Caesar.

Unknown; the etymology was subject to many interpretations in antiquity, all of which remain doubtful. Among these are: * From a Punic word for “elephant”. This etymology was endorsed by Julius Caesar himself, thereby following the claims of his family that they inherited the cognomen from an ancestor, who had received the name after killing an elephant, possibly during the first Punic war. * From the phrase a caesiis oculis ("because of the blue eyes"): Caesar's eyes were black, but since the despotic dictator Sulla had had blue eyes, this interpretation might have been created as part of the anti-Caesarian propaganda in order to present Caesar as a tyrant. * From the phrase a caesariē ("because of the hair"): Since Caesar was balding, this interpretation might have been part of the anti-Caesarian mockery. * From the phrase a caeso matris utero ("born by Caesarean section"): In theory this might go back to an unknown Julian ancestor who was born in this way. On the other hand, it could also have been part of the anti-Caesarian propaganda. * From the verb caedō (“to cut”) (supine caesum), in the argument of the Julians for receiving a sodality of the Lupercalia. The praenomen Kaeso (or Caeso) was best known from the Quinctii and the Fabii, possibly derived from their ritual duty of striking with the goat-skin at the luperci Quinctiales and the luperci Fabiani.