Julius Caesar and Alexander the Great--of the gods?

[docoflove1974]

I put this here because I think I know where this thread will ultimately lead...but if the higher-ups feel it should be placed in a more 'academic' forum, then go for it.

 

There is quite a bit of talk about Julius Caesar and his claims (whatever you may make of them) that he is the 'darling of Venus' and perhaps descended from him. Take it as propaganda, for surely many of the time did, too. I believe I read that he thought quite highly of Alexander the Great, both for his tactical prowess and his handling of his empire.

 

Caldrail said the following in the 'Was Jesus Caesar?' thread:

 

But... I know Caesar claimed he was a descendant of the gods, but then that was self-aggrandisement and it wasn't unknown for romans of high birth to make such claims.

 

This got me to thinking...Alexander the Great had been lead to believe (by his mother, mostly) that he was the son of Zeus...did Julius Caesar pick up on that, too, and use it to his benefit? Do we know when the myth of his being of godly-blood came into existence? Would he have thought that, hey, if it worked for good ol' Alex, why not me?

[Gaius Julius Camillus]

According to wikipedia, and I am using it because I am at the library, away from my books, Lucius Julius Libo was a member of the influential Julii clan, whose patrician family was always of the most distinguished blood, however they had long since fallen out of the inner Roman elite. Libo descended from the Julii who fled from Alba Longa to Rome, a city that was destroyed by the Roman king Tullus Hostilius. His ancestors claim their descent from the goddess Venus and the first Roman king Romulus. Libo was consul in 267 BC, and his son of the same name was father to Numerius Julius Caesar, born before 300 BC. Numerius himself, was a grandfather to Sextus Julius Caesar I.

 

Considering that the Julii had long since fallen into disfavor, I can easily see how young Julius would use the myth to further his career, but it seems, he was not the first to do so. So obviously it did not have the effect that the family had hoped for. I think it far more likely that this only fueled his desire for glory more and set into motion the events we all know so well.

 

I mean how can a descendant of venus not be in the in crowd! I hope this helps.

Edited May 27, 2008 by Lucius Julius Venustinius

[docoflove1974]

But could it be that Julius Caesar, knowing the family myth and learning from the life of Alexander the Great, turned this myth into something much bigger? I can't recall off the top of my head whether Alexander made that big a deal of it, but certainly Julius did. And if the family had long since fallen out of the Roman inner sanctum, and the myth hadn't been used much publically for several generations, then perhaps Julius would have thought to use it again?

[Gaius Julius Camillus]

I think he may well have, and we all know Octavian, err, excuse me, the divine Augustus, had no issue exploiting his bloodline through the work of Virgil's Aenead.

 

Caesar did run for Pontifex Maximus, accumulating a huge debt, which basically either assured his ruin, or his success. It was a gamble to get himself and his family out of obscurity, but everything in his life seemed to be a gamble.

 

After the civil war, he established the Julian Calendar, and built the Forum of Caesar, with its Temple of Venus Genetrix, which concurs with your assertion that he sought to use it again to further his name and family.

[M. Porcius Cato]

But could it be that Julius Caesar, knowing the family myth and learning from the life of Alexander the Great, turned this myth into something much bigger?

 

But what ambitious Roman didn't extol their ancestors and promote their family myths? I don't think we need Alexander to explain why Caesar promoted his descent from the kings of Alba Longa.

[Bryaxis Hecatee]

In fact the Iulii were not the only clan to have made such claim of divine ancestry, and the process began quite early. Yet indeed Caesar brought a novelty to the concept, that of having a cult done about it. Novelty I say, but not so much in fact : the main difference between Caesar and the other was that he had that cult spread inside the city of Rome itself, which indeed was quite shocking as a rupture with roman tradition. But in the east roman rulers had been divinised and honored by cults since at least Flamininus, the liberator of Greece, who had even received a splendid statue showing him as a god, a famous piece now displayed at Rome's national museum. When Flamininus brought this statue back from Greece, a statue showing him in the heroic nude form which the roman never used then for living humans he provoqued quite a stir, with some wanting him to melt the damn statue.

 

For the Greeks on the other hand the gift had nothing unusual about it : after all they did such divinisation quite regularly since the 4th century and had even done so earlier ( but for dead men ) in the 7th and 6th centuries when they made heroes ( = half gods ) from the founders of the colonial cities.

 

In the case of Caesar it seems he got his cult started much earlier than his great victorie, during the wars in the east of his youth : that's when he got his own first cult statue, sometime in the 80's or 70's. But at first he did not care much other than for the fact it might do him enemies in Rome, for which he did not trouble himself very much.

 

The big cult we know about, the one which went on in Rome itself, is much later, probably dating from the late 50's at the earliest, and was simply bringing in Rome a practice rather widespread in the greek part of the Republic.

 

But one of the big problems he faced was that the deification process was mostly confined to eastern kings, leading some to think he might want that kind of power. But the main propagator and organisator of Caesar's cult was Octavian/Augustus, and not Caesar himself...

[M. Porcius Cato]

In the case of Caesar it seems he got his cult started much earlier than his great victorie, during the wars in the east of his youth : that's when he got his own first cult statue, sometime in the 80's or 70's.

 

Caesar won the corona civica for his service in the east, but I doubt that a mere contubernales of the unremarkable Thermus would have been worshipped by the locals. So, if there were any cult statues erected to that queen of Bithynia, they must have been cast from the same mold that shaped the cult statues to Antinuous.