Boris Johnson, Brexit and the Roman Empire

His book, The Dream of Rome, written almost fifteen years ago, with a much younger Boris Johnson on the cover, tells us much about the recently elected British Prime Minister - his ambitions, his political tactics, and most of all his reasons for supporting Brexit. He draws upon his analysis of the history of the Roman Empire to give us the reasons.

The cover of his book tells that European leaders throughout the ages have been "trying and failing to imitate the Roman achievement." The Romans were able "to weld together the peoples of Europe to create a single identity". He then gives us at least a dozen reasons, many drawn from the history of Rome, to tell us why that melding cannot be repeated.

He starts his story with an account of the battle of Teutoburg, in 9 AD, a massive disaster for the hitherto unconquered Roman armies. Deceived by a supposed ally, Arminius a German nationalist, into an unforeseen ambush, the Romans had several divisions completely wiped out. The Roman legions were led by Publius Quinctilius Varus. Arminius, a German officer in Varus's headquarters, had acquired Roman citizenship and had received a Roman military education, which enabled him to deceive the Roman commander; also to anticipate the Roman army's responses. Rome never again tried to conquer the barbarians, as they described them, beyond the Rhine. The result was romance languages on one side of the Rhine and guttural languages on the other. Never the two shall mix claims Boris Johnson. He adds chapter and verse on his reasons for deriding the European experiment. If the legions had extended the Roman Empire beyond the Rhine, he states, 'the Rhine would not have played its grim role in the history of our continent", … "the scene of hideous slaughter between the German speakers and the French".

He extends his concept of barbarians, however, to all Europe, to all countries of the current EU: They were, Johnson claims "by the standards of Graeco Roman culture, complete barbarians." (p.120). He repeats Tacitus' "contemptuous" description of the Fenni,a northern tribe identified with the Finns, 'who live in grotesque poverty". Boris sums it up by describing Europe under the phrase:" The whole thing is hopelessly uncouth."

Perhaps at the top is his experience with the concept of a European union was his experience at a Brussels international school.The English did not mix with the French (he claimed), and neither of them interacted with the Germans. That, we get the impression, was Boris' concept of the natural order of things.

His attack on the concept of the union of Europe is multi-pronged. One is its spending. Sitting Club Class in any European flight, he tells us, the chances are high that a person near you will be paid by the EU, attending some conference at a swank hotel ,on a socially important issue – the climate, sexual harassment, etc. and having a very enjoyable time ,"entertained by gorgeous pouting Interpreters."

Johnson uses Arminius, who has a 28 metre high statue erected to his honour not far from the battlefield, to promote his Euroscepticism. We are all divided he says, into Euro-sceptics and Euro-philes. Some prefer their national customs, traditions and national governments; Others prefer forming a single unit out of disparate nations.

Coming through the pages is Boris Johnson's high regard for Octavian, later the emperor Augustus,whom he describes as: "one of the most brilliant politicians of history" (p.63). His admiration for the emperor gives us an insight into Johnson himself. "Augustus was the first to understand the role of literature in organising political opinion." (p.74). Johnson has written five books. One of them, on Winston Churchill, the media pointed to Johnson's "not so subtle" attempts to draw a parallel between himself and Churchill.

Augustus, along with Mark Antony and Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, formed the second triumvirate on 27 November 43 BC, with the enactment of the Lex Titia, which is viewed by some as the beginning of the end of the Roman Republic. The triumvirate issued proscriptions on their enemies. These proscriptions resulted in the execution of 4,700 opponents and the confiscation of their estates. Included was Marcus Tullius Cicero, one of the more incisive intellects to grace the human stage. He was singled out by Mark Antony for his condemnations of Antony in the Roman Senate (in a series of speeches titled The Philippics). Cicero's chief objection to Antony was political. Antony was Julius Caesar's second in command. It was Caesar, with his crossing of the Rubicon, and the resulting civil wars, who brought about the end of the Roman Republic. Cicero, although not one of the sixty senators who assassinated Caesar, supported the Republic, the earlier administrative system for Rome. According to the historian Plutarch, Antony spent his teenage years wandering through Rome with his brothers and friends gambling, drinking, and becoming involved in scandalous love affairs, which are among the accusations endorsed by Cicero.

Boris notes that it is claimed by some that Octavian argued with Marc Antony for two days to keep Cicero off the proscription list. But Johnson adds" there seems no reason to believe it". It was expedient for Octavian to be on the side of Antony (p.68). According to Plutarch, Antony's soldiers slew Cicero, then cut off his head. On Antony's instructions his hands, which had penned the Philippics against Antony, were cut off as well; these were nailed and displayed along with his head in the Forum. Boris adds a more objectional sequel, one that is not widely known, of the treatment of Cicero's head by one of Antony's ex-wives. She pulled out the tongue in the severed head and spat in Cicero's face. This writer is far from sure on where Johnson obtained this information, His book has no references The Penguin classics containing Cicero's On Living and Dying Well has a section on Cicero's death and over a dozen eulogies from later writers, the only one we may have heard of being Seneca. All of them condemn the killing: "His death was cruel"; "undeserving"; "shocking"; "Criminal weapons killed him" ;"Three tyrants killed him". None of them mention the tongue pulling. It might be reasonably ascribed to Boris Johnson's supreme ability to create fictional history.

Mark Antony who was responsible for the Eastern part of the Empire was defeated, along with Cleopatra, in 31 BC in the battle of Actium. From then on, Octavian was sole ruler; from 27 BC on, he called himself Augustus ("the exalted one").

Boris started his attacks on the European Union with the battle of Teutoburg: follows almost immediately with describing the signing of the treaty of union on October 2004 in Rome as a "shindig" (p.29). The deriding of Europe continues throughout his book:

• "The grain market in ancient Rome was as rigged as anything in the common agricultural Policy "(p.136);
• The emperor Domitian ordering all vineyards in Provence "to be grubbed up….an agricultural intervention common place in Europe over the last 50 years." (p.138).
• Romans decided that there should be no growing wine north of the alps "anticipates the mad control freakery of the EU's wine regime." (p.161).
• The inhabitants of the then empire "wanted to become Roman in a way that they never wanted to become European." (p.179).
• The legions abandoned Britannia in 410 BC. Britain's "dark ages began" although the last emperor of the west did not flee until 476 BC. The country's early exclusion "gave us a series of complexes about membership in the Europen Union." (p.209).

Johnson completes his history with two issues. One is on the advent of Christianity and the parallels between the divinity of Augustus and that of Jesus Christ. The other was Islam. Augustus, heir to a deified Julius Caesar, was titled son of god, Divi Filius. Virgil and Horace both stated Augustus to be divine. Johnson also draws parallels with several of the bible stories on the slaughter of the innocents, the coming of the saviour, and the virgin birth, all of which also occurred in the history of Ancient Rome. He describes them as "not entirely coincidences. They can't be." (p.81).

The final issue was Islam. That last chapter, "And then came the Muslims", is strongly anti -Muslim, and would have only distant connections with Rome and no connection with the European Union.

This writer came away with two overriding impressions of Boris Johnson. One was the overwhelming impact of the breadth of education and classical knowledge of the British Prime Minister. The second was that his commitment to power and political success has dubious ethical overtones. He describes Augustus in very flattering terms, "The man who made it all possible," yet Augustus acceded to the proscriptions that killed 130 senators and 3000 Romans. Cicero was one of them, yet as noted, Johnson believes that Augustus concurred with the killing.

One of the themes of Johnson's thoughts on Augustus is that "it will be very hard to create a single Europen consciousness without such a figure." (p.76)

This writer, however, does disagree with Johnson on BREXIT in several respects. Many have noted that Europe after centuries of constant conflict had enjoyed its longest period of peace in its history. In 2012, the EU was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. The European Union has also proved its worth as a counter to the unpredictable follies of the president of the United States, particularly on Iran. But finally there are the disastrous economic consequences in Britain of Brexit. With the possible exit of Scotland, and even Wales, Great Britain could become a Little Britain.

This writer is thankful to Boris Johnson in one respect. He had always wondered why the people of Rome, and the Senate, accepted Augustus as emperor when they had earlier assassinated his uncle Julius Caesar, for claiming the imperial crown. The answer appears to be Augustus' ruthless streak, ambition, and high level of competence, attributes that Johnson himself in his book has stated that he admires. The Battle of Philippi in 44 BCwas of course, the principal reason. It was the final battle in the Wars of the Second Triumvirate between the forces of Mark Antony and Octavian and the leaders of Julius Caesar's assassination, Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus, known as the Liberatores, in 42 BC, at Philippi in Macedonia. The Second Triumvirate declared this civil war ostensibly to avenge Julius Caesar's assassination, but the underlying cause was a long-brewing conflict between the Optimates– the conservative political faction in the late Roman Republic, formed in reaction to the reforms of the Gracchi brothers - and the Populares who favoured the cause of the plebeians. Many politicians of the Republic postured as Populares to enhance their popularity among the plebs, notably Julius Caesar and Augustus, who enacted many of the Populares' objectives during their rule.

The question arises then, as to the motivations behind the Populares in their assassination of Julius Caesar. It does seem that the principal motivation was their objection to Caesar's usurpation of power, and his declaration of himself as emperor. Cicero, although not involved in the assassination, supported the return to the Republic. The Optimates, then cannot be classified entirely as wealthy conservatives, seeking to maintain their own benefits, but more as senior politicians seeking to stop a military takeover. Although they may not have realised it at the time, the usurpation of power by Caesar, and then by his nephew, Augustus, was the start of the decline of the colossus that was ancient Rome.