3/2/2023 0 Comments Proelia shadow![]() For some critics, Caesar's actions in January of 49 and later, when he became Dictator, provide die interpretive context for understanding his true meaning. These are both things that he has been made to say or mean by both ancient and modem writers. ![]() I am going to argue that Caesar did not-at any rate in his own book, the De Bello Civili-did not say, and did not mean, that his dignitas was more important to him than loyalty to the res publica, nor did he say or mean that defense of his dignitas was sufficient cause for civil war. It is fundamentally a paper about Uterary method. This is not, fundamentally, a paper about whether Caesar was or was not an evil warmonger, a latent dictator, or not. (We might call this Prosecution Exhibit A.) My purpose in this essay is to understand that sentence, and to put it into its cultural and literary context. Ruebel Near the beginning of his account of the Civil War between himself and Pompey, Caesar wrote the famous sentence, sibi semper primam fuisse dignitatem vitaquepotiorem, "For him, dignitas had always been foremost, and more compelUng than life" (De Bello Civili 1.9.2). Ruebel: Caesar's Dignitas and the Civil War133 Caesar's Dignitas and the Outbreak of Civil War1 James S. In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:
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