Caesar Appointed Dictator in Perpetuity: The Ides of March
Caesar was made dictator for life in February 44 BC and was murdered five weeks later. The office had been an emergency magistracy of six months, used for a specific crisis and laid down afterwards; Sulla had held it without a time limit for two years and resigned, which had at least preserved the form. Caesar had held a series of dictatorships since 49 BC, each longer than the last, and the perpetual grant removed the last pretence that the Republic was in abeyance rather than over. The honours that accumulated with it were the political problem. His image appeared on the coinage while he was alive, which had never been done; a statue was placed among those of the kings; a priest of his cult was appointed; he was given a gilded chair in the senate house and the right to wear triumphal dress permanently; and the month of Quintilis was renamed. He also received the senate seated when a delegation came to him with a decree, which offended more people than anything else on the list. The Lupercalia in February, at which Antony offered him a diadem twice and he refused it twice to public applause, was probably staged to test opinion and produced a clear answer. Sixty senators, most of them pardoned enemies and promoted friends, decided that only his death would restore the constitution. It produced thirteen more years of civil war and a permanent monarchy. The title also gave the Latin word its modern sense. A dictator had been a temporary magistrate with a defined task, and after Caesar the word means what it means now, which is a change made by one man's use of an office.
- Year: 44 BCE
- Category: Political
