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March 15–April 15, 44 B.C.: The Month that Changed Rome—and the World

GETTY VILLA

Auditorium

This is a past event

This event has been canceled as part of Getty’s response to the coronavirus (COVID-19).

When Brutus and his co-conspirators killed Julius Caesar on March 15, 44 B.C., they thought Romans would embrace them as liberators and condemn Caesar as a tyrant. Romans did not. But they did not immediately condemn the assassins either. Historian Edward Watts of the University of California, San Diego discusses the struggle between Brutus, Cassius, Marc Antony, Cicero, and the future emperor Augustus to define Caesar's legacy. Their battle would transform Rome’s future and set the stage for Brutus’s Roman Republic to become Augustus's Roman Empire.

This lecture is part of a weekend focus on Julius Caesar and the Ides of March. Learn more >  

Edward Watts holds the inaugural Alkiviadis Vassiliadis Endowed Chair in Byzantine History at UC San Diego. His eclectic teaching and research span Greek, Roman, and Byzantine history. Watts attended Brown University, where he focused on classics and religious studies, and received his MA and PhD in history from Yale University. He writes and teaches about the political, religious, and intellectual history of the Roman and Byzantine worlds. Watts is the author or co-editor of ten books, the most recent of special interest to our Ides of March program: Mortal Republic: How Rome Fell into Tyranny (2018).

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