When Julius Caesar was murdered, the power vacuum was filled by three men - Mark Antony, the flamboyant soldier interested only in plunder; Octavius, Caesar's named heir, but not even a citizen - and the least known of all, Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, an old-fashioned patrician who believed blindly in the ideals of Rome, but was hopelessly inept at both war and politics.

Told from Lepidus's point of view, this masterly tragicomedy charts both the seminal events of the post-Caesarian era, and the career of a man locked into his own conviction that what would preserve his line must also be good for Rome. It is funny, fascinating, and ultimately moving.