Excerpt from The Death of Caesar by Barry Strauss, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

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RIDING WITH CAESAR

IN AUGUST 45 B.C., SEVEN months before the Ides of March, a procession entered the city of Mediolanum, modern Milan, in the hot and steamy northern Italian plain. Two chariots led the march. In the first stood Dictator Gaius Julius Caesar, glowing with his victory over rebel forces in Hispania (Spain).

In the position of honor beside Caesar was Marcus Antonius—better known today as Mark Antony. He was Caesar's candidate to be one of Rome's two consuls next year, the highest-ranking public officials after the dictator. Behind them came Caesar's protégé, Decimus, fresh from a term as governor of Gaul (roughly, France). Beside him was Gaius Octavius, better known as Octavian. At the age of only seventeen, Caesar's grandnephew Octavian was already a man to be reckoned with.

The four men had met in southern Gaul and traveled together over the Alps. They took the Via Domitia, an old road full of doom and destiny—Hannibal's invasion route and, according to myth, Hercules' road to Spain.

Caesar was heading for Rome. For the second time in little over a year, he was planning to enter the capital in triumph, proclaiming military victory and an end to the civil war that began four years earlier, at the start of 49 B.C. But it was not easy to end the war, because its roots went deep. It was in fact the second civil war to tear Rome apart in Caesar's lifetime. Each war reflected the overwhelming problems that beset Rome, from poverty in Italy to oppression in the provinces, from the purblind selfishness and reactionary politics of the old nobility to the appeal of a charismatic dictator for getting things done. And behind it all lay the dawning and uncomfortable reality that the real power in Rome lay not with the Senate or the people but with the army.

Dark-eyed and silver-tongued, sensual and violent, Caesar possessed supreme practical ability. He used it to change the world, driven by his love for Rome and his lust for domination. Caesar's armies killed or enslaved millions, many of them women and children. Yet after these bloodbaths he pardoned his enemies at home and abroad. These overtures of goodwill raised suspicions—could the conqueror be a conciliator?—but most had no choice but to acquiesce.

Of all the Romans in his entourage, Caesar chose these three men—Antony, Decimus, and Octavian—for places of honor on his reentry to Italy. Why? And why would one of them betray him within seven months? And why, after Caesar's death, were the three men able to raise armies and turn on each other in a new war that retraced their route from northern Italy into southern Gaul?

Consider how each of these men came to Caesar in the years before 45 B.C.

THE RISE OF DECIMUS

Decimus Junius Brutus Albinus, to use his full name, was a close friend of Caesar. They had worked together for at least a decade, beginning in 56 B.C. In that year, when Decimus was about twenty-five years of age, he made a sensation as Caesar's admiral in Gaul. He won the Battle of the Atlantic, which conquered Brittany and opened the door to the invasion of England.

First impressions are important and, in this case, accurate. War, Gaul, and Caesar were Decimus's trademarks. He was speedy, vigorous, resourceful, and he loved to fight. He was proud, competitive, and eager for fame. Like other ambitious men of his class, he won elected office in Rome, but the capital and its corridors of power never captivated him as the Gallic frontier did.

Decimus was born on April 21, around 81 B.C. He came from a noble family that claimed descent from the founder of the Roman republic, Lucius Junius Brutus. Decimus's grandfather was a great general and statesman but his father was no soldier and his mother was a flirt who dallied with revolution and adultery and perhaps with Caesar, who seduced many of the married noble ladies in Rome. A great historian suggested that Decimus was Caesar's illegitimate son. Intriguing as this theory is, it is not supported by the evidence.

Excerpted from The Death of Caesar by Barry Strauss. Copyright © 2015 by Barry Strauss. Excerpted by permission of Simon & Schuster. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.