Gaius Julius Caesar (proconsul of Asia, 90s BC)

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Gaius Julius Caesar (ca. 140 BC–85 BC) was a Roman senator, supporter and brother-in-law of Gaius Marius, and father of Julius Caesar, the later dictator of Rome.

Caesar was married to Aurelia Cotta, a member the of Aurelii and Rutilii families, and had two daughters, both named Julia, and a son, Julius Caesar, born in 100 BC.^[1] He was the brother of Sextus Julius Caesar, consul in 91 BC^[2] and thus the son of Gaius Julius Caesar.

Caesar's progress through the cursus honorum is well known, although the specific dates associated with his offices are controversial. According to two elogiae erected in Rome long after his death, Caesar was a commissioner in the colony at Cercina, military tribune, quaestor, praetor, and proconsul of Asia.^[3] The dates of these offices are unclear. The colony is probably one of Marius' of 103 BC.^[4] Broughton dated the praetorship to 92 BC, with the quaestorship falling towards the beginning of the 90s.^[5] Brennan has dated the praetorship to the beginning of the decade.^[6]

Caesar died suddenly in 85 BC, in Rome, while putting on his shoes one morning. Another Caesar, possibly his father, had died similarly in Pisa.^[7] His son, Julius Caesar, survived. His father had seen to his education by one of the best orators of Rome, Marcus Antonius Gnipho.^[8] In his will, he left Caesar the bulk of his estate, but after Marius's faction had been defeated in the civil war of the 80s BC, this inheritance was confiscated by the dictator Sulla.^[9]