“Caesar’s Women”, by Colleen McCullough

696 pages, William Morrow & Company, ISBN-13: 978-0688093716

Caesar’s Women by Colleen McCullough is the fourth book in her “Masters of Rome” series and spans the years 67 to 59 BC. The series has a thesis (first introduced in 1939 by Sir Ronald Syme in his epic historical treatise “The Roman Revolution”): as Rome became more powerful within the Mediterranean world, the old ways of doing things – through the deliberation of various interests, mainly aristocratic and mercantile – became impossibly cumbersome. It became more and more difficult to govern an empire with institutions originally designed to administer a city-state. Certain powerful leaders (especially Marius, Sulla, and Caesar) tried to create a state in which they had autocratic power but also preserved the externals of the old ways. They were opposed by the conservatives (called the optimates by classical historians, though they themselves preferred the title boni or “good men”). The obtuse or simply ignorant resistance of these reactionaries, who are all (except for Cato) presented as degenerate or self-serving, made the creation of an autocracy necessary. The result was the birth of an imperial monarchy, and a radically different organization of power. Each book in the series features a detailed glossary, hand-drawn illustrations of the major characters, and notes by McCullough detailing her reasoning for portraying certain events in certain ways.

The novel is set during a ten-year interval, from 68-58 BC, which Julius Caesar spent mainly in Rome, climbing the political ladder and outmaneuvering his many enemies. It opens with Caesar returning early from his quaestorship in Spain, and closes with his epochal departure for the Gallic campaigns. Some of the pivotal moments include Caesar’s marriage to Pompeia; his curule aedileship; his narrow election as Pontifex Maximus in 63 BC; his praetorship in 62 BC; his divorce from Pompeia; his governorship of Further Spain; the first time he was hailed imperator on the field by his troops, the blocking of his triumphal parade by Marcus Porcius Cato; the creation of the First Triumvirate, which Caesar formed with Marcus Licinius Crassus and Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus in 60 BC; his betrothal of his daughter Julia to Pompey; his marriage to Calpurnia; and his first consulship, in 59 BC. Reflecting the title, Caesar’s divorce and remarriage come into play, as does his daughter’s marriage, his lengthy affair with Servilia and his close relationship with his mother, Aurelia. However, most of the plot is concerned with the political struggles of Caesar’s rise to power, his conflict with the conservative boni faction, and his election to each post on the Roman ladder of government.

Of her entire Masters of Rome, series I found Caesar’s Women to be one of the best because the women characters in this epic story are finally pushed to the forefront. If you are looking for gratuitous deeds of stereotypical Hollywood Rome with orgies, murder and the like, this is not the book for you; but the serious lover of Roman history will find the exploits of the women in this novel so believable that it feels like absolute historical accuracy. The classes of each woman drives their ambitions, from Servilia (Caesar’s mistress) who rules her household with an iron fist – but knows she cannot rule Caesar, whose class far surpasses her own; to Cleopatra, the young and immature Queen of Egypt who seeks to rule both Egypt and Caesar; to Julia, the daughter of Caesar who meekly accepts whatever destiny her father deems best for himself…the women of this novel come to life in vivid color and distinct behavior and each, in her own way, guides the life of that (perhaps) greatest Roman, Julius Caesar. Caesar’s Women, like all of the Masters of Rome, is an immersive voyage back 2000+ years in time that introduces readers to the inner workings of Roman government and ably explores the psychology of towering figures from the past. If it can be slow-moving (as most installments in this series are) it is also rich and rewarding and tells its tale on a daring scale. Simply put, there is nothing else out there like this series.