Marcus Junius Brutus - Background, Chronology, Later evaluations of Brutus

Roman politician. He sided with Pompey when the civil war broke out, but submitted to Caesar, and was appointed Governor of Cisalpine Gaul. He divorced his wife to marry Portia, the daughter of his master, Cato. Cassius persuaded him to join the conspiracy against Caesar (44 BC); but, defeated by Mark Antony and Octavian at Philippi, he killed himself.

Marcus Junius Brutus (85 BC – 42 BC), or Quintus Servilius Caepio Brutus, was a Roman senator of the late Roman Republic.

Background

Marcus Brutus's father, M. Some sources refer to the possibility of Caesar being his real father, but this is unlikely since Caesar was fifteen years old at the time of Brutus' birth and the affair with his mother started some ten years later. Brutus' uncle Quintus Servilius Caepio adopted him when he was a young man and Brutus was known as Q. Servilius Caepio Brutus for an unknown period of time. From his first appearance in the Senate, Brutus aligned with the Optimates (the conservative faction) against the First Triumvirate of Marcus Licinius Crassus, Pompey, and Caesar.

When civil war broke out in 49 BC between Pompey and Caesar, Brutus followed his old enemy and present leader of the Optimates, Pompey. After the disaster of the Battle of Pharsalus, Brutus wrote to Caesar with apologies and Caesar immediately forgave him. In the next year (45 BC), Caesar nominated him to be a praetor.

A conservative by nature, Brutus never concealed his convictions. However, Brutus, like many other senators, was extremely unsatisfied with the state of the Republic. Brutus began to conspire against Caesar with his friend and brother-in-law Cassius and other men, calling themselves the Liberatores ("Liberators").*

Shortly before the assassination of Caesar, Brutus met with the conspirators and told them that, if anyone found out about the plan, they were going to turn their knives on themselves. see Roman calendar) of 44 BC, a group of senators called Caesar to the forum for the purpose of reading a petition, written by the senators, asking him to hand power back to the Senate. As Caesar began to read the false petition, one of the senators, named Casca, pulled down Caesar's tunic and made a glancing thrust at the dictator's neck. In Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, the dictator directed his famous last words at him: Et tu, Brute? or And [even] you, Brutus? Suetonius stated that Caesar said, in Greek, καὶ σύ, τέkνον; (transliterated as "Kaì sú, téknon?", that is Even you, my child?), translated in Latin as Tu quoque, Brute, fili mihi? (You, too, Brutus, my son?) (De Vita Caesarum, Liber I Divus Iulius, LXXXII). Shortly after the assassination, the senators left the building talking excitedly amongst themselves, and Brutus cried out to his beloved city: "People of Rome, we are once again free!"*

However, the city itself was against them, because most of the population loved Caesar dearly. Ironically, Brutus was named as a minor beneficiary in Caesar's recorded will, along with Antony.

Since Rome no longer saw them as saviors of the Republic and they faced treason charges, Brutus and his fellow conspirators fled to the East. In Athens, Brutus dedicated himself to the study of philosophy and, no less importantly, to the raising of funds to support an army in the coming war for power.*

Octavian and Antony marched their army toward Brutus and Cassius. After two engagements at the Battle of Philippi in 42 BC, during the first of which Cassius committed suicide, Brutus fled with his remaining forces.

Chronology

85 BC – Brutus was born in Rome 58 BC – assistant to Cato, governor of Cyprus 53 BC – quaestorship in Cilicia 49 BC – follows Pompey to Greece, during the civil war against Caesar 48 BC – Pardoned by Caesar 46 BC – governor of Gaul 45 BC – praetor 44 BC – supposedly murders Caesar with other senators; goes to Athens 42 BC – death October 3 - First Battle of Philippi – defeated Octavian, but Antony defeated Cassius, who committed suicide October 23 - Second Battle of Philippi – his army was decisively defeated; Brutus escaped, but committed suicide soon after.

Later evaluations of Brutus

Dante considered Brutus to be the epitome of shameful betrayal, and in his Inferno section of the Divine Comedy (Inferno, XXXIV, 64-67), portrayed Brutus being chewed, but never consumed, by Satan, along with Judas Iscariot and Gaius Cassius Longinus at the very lowest level of Hell. Shakespeare has Mark Antony describe Brutus as "the noblest Roman of them all" in the final scene of Julius Caesar. The phrase Sic semper tyrannis ("Thus always to tyrants") is attributed to Brutus at the assassination. John Wilkes Booth, the assassin of Abraham Lincoln, was inspired by Brutus. Booth performed the part of Brutus six months before assassinating Lincoln. In the Masters of Rome novels of Colleen McCullough, Brutus is portrayed as a timid intellectual poseur who hates Caesar for personal reasons.