Monday, April 8, 2013

Beware the Ides of March

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Julius Caesar was a Roman dictator who was born in July of the year 100 B.C. He lived 55 years and died on the 15 of March. The day of his death is marked on the Roman calendar as the Ides of March. The Romans numbered their months from three fixed points in the month. The first point was called the Nones, which is about the 5th or 7th day in a month. The second was the Ides, which is about the 13th or 15th day. The last point was the Kalends, which is the 1st day of the following month.
The Ides were determined by the full moon, and was supposed to be sacred to Jupiter, because he led the sheep to be sacrificed, but sheep were not the only animals being sacrificed; today was the day that the great Roman dictator Julius Caesar was assassinated.
Written in William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, he dramatized the day when the soothsayer told Julius Caesar to “beware the Ides of March.” On the Ides of March Julius unknowingly joked that, “The Ides of March have come” and that he was unhurt. Until later at the meeting of the senate, Marcus Junius Brutus led as many as 60 conspirators, to stab Caesar to death.The Ides of March has always peaked my interest as today is my birthday, and all my friends joke about how I may be the reincarnation of Julius.


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