Yet even as Cato braced himself to carry on the fight he could not help but reflect with bitterness on his own role in the crisis. By pushing Caesar and Pompey to the extremes, and failing to anticipate the full depths of Crassus’ cynicism, he had done much to precipitate the coup. ‘The three-headed monster’8 had been smoked out into the open, and now that it no longer had to keep to the shadows it was able to scavenge unfettered. Pompey had his settlement of the East ratified, Crassus toyed profitably with the tax laws, while Caesar scouted around for a proconsular command. He settled on the governorship of two provinces, Illyricum in the Balkans and, directly on the northern frontier of Italy itself, Gallia Togata, ‘Toga-Wearing Gaul’. The only consolation for senators concerned at the thought of Caesar being awarded three legions virtually on Rome’s doorstep was the fact that neither of his two provinces offered much scope for flamboyant conquests. Then suddenly, in the spring, Metellus Celer succumbed to his illness and Caesar was given the opportunity to lay his hands on a third province – for Metellus’ death had not only removed a thorn from Pompey’s side, but left Transalpine Gaul, on the far side of the Alps, without a governor. This was a province temptingly menaced by any number of barbarians, and Caesar snaffled it up eagerly. The term of his command, for all three provinces, was set at a stupefying five years. The new proconsul was promised a rich feast of glory indeed.
For Cato, this represented an especially bitter defeat. The shattered fragments of his coalition were powerless to oppose it. When hatred for Pompey tempted Lucullus out of retirement one last time he was treated with such dismissive hostility by Caesar that he broke down and begged for mercy on his knees. That so great and haughty a man should have abased himself was shocking to everyone: perhaps, in the tears he shed before Caesar, there was an early symptom of the senile dementia that would progressively destroy him until his death two years later. If so, then the darkening of Lucullus’ mind would have seemed to Cato a grim portent of the enfeeblement of the Republic. It was a sickness to which he was determined he would not succumb himself.
No true citizen could endure to be a slave. This was a truth written in the blood of Rome’s history. After the bucket of excrement had been poured over his head, Bibulus had turned to his fellow consul, loosed the folds of his shit-bespattered toga, and bared his throat. Caesar, amused, had ducked the invitation to cut it – but, for all the melodrama of Bibulus’ gesture, it had served to restore to him his honour. Cato and his allies had no qualms about offering themselves for martyrdom. The consul immured himself in his house, playing the refusenik to great effect for the remainder of the year, while Cato took the challenge directly into the Forum, daring his enemies to do their worst. Both men courted intimidation and violence. Not only did they succeed in casting a shadow of illegality over Caesar’s legislation, but they ruined the image of the triumvirate behind it. No more telling blow in the propaganda war could have been struck. Caesar, for the sake of his career, had been prepared to play fast and loose with the constitution, but neither Pompey nor Crassus wished to be regarded as a rapist of the Republic. As far as they were concerned, they were playing by the rules: that complex, unwritten skein of precedents that bound every player in the political game. The powerful had been joining together in syndicates since the earliest days of the Republic. So it was, for instance, that when Caesar wished to solidify his alliance with Pompey he did so in the most traditional manner possible: by giving him the hand of his daughter. Cato, however, with the moral authority of a man who had refused to take a similar step, immediately denounced him as a pimp. Insults such as this drew blood. Although Crassus, Macavity-like as ever, evaded much of the abuse, Caesar and Pompey both grew steadily more reviled. They kept their grip on the reins of power, but that, for a Roman aristocrat, was never enough. He also had to be respected, honoured, loved.
For Pompey, unpopularity was especially hard to bear. The man who had spent a lifetime basking in the adoration of his fans now found himself ‘physically twisted’ by the loss of his prestige, ‘moping miserably, racked with indecision’. So pathetic was the sight that Cicero told Atticus he believed that ‘only Crassus could enjoy it’.9 Naturally, the smirking of his old enemy did nothing to improve Pompey’s mood. The alliance between the two men came increasingly under strain. Neither Crassus, scanning around for fresh carcasses to pick at, nor Pompey, morose with resentment and self-pity, felt any loyalty to the other. Within months of the emergence of the three-headed monster, two of the three heads were snapping viciously at each other. Cato, observing the spectacle with stern satisfaction, could begin to hope that the Republic might be saved after all.
True, there remained the menace of the third head. Caesar had Gaul waiting for him. A war there, which he was almost bound to start, would provide him with an unparalleled opportunity to rebuild his reputation. All the same, Cato’s tactics had inflicted permanent damage on Caesar too. He would leave behind him in Rome a legacy of hatred and fear. No matter how much glory he won in Gaul, and no matter how much gold, a hard core of opponents would continue to regard him as a criminal. For as long as Caesar remained a proconsul he was safe from prosecution – but he could not remain in Gaul for ever. The five years would pass, and at the end of them Cato would be waiting, ready to move. Justice demanded it, as did the needs of his country. If Caesar were not destroyed, then force would be seen to have triumphed over law. A republic ruled by violence would barely be a republic at all.
Clodius Raises the Stakes
The winter festival of the crossroads, the Compitalia, had always been an excuse for riotous celebrations. To the poor, crammed into the maze of back alleys that snarled off every shopping street in Rome, the opportunity to band together, to honour the gods who protected their neighbourhood, was a precious one. But to the rich, it spelled trouble. The Senate, impatient with anything that appeared to challenge its authority, had spent the sixties BC legislating the Compitalia virtually out of existence. The local trade associations, the collegia, which had traditionally organised street parties during the festival, had been the particular focus of senatorial suspicion. In 64 they had been banned altogether. The festival itself had been left to wither and die.
By 59, the Compitalia had become so drained of menace that Cicero could regard it as nothing more than a pleasant backdrop to a stroll. His old friend Atticus was over from Greece, and in January, to celebrate the festival, Cicero suggested that they tour the city’s crossroads together. The two men had much to discuss. It was the first month of Caesar’s consulship. A few weeks previously Cicero had been approached by an agent of the triumvirate. Would he be interested, the agent had asked, in joining forces with Caesar, Pompey and Crassus? Cicero had failed to appreciate this offer for what it was, a chance to rule Rome – but even had he done so, he would surely still have turned it down. He was the conqueror of Catiline, after all. How could he possibly take part in a conspiracy against the Republic? The rule of law was precious to him – even more precious than his personal safety. Cicero, who was not a fearless man by nature, knew that his decision had left him dangerously exposed. Just think, he told Atticus wistfully, what he had turned his back on: ‘reconciliation with my enemies, peace with the great unwashed, a leisured old age’.10