Who was the soothsayer?
According to Suetonius and Plutarch, sometime in March when Caesar was making sacrifices, a soothsayer or astrologer named Spurinna warned Caesar of danger on a date no later than the Ides of March. According to Plutarch’s account, written in 75AD, Caesar had decided, wisely, to remain within the safety of his chambers on 15 March. However, Caesar’s ‘friend’ Decimus (Albinus) Brutus (not Marcus Brutus) managed to convince him that the astrologer’s warnings were nothing more than superstition; so Caesar attended the Senate anyway on that date. On his way to the Senate, Caesar contrived to meet up with Spurinna and, upon seeing him mocked, ‘The Ides of March are come’. Spurinna replied, ‘Yes, they are come, but they are not past’. Later that day – on 15 March, 44BC – Caesar’s enemies assassinated him in the Pompeii theatre, at the foot of Pompey’s statue, where the Roman Senate was meeting that day in the Temple of Venus. Why did Caesar ignore the warning? One theory as to why Caesar mig
