Caesar

Asinius Pollio says that these words, which Caesar afterwards wrote down in Greek, were uttered by him in Latin at the time; he also says that most of the slain were servants who were killed at the taking of the camp, and that not more than six thousand soldiers fell. Most of those who were taken alive Caesar incorporated in his legions, and to many men of prominence he granted immunity. One of these was Brutus, who afterwards slew him. Caesar was distressed, we are told, when Brutus was not to be found, but when he was brought into his presence safe and sound, was pleased beyond measure.

There were many portents of the victory, but the most remarkable one on record is that which was seen at Tralles. In that city’s temple of Victory there stood a statue of Caesar, and the ground around it was itself naturally firm, and was paved with hard stone; yet from this it is said that a palm-tree shot up at the base of the statue.[*](Cf. Caesar B. C. iii. 105 ad fin.) Moreover, at Patavium, Caius Cornelius, a man in repute as a seer, a fellow citizen and acquaintance of Livy the historian, chanced that day to be sitting in the place of augury.

And to begin with, according to Livy, he discerned the time of the battle, and said to those present that even then the event was in progress and the men were going into action. And when he looked again and observed the signs, he sprang up in a rapture crying: Thou art victorious, O Caesar! The bystanders being amazed, he took the chaplet from his head and declared with an oath that he would not put it on again until the event had borne witness to his art. At any rate, Livy insists that this was so.[*](In Book cxi, which is lost.)

Caesar gave the Thessalians their freedom, to commemorate his victory, and then pursued Pompey; when he reached Asia he made the Cnidians also free, to please Theopompus the collector of fables, and for all the inhabitants of Asia remitted a third of their taxes.

Arriving at Alexandria just after Pompey’s death, he turned away in horror from Theodotus as he presented the head of Pompey, but he accepted Pompey’s seal-ring, and shed tears over it.[*](Cf. the Pompey, lxxx. 5.) Moreover, all the companions and intimates of Pompey who had been captured by the king as they wandered over the country, he treated with kindness and attached them to himself. And to his friends in Rome he wrote that this was the greatest and sweetest pleasure that he derived from his victory, namely, from time to time to save the lives of fellow citizens who had fought against him.

As for the war in Egypt, some say that it was not necessary, but due to Caesar’s passion for Cleopatra, and that it was inglorious and full of peril for him. But others blame the king’s party for it, and especially the eunuch Potheinus, who had most influence at court,[*](See the Pompey, lxxvii. 2.) and had recently killed Pompey; he had also driven Cleopatra from the country, and was now secretly plotting against Caesar. On this account they say that from this time on Caesar passed whole nights at drinking parties in order to protect himself. But in his open acts also Potheinus was unbearable, since he said and did many things that were invidious and insulting to Caesar.