The Roman general and dictator Gaius Julius Caesar (lived 100 – 44 BCE) is one of the most famous figures from all of ancient history. He been the subject of countless stage plays, films, television shows, and novels and his article on Wikipedia is consistently one of the most frequently viewed articles within WikiProject Classical Greece and Rome.
Not many people are aware, however, that, according to several ancient biographers, Julius Caesar had a chronic illness that reportedly caused him to experience headaches, sudden seizures, and vertigo. This illness is traditionally identified as epilepsy, based on descriptions of it as such by ancient writers, but the exact cause of the illness cannot really be identified, since Caesar is long dead and the descriptions of his illness in the ancient sources are far too vague for any kind of medical diagnosis.
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