned east, where from 40-35 he was
engaged in a series of largely unsuccessful campaigns against
the Parthians. His desperate need for financial and military
support drove him into the arms of Cleopatra (literally and
figuratively) and he became her official consort. Antony had 3
children by Cleopatra. In 36, despite their age (6, 6, and 2,
respectively), he granted each of these children, as well as
Cleopatra herself, territories in the East as their official
realms; he also lent his support to the claims of Caesarion
(then 13 years old) to be Caesar's true son and heir. To Roman
eyes these moves were troubling, suggesting that Antony was
becoming a champion of
Egypt and its oriental queen.

Meanwhile, Octavian was busy in the West fighting *Sextus
Pompeius, a son of Pompey the Great. Sextus had gathered the
last of the Republican opposition about him in Spain and by 42
controlled Sicily. With his fleet, Sextus was able to harass
Roman shipping, nearly cutting off Rome's
grain supplies. To the degree that Sextus could claim to be
fighting for the cause of his father, Pompey, he represented
the last forces of the old Republic; in reality, he was as much
a military overlord/adventurer as Antony and Octavian. Octavian
once again showed his lack of military experience, suffering a
series of humiliating defeats, and, in 38, was forced to meet
with Antony in order to ask for reinforcements. (At the same
time the term of the Triumvirate, originally slated to expire
in 38, was extended for another five years.) In 36 Octavian --
or, rather, his general *M. Vipsanius Agrippa, working in
tandem with Lepidus -- finally defeated Sextus at the battle of
Naulochus. Lepidus made an attempt to seize Sicily for himself,
but was soon deserted by his supporters and captured. As
pontifex maximus Lepidus could not be killed (as we shall see,
Octavian was beginning to develop scruples!), so he was merely
stripped of his official powers and placed under permanent
house arrest in Rome.

Actium. The year 36 marks something of a turning point in
Octavian's career. From this point on he began to doff the role
of ruthless military warlord and instead present himself as a
defender of the Republic (such as it was!). This strategy was
to stand him in good stead in the propaganda war against
Antony. Antony, Octavian could claim, had become the thrall of
a depraved eastern
monarch: he had "gone native" and (Octavian claimed) planned to
reduce Rome to a mere subject state, transferring the capital
of the empire to Egypt. The Romans would be slaves to a mongrel
horde of oriental eunuchs and their lascivious queen, compelled
to worship Egypt's decadent, bestial gods and to adopt the
perverse religious practices of a land whose rulers regularly
married their own siblings.

Tensions between Antony and Octavian began to reach a head in
35, when Antony formally repudiated Octavia, who had remained
loyal to him despite the repeated humiliation to which he had
subjected her. In 33, when the Triumvirate officially expired,
Octavian held the consulship: he was then able to present
Antony as a private Roman citizen acting without the authority
of the state and to contrast his own position as loyal servant
of the Republic. There followed, in 32, the public reading of
Antony's will (which, according to custom, had been deposited
in Rome for safe keeping): the provisions it contained were
not outrageous -- for example, Antony asked to be buried with
Cleopatra and requested official recognition for his children
by Cleopatra and for Caesarion -- but they furthered the
impression that Antony now regarded himself as an Egyptian.

n the end war was inevitable. The issue was decided in 31 at
the naval battle of *Actium (in northwest Greece). Antony had
established camp in the bay of Actium in late 32, hoping to use
it as a base of operations against Octavian. He became mired
there, however, his lines of supply cut off and his forces
steadily shrinking due to disease and desertion. As time wore
on, his troops became ever more demoralized, in part due to the
presence of Cleopatra in their camp: Roman soldiers did not
like the idea of being the servants of a foreign queen (think
of Livy's portrayal of Tanaquil). Moreover, Antony's Egyptian
fleet was outnumbered and out-generaled by Octavian's fleet,
led by Agrippa. By September of 31 Antony had realized that his
position was
untenable and attempted to slip away with his fleet to Asia
Minor. His plans were poorly executed by his demoralized
troops, however, and only Cleopatra's ships managed to escape,
followed by Antony with a few Roman stragglers. The remainder
of Antony's forces surrendered after only token
resistance. The battle of Actium was, then, something of a
fiasco: a failed tactical retreat. Octavian and his supporters,
however, presented it as a glorious triumph, spreading the
story that Antony, accompanied by Cleopatra, had intended a
full-scale naval battle but had turned tail and deserted his
troops when he saw Cleopatra's ship fleeing in fear. In this
version, Antony is betrayed by his besotted obsession with the
cowardly and depraved Egyptian queen.

Antony and Cleopatra fled to Egypt, where they committed
suicide. Octavian, however, hailed his triumph as belonging to
the Roman Senate and people -- a victory for Rome's political
and religious traditions over a nefarious threat from the
decadent East. (Notice that once again Octavian held the
consulship -- his third -- in this crucial year, allowing him
once more to present himself as the servant of the Roman people
fighting in defense of the Republic, rather than as a military
despot intent on wiping out a hated rival.) He claimed to have
been supported in this victory by the god *Apollo, who had a
small temple on a nearby promontory. Apollo, the god of Actium,
became a prominent figure in Octavian/Augustus' reign. A god of
poetry, music, and culture, he provided a fitting contrast to
the "degenerate" Egyptian culture championed by Antony. He also
embodied two contrary features that Octavian found useful, for
Apollo was both a powerful god of retribution, smiting those
who strayed beyond the proper bounds set for mortal ambitions,
and a gentle god of refinement and
culture. (These two contrasting features are symbolized by two
of Apollo's attributes: the bow and the lyre.) As we shall see,
the poets and artists who celebrated Octavian/Augustus'
achievements presented his career as displaying these same two
contrasting features, with Actium as the turning
point. Before Actium, we find the stern triumvir who employs
violence to punish his father's murderers, restore "order" to
Italy, and check the wild ambitions of Antony and Cleopatra;
after Actium, we find the benign ruler who oversees a
political, moral, and cultural renaissance at Rome.

Records not imported into INDI (individual) Gramps ID I4696:

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Skipped subordinate line Line 114289: 4 TEXT Date of Import: Aug 7, 2000