(Some scholars argue that in Northward Ho, by Thomas Dekker and John Webster – a play performed in 1605 and printed in 1607 – the character Bellamont is intended to represent Chapman.
It has been argued that the work was never staged – and conversely that it was, "possibly with Shakespeare in the cast," and perhaps influenced Julius Caesar and Antony and Cleopatra.
[3] As the title indicates, Chapman's play deals with the conflict between Julius Caesar and Pompey the Great that ended the First Triumvirate of ancient Rome in the 1st century BC.
In the play, Chapman depicts the antagonism between the two title characters, but also the pupil/master relationship between Pompey and Cato the Younger in Stoic philosophy.
Chapman's sources were Thomas North's translation of the Parallel Lives of Plutarch, and the Pharsalia of Lucan, and, among more abstruse works, the Contra Celsum of Origen.