Wesley Hanson, Howard University

“Exemplary Landscape in Caesar’s Bellum Gallicum”

Caesar’s depiction of various landscapes plays a prominent role in the Bellum Gallicum. Scholars have long noted the ideological significance of how Caesar portrays the landscapes of Gaul, Germany, and Britain (Krebs 2006; Brown 2013; Krebs 2018; Riggsby 2018); they tend to focus on how Caesar depicts landscapes to weigh whether or not his enemies could be assimilated to Roman customs (Riggsby 2006; Köster 2021). Despite increasing attention to Caesar’s literary abilities (Grillo 2012), scholars have not robustly examined how Caesar’s soldiers interact with the landscapes that they seek to conquer – that is, outside of a military historical context.

This paper builds on recent scholarship on Caesar’s narrative prowess and literary landscape studies by examining Caesar’s depiction of his amphibious assault of Britain. I argue that Caesar, in depicting the seascape around Britain, draws on the exemplary story of Horatius Cocles in order to connect his commentarius to a mythic antecedent. In doing so, he repurposes a famous myth about defensive military action to suit his military assault on foreign land. Central to this literary appropriation is the role that water plays in establishing the exemplary impact of each narrative. Various versions of the Cocles story agree that he jumps into the Tibur as part of his defense of the pons Sublicius; he may have even prayed to Father Tibur as he leapt in.

Caesar notes that his soldiers were afraid to jump into the ocean in order to assault Britain until an unnamed Aquifer does so, shouting that he will perform his duty “for the Republic and his General” (rei publicae atque imperatori) (BG 4.25). By respecting the chain of command, this standard bearer recognizes how virtuous action that spurs on the collective engenders individual glory. Caesar casts this anonymous figure into the Cocles role: leaping into the ocean, aphorism on his lips, the Aquifer ensures the campaign’s success. Caesar thus inverts aspects of the original story – defensive action becomes an assault, a named hero an unnamed soldier – but maintains the centrality of the waterscape to his appropriation: the Tibur is Rome’s historical wellspring, but across the ocean lies future glory.