English: A phrygian cap on a pole. The symbol originated in the immediate aftermath of the assassination of Roman dictator
Julius Caesar by a group of Rome's Senators in 44 BC.
[1] Immediately after Caesar was killed, the leaders of the assassination plot went to meet a crowd of Romans at the
Roman Forum; a
pileus (a kind of skullcap that identified a freed slave) was placed atop a pole to symbolize that the Roman people had been freed from the rule of Caesar, which the assassins claimed had become a tyranny because it overstepped the authority of the Senate and thus betrayed the Republic.
[2] During the
French revolution, the Roman pileus was confused with the
Phrygian cap, and this mis-identification then led to the use of the Phrygian cap as a symbol of
Republicanism. With or without the pole, the Phrygian cap is now used as a symbol on the state emblems of many republics.
- ↑ Adrian Goldsworthy. Caesar: Life of a Colossus. Paperback edition. London, England, UK: Phoenix, 2007. Pp. 596-619.
- ↑ Adrian Goldsworthy. Caesar: Life of a Colossus. Paperback edition. London, England, UK: Phoenix, 2007. Pp. 619.