On January 10, 49 BC Julius Caesar marched into Italy with a single legion (Legio XIII) committing himself to a Civil War with the Senatorial army commanded by Pompey the Great.

Caesar is often presented as the aggressor in this conflict, but this video presents some of the flaws in the efforts to blame Caesar for the war when it more naturally falls on the reactionary optimate faction led by Cato the Younger.

This momentous decision gave rise to two of the most enduring idioms in English: "The Die is Cast" and "Cross the Rubicon"


#history #spqr #tribunate