Ides of March
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40 free Ides of March trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The Ides of March is the most famous date in ancient history, and one of the few days of the Roman year that people still call by its Roman name. Long before it became a byword for betrayal it was an ordinary marker in the month, with religious duties and everyday business attached. Then a group of senators chose it for the killing of Julius Caesar, and the warning to beware it has echoed ever since. This quiz covers the day from every side. It starts with the Roman calendar and what the Ides meant to ordinary Romans, then follows Caesar's last morning: the omens, the plotters, the Senate meeting and the attack itself. Further questions deal with the aftermath, from the funeral and the civil war that followed to the way Shakespeare and later writers retold the story. A final group looks at the name's afterlife in film and music and at other events that happened to fall on the same date. It is written for history fans, Latin and classics students, teachers planning a lesson around the date, and anyone hosting a themed quiz night. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you will leave knowing more than the famous warning.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The Ides of March, the day Julius Caesar was assassinated, falls on which date of the month?
The 15th
The 15th was the Ides only in March, May, July and October; in every other Roman month the Ides came two days sooner.
Q 02The Rome ruins where Julius Caesar was killed now host a sanctuary for which animals?
Cats
Cats have had a no-kill shelter among the temple ruins of Largo di Torre Argentina since 1993, despite archaeologists' calls to move it.
Q 03In Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, who calls from the crowd to warn Caesar about the Ides of March?
A soothsayer
A soothsayer gives the warning on stage, and ancient writers tell a similar story: Suetonius names the seer as Spurinna, a reader of animal entrails.
Q 04Which assassin of Julius Caesar was the son of Servilia, Caesar's long-time mistress?
Brutus
Brutus inspired ancient gossip that Caesar was his real father, though Caesar was only a teenager when he was born.
Q 05Which foreign queen was staying at Julius Caesar's villa in Rome when he was killed on the Ides of March?
Cleopatra
Cleopatra stayed on in Rome for about a month after the murder, hoping in vain that her young son Caesarion would be recognised as Caesar's heir.
Q 06From 1918 until 1955, Americans faced which yearly federal deadline on the Ides of March?
Filing income taxes
Filing income taxes moved to mid-April in 1955; before 1918 the deadline had come even sooner, on the first of March.
Q 07Long before the murder of Julius Caesar, Romans knew the Ides as each month's deadline for what?
Settling debts
Settling debts and paying rent fell on the Ides of every month, so for most Romans the date meant bills long before it meant betrayal.
Q 08Weeks before the Ides of March, Julius Caesar took which new title that alarmed many Roman senators?
Dictator for life
Dictator for life is the usual rendering of dictator perpetuo, granted early in 44 BC; to the plotters it ended any hope that he would ever step down.
Q 09Set upon by dozens of senators, Julius Caesar was stabbed about how many times on the Ides of March?
23
Caesar took 23 wounds, yet the physician who examined his body judged that only one of them, a stab to the chest, had been fatal.
Q 10Julius Caesar was killed on the Ides of March at a Senate meeting held inside which Roman complex?
Theatre of Pompey
The Theatre of Pompey complex held the hall where the Senate met that day, and Caesar fell beside a statue of the rival he had beaten in civil war.
Q 11Which wife of Julius Caesar begged him to stay home on the Ides of March after dreaming of his death?
Calpurnia
Calpurnia dreamed he lay dying in her arms and talked him into staying home, until a plotter he trusted scoffed at heeding a woman's dreams.
Q 12Which ally of Julius Caesar was deliberately detained outside the Senate meeting while the assassins struck?
Mark Antony
Mark Antony was waylaid at the door, in most accounts by Trebonius, so that the consul and seasoned general could not come to Caesar's aid.
Q 13Which teenage great-nephew did Julius Caesar's will, opened after the Ides of March, name as his main heir?
Octavian
Octavian was across the Adriatic at Apollonia when the news came; he sailed home, took Caesar's name and in time became Rome's first emperor.
Q 21At which battle, two years after the Ides of March, were the leaders of Julius Caesar's assassins defeated?
Philippi
Philippi ended the assassins' cause: one of their two leaders killed himself after a false report that his partner had also been beaten.
Q 22Which sight in the sky, seen during games honouring the murdered Julius Caesar, was hailed as his soul?
A comet
A comet shone for seven days in a row during the games, and Romans took it as proof that the murdered Caesar had become a god.
Q 23After the Ides of March, Julius Caesar's body was cremated in which public space, later the site of his temple?
The Forum
The Forum saw the body carried in from the Regia and cremated, and two years later a temple to the deified Caesar was decreed for the same spot.
Q 14The month whose Ides proved fatal to Julius Caesar takes its name from which Roman god?
Mars
Mars gave his name to Martius, the opening month of the earliest Roman year and the start of the season for warfare.
Q 15The Ides of every Roman month, March included, were sacred to which god, honoured with a sheep sacrifice?
Jupiter
Jupiter received the so-called Ides sheep each month, led along the Sacred Way by his own high priest and sacrificed on the citadel.
Q 16The Ides of each Roman month were originally meant to coincide with which lunar phase?
Full moon
Full moon fell at mid-month in a lunar calendar, so in Rome's earliest calendar the Ides of March brought the first one of the new year.
Q 17Which Roman term named the first day of every month, a fixed point like the Ides?
Kalends
Kalends opened each month and gave English the word calendar; Romans dated a day by counting down to it, to the Nones or to the Ides.
Q 18Ancient writers who gave the dying Julius Caesar final words quoted them not in Latin but in which language?
Greek
Greek was the language of the three words some Romans claimed he spoke, meaning 'you too, child'; Suetonius himself believed he died without speaking.
Q 19Which conspirator struck the first blow against Julius Caesar, attacking from behind at his shoulder?
Casca
Casca attacked while another plotter tugged at Caesar's toga as a distraction, then shouted for his own brother to come and help him.
Q 20Which senator, brother-in-law to the most famous of Julius Caesar's assassins, was a leading instigator of the murder?
Cassius
Cassius had married a half-sister of his fellow ringleader, and took offence when Caesar handed that younger man the more senior post.
Q 24At which Roman festival, a month before the Ides of March, did Julius Caesar publicly refuse a royal diadem?
Lupercalia
Lupercalia saw his fellow consul press the diadem on him before a crowd, and ancient accounts disagree on who planned the scene and why.
Q 25Julius Caesar was due to leave Rome three days after the Ides of March for a war against which foreign power?
Parthia
Parthia had crushed a Roman army under Crassus at Carrhae nine years before, and Caesar's departure date left the plotters only days to act.
Q 26The men who killed Julius Caesar on the Ides of March are known to history by which collective name?
The Liberators
The Liberators marched through the city after the killing proclaiming Rome free again, but the war named for them ended in the Republic's collapse.
Q 27A Roman coin stamped EID MAR to celebrate the Ides of March shows a freedman's cap between two of which objects?
Daggers
Daggers stand for the weapons used on Caesar, and the plot leader who issued the coin put his own portrait on the other side.
Q 28Handed a note exposing the plot on his way into the Senate, what did Julius Caesar do with it?
Kept it unread
Caesar kept it unread and went into the meeting, a near miss that Shakespeare later staged with Artemidorus as the man holding out the note.
Q 29At Julius Caesar's funeral, a mob killed a man named Cinna in mistake for a plotter; what was his real trade?
Poet
Poet Helvius Cinna shared a name with a Cornelius Cinna who had spoken up for the assassins, so the grieving crowd lynched the wrong man.
Q 30Which orator, left out of the plot against Julius Caesar, later wrote that he wished he had been invited?
Cicero
Cicero was judged too cautious to be let in on the secret, yet afterwards he complained that the plotters had not gone far enough.