Sublime

The word that Romans most often used to describe his position was princeps, meaning ‘first citizen’ rather than ‘emperor’, as we choose to call him, and one of his most famous watchwords was civilitas – ‘we’re all citizens together’.

Against this background, three men – Pompey, Julius Caesar and Marcus Licinius Crassus – made an informal deal to use their combined influence, connections and money to fix the political process in their own interests. This ‘Gang of Three’, or ‘Three-Headed Monster’, as one contemporary satirist put it, for the first time effectively took public

At the end of 45 BCE he caused a particular stir when the death of one of the sitting consuls was announced on the very last day of the year. Caesar instantly convened an assembly to elect one of his friends, Caius Caninius Rebilus, to the vacant post for just half a day. This prompted a flood of jokes from Cicero: Caninius was such an