Cezar in Anglia !

 “Leap, fellow soldiers, unless you wish to betray your eagle to the enemy. I, for my part, will perform my duty to the republic and to my general.”

Heading south for the winter of 56 BC, Caesar met with his fellow triumvirs Pompey and Crassus to renew the terms of their informal agreement to dominate the state. Pompey had grown increasingly jealous of Caesar, fearing for his legacy that Caesar’s achievements should out shadow his own. Just as Pompey had once boasted about overtaking Sulla, now he was yesterday’s man, with Caesar the rising star. Caesar was a master of PR, and in keeping an autobiography had readers regularly regale Romans with tales of his exploits in Gaul. Pompey even pressed for the Senate to stop reading aloud reports from Caesar’s campaigns. Caesar had also moved apart from Crassus, having initially been heavily indebted to him and effectively his client. His Gallic conquests had yielded huge wealth of his own, and he famously paid of Crassus by sending a train of wagons filled with gold to his home to clear the debt. Crassus was always loath to have any of his clients clear their debt to him, for he would then have no leverage over them.

When the trio met at Lucca, they agreed their course of action for the next several years. Caesar had his proconsulship in Gaul prorogued for a further five years, while Crassus and Pompey agreed that they would serve as Consuls in the next elections, with Caesar sending soldiers to vote to ensure their victory. Crassus’ son Publius was released from Caesar’s service so he could join his father for his Syrian campaign. Pompey would be assigned the provinces of Hispania and Africa, while Crassus would be assigned Syria, affording him the opportunity to further increase his huge wealth from the rich province. This move also saw Caesar surrounded by the two, who could thus raise the necessary legions and surround him if it came to war.

With this agreement in place, Caesar returned to Gaul and began focussing his attention on the tribes of the Atlantic seaboard, and the Roman enemies, the Veneti. A seafaring people, they had a strong fleet in the Gulf of Morbihan, and given Caesar’s land dominance were able to take to the waves to avoid his legions. Caesar thus set about constructing a fleet, though found the usual Mediterranean triremes were unsuitable for the Atlantic. The strong oak Veneti ships with high sterns rendered the Roman rams ineffective, and so Caesar had his ships fitted with long poles and hooks so they could grasp the Veneti ships and pull them close enough for his marines to board. A tough campaigning year of 56 BC saw the Veneti subdued.

The following year saw Caesar set out to launch a punitive expedition against the German Suebi. His legions constructed a marvel of Roman engineering, the Rhine bridge, using floating piledrivers to hammer columns into the riverbed and then lay his bridge over the top. This was no Xerxes’ style pontoon, this was a 30 ft wide, 400m long bridge across a 30 ft deep river. While Caesar never engaged the Suebi in battle in Germania, for they fled from him, his legions brutalised the local populace, killing and enslaving tens of thousands of Germans. His bridge shattered the German illusion that the Rhine was a frontier, from which they could attack Rome without reprisal – now they knew how easily the legions could cross. Completing the deterrent, Caesar burnt the bridge after returning to show how unimportant it was.

Later that year, Caesar crossed the English Channel with two legions, though arriving at Dover found massed ranks of Celtic warriors awaiting him, so sailed on. Tracked by their cavalry, his men landed off the coast of Kent to the bitter attacks of the Celts. The Roman ships were unable to beach, meaning the legionaries had to jump out in deep water, while under heavy missile fire. Spurring on the legionaries, the aquilifer (Eagler bearer) for the Tenth declared: “Leap, fellow soldiers, unless you wish to betray your eagle to the enemy. I, for my part, will perform my duty to the republic and to my general.” Eventually the Roman artillery managed to drive off the Britons. After making camp, the Romans were hit by heavy storms, which wrecked and sunk several of their ships, unused to the British weather. Sensing the Romans could be starved into submission over the winter, the British attacked a Roman foraging legion, but were driven off by the rest of the army. An attack on the camp also saw the Celts repulsed, suffering heavy losses. With a loss of ships and supplies dwindling, Caesar thought it best to return to Gaul. Though his invasion had not led to annexation or occupation, or particularly awed the Celts, it greatly enhanced his prestige in Rome for taking her eagles “beyond the known world”, with the Senate declaring 20 days of thanksgiving. Caesar justified his campaign by saying the Britons were supporting the still-hostile Gauls, though it was more likely to reconnoitre Britain’s mineral wealth and resources.

Caesar spent the winter of 55 BC planning his second invasion, gathering five legions and 2,000 cavalry so as not to repeat the mistakes of his first invasion. It was around this time that Mark Antony, with the patronage of Pulcher, began his service with Caesar’s legions, proving an excellent leader and shrewd tactician. Landing unopposed, Caesar marched his troops 12 miles overnight to confront the Celts at the River Stour, driving them back to Bigbury Wood in Kent, and again defeating them. However he then received word that around 40 ships had been wrecked in a storm, and returned his legions to the coast to repair them.

Several skirmishes followed betwixt the Romans and Britons, with a tribune among the dead, and the Celts realised they could not defeat Caesar in open battle. Their king thus disbanded most of his force, retaining some 4,000 chariots to proffer greater mobility, which, coupled with their knowledge of the terrain, could see them conduct an effective guerrilla campaign against the Romans. When Caesar found a ford of the River Thames defended with sharpened stakes, he sent an armoured war elephant into the river, and the sight of this strange beast – likely the first time an elephant had been seen in Britain – caused the Celts to panic and rout. As Caesar besieged the hostile Celts, more and more British tribes approached him proffering their support and asking to become friends of Rome.

Caesar’s campaigns of the last two years were met with much criticism, with little pretext beside his naked ambition and imperialism. When his daughter died giving birth to Pompey’s child in 54 BC, the last strand of friendship betwixt the two was broken, and Pompey began to stoke hostility against Caesar and his illegal campaigns. Despite his growing success in britain, Caesar was beginning to receive alarming reports of growing unrest and rebellion in Gaul. Wanting to swiftly conclude his British campaign and return across the Channel, he agreed to take a number of hostages and receive tribune, though did not leave any garrisons behind to ensure them, and little was actually collected. The winter of 54 BC saw a large uprising in Gaul by Ambiorix, who wiped out 15 auxiliary cohorts, and almost captured a town before it was relieved by the returning Caesar. He built a second Rhine bridge in several days, launching further punitive raised against the Suebi. But Ambiorix’s revolt was merely the precursor to a much larger uprising by Vercongetorix, while in Rome, Marcus Crassus had now assembled the legions he now needed to finally claim his own military reputation and march east.