Given the famous deeds associated with Julius Caesar — his crossing of the Rubicon in 49 BCE, his assassination on the Ides of March, 44 BCE, and even his salacious sex life — it might surprise you to learn that we know next to nothing about his childhood.
What little we do know comes mainly from the Greek writer Plutarch (c. 40 – 120s CE) and the Roman biographer Suetonius (c. 69 – 122 CE), both of whom were writing around 150 years after Caesar’s corpse had been consigned to a funeral pyre in the Roman Forum.
Take a tour in Rome today, however — especially around the Monti district — and chances are your guide will tell you that Julius Caesar was born here. Or rather that he was born in an apartment in the Subura, ancient Rome’s “red light district” and today’s trendy neighbourhood of Monti.
Unfortunately, this rags-to-riches origin story is pure fantasy and belongs not to ancient Rome but to modern imagination. Our sole reference to Caesar living in the Subura comes from Suetonius, who tells us that Caesar lived there in his bachelor days before he moved to the Via Sacra:
“He lived at first in the Subura in a modest house, but after he became pontifex maximus, in the official residence on the Sacred Way.”
Suetonius, Life of Julius Caesar, 46.1
Caesar became Pontifex Maximus (Rome’s head priest) in 64 BCE, when he was 36 years old. He may well have lived in the Subura during his dirty thirties, but he certainly didn’t grow up here. His parents, who could count consuls among their recent ancestors, were the crème de la crème of the Roman aristocracy. They would not have raised children in the slums of the Subura.
I do understand where this myth comes from. Monti is home to the oldest continuously inhabited street in Rome, or possibly even the world – Via Madonna dei Monti. You can quite understand why Romans would want to fix the residence of their most famous historical figure here, especially when there’s an ancient quote that, with a bit of work, can be made to fit.
So much for what we don’t know, but what do we know about Caesar’s childhood?
Julius Caesar’s Parents
Caesar’s mother was Aurelia, a patrician woman and part of the Aurelii Cottae gens, a prominent noble family throughout the Roman Republic. Tacitus mentions Caesar’s mother in a section of his Dialogus de Oratoribus (c. 100 CE) which highlights the virtues expected of Roman mothers. Aurelia was, by his assessment, an exemplary Roman mother, by which he meant one who was diligent in guiding not only her children’s studies and duties but even their games and playtime “with a certain dignity and modesty”.
Tacitus would have taken a dimmer view of Aurelia had she raised her family in the Subura. Instead, he included her in the illustrious company of women who had raised Rome’s “future leaders”:
“This is how we’ve heard Cornelia raised the Gracchi, Aurelia raised Caesar, and Atia raised Augustus—mothers who oversaw the upbringing of future leaders.”
Tacitus, Dialogues on Orators, 28
An exemplary mother she may have been, but Aurelia was also an in-law from hell. Plutarch, who calls her a “woman of discretion”, also lets slip that she would never let Caesar’s wife, the young Pompeia, out of her sight and made it “difficult and dangerous for lovers to have an interview.” (Plutarch, Caesar, 9.3).
Was Caesar Born by Caesarean Section?
That Aurelia lived long enough to harangue Caesar’s wife should raise eyebrows for anyone who has heard she died in childbirth. One of the most pervasive myths associated with Julius Caesar is that he was born by Caesarean section. In fact, this procedure was always fatal in antiquity, and often performed on pregnant women after they had died. And as we have seen, Aurelia lived for decades after Caesar’s birth and even gave birth to another girl, Julia.
Caesar’s father was also called Gaius Julius Caesar — a Roman custom that passed honour and prestige down through the family line, but causes headaches for us modern historians. He enjoyed an impressive career, adding the titles of military tribune, questor, praetor and propraetor of Asia to his curriculum vitae. But his most significant act was dying: suddenly, in the middle of the morning, while putting on his shoes — something that earned him a mention in Pliny the Elder’s chapter on “Instances of Sudden Death”. (Pliny, Natural Histories, 7.54).
He was 55, and young Julius was 16.
Finally, Caesar had two sisters: Julia Major (the elder) and Julia Minor (the younger). We know very little about Caesar’s older sister. As is common for minor female figures in Roman history, pretty much all the information we have relates to which powerful men she was related to, and by what degree. Caesar’s younger sister gets a bit more of a write-up, but that’s only because she ended up being the grandmother of the man who became perhaps more influential than Caesar himself: Rome’s first emperor, Augustus.
So much for his family. But what else do we know about the young Julius Caesar?
Horsing Around
Plutarch tells us that, even as a boy, Julius Caesar was an accomplished horseman:
“For he was wont to put his hands behind his back and, holding them closely there, to ride his horse at full speed.”
Plutarch, Caesar, 17.6
Plutarch also tells us that Caesar was a strong swimmer. He recounts an incident during the Alexandrian War (48 BCE) in which Caesar, under attack, leapt into the sea and swam to safety, holding important documents above water with one hand. (Caesar, 49.7). Unless Caesar had learned how to swim late in life, we can assume he started early, but it is worth emphasising that there is no ancient source supporting that he did so.
And yet an episode from Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar recounts Caesar taking part in a swimming contest in the River Tiber with Cassius, one of his assassins. In this content, Caesar falters and has to be rescued by Cassius, who bears him to land on his shoulders. However, this is nothing more than a dramatic invention to highlight the tension between Cassius and the now-omnipotent Caesar.
Caesar’s Gallic Tutor
Suetonius tells us that Caesar had a tutor, Marcus Antonius Gnipho, a man born to formerly enslaved parents with a formidable intellect. He was “a man of great talent, of unexampled powers of memory, and well read not only in Latin but in Greek as well.” His brilliance was matched by a kind disposition: he never argued with students over fees, and they often increased his pay voluntarily.
Gnipho did not live beyond 50. Given his Gallic origins, this may have been a blessing. At least he did not live to see his protegee wage war on his people, capture and parade King Vercingetorix before putting him to death in the Mamertine Prison, and commit what by modern standards would be considered genocide in Gaul.
Yet if there is a rags-to-riches story here, it belongs to Caesar’s Gallic tutor — not to young Julius himself.
