Did you know? You can earn activity points by filling your profile with information about yourself (what city you live in, your favorite team, blogs etc.)

Re: The key date , March 15 ,2013 - Korg vs EDIG/ Beware the ides of March!

in response to

The key date , March 15 ,2013 - Korg vs e.DIGITAL, ENE without counter claim

sman998

posted on Mar 05, 2013 12:52PM

Ides of March

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

This article is about the day in the Roman calendar. For other events that occurred on 15 March, see March 15. For the 2011 film directed by George Clooney, see The Ides of March (film). For other uses, see Ides of March (disambiguation).

Vincenzo Camuccini, Mort de César, 1798

The Ides of March (Latin: Idus Martii or Idus Martiae) is the name of the 15th day of March in the Roman calendar.

Etymology

The word Ides comes from the Latin word "idus", a word that was used widely in the Roman calendar indicating the approximate day that was the middle of the month. The term ides was used for the 15th day of the months of March, May, July, and October, and the 13th day of the other months.[1] The Ides of March was a festive day dedicated to the god Mars and a military parade was usually held.

Julius Caesar

In modern times, the term Ides of March is best known as the date on which Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 B.C. Caesar was stabbed (23 times) to death in the Roman Senate by a group of conspirators led by Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus. The group included 60 other co-conspirators according to Plutarch. Another point which arises is Shakespeare's use of the Ides of March and (the lack of doubt in) Marcus Brutus' decision to assassinate Caesar to portray an atmosphere of madness, pleasure, and pandemonium. It is said that on ides of March the sea succumbs to chaos and the full moon brings high tides. All these points give the Ides of March a very mysterious quality.[2]

According to Plutarch, a seer had foreseen that Caesar would be harmed not later than the Ides of March; and on his way to the Theatre of Pompey (where he would be assassinated), Caesar met the seer and joked, "The ides of March have come," meaning to say that the prophecy had not been fulfilled, to which the seer replied "Aye, Caesar; but not gone."[2] This meeting is famously dramatised in William Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar, when Caesar is warned by the soothsayer to "beware the Ides of March."[3][4]

Furthermore, Suetonius writes that the haruspex Spurinna warns Caesar of his death which will come "not beyond the Ides of March" as he is crossing the river Rubicon.