Rome

1. Rome Republic to Empire

2. Changes in Warfare • Rome faced threats from neighbors from 500-300 BCE. • Many problems with the Greek Colonies in southern Italy. • The Greek phalanx was a column formation of heavy infantry carrying long spears, or pikes, and swords. • Either conquered or forced others to ally with Rome. • By 264 Rome Controlled the entire region. • Success of Rome came from its army. • Early on all men served in the army and the army used the Greek Phalanx Warfare. • Roman generals realized the Phalanx was too slow and cumbersome and switched to Legions of 6000 men divided into smaller units of 60 to 120 men

3. The Greek phalanx was a column formation of heavy infantry carrying long spears, or pikes, and swords.

4. Roman Soldiers were called Legionaries, they were well trained and deserters were punished with death. • Slaughter and enslavement of whole cities became there calling card. • Many of the conquered cities kept their own government if they helped Rome fight, giving some people rights and even citizenship. • Rome set up Coloniae or military colonies with a series of roads to connect them together becoming major trade routes. “All Roads lead to Rome”

5. ANCIENT ROMAN ROADS • The Romans built thousands of miles of wonderful roads, to connect every part of the empire back to Rome. Up until about a hundred years ago, people were still using these roads, as roads! In recent years, instead of building new roads, modern engineers simply covered many of the old Roman roads with a coat of asphalt. The Romans did a wonderful job building roads! • To help people find their way, while traveling these roads, the Romans more or less invented the milestone which grew increasingly wordy, and increasingly tall, to be easily readable from a vehicle. Some are 6 feet tall. The milestone usually gave the mileage to the nearest large city, sometimes to an intermediate place as well; and the date and perhaps who paid for the road. • There seems to have been no formal traffic code, including what side of the road to drive on; but there were various laws about what you could and could not do on a given type and location of road, and when you could do it. Roads were considerably less crowded, and much less travel than today. The real danger on a road was ambush by highway robbers: which shows that a traveling vehicle could be alone on any given stretch of road.

6. Roman Roads

8. Rome vs. Carthage • Rome wanted to halt the expansion of Carthage or Punici, as they called it. • TheFirst Punic War • Carthage tried to take control of the Strait of Messina, between Sicily and Italy. • Carthage was one of the wealthiest city states around and wanted to expand and control trading routes. • Full scale war broke out. • Carthages ships had the upper hand at first; Rome began to build more ships of their own and began to use the new tactic of hooking ships and “reeling” them in and boarding them for hand to hand combat. This was the key to their naval success. • In 241 BCE Carthage Paid an Indemnity (Compensation for damage, loss, or injury suffered similar to reparation) to Rome For damages and the war was over.

9. Second Punic War • 221BCE young soldier named Hannibal became General of the Carthaginian army in Spain. He began capturing Roman controlled cities in Spain and then made a bold move to invade Italy. • Hanibal took 40,000 men and 40 Elephants over the Alps to try to ballte the Romans on Italian soil • Battle of Cannae in South Eastern Italy; Rome rallied under Scipio who attacked Carthage and drove Hannibal Back to North Africa. • In 202BCE Scipio defeated Hannibal in Zama near Carthage and forced Carthage to give up lands in Spain as well as pay another indemnity.

10. The Third Punic War: • Carthage again regained its old power and again and posed no threat to Rome but Rome attacked anyway in 146 BCE laying waste to the city and even sowing salt into the soil. • Rome now controlled the entire Western Mediterranean.

11. Crisis in the Republic • With military success came discontent. • Conquered territories complained of corrupt Roman overlords. • Wealthy landowners began to use captured slaves as labor and took jobs away from poor tenant farmers. • Discontented the lower class/poor flocked to Rome looking for jobs and prosperity; which they found neither. • The widening gap between the rich and poor led to the fear, of the wealthy, of an uprising by the poor and slaves. • 73-71 BCE 70,000 slaves led by Spartacus revolted, 6000 of which were killed, the revolt was put down but it did put a strain on Rome’s military. • In 133 BCE Reformer Tribune Tiberius Gracchus called for changes limiting the size of the Laifundia or large farming estates to aid the poor by giving them some land of their own. The wealthy opposed his ideas and Tiberius was murdered. 10 years later his brother Gaius Gracchus called for the same reforms and was murdered as well.

12. Roman Empire 100 AD.

13. Crisis in the Republic Cont’ • After the death of Gracchus army leaders came to power in Rome, the first was Marius in 107 BCE who saw that the citizen army was obsolete with the dwindling numbers of small farmers. Marius looked to the unemployed poor of the city to build his new professional army paid for their work and promised land after they serve. These soldiers owed their allegiance not to the republic but to their commander. • The rise of professional armies with their allegiances to their commanders led to the rise of rival military leaders who fought for control. • Sulla a rival of Marius fought for control of Rome; Sulla drove Marius into exile and declared himself Dictator of Rome. • Another man, Julius Caesar, born in 100 BCE used this same tactic to gain power.

14. Julius Caesar • One of Rome’s greatest leaders and generals, rose through the ranks and by 60 BCE had aligned himself with General Pompey and politician Crassus. In 59BCE he was elected to Consul with their help. For 10 years the three men ruled Rome as a Triumvirate, using force and bribery to control Senators and tribunes.

15. Military Campaigns of Caesar • As Consul Caesar realized that he needed military victories to advance his political career. He conquered the Celts in Gaul and twice invaded Britain. • His victories made him a military hero to Rome’s Lower classes but he was seen as a threat to the Senate. • By 49 BCE the Triumvirate fell apart, Crasssus was dead and Pompey became a political rival of Julius Caesar. That same year Pompey convinced the Senate to order Caesar to give up his army and return to Rome. Caesar refused and gathered 5000 loyal troops and returned to Rome crossing the Rubicon and moving into Roman Italy. Caesar and his army drove Pompey and his forces out and took control of all of Rome.

16. Caesar in Power • 45 BCE Caesar took over the government as dictator for life, much like a monarch. • Granted people outside of Roman Italy citizenship. • Added representatives in the Senate from the provinces that were loyal to him therefore the central government was more responsive to the newly conquered territories. • Added many social reforms to benefit the poor; • Public works programs to give jobs to the poor. • Ordered slave owning landowners to hire more free laborers. • Colonial lands given to the poor. • Distributed free grain to the poor. • Caesar created a new calendar to replace the Roman lunar calendar, the new solar calendar had 365 Days and 1 extra day every fourth year. This calendar, the “Julian” calendar was used in Western Europe till early Modern times.

17. Caesar’s Death "Et tu, Brute?" (Even you, Brutus?) • Many viewed Caesar as a good leader who brought peace to Rome; others view him as a tyrant who made himself a “king”. • According to ancient Roman law anyone who plotted to become king could be killed without trial; using this law a group of senators killed Julius Caesar as he entered the Senate. Chief of these conspirators was Cassius and Brutus.

18. The End of the Republic • After Caesar’s death his 18 year old grandnephew joined with Marc Antony and Marcus Lepidus (two of Caesars top government officials) Creating the 2nd Triumvirate. They avenged Caesars death and divided up the Roman world in the guise of continuing the republic. • Octavian forced Lepidus to retire from government and Antony married Cleopatra, a move which Octavian used to his advantage saying that Antony would try to rule Rome with his Egyptian Queen wife. • Octavian declared war on Antony in the name of Rome, to evade capture by Octavian Antony and Cleopatra committed suicide in Egypt. • This began the undisputed rule of Rome by Octavian and marked the beginning of the Roman Empire.

19. Pax Romana • For over 200 years peace reigned through the Roman empire this period was know as the Pax Romana or “Roman Peace” By this time the Empire was 30 million square miles with between 60 and 80 million people, 1 Million in the City of Rome. • Augustus kept stability in the empire, glorified Rome with larger public buildings, set up the civil service, collected taxes and created a postal system. After Augustus’ death the strong government keep things running smooth in the Empire. • Growth of trade and use of a coin currency the Denarius was used through out the empire. Rome traded as far away as India and China.

20. The Roman World • Romans emphasized values such as discipline, strength and loyalty. Strength over beauty, power over grace and usefulness over elegance. • Romans used slaves more than other ancient societies, 1/3 of the population of the empire were slaves they worked on farms, in homes and were used in public contests to the death. Children born of slaves became slaves. Slaves were sole property of their owners.

21. Roman Gods and Goddesses • Early Romans worshiped powerful spirits or divine forces that they thought were in everything around them. • They gave names to these powerful gods and honored them through ritual hoping to gain their favor. • Romans worshiped the gods in homes as well as in public rituals with priest in temples. • Father of the Roman gods was Jupiter with is wife Juno and Minerva goddess of wisdom.

22. Wealth and Status • Wealth and social status made a big difference in how people lived, rich lived extravagant lives large homes, slaves and luxuries. • Most of Rome was in poverty and barely got by, outside of the lavish homes and large public buildings were tenements, threatened by disease and fire.

23. Games as Distractions • To control the masses of Romans and keep their minds off of their poverty the government provided free games races, mock battles and gladiator contests. By 250 A.D. there were 150 holidays, on those days the Coliseum (page 182) would be filled with 50,000 both rich and poor to watch the games. There would be animals brought from all over the empire that would fight to the death as well as gladiators engaged in combat with animals and other Gladiators fighting to the death.