Ancient Rome began as an Italic settlement, traditionally dated to 753BC, beside the River Tiber in the Italian Peninsula. The settlement grew into the city and polity of Rome, and came to control its neighbours through a combination of treaties and military strength. It eventually controlled the whole Italian Peninsula, assimilating the Greek culture of Magna Graecia (in southern Italy) and the Etruscan culture in north-central Italy, and then became the dominant power in the Mediterranean region and parts of Europe. At its height it controlled the North African coast, the Iberian and Balkan peninsulas and most of Southern and Western Europe, and much of the Middle East, including Anatolia, the Levant, Egypt, and parts of Mesopotamia and Arabia, and Crimea. That empire was among the largest empires in the ancient world, covering around 5million square kilometres (1.9million square miles) in AD117, with an estimated 50 to 90million inhabitants, roughly 20% of the world's population at the time. The Roman state evolved from an elective monarchy to a classical republic and then to an increasingly autocratic military dictatorship during the Empire.
Ancient Rome is often grouped into classical antiquity together with ancient Greece, and their similar cultures and societies are known as the Greco-Roman world. Ancient Roman civilisation has contributed to modern language, religion, society, technology, law, politics, government, warfare, art, literature, architecture, and engineering. Rome professionalised and expanded its military and created a system of government called res publica, the inspiration for modern republics such as the United States and France.[1] It achieved impressive technological and architectural feats, such as the empire-wide construction of aqueducts and roads, as well as more grandiose monuments and facilities. (Full article...)
Modern depiction (1876) by Jean Léon Gérôme of a chariot race in Rome's Circus Maximus, as if seen from the starting gate. The Palatine Hill and imperial palace are to the left.
Chariot racing (Ancient Greek: ἁρματοδρομία, harmatodromía; Latin: ludi circenses) was one of the most popular ancient Greek, Roman, and Byzantine sports. In Greece, chariot racing played an essential role in aristocratic funeral games from a very early time. With the institution of formal races and permanent racetracks, chariot racing was adopted by many Greek states and their religious festivals. Horses and chariots were very costly. Their ownership was a preserve of the wealthiest aristocrats, whose reputations and status benefitted from offering such extravagant, exciting displays. Their successes could be further broadcast and celebrated through commissioned odes and other poetry.
In standard Greek racing practise, each chariot held a single driver and was pulled by four horses, or sometimes two. Drivers and horses risked serious injury or death through collisions and crashes; this added to the excitement and interest for spectators. Most charioteers were slaves or contracted professionals. While records almost invariably credit victorious owners and their horses for winning, their drivers are often not mentioned at all. In the ancient Olympic Games, and other Panhellenic Games, chariot racing was one of the most important equestrian events, and could be watched by unmarried women. Married women were banned from watching any Olympic events but a Spartan noblewoman is known to have trained horse-teams for the Olympics and won two races, one of them as driver. (Full article...)
Image 26Excavation on the Palatine Hill has found the foundations of a hut believed to correspond to the Hut of Romulus, which the Romans themselves preserved into late antiquity. (from Founding of Rome)
Image 27Landscape resulting from the ruina montium mining technique at Las Médulas, Spain, one of the most important gold mines in the Roman Empire (from Roman Empire)
Image 39Forum of Gerasa (Jerash in present-day Jordan), with columns marking a covered walkway (stoa) for vendor stalls, and a semicircular space for public speaking (from Roman Empire)
Image 41Solidus issued in the name of Constantine II as caesar by Constantine the Great, depicting Victoria on the reverse, one of the last deities to commonly appear on Roman coins, which gradually transformed into an angel under Christian rule (from Roman Empire)
Image 42A teacher with two students, as a third arrives with his loculus, a writing case (from Roman Empire)
Image 48Pride in literacy was displayed through emblems of reading and writing, as in this portrait of Terentius Neo and his wife (c.20 AD). (from Roman Empire)
Image 49Cinerary urn for the freedman Tiberius Claudius Chryseros and two women, probably his wife and daughter (from Roman Empire)
Image 50Condemned man attacked by a leopard in the arena (3rd-century mosaic from Tunisia) (from Roman Empire)
Sejanus is arrested, an etching by G. Mochetti after drawing by Bartolomeo Pinelli
Lucius Aelius Sejanus (/sɪˈdʒeɪnəs/ⓘ; c.20 BC – 18 October AD 31) was a Roman soldier and confidant of the Roman Emperor Tiberius. Of the Equites class by birth, Sejanus rose to power as prefect of the Praetorian Guard, the imperial bodyguard, of which he was commander from AD 14 until his execution for treason in AD 31.
While the Praetorian Guard was formally established under Emperor Augustus, Sejanus introduced a number of reforms which saw the unit evolve beyond a mere bodyguard into a powerful and influential branch of the government involved in public security, civil administration and ultimately political intercession; these changes had a lasting impact on the course of the Principate. (Full article...)
...Thatthe Paterfamilias of a family, had the power to sell his children into slavery?
...ThatTrajan was the last Roman Emperor to harry the coast of Arabia with the Roman Navy?
...ThatTrajan was born at Italica, in Spain and adopted by the Roman Emperor Nerva and made his heir, which entitled Trajan to call himself the son of Nerva
Marcus Aurelius (April 26, 121 CE. – March 17, 180 CE.), was Roman Emperor from CE 161 to 180 who defeated several significant invasions and put down a revitalisation of the Parthian Empire. His Stoic tome Meditations, which he wrote while on campaign, is still revered as a literary monument to a philosophy of service and duty.
[...] Caesar is a god in his own city. Outstanding in war or peace, it was not so much his wars that ended in great victories, or his actions at home, or his swiftly won fame, that set him among the stars, a fiery comet, as his descendant. There is no greater achievement among Caesar's actions than that he stood father to our emperor. Is it a greater thing to have conquered the sea-going Britons; to have led his victorious ships up the seven-mouthed flood of the papyrus-bearing Nile; to have brought the rebellious Numidians, under Juba of Cinyps, and Pontus, swollen with the name of Mithridates, under the people of Quirinus; to have earned many triumphs and celebrated few; than to have sponsored such a man, with whom, as ruler of all, you gods have richly favoured the human race? Therefore, in order for the emperor not to have been born of mortal seed, Caesar needed to be made a god. [...]
Augustus, his 'son', will ensure that he ascends to heaven as a god, and is worshipped in the temples. Augustus, as heir to his name, will carry the burden placed upon him alone, and will have us with him, in battle, as the most courageous avenger of his father's murder. Under his command, the conquered walls of besieged Mutina will sue for peace; Pharsalia will know him; Macedonian Philippi twice flow with blood; and the one who holds Pompey's great name, will be defeated in Sicilian waters; and a Roman general's Egyptian consort, trusting, to her cost, in their marriage, will fall, her threat that our Capitol would bow to her city of Canopus, proved vain.
Why enumerate foreign countries or the nations living on either ocean shore? Wherever earth contains habitable land, it will be his: and even the sea will serve him!
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