Ides of March

Well today is the 15 March, the Ides of March, fateful day in the Roman Calendar when Gaius Julius Caesar was assassinated in the Portico of the Theatre of Pompey (Piazza Argentina today), where the Senate was meeting. In all 27 blows only one was fatal all witnessed by Marcus Tulius Cicero who was sitting opposite him. Just think had Caesar listened to his wife and his friends and had not gone out without his bodyguard, none of this would have happened. In fact we know today that almost everyone knew something was going to happen at the Senate meeting, the plot had been uncovered the night before. Caesar walk the short distance from his house in the Forum to the meeting, he wore red leather boots because he had been acclaimed by the army as a great commander (imperator), a purple tunic bordered with gold. The world we know today would be a very different place for sure, probably no Emperors and a different outcome for Rome. Ironic really Caesar died at the foot of the statue of his political nemesis Pompey the Great, who had been killed in Egypt just a few years prior. His nephew Octavian who was only 18 years old was named in his will as heir. He had his uncle deified and a temple built to him in the Roman Forum.