Isaac Asimov - Asimov’s Guide To Shakespear. Volume 1

Pompey was forced to turn elsewhere. He formed an alliance with Marcus Licinius Crassus, the richest man in Rome, and with a skillful and charming orator and politician, Julius Caesar. Caesar was then an impoverished aristocrat (who nevertheless opposed the Senators) in the employ of Crassus.

The three together, in 60 b.c., formed the First Triumvirate (triumvir means "three men") and ruled Rome.

The three took advantage of their power to parcel out provinces for themselves. Caesar, born in 100 b.c., and by far the most capable of the three, obtained for himself the governorship of that portion of Gaul ruled by Rome (a portion that included what is now northern Italy and southern France). He used that as a base from which to conquer the rest of Gaul. Fighting his first battles at the age of forty-four, he surprised everyone by showing himself to be a military genius of the first rank.

Pompey, who was assigned the governorship of Spain, but who let deputies run it while he himself remained in Rome, was not entirely pleased by Caesar's sudden development of a military reputation. As for Crassus, he was jealous enough to take an army to the east to fight the Parthians, who ruled over what had once been the eastern part of the Persian Empire. In 53 b.c. he lost a catastrophic battle to them at Carrhae, and lost his life as well.

Pompey and Caesar now shared the power, with no third party to serve as intermediary.

By now the senatorial conservatives, frightened by Caesar's success and recognizing Pompey as far the less dangerous of the two, had lined up solidly behind the latter.

Pompey, flattered by aristocratic attentions, let himself be wooed into open opposition to his erstwhile ally. When Caesar's term as governor of Gaul came to an end, the Senate, buoyed up by Pompey's support, arrogantly ordered Caesar to return to Rome at once without his army. This was technically in order since it was treason for any Roman general to bring a provincial army into Italy.

Caesar, however, knew that if he arrived in Rome without his army, he would be arrested at once on some charge or other, and might well be executed.

So after hesitating at the Rubicon River (the little Italian creek which was the boundary of Italy proper, in the Roman view) he made his decision. On January 10, 49 b.c., he crossed the Rubicon with a legion of troops and a civil war began.

Pompey found, much to his own surprise, that Caesar was far more popular than he, and that soldiers flocked to Caesar and not to himself. He was forced to flee to Greece and the senatorial party fled with him. Caesar followed and at a battle in Pharsalia, Greece, on June 29, 48 b.c., Caesar's army smashed that of Pompey.

Pompey had to flee again, almost alone, to Egypt, which was then still independent of Rome. The Egyptian government, however, was afraid to do anything that might displease Caesar, who was clearly the coming man. They therefore assassinated Pompey the instant he landed on Egyptian soil.

Caesar followed, and remained in Egypt for a while. There he met Cleopatra, its fascinating young queen.

Caesar next traveled to Asia Minor, and then to Africa, to defeat die-hard armies allied to those who shared the views of the dead Pompey and the senatorial party. Only then did he return to Rome for his quadruple triumph.

In no part of that quadruple triumph did Caesar commemorate his victory over Pompey himself. In fact, as a deliberate stroke of policy, Caesar forgave such of the Pompeian partisans as he could and did his best to erase hard feelings. His mission, as far as possible, was to unite Rome and put an end to the civil broils through conciliation.

And yet the Roman tribunes in their harangue to the populace bring up Pompey, reproachfully, in connection with this last triumph of Caesar, and Marullus says to the gathered people:

—Act I, scene i, lines 51-54

By "Pompey's blood" is not meant Pompey's death in defeat, as might seem, but Pompey's kinsmen.

Pompey had two sons, the elder of whom shared his father's name and was Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus also. We can call him Gnaeus Pompeius to differentiate him from his father, whom we can still call simply Pompey.

Gnaeus Pompeius remained with the senatorial party after his father's death. He had a fleet in his charge and he brought it to Africa (where the modern nation of Tunis exists), putting it at the service of the largest remaining senatorial army. When Caesar defeated it in April 47 b.c., Gnaeus Pompeius escaped to Spain.

After the quadruple triumph, only Spam was left in opposition. Caesar took his legions there and in March 45 b.c. a battle took place at Munda in southern Spain.

The senatorial army fought remarkably well and Caesar's forces were driven back. For a time, indeed, Caesar must have thought that years of invariable victory were going to be brought to ruin in one last battle (as had been the case of Hannibal of Carthage a century and a half earlier). So desperate was he that he seized a shield and sword himself, rushed into battle (he was fifty-five years old then), and shouted to his retreating men, "Are you going to let your general be delivered up to the enemy?"

Stung into action, the retiring legions lunged forward once more and carried the day. The last senatorial army was wiped out. Gnaeus Pompeius escaped from the field of battle, but was pursued, caught, and killed. (Pompey's younger son escaped and lived to play a part in the events that took place some six years later, and in another of Shakespeare's plays, Antony and Cleopatra.)

Now, returning from Spain, Caesar was celebrating Ms victory over Gnaeus Pompeius and it was in this sense that he came in "triumph over Pompey's blood."

The populace disbands and leaves the stage, presumably returning to their houses in guilt. The tribune, Flavius, then suggests that they tear down the decorations intended for the triumph. Marullus hesitates, for it may be sacrilege. He says:

—Act I, scene i, lines 69-70

The Lupercalian festival was an ancient fertility rite whose origins are lost in antiquity and probably predate civilization. It involved the ritual sacrifice of goats, which were noted for being ruttish animals.

Strips of the skin of the sacrificed goats were cut off by the priests in charge. They then ran about the Palatine Hill, striking out with those thongs. Anyone struck would be rendered fertile, supposedly, and sterile women therefore so placed themselves at the rites as to make sure they would be struck.

The "feast of Lupercal" was held each year on February 15 and this was not the day of Caesar's last triumph at all (as would appear from the play), but four months later. Shakespeare, however, commonly compresses time in his historical plays (a compression that is a dramatic necessity, and even a dramatic virtue), and here he lets the four months pass between the driving off of the populace and the next speech of the tribunes. There is no further talk of the triumph.

One would suppose from this first scene that the triumph was somehow aborted and never took place. It did take place, of course. The chief point of the scene is to show that there is opposition to Caesar.

Flavius shrugs off the possibility of sacrilege. It is more important to resist Caesar's pretensions. He says: