268 Outlines of European History Caesar sole master of Rome The assassi- nation of Caesar There was now no one in Rome to gainsay this mightiest of the Romans. He made no attempt to abolish the outward forms of the Republic. For this he was too wise. He caused himself to be appointed Dictator for life, consul for ten years, and gath- ered the powers of all other important offices into his hands. He filled the Senate with his own supporters and appointees till it was ready at any time to do his bidding. He began exten- sive reforms of the corrupt Roman administration. He put an end to centuries of vexation with the Graeco-Roman moon calendar (p. 193) by introducing the practical Egyptian calendar (p. 23), which we are all still using. -^ Divine honors were now paid to this tremendous Roman who had lifted himself to the throne of the world. He planned far-reaching conquests into new lands beyond the frontiers, like the subjugation of the Germans be- yond the Rhine. Had he carried out these plans, the language of the Germans to-day would be a descendant of Latin, like the speech of the French and the Spanish. But there were still men in Rome who were not ready to submit to the rule of one man. On the fifteenth of .March, 44 B.C., only a year after Caesar had quelled the last disturbance in Spain, these men struck down the greatest of the Romans. If some of his murderers fancied themselves patriots overthrow- ing a tyrant, they little understood how vain were all such efforts to restore the ancient Republic. World dominion and its mili- tary power had forever demolished the Roman Republic, and t he murder- gf T^sar ggm'n plunged italv ar|d the Empire intn^ civil war. QUESTIONS Section .40. Define the western Mediterranean world. Discuss the geography and climate of Italy. Did the peoples of the Late Stone Age in the West advance in civilization as fast as the ^gean people ? Do you think their distance from the Orient had anything 1 Unfortunately the Romans altered the convenient Egyptian calendar with its twelve thirty-day months and five holidays at the end ; hence the varying length of our months.
