[106] For the behavior of Caesar when the senate approached him to confer its honors upon him, see Appian 2, 107; Dio 44, 8; Suetonius, Caes., 78; Plutarch, Caes., 60; Livy, Epit., 116; [Eutropius] 6, 25; Zonaras 10, 11. Appian and Plutarch speak of Caesar as seated on the rostra; Dio, Suetonius, and Livy place him before the temple of Venus Genetrix. In the interest of accuracy it is to be noted that both Appian and Plutarch incorrectly refer to ‘consuls’ in the plural as being at the head of the procession: ‘τῶν ὑπάτων ἡγουμένων’ and ‘προσιόντων δὲ τῶν [ὑπάτων].’
Excuses for Caesar’s failure to rise are offered by three of the historians: Dio lays the blame upon an attack of diarrhoea, Plutarch upon an attack of epilepsy, while Nicolaus, less extravagantly, simply says that Caesar did not at first see the throng because of his deep interest in his own undertaking. More plausible are the suggested reasons of Suetonius: that L. Cornelius Balbus dissuaded Caesar from rising (compare Plut., Caes., 60, end), or that C. Trebatius Testa urged him to rise and thus displeased him.
[107] Reading συνόντες with the codex. Piccolos reads συγγνόντες, and Dindorf συνέντες.
[108] See also Appian 2, 106, 134, 138; Dio 44, 4; 5, 50. After Caesar’s death Antony had inscribed upon a statue of Caesar which he placed on the rostra, ‘parenti optime merito’ (Cic., Fam., 12, 3, 1). Suetonius, Caes., 85 tells of the column erected in the forum, similarly inscribed, ‘parenti patriae.’
[109] See Appian 2, 107, 109; Dio 44, 7. Caesar’s motive in dismissing his guard was found to be difficult to explain by those who afterward sought for causes. To many it could not but seem almost suicidal negligence (Suet., Caes., 86); certainly his course did not meet with the favor of his more prudent adherents: ‘laudandum experientia consilium est Pansae atque Hirti, qui semper praedixerant Caesari ut principatum armis quaesitum armis teneret’ (Vell. 2, 57, 1).
23.[110] As Pontifex Maximus, Caesar lived in the Regia, in the Via Sacra.
[111] The bridge has been identified by M. E. Deutsch, University of California Publications in Classical Philology, vol. 2, pp. 267 ff. ‘Petronia amnis est in Tiberim perfluens, quam magistratus auspicato transeunt cum in campo quid agere volunt’ (Festus 250). This stream, which flowed westward from the Quirinal, was accordingly bridged by a small wooden footway from which one might easily have been pushed into the shallow watercourse below. Suetonius also refers to a ‘pons’ but seems erroneously to have supposed it was the ‘pons’ of the voting place.
[112] The ‘Feriae Annae Perennae’ were celebrated on March 15 (CIL 12 p. 311; Wissowa, Religion und Kultus der Römer,2 pp. 147 and 241. See also Ovid, Fast., 3, 523; Macrobius, Sat., 1, 12, 6). Perhaps the reference is to the Quinquatrus of March 19 (Wissowa, op. cit., p. 144).
[113] Suetonius, Caes., 80, alone agrees with Nicolaus in recounting the four tentative plans discussed by the conspirators before it was decided that Caesar be killed in the senate on March 15, but he is far less explicit. According to Appian, 2, 115, Caesar was to have set out for the East within four days of that date; hence the conspirators must have felt that there was no time to lose. The motions which Caesar wished to introduce at this session of the senate referred to final preparations and assignments before he departed for Parthia. Dio 44, 15, says that Brutus and Cassius felt that the motion might be put that Caesar be declared king in order to assure victory over the Parthians in accordance with a Sibylline prophecy (see chap. 20, [note] [96]), and since they could not vote for the measure, from conviction, nor against it, from policy, they decided to kill him before suspicion should become directed against themselves. In this connection, see Appian 2, 113; Plutarch, Brut., 10, where attempts have been made to reproduce the supposed dialog between Brutus and Cassius on the subject.
24.[114] According to the Greek mode of orientation to the east, which Nicolaus has in mind, the back of one sacrificing would be kept toward the west. The Romans followed the Etruscan rule of facing south, in which case the west, being on the right, would not be an unfavorable quarter.