In literary and historical representations Caesar has been romanticized as an enlightened political visionary and condemned as a bloodthirsty Machiavellian whose ambitions knew no bounds. Providing a famous reflection of the former position, Dante ranks Caesar's assassins, Brutus and Cassius, with Judas Iscariot in the lowest depths of Hell
(Inferno, 34). Regardless of differing assessments of his character, there must be consensus that Caesar was a man who changed the world and continues to be a figure larger than life.
Yet, even in the case of this towering personage, historical context is essential to a proper understanding of the individual's life and achievements. Caesar was in a sense the end product of sweeping historical forces that had been radically transforming Roman society for a century or more before his birth on 13 July 100 B.C.
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