Caesar:
Who is it in the press that calls on me?
I hear a tongue shriller than all the music
Cry “Caesar!” Speak, Caesar is turn’d to hear.
Soothsayer:
Beware the ides of March.
Caesar:
What man is that?
Brutus:
A soothsayer bids you beware the ides of March.
Julius Caesar, Act 1, scene 2, lines 15–19
Today is The Ides of March, a sacred holiday for the ancient Romans that has become, thanks to more than just one notorious assassination, one of the bloodiest holidays in history.
Ancient Romans did not have months laid out like we did, and measured time backward from the last day of any given month. The nones of the month usually fell on the 5th, the ides on the 13th, and the kalends on the first of the following month. They would then refer to today’s date in reference to these points. The ides, on months lasting 31 days, fell on the 15th, and was considered to be Jupiter’s day. It was a monthly occurrence to see the priests of Jupiter leading rituals wherein a live sheep was led down a sacred road to a site where it would be stabbed and eaten in honor of the god. As time passed, this sacrifice eventually also incorporated a wild New Year’s party (yup, one a month) wherein people would have wild orgies.
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Part of these orgies would be a strange Greek ritual wherein an old man would be dressed in animal skins, and then driven from the town with the revelers whipping and berating him the whole way. No one is really sure what the function of this ritual was, although some have said it was a representative expulsion of the old year. Every month. One would think they’d run out of old men at some point.
The bloodiest incident on the ides of March is, of course, the assassination of Julius Caesar (44 BCE) as famously dramatized in William Shakespeare’s play (c. 1599). A soothsayer warned Caesar to beware the ides of March. As it turns out, Brutus and several other associates of his were to stab Caesar to death in the state capital. We all know the story. It’s still pretty damn harsh.
Public Domain
But that’s not where ides of March violence ended with the Romans. The assassination of Caesar ushered in the Imperial Rome, and, as with all big political movements, was eventually spun by political spin-meisters, in this case to allow for more violence and widespread political revenge. In 40 BCE, you see Caesar’s replacement, Caesar Augustus (the one who ruled when Christ was born), fought a notorious battle against Mark Antony’s brother Lucius. Lucius’ army was seen as an enemy of the state, and were sympathetic to the old Caesar, who was deified after his death (Roman rulers are seen as Gods). The people thirsted for revenge against Caesar’s assassins, and Augustus saw an opportunity to do two things.
300 soldiers were taken hostage by Augustus, and were “sacrificed” on the ides of March as a holy form of justice for Caesar’s death. It was also a way, perhaps, for him to clear the air on the old administration and make his own mark. it was all staged, however, as a holy ritual to be tied in with the holiday. So a holiday was besmirched by an assassination, but eventually reclaimed by a mass murder of 300 soldiers.
So happy ides of March, everyone. Celebrate by… well, please don’t “sacrifice” anyone. Here’s an idea: “Sacrifice” a sheep by eating a lamb chop at a high-end restaurant.
Top Image: Public Domain
Witney Seibold is a contributor to the CraveOnline Film Channel, and the co-host of The B-Movies Podcast. He also contributes to Legion of Leia and to Blumhouse. You can follow him on “The Twitter” at@WitneySeibold, where he is slowly losing his mind.
