Party Politics and the Death of Rome
The Death of Marcus Porcius Cato has long served as one of the defining moments of Roman history. Having seen the republican forces defeated at Thapsus (in north Africa) by a Caesarian army in 46 BC, Cato found himself holed up in the port town of Utica, a short distance from the battlefield. On the night of his death, Cato calmly retired to his bedroom and began reading Plato’s “On the Soul” — before plunging a sword into his stomach. As his attendants burst into the room and tried to save him, Cato continued to injure himself — and finally succumbed to his wound. For many, Cato died as he had lived. Known for his deeply conservative views and traditional values, Cato embodied the Roman belief in personal responsibility and civic duty. At the height of a civil war that would engulf the Roman Republic, and faced with certain defeat, Cato chose to take his own life over living under the dictatorship of Caesar. In death, Cato would display the values that he had espoused as le