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Roman Empire

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The Roman Empire in 117 AD

The Roman Empire began with the defeat of Marcus Antonius at the Battle of Actium in 31 BC, when Octavius became the sole remaining member of the Second Triumvirate and returned to Rome, where he was bestowed with the title "Augustus the honorable and magnificent commander in chief, son of the divine Julius Caesar". The Roman Empire sat astride the Western World like a colossus and imposed a peace called Pax Romana for two hundred years before decline slowly set in. The Roman Empire ended in the West in AD 476, but continued in the East as the Byzantine Empire until the 15th Century.


List of Roman Emperors

  • Augustus (Octavianus) (27 BC - 14 AD)
  • Tiberius (14-37), stepson of Augustus.
  • Caligula (37-41), son of Tiberius's nephew.
  • Claudius (41-54), nephew of Tiberius.
  • Nero (54-68), son of Claudius's aunt.[1]

Nero's tyrannies spawned several revolts. The final, successful revolt was launched by Galba, commander of the Spanish legions. When the Senate endorsed him as emperor as he was marching on Rome, Nero fled and committed suicide, ending the Julio-Claudian dynasty. However, since no successor had perceived legitimacy, generals from across the empire jockeyed for power in the "Year of Four Emperors". Finally, Vespasian, commander of the legions fighting against the Jewish revolt, took firm power.

Domitian, ignoring the Senate (which was still the nominal chief power), demanded to be called "Lord and God" instead of "Princeps" ("first citizen," the title awarded by the Senate). When he died, the Senate elected Nerva to succeed him. Nerva, childless, started the period of the "Five Good Emperors", during which the emperor adopted someone, often a popular general, as his successor.

[2]

Marcus Aurelius named his incompetent son Commodus as his heir. Commodus swiftly lost control, and the empire descended into anarchy, called the Crisis of the Third Century. The Praetorian Guard publicly auctioned the throne; the winner, Didius Julianus, reigned only until the general Septimus Severus reached Rome to depose and execute him. However, he could not prevent the empire from sliding into chaos. Numerous "emperors" reigned simultaneously in different parts of the empire. For a time, the western provinces declared independence as the "Gallic Empire".

Finally, Diocletian took control. Determining that the late crisis proved the empire had grown too big for one man to rule, he declared that there would be two emperors ("Augusti"), each with a delegate and successor ("Caesar"). One pair would rule in the east; another in the west. In theory, each Caesar would peacefully succeed his Augustus. Diocletian and his co-Augustus abdicated simultaneously to start this succession practice, but it also swiftly disintegrated into war.

The Empire was now more or less permanently divided into Eastern and Western sections. The Western Roman Emperor ended in 476 when the child-emperor Romulus Augustulus (a puppet of his father Orestes) was peacefully deposed by his general, the Germanic chieftain Odoacer. However, the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantine Empire) continued until 1453, when Constantine XI died in the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks.

References

  1. ↑ http://www.roman-emperors.org/nero.htm
  2. ↑ http://www.roman-emperors.org/impindex.htm
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