ABSTRACT
The assassination of Caesar failed to restore the res publica and instead created political uncertainty. His former associates and opponents maneuvered with a mixture of passion, caution, and perhaps desperation to establish control. Events on the Ides of March changed the participants and the nature of political life at Rome. It was soon apparent that the conspirators were only one faction in the Senate and did not represent majority sentiments. The rest of the year was a period of cautious movements, as commanders and politicians who had experienced the bloodshed and vagaries of the battlefield in the civil war of 49–45 sought to work out a compromise and avoid another war and the shedding of citizens’ blood. The arrival of Caesar’s great-nephew and adopted son Octavian in the spring complicated matters. Most of Caesar’s following gradually coalesced into a coalition to avenge their fallen leader. Cicero’s voice was powerful in advocating immediate military and political measures, as he strove constantly in his “Philippic” orations and numerous letters to raise armies in a patriotic war against Antony. Furious in his expenditure of energy, but rash and unconvincing to those who had experience of warfare, Cicero gradually dragged many senators into a war they were reluctant to fight.
