Editing Julius Caesar (section)

=== Politics, Gaul, and Rome ===
In the initial years from the end of Caesar's consulship in 59&nbsp;BC, the three so-called triumvirs sought to maintain the goodwill of the extremely popular [[Publius Clodius Pulcher]],<ref>{{harvnb|Gruen|1995|p=98|ps=. "It should no longer be necessary to refute the older notion that Clodius acted as agent or tool of the triumvirate". Clodius was an independent agent not beholden to the triumvirs or any putative popular party. {{cite journal |last=Gruen |first=Erich S |title=P. Clodius: Instrument or Independent Agent? |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1086053 |journal=Phoenix |volume=20 |issue=2 |pages=120–30 |date=1966 |issn=0031-8299 |jstor=1086053 |doi=10.2307/1086053}}}}</ref> who was [[plebeian tribune]] in 58&nbsp;BC and in that year successfully sent Cicero into exile. When Clodius took an anti-Pompeian stance later that year, he unsettled Pompey's eastern arrangements, started attacking the validity of Caesar's consular legislation, and by August 58 forced Pompey into seclusion. Caesar and Pompey responded by successfully backing the election of magistrates to recall Cicero from exile on the condition that Cicero would refrain from criticism or obstruction of the allies.{{sfn|Ramsey|2009|pp=37–38}}<ref>{{harvnb|Morstein-Marx|2021|p=194|ps=, noting Caesar's opposition – in early 58&nbsp;BC – to Cicero's banishment. Caesar offered Cicero a position on his staff which would have conferred immunity from prosecution but Cicero refused. {{harvnb|Ramsey|2009|p=37}}.}}</ref>{{sfn|Ramsey|2009|p=39}}

Politics in Rome fell into violent street clashes between Clodius and two tribunes who were friends of Cicero. With Cicero now supporting Caesar and Pompey, Caesar sent news of Gaul to Rome and claimed total victory and pacification. The Senate at Cicero's motion voted him an unprecedented fifteen days of thanksgiving.<ref>{{harvnb|Morstein-Marx|2021|p=220|ps=, citing Gelzer, "this extraordinary honour... cut the ground from under the feet of those who maintained that since 58 Caesar had held his position illegally"; Morstein-Marx also rejects the claim of senatorial duress at {{harvnb|Plut. ''Caes.''|loc=21.7–9}}.}}</ref> Such reports were necessary for Caesar, especially in light of senatorial opponents, to prevent the Senate from reassigning his command in Transalpine Gaul, even if his position in Cisalpine Gaul and Illyricum was guaranteed by the ''lex Vatinia'' until 54&nbsp;BC.{{sfnm|Morstein-Marx|2021|1pp=196, 220|Ramsey|2009|2pp=39–40}} His success was evidently recognised when the Senate voted state funds for some of Caesar's legions, which until this time Caesar had paid for personally.{{sfn|Morstein-Marx|2021|pp=220–21}}

The three allies' relations broke down in 57&nbsp;BC: one of Pompey's allies challenged Caesar's land reform bill and the allies had a poor showing in the elections that year.{{sfn|Ramsey|2009|pp=39–40}} With a real threat to Caesar's command and {{lang|la|acta}} brewing in 56&nbsp;BC under the aegis of the unfriendly consuls, Caesar needed his allies' political support.{{sfn|Morstein-Marx|2021|p=229}} Pompey and Crassus too wanted military commands. Their combined interests led to a renewal of the alliance; drawing in the support of [[Appius Claudius Pulcher (consul 54 BC)|Appius Claudius Pulcher]] and his younger brother Clodius for the consulship of 54&nbsp;BC, they planned second consulships with following governorships in 55&nbsp;BC for both Pompey and Crassus. Caesar, for his part, would receive a five-year extension of command.{{sfnm|Ramsey|2009|1pp=41–42|Morstein-Marx|2021|2p=232}}

Cicero was induced to oppose reassignment of Caesar's provinces and to defend a number of the allies' clients; his gloomy predictions of a triumviral set of consuls-designate for years on end proved an exaggeration when, only by desperate tactics, bribery, intimidation and violence were Pompey and Crassus elected consuls for 55&nbsp;BC.{{sfnm|Ramsey|2009|1p=43|Morstein-Marx|2021|2pp=232–33}} During their consulship, Pompey and Crassus passed – with some tribunician support – the {{lang|la|lex Pompeia Licinia}} extending Caesar's command and the [[Lex Trebonia (55 BC)|''lex Trebonia'']] giving them respective commands in Spain and Syria,{{sfnm|Ramsey|2009|1p=44|Morstein-Marx|2021|2pp=232–33}} though Pompey never left for the province and remained politically active at Rome.{{sfn|Gruen|1995|p=451}} The opposition again unified against their heavy-handed political tactics – though not against Caesar's activities in Gaul<ref>{{harvnb|Morstein-Marx|2021|p=238}}, citing Cic. ''Sest.'', 51, "hardly anyone has lost popularity among the citizens for winning wars".</ref> – and defeated the allies in the elections of that year.{{sfn|Ramsey|2009|p=44}}

The ambush and destruction in Gaul of a legion and five cohorts in the winter of 55–54&nbsp;BC produced substantial concern in Rome about Caesar's command and competence, evidenced by the highly defensive narrative in Caesar's ''Commentaries''.<ref>{{harvnb|Morstein-Marx|2021|pp=241ff|ps=, citing {{harvnb|Caes. ''BGall.''|loc=5.26–52}}.}}</ref> The death of Caesar's daughter and Pompey's wife Julia in childbirth {{circa|late August 54}} did not create a rift between Caesar and Pompey.<ref>{{harvnb|Morstein-Marx|2021|p=272 n. 42|ps=: "Gruen.. and Raaflaub... have effectively disposed of the old idea, too heavily influenced by [Plutarch]", citing {{harnvb|Plut. ''Caes.''|loc=28.1}} and {{harvnb|Plut. ''Pomp.''|loc=53.6–54.2}}, "that Pompey had now turned against Caesar... since Julia's death in 54".}}</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Ramsey|2009|p=46|ps=: "Despite the fact that Pompey declined Caesar's later offer to form another marriage connection, their political alliance showed no signs of strain for the next several years".}}</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Gruen|1995|pp=451–52, 453|ps=: "Julia's death came in the late summer of 54[;] if it opened a breach between Pompey and Caesar, there is no sign of it in subsequent months... The evidence indicates no change in the relationship during 53"; "Julia's death provoked no change in the contract[;] Caesar did not cut Pompey out of his will until the outbreak of civil war".}}</ref> At the start of 53&nbsp;BC, Caesar sought and received reinforcements by recruitment and a private deal with Pompey before two years of largely unsuccessful campaigning against Gallic insurgents.{{sfn|Morstein-Marx|2021|pp=243–44}} In the same year, Crassus's campaign ended in disaster at the [[Battle of Carrhae]], culminating in his death at the hands of the [[Parthian Empire|Parthians]]. When in 52&nbsp;BC Pompey started the year with a sole consulship to restore order to the city,<ref>{{cite journal |last=Ramsey |first=J T |date=2016 |title=How and why was Pompey made sole consul in 52 BC? |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/45019234 |journal=Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte |volume=65 |issue=3 |pages=298–324 |doi=10.25162/historia-2016-0017 |jstor=45019234 |s2cid=252459421 |issn=0018-2311}}</ref> Caesar was in Gaul suppressing insurgencies; after news of his victory at Alesia, with the support of Pompey he received twenty days of thanksgiving and, pursuant to the "Law of the Ten Tribunes", the right to stand for the consulship in absentia.{{sfn|Morstein-Marx|2021|pp=247–48, 260, 265–66}}{{sfn|Wiseman|1994|p=412}}