Caesar's Death Made Octavian Emperor

The first settlement after Caesar's murder is already false. Source trail 0:001:32 So we are doing Octavius and the birth of the Roman Empire today. Okay, so Let's review where we are The year is 44 BCE and Julius Caesar has just been assassinated And the three main conspirators There are 60 senators,...people against conspirators and eventually Public sentiment was so much against the conspirators had to flee to the provinces Okay, and then Mark Anthony read the will of Caesar. Okay, Caesar's will Remember that there'... Antony promises not to seek revenge if the conspirators declare that Caesar was not a tyrant and did not want kingship. But while that peace is supposed to prevent civil war, Antony works behind the scenes to turn the Roman people against the killers.

Then the will changes everything. Caesar gives every citizen three months of a soldier's wages, turns private property into public parks, names the young Octavian as adopted son and heir, and even leaves secondary inheritance to Antony and Decimus Brutus. The will is shocking because it says Caesar loved Rome and even loved the people who conspired to kill him Source trail 4:16 Caesars it is shocking and it shows to the wrong people that Caesar really loved them and That Caesar loved everyone including the people who conspired to kill him. Okay, Mark, Anthony Is very upset about this will so t... .

Octavian's first political act is not a victory in battle. Antony refuses him Caesar's property, so Octavian borrows money to honor the gifts in the will. That move makes him the practical executor of Caesar's love. Around him, Rome becomes a Game of Thrones board Source trail 5:31 now a volatile Game of Thrones situation Game of Thrones Mark Anthony considers himself the legitimate here of Caesar and refuses to acknowledge Octavia Octavian Octavian has returned and demands to be acknowledged as t... : Antony wants Caesar's legacy, the Bruti and Cassius hold armies in the provinces, Lepidus has an army, and Cicero tries to preserve the Senate by balancing everyone against everyone.

The weakest player is the one history will have to explain. Octavian is eighteen, has no army, and has almost no allies in Rome. Yet over the next fifteen years he destroys one enemy after another Source trail 7:50 But so so is Mark Anthony. And lepidus also wants to be a heir as well. And then on the other side are Decimus Brutus, Marcus Brutus, and Cassius who are fighting for their own legacy. Okay, so this is this is a situati... . The path begins with Cicero authorizing him against Antony and then turns immediately brutal: Octavian, Antony, and Lepidus form the second triumvirate, kill their enemies, kill Cicero, replace a third of the Senate, and march against Brutus and Cassius at Philippi.

The civil war sequence gives Octavian the world. Source trail 10:2111:44 Okay, Philippi is a city named after King Philip. And in this battle Mark Anthony and Octavian triumphed in the largest battle in history at that time. Okay, and after this battle where Marcus Brutus and Cassius are kil...In this battle what happens is basically Mark Anthony and Cleopatra, they run away from the battle, and then they return to Alexandria and then Octavian goes and hunts them down, and they both commit suicide before they... Philippi kills Marcus Brutus and Cassius. The triumvirs divide the Roman world. Lepidus loses his soldiers to Octavian. Antony and Cleopatra lose at Actium and then die in Alexandria. In 27 BCE, Octavian returns to the Senate and becomes Augustus Caesar, the first emperor of Rome.

The question is how this happened. Luck is not enough, because saying he became emperor by being lucky Source trail 11:4413:00 In this battle what happens is basically Mark Anthony and Cleopatra, they run away from the battle, and then they return to Alexandria and then Octavian goes and hunts them down, and they both commit suicide before they...You become emperor by being lucky, okay? So that's, that doesn't suffice. Second is, you can say he was brilliant. Julius Caesar was brilliant, right? King Philip of Macedon was brilliant. These are all brilliant people... only renames the outcome. Brilliance is not enough, because Octavian is not Caesar: he is not the great speaker, not the charismatic commander, and not a strong military strategist. Ruthlessness is not enough, because Roman politics is full of ruthless men. Legionary loyalty is not enough, because Antony also has a claim to Caesar's soldiers. Agrippa is not enough, because other men also had generals, and Agrippa's loyalty itself still has to be explained.

The better explanation is that Caesar's death created the condition of Octavian's victory. Source trail 15:07 And this, again, is true. Marcus Agrippa is a brilliant military leader. But so were Cassius, Decimus. There were other brilliant military leaders. The other issue is that in this ruthless world of Roman politics, how c... Caesar's greatness was myth-making. He had made himself the man of destiny who would save the Republic. While alive, that myth competed with older Roman myths, especially Lucius Brutus killing the king to create the Republic. After Caesar is killed, the competition changes.

The murder makes Caesar's myth dominant. It does not merely improve Caesar's reputation; it turns his myth into reality Lens point legitimacy-fiction Legitimacy fiction becomes real when a story invented to solve a political crisis changes what later actors can feel, say, inherit, punish, or obey. The fiction is not harmless because it is invented; it becomes force when it reorganizes the field of action. legitimacy-fiction A founder's fiction outlives the founder when death, inheritance, public guilt, and transferred love make the name more politically usable than the living person was. Source trail 16:27 And so Caesar had this great myth, but it was against other dominant myths. When Caesar was killed, it made his myth the dominant myth. That myth was his myth of Rome. In fact, it turned his myth into reality. And it wa... . The dead Caesar now appears as the man who truly loved Rome and truly meant to restore the Republic. That new reality propels Octavian because the Roman people can transfer their love Lens point legitimacy-fiction A founder's fiction outlives the founder when death, inheritance, public guilt, and transferred love make the name more politically usable than the living person was. Source trail 17:34 So it was basically people transferring their love of Pierre Trudeau onto their son, okay? So that's one example. The other example, of course, in America is George W. Bush, right? Whose father was George H. W. Bush, wh... of Caesar onto the son named in the will.

This is the lecture's political rule. Politics is not only institutions, speeches, or armies. Political change is myth change Lens point legitimacy-fiction Legitimacy fiction becomes real when an invented political story changes the field of action: people inherit it, compete inside it, transfer love through it, and treat its names, offices, texts, or rules as binding reality. Source trail 18:24 That's right. Yep, that's right. So if you think about it, politics, political change, it's really about myths, right? If you want to create political change, you have to change the myths. And new governments will creat... . If a government wants a new order, it needs a new story powerful enough to reorganize what people think is legitimate, shameful, possible, and sacred.

That is why the assassins cannot be understood only as enemies in a military contest. They are also men trapped by myths. Decimus wants recognition from Caesar. Cassius may experience mercy as contempt Lens point legitimacy-fiction Mercy becomes legitimacy only when the receiving world can experience it as release, order, or gratitude; inside an honor grammar, the same mercy can mark a rival as harmless and turn clemency into contempt. Source trail 19:40 So you could say that Decimus Brutus, he was driven by jealousy, or maybe thwarted ambition. Okay? He wanted to prove that he was better than Julius Caesar. So that's Decimus Brutus. Cassius is a different story. Cassiu... . Marcus Brutus imagines himself as the virtuous descendant of Lucius Brutus, but that virtue is also vanity. All three stand inside a Roman world where honor, ancestry, mercy, and republican myth determine what action can mean.

What unites the conspirators is the feeling that Rome is changing too fast. Caesar brings provincial aristocrats into the Senate and ends provincial corruption. These reforms may be good for the empire and for the Republic in the long term, but they injure noble interests and disturb Roman self-understanding in the short term. Rome is conservative enough that necessary reform can feel like the destruction of Rome Source trail 23:25 because he was from the provinces, and they were foreigners, the Roman people were very upset by this. Okay? That's the first thing. Second thing is Caesar ended corruption in the provinces. And that goes against the in... .

Caesar does not see the assassination coming because the Senate is not just a room. Rome is sacred geography Source trail 24:23 And so this is what compelled the conspirators to act against Caesar. Okay? But this raises a very interesting question. Caesar is a genius. He's brilliant. How could he not see this coming? Right? How could he not imag... . The pomerium is protected by the gods; soldiers cannot enter as soldiers; weapons and violence are forbidden. The Senate is the holiest civic space, its laws are treated as the laws of the gods, and Caesar's body has been declared sacrosanct. To kill him there is not only murder. It is violence against the sacred order.

If Caesar cannot imagine the conspiracy, then something else follows: he does not want to be king. Kingship is Rome's ultimate taboo. Caesar may behave arrogantly and may behave like a king, but becoming king would defy the Republic Source trail 26:52 Okay? Does that make sense so far, guys? It was beyond the imagination of Julius Caesar. But if this is true, then something else is true, which is that Julius Caesar did not want to become king. Because being king was... . The better model is Sulla rewritten: Caesar sees himself as a merciful dictator who will reform, spare enemies, restore the Republic, and then retire.

The assassination proves the opposite of what the assassins intended. If Caesar had wanted to be king, he would have surrounded himself with guards and made himself unavailable to enemies. They could kill him only because he did not act like a man preparing for kingship Source trail 28:0829:20 Okay? He could become king, but he chose to not become king because to become king would mean the death of the Republic. And that's not taboo. That's a rubicon he refused to cross. Okay? So we can imagine that Caesar sa...Right? Otherwise, Caesar would surround himself with party guards. Otherwise, Caesar would not make himself available to his enemies. So, upon the death of Caesar, all his enemies, Decimus, Marcus, and Cassius, realized... . Once he is dead, the killers and the people understand that their doubt helped make the murder possible.

That recognition creates paralysis. Caesar's death showers the people with gifts and makes them feel guilty for doubting him. It also traps Marcus Brutus. If he moves an army against Rome to save Decimus, he becomes the ambitious man he accused Caesar of being. His own story prevents action Source trail 30:2931:39 Okay? And to compound the guilt, Caesar showered the people with generosity upon his death. Right? Okay? So, you can see how the death of Caesar creates this new reality where people now recognize Caesar did not want to...He's the one who wants to become king. Right? Therefore, Marcus Brutus and Cassius could only wait for their deaths. Because if they're the case, the belief that Caesar wanted to become king wasn't true. It couldn't be... . He can only wait for death.

Antony is trapped differently. He loves Caesar, feels betrayed that Caesar named Octavian, and tries to prove that he is the rightful heir. To do that, he imitates Caesar's unfinished ambitions: he attacks Parthia, fails where Caesar dreamed of world conquest, falls into depression, becomes Cleopatra's lover because Caesar had been Cleopatra's lover, and finally writes a will that gives Roman eastern lands to Cleopatra's children. Antony does not merely lose to Octavian. He destroys himself trying to be Caesar Source trail 35:47 All the property, all that land that Mark Anthony controls will be given to his children with Cleopatra. They're foreign citizens. And also, Mark Anthony does not have the authority to give that land out to his children... .

Lepidus is competent but not bold enough to challenge for ultimate power, and his soldiers drift to Octavian because Octavian is the heir of Julius Caesar. Octavian is not charismatic, not a great general, and not obviously brilliant in the old sense. His difference is that he believes the inheritance. Caesar believed in him; therefore he has a responsibility to finish the father's work and restore the Republic. So he acts. A few successes are enough Source trail 38:03 Okay? So, the difference between Octavian and the others... was he acted. He wasn't very successful, but he was willing to act, whereas Marcus Brutus was not willing to act. And when you act, sometimes you will succeed.... .

This belief allows the institutional transformation. Source trail 38:0339:1240:14 Okay? So, the difference between Octavian and the others... was he acted. He wasn't very successful, but he was willing to act, whereas Marcus Brutus was not willing to act. And when you act, sometimes you will succeed....Okay? Augustus Caesar was in power for 40 years. Over time, he became even more powerful than a king. This is what he did. He amassed all powers to himself. After he conquered Egypt, he made Egypt into his own personal... Augustus rules for forty years and becomes more powerful than a king. Egypt becomes his private estate. Egyptian wealth pays his army. The army becomes professional and loyal to the emperor because the emperor pays it. Gaul's land goes to veterans. The Roman people tolerate this because they think he is animated by Caesar's mission to save the Republic.

That is the tragedy. The Roman people have been taught to fear kings, but they believe Octavian too much Source trail 40:14 Okay? So, basically, he made the entire army loyal to him personally. So, he now has the power of God. The Roman people allowed him to do that because they believed that, like Octavian... Sorry, like Julius Caesar, Octa... . They let him gather powers no king had held, and the savior of the Republic destroys the Republic by concentrating all power in his hands. He now has the power of God Source trail 40:14 Okay? So, basically, he made the entire army loyal to him personally. So, he now has the power of God. The Roman people allowed him to do that because they believed that, like Octavian... Sorry, like Julius Caesar, Octa... because the army, the money, the land, and the myth all point to him.

The audience question about why Caesar named Octavian instead of Antony sharpens the point. Antony is loyal, but Caesar as genius does not care about loyalty by itself Source trail 41:43 The most trusted lieutenant of Caesar. Why didn't Caesar trust him? And the answer is, Caesar, as a genius, he doesn't care about loyalty. He cares about talent. He cares about ability. And Mark Antony was a notorious h... . He cares about talent and ability. Antony is volatile, a hothead, a drunk, emotionally unstable, and bad at governing Rome in Caesar's absence. Octavian is level-headed and politically competent. Caesar is right: being emperor is hard, and Octavian's brilliance is political manipulation, the ability to balance factions for decades.

The later answer about the assassination returns to the taboo argument. Sixty conspirators bring daggers under their togas, but only five physically attack Caesar Source trail 44:27 That's right. So, yeah. I mean, it was very hard to kill Caesar. Okay? So, they were in the Senate. There were 60 conspirators. Okay? They all brought knives. They hit the knives, the daggers, and the toga. Okay? They w... . These are soldiers and generals used to killing people. The problem is not fear of death. The problem is fear of carrying the ultimate taboo into the Senate. The first attacker stands behind Caesar shaking and manages only a pinprick in the back Source trail 45:27 Talking to the Senate. And he was shaking. Okay? And he only managed to, like, pinprick Caesar in the back. Okay? This is where we get the idea of backstabbing from. Okay? So, and it... And Caesar didn't really notice.... . Even Caesar, while being attacked, cannot immediately believe anyone would be bold enough to break the taboo.

Augustus does not understand himself as naked emperor either. He is first citizen, first man in the Senate, guardian of eternal prosperity and stability for the Roman Republic. That self-understanding creates the succession problem. A great emperor is not enough; the next emperor must be great too. His solution is adoption: the most competent relative, the best man in Rome Source trail 47:3948:50 a great emperor but the second emperor had to be had to be great as well and so his solution was this his solution would be he would adopt the most competent relative that he had to be Emperor he would create this new s...then Germanicus would inherit the throne, and he'd be a good emperor, and as a good emperor, you would then be able to find someone else who had good talent, and you would appoint him the next emperor. If you had this s... , should be adopted into imperial power.

Germanicus is supposed to be the next Caesar-like figure: brilliant, loved by soldiers, but too young. Tiberius is supposed to be the bridge. Instead, Tiberius refuses the system, kills Germanicus and much of his family, and adopts Caligula. The adoption machine breaks almost immediately. On this reading, Tiberius marks the death of the Roman Empire even though the empire continues for centuries, because what remains is size and inertia Source trail 50:11 And by the time you got to Tiberius, this system collapsed, and you could make the argument that Tiberius marked the death of the Roman Empire, okay? The Roman Empire would continue for another, like, 300 years. But it... carrying a system already full of internal revolt and tension.