Daily History Challenge · No. 5 · Friday 3 July 2026 · When?
Puzzle No. 5: When?
The event was Caesar's Gallic Wars and the Siege of Alesia, in 58 to 50 BCE (Alesia 52 BCE).
The answer
Between 58 and 50 BCE the proconsul Gaius Julius Caesar conquered Gaul (roughly modern France and Belgium), bringing a vast new territory and its peoples under Roman control and dramatically extending Roman power to the Atlantic and the Rhine. The campaigns climaxed in 52 BCE at Alesia, where Caesar besieged the Gallic chieftain Vercingetorix, who had united many tribes in revolt. Caesar's army built a double ring of fortifications, an inner wall to contain the trapped defenders and an outer wall to repel a massive Gallic relief force, and won a complete victory; Vercingetorix surrendered the next day, ending organised Gallic resistance. The conquest, narrated by Caesar himself in his Commentaries, brought immense plunder and slaves, made Caesar enormously wealthy and gave him a battle-hardened, intensely loyal army. That army and prestige made him a rival the Senate and Pompey could not control, setting the stage directly for the civil war that would destroy the Republic. The Romanisation of Gaul reshaped western Europe for centuries.