From its origin as a city-state in
ItalyThis is an overview of the history of Italy during Roman times.-The origins of Rome :According to legend, Rome was founded in 753 BC by Romulus and Remus, and was then governed by seven Kings of Rome...
in the 8th century BC, to its rise as an
empireThe Roman Empire was the post-Republican phase of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean. The term is used to describe the Roman state during and after the time of the first emperor,...
covering much of
EurasiaEurasia is a large landmass covering about 52,990,000 km
2 or about 10.6% of the Earth's surface...
and
North AfricaNorth Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa.Geopolitically, the UN definition of Northern Africa includes the following seven countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Sudan, Tunisia,Mauritania, and...
and fall in the 5th century AD, the political history of
Ancient RomeAncient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea, it became one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
was typically closely entwined with its
military historyMilitary history is a humanities discipline within the scope of general historical recording of armed conflict in the history of humanity, and its impact on the societies, their cultures, economies and changing intra and international relationships....
. The core of the
campaign history of the Roman military is an aggregate of different accounts of the Roman military's land battles, from its initial defence against and subsequent conquest of the city's hilltop neighbours in the
Italian peninsulaThe Italian Peninsula or Apennine Peninsula is one of the three peninsulas of Southern Europe , spanning 1,000 km from the Po Valley in the north to the central Mediterranean Sea in the south. The peninsula's shape gives it the nickname Lo Stivale...
, to the ultimate struggle of the
Western Roman EmpireThe Western Roman Empire was the western half of the Roman Empire, from its division by Diocletian in 285; the other half of the Roman Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire, today widely known as the Byzantine Empire....
for its existence against invading Huns,
VandalsThe Vandals were an East Germanic tribe that entered the late Roman Empire during the 5th century. The Goth Theodoric the Great, king of the Ostrogoths and regent of the Visigoths, was allied by marriage with the Vandals as well as with the Burgundians and the Franks under .The Vandals are perhaps...
and
Germanic tribesThe Germanic Wars is a name given to a series of wars between the Romans and various Germanic tribes between 113 BC and 439 A.D. The nature of these wars varied through time between Roman conquest, Germanic uprisings and later Germanic invasions in the Roman Empire that started in the late 2nd...
after the empire's split into East and
WestThe Western Roman Empire was the western half of the Roman Empire, from its division by Diocletian in 285; the other half of the Roman Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire, today widely known as the Byzantine Empire....
. These accounts were written by various authors throughout and after the history of the Empire. Despite the later Empire's encompassing of lands around the
peripheryThe Mediterranean Basin comprises the lands around and surrounded by the Mediterranean Sea. In biogeography, the Mediterranean Basin refers to the lands around the Mediterranean Sea that have a Mediterranean climate, with mild, rainy winters and hot, dry summers, which supports characteristic...
of the
Mediterranean SeaThe Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean region and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Anatolia and Europe, on the south by Africa, and on the east by the Levant. The sea is technically a part of the Atlantic Ocean, although it...
,
naval battlesNaval warfare is combat in and on seas, oceans, or any other major bodies of water such as large lakes and wide rivers.-History:Mankind has fought battles on the sea for more than 3,000 years. Land warfare would seem, initially, to be irrelevant and entirely removed from warfare on the open ocean,...
were typically less significant than land battles to the military history of Rome, due to its largely unchallenged dominance of the sea following fierce naval fighting during the
First Punic WarThe First Punic War was the first of three major wars fought between Carthage and the Roman Republic. For 23 years, the two powers struggled for supremacy in the western Mediterranean Sea. Carthage, located in what is today Tunisia, was the dominant Western Mediterranean power at the beginning of...
.
The Roman army battled first against its tribal neighbours and
EtruscanEtruscan civilization is the modern English name given to the culture and way of life of a people of ancient Italy and Corsica, residing between the Apennines and the River Tiber, whom the ancient Romans called Etrusci or Tusci...
towns within Italy, and later came to dominate much of the Mediterranean and further afield, including the provinces of
BritanniaRoman Britain was those parts of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire between AD 43 and about 410. The Romans referred to their province as Britannia...
and
Asia MinorThe history of Anatolia encompasses the region known as Anatolia , known by the Latin name of Asia Minor, considered to be the westernmost extent of Western Asia...
at the Empire's height. As with most ancient civilisations, Rome's military served the triple purposes of securing its borders, exploiting peripheral areas through measures such as imposing
tributeA tribute is wealth one party gives to another as a sign of respect or, as was often case in historical contexts, of submission or allegiance...
on conquered peoples, and maintaining internal order. From the outset, Rome's military typified this pattern, and the majority of Rome's campaigns were characterised by one of two types: the first is the territorial expansionist campaign, normally begun as a counter-offensive, in which each victory brought subjugation of large areas of territory and allowed Rome to grow from a small town to one of the
largest empires in the ancient world, including a population of 55 million in the early empire when expansion was halted; the second is the
civil warA civil war is a war between organized groups within a single nation state, or, less commonly, between two nations created from a formerly-united nation state. The aim of one side may be to take control of the nation or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies...
, examples of which plagued Rome right from its foundation to its eventual demise.
Roman armies were not invincible, despite their formidable reputation and host of victories: over the centuries the Romans "
produced their share of incompetents" who led Roman armies into catastrophic defeats. Nevertheless, it was generally the fate of even the greatest of Rome's enemies, such as
PyrrhusPyrrhus or Pyrrhos was a Greek general of the Hellenistic era. He was king of the Greek tribe of Molossians, of the royal Aeacid house , and later he became King of Epirus and Macedon . He was one of the strongest opponents of early Rome...
and Hannibal, to win the battle but lose the war. The history of Rome's campaigning is, if nothing else, a history of obstinate persistence overcoming appalling losses.
Kingdom (753 BC – 508 BC)
Rome is almost unique in the ancient world in that its history, military and otherwise, is documented often in great detail almost from
the city's very foundationThe founding of Rome is reported by many legends, which in recent times are beginning to be supplemented by more scientific reconstructions.Virgil's Aeneid is an important source for information about those early times or, at least, the myth-historical events current in the Augustan period.The...
right through to its
eventual demiseThe decline of the Roman Empire refers to both the gradual disintegration of the economy of Rome and the barbarian invasions that were its final doom...
. Although some histories have been lost, such as
TrajanMarcus Ulpius Nerva Traianus, commonly known as Trajan , was a Roman Emperor who reigned from A. D. 98 until his death in A. D. 117...
's account of the Dacian Wars, and others, such as Rome's earliest histories, are at least semi-apocryphal, the extant histories of Rome's military history are extensive.
The very earliest history, from the time of Rome's founding as a small tribal village, through to the downfall of Rome's kings, is the least well preserved. This is because, although the early Romans were literate to some degree, either they lacked the will to record their history at this time or else such histories as they did record were lost.
Although the Roman historian
LivyTitus Livius , known as Livy in English, was a Roman historian who wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people, Ab Urbe Condita Libri, "Chapters from the Foundation of the City," covering the period from the earliest legends of Rome well before the traditional foundation in 753 BC...
(59 BC – AD 17) lists a series of seven kings of early Rome in his work
Ab Urbe ConditaAb urbe condita is Latin for "from the founding of the City ", traditionally set in 753 BC. It was used to identify the Roman year by a few Roman historians...
, from its establishment through its earliest years, the degree to which the first four kings (
Romulus- People:* Romulus and Remus, the mythical founders of Rome* Romulus Augustulus, the last Western Roman Emperor* Valerius Romulus , deified son of a Roman emperor*Romulus *St. Romulus of Genoa, bishop of Genoa*St...
,
NumaNuma Pompilius was the second king of Rome, succeeding Romulus.-Life and Reign:Plutarch tells that Numa was the youngest of Pomponius' four sons, born on the day of Rome's founding . He lived a severe life of discipline and banished all luxury from his home...
,
Tullus Hostiliusthumb|250px|Tullus Hostilius defeating the army of [[Veii]] and [[Fidenae]], modern fresco.Tullus Hostilius was the third of the Kings of Rome. He succeeded Numa Pompilius, and was succeeded by Ancus Marcius...
and
Ancus MarciusAncus Marcius was the fourth of the Kings of Rome.He was the son of Marcius and Pompilia and, through his mother, grandson of Rome's second king Numa Pompilius ....
) are apocryphal is certainly open to question. A number of points of view have been proposed over the long run of time.
GrantMichael Grant CBE was an English classicist and numismatist. According to his obituary in The Times he was "one of the few classical historians to win respect from [both] academics and a lay readership"...
and others argue that prior to the time when the Etruscan kingdom of Rome was established under the traditional fifth king,
Tarquinius PriscusLucius Tarquinius Priscus, also called Tarquin the Elder or Tarquin I, was the fifth King of Rome from 616 BC to 579 BC. His wife was Tanaquil.According to Livy, Tarquinius Priscus came from the Etruscan city of Tarquinii...
, Rome would have been led by a religious leader of some sort. Very little is known of Rome's military history during this era, and what history has come down to us is of a
legendA legend is a narrative of human actions that are perceived both by teller and listeners to take place within human history and to possess certain qualities that give the tale verisimilitude...
ary rather than a known factual nature. Traditionally, Romulus fortified one of the first-settled of Rome's seven hills, the
Palatine HillThe Palatine Hill is the centermost of the Seven Hills of Rome and is one of the most ancient parts of the city...
, after founding the city, and Livy states that shortly after its founding Rome was "
equal to any of the surrounding cities in her prowess in war".
| "Events before the city was founded or planned, which have been handed down more as pleasing poetic fictions than as reliable records of historical events, I intend neither to affirm nor to refute. To antiquity we grant the indulgence of making the origins of cities more impressive by comingling the human with the divine, and if any people should be permitted to sanctify its inception and reckon the gods as its founders, surely the glory of the Roman people in war is such that, when it boasts Mars in particular as its parent... the nations of the world would as easily acquiesce in this claim as they do in our rule." |
| Livy Titus Livius , known as Livy in English, was a Roman historian who wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people, Ab Urbe Condita Libri, "Chapters from the Foundation of the City," covering the period from the earliest legends of Rome well before the traditional foundation in 753 BC...
, on Rome's early history |
The first campaigns that were fought by the Romans in this legendary account are the wars with various Latin cities and the Sabines after the Rape of the Sabine Women. According to Livy, the Latin village of Caenina responded to the event first by invading Roman territory, but were routed and their village captured. The Latins of
AntemnaeAntemnae , an ancient village of Latium, situated on the west of the Via Salaria, two miles north of Rome, where the Anio falls into the Tiber....
and those of
CrustumeriumCrustumerium was an ancient town of Latium, on the edge of the Sabine territory, near the headwaters of the Allia, not far from the Tiber....
were defeated next in a similar fashion. The remaining main body of the Sabines attacked Rome and briefly captured the citadel, but were then convinced to conclude a treaty with the Romans under which the Sabines became Roman citizens.
There was a further war in the
8th century BCThe 8th century BC started the first day of 800 BC and ended the last day of 701 BC.- Overview :The 8th century BC was a period of great changes in civilizations. In Egypt, the 23rd and 24th dynasties led to rule from Nubia in the 25 Dynasty...
against Fidenae and Veii. In the
7th century BCThe 7th century BC started the first day of 700 BC and ended the last day of 601 BC.The Assyrian Empire continued to dominate the near east during this century, exercising formidable power over neighbors like Babylon and Egypt. In the last two decades of the century, however, the empire began to...
there was a war with Alba Longa, a second war with Fidenae and Veii and a second Sabine War. Ancus Marcius led Rome to victory against the Latins and, according to the Fasti Triumphales, over the
VeientesVeii was, in ancient times, an important Etrurian city NNW of Rome, Italy; its site lies in Isola Farnese, a village of Municipio XX, an administrative subdivision of the comune of Rome in the Province of Rome...
and Sabines also.
Under the Etruscan kings
Tarquinius PriscusLucius Tarquinius Priscus, also called Tarquin the Elder or Tarquin I, was the fifth King of Rome from 616 BC to 579 BC. His wife was Tanaquil.According to Livy, Tarquinius Priscus came from the Etruscan city of Tarquinii...
,
Servius TulliusServius Tullius was the sixth legendary king of ancient Rome and the second king of the Etruscan dynasty. The traditional dates of his reign are 578-535 BC. Described in one account as originally a slave, he is said to have married a daughter of Lucius Tarquinius Priscus, and succeeded him after...
and Tarquinius Superbus, Rome expanded to the north-west, coming into conflict again with the Veientes after the expiry of the treaty that concluded their earlier war. There was a further campaign against the
GabiiGabii was an ancient city of Latium, located due east of Rome along the Via Praenestina, which was in early times known as the Via Gabina....
, and later against the
RutuliThe Rutuli or Rutulians were members of a legendary Italic tribe. Thought to have been descended from the Umbri and the Pelasgians, the Rutuli were located in territory whose capital was the ancient town of Ardea, located about 20 miles southeast of Rome....
. The Etruscan kings were overthrown as part of a wider reduction in Etruscan power in the region during this period, and Rome reformed itself as a
republicA republic is a form of government in which the head of state is not a monarch and the people have an impact on its government. The word 'republic' is derived from the Latin phrase res publica which can be translated as "a public affair".Both modern and ancient republics vary widely in their...
, a form of government based on popular representation and in contrast to its previous
autocraticA autocracy is a form of government in which the political power is held by a self-appointed ruler. The term autocrat is derived from the word autokratōr...
kingship.
Early Italian campaigns (458–396 BC)
The first non-apocryphal Roman wars were wars of both expansion and defence, aimed at protecting Rome itself from neighbouring cities and nations and establishing its territory in the region. Florus writes that at this time
Although sources disagree, it is possible that Rome itself was twice invaded by Etruscan armies in this period, first in around 509 BC under the recently-overthrown king Tarquinius Superbus, and again in 508 BC under the Etruscan Lars Porsenna.
Initially, Rome's immediate neighbours were either
Latin"Latins" can refer to several groups of people. Its meaning has changed throughout time, and can still refer to different things even today.-Antiquity:...
towns and villages on a tribal system similar to that of Rome, or else tribal Sabines from the Apennine hills beyond. One by one, Rome defeated both the persistent Sabines and the local cities that were either under Etruscan control or else Latin towns that had cast off their Etruscan rulers, as had Rome. Rome defeated the
LaviniiLavinium was a port city of Latium, to the south of Rome, at a median distance between the Tiber river at Ostia and Anzio. The coastline then, as now, was a long strip of beach. Lavinium was on a hill at the southernmost edge of the Silva Laurentina, a dense laurel forest, and the northernmost...
and
TusculiTusculum is the classical Roman name of a major ancient Alban Hills city, in the Latium region of Italy.-Location:The ruins of Tusculum are situated on the Tuscolo hill, on the north edge of the outer crater ring of the Alban volcano...
in the
Battle of Lake RegillusThe Battle of Lake Regillus was a legendary early Roman victory, won over the Latin League led by the expelled Etruscan former king of Rome. It has been dated at various years, including 499 BC, 496 BC and 493 BC....
in 496 BC, the Sabines in an Unknown Battle in 449 BC, the
Aequithumb|240px|Location of the Aequi in central Italy.The Aequi were an ancient people of north-east Latium, in central Italy, who appear in the early history of ancient Rome.-History:...
in the
Battle of Mons AlgidusThe Battle of Mons Algidus was fought in 458 BC between the Roman Republic and the Aequi near Algidus Mons, Latium. The Roman dictator Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus turned a Roman defeat into an important victory.-Background:...
in 458 BC and the
Battle of CorbioneThe Battle of Corbione took place in 446 BC. General Titus Quinctius Capitolinus Barbatus and legatus Spurius Postumius Albus Regillensis led Roman troops to a victory over the Aequi tribes of north-east Latium and the Volsci tribes of southern Latium...
in 446 BC, the
VolsciThe Volsci were an ancient Italic people, well known in the history of the first century of the Roman Republic. They then inhabited the partly hilly, partly marshy district of the south of Latium, bounded by the Aurunci and Samnites on the south, the Hernici on the east, and stretching roughly from...
in the
Battle of CorbioneThe Battle of Corbione took place in 446 BC. General Titus Quinctius Capitolinus Barbatus and legatus Spurius Postumius Albus Regillensis led Roman troops to a victory over the Aequi tribes of north-east Latium and the Volsci tribes of southern Latium...
in 446 BC and the Capture of Antium in 377 BC, the
AurunciThe Aurunci were an Italic population which lived in southern Italy from around the 1st millennium BC. Of Indo-European origin, their language belonged to the Oscan group...
in the Battle of Aricia, and the
VeientesVeii was, in ancient times, an important Etrurian city NNW of Rome, Italy; its site lies in Isola Farnese, a village of Municipio XX, an administrative subdivision of the comune of Rome in the Province of Rome...
in the
Battle of the CremeraThe Battle of the Cremera was fought between the Roman Republic and the Etruscan city of Veii, in 477 BC .Historical records show the defeat of the Roman stronghold on the river Cremera, and the consequent incursions of the Veientes in Roman territory.The preserved account of the battle, written by...
in 477 BC, the Capture of Fidenae in 435 BC and the Siege of Veii in 396 BC. After defeating the Veientes, the Romans had effectively completed the conquest of their immediate Etruscan neighbours, as well as secured their position against the immediate threat posed by the tribespeople of the Apennine hills.
However, Rome still controlled only a very limited area and the affairs of Rome were minor even to those in Italy: the remains of Veii, for instance, lie entirely within modern Rome's suburbs and Rome's affairs were only just coming to the attention of the Greeks, the dominant cultural force at the time. At this point the bulk of Italy remained in the hands of
LatinLatin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Roman conquest, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe...
,
SabineThe Sabines were an Italic tribe that lived in the central Appennines of ancient Italy, inhabiting also Latium north of the Anio before the founding of Rome...
, Samnite and other peoples in the central part of Italy, Greek colonies to the south, and, notably, the Celtic people, including the
GaulsThe Gauls were a Celtic people living in Gaul, the region roughly corresponding to what is now France and Belgium, from the Iron Age through the Roman period. They spoke the Continental Celtic language called Gaulish....
, to the north. The Celtic civilization at this time was vibrant and growing in strength and territory, and stretched, if incohesively, across much of mainland Europe. It is at the hands of the Gallic Celts that Rome suffered a humiliating defeat that temporarily set back its advance and was to imprint itself upon the Roman consciousness.
Celtic invasion of Italia (390–387 BC)
By 390 BC, several Gallic tribes had begun invading Italy from the north as their culture expanded throughout Europe. Most of this was unknown to the Romans at this time, who still had purely local security concerns, but the Romans were alerted when a particularly warlike tribe, the
SenonesThe Senones were a Gallic people of Gallia Celtica, who in the time of Julius Caesar inhabited the district which now includes the departments of Seine-et-Marne, Loiret and Yonne....
, invaded the Etruscan province of Siena from the north and attacked the town of
ClusiumClusium was an ancient city in Italy, one of several found at the site. The current municipality of Chiusi partly overlaps this Roman walled city. The Roman city remodeled an earlier Etruscan city, Clevsin, found in the territory of a prehistoric culture, possibly also Etruscan or proto-Etruscan...
, not far from Rome's sphere of influence. The Clusians, overwhelmed by the size of the enemy in numbers and ferocity, called on Rome for help. Perhaps unintentionally the Romans found themselves not just in conflict with the Senones, but their primary target. The Romans met them in pitched battle at the
Battle of the AlliaThe Battle of the Allia was a battle of the first Gallic invasion of Italy. The battle was fought near the Allia river: the defeat of the Roman army opened the route for the Gauls to sack Rome. It was fought in 390/387 BC.-Background:...
around 390–387 BC. The Gauls, under their chieftain
BrennusBrennus was a chieftain of the Senones, a Gallic tribe originating from the modern areas of France known as Seine-et-Marne, Loiret, and Yonne, but which had expanded to occupy northern Italy. In 387 BC he led an army of Cisalpine Gauls in their attack on Rome. It has been theorized that Brennus is...
, defeated the Roman army of around 15,000 troops and proceeded to pursue the fleeing Romans back to Rome itself and partially sacked the town before being either driven off or bought off.
Now that the Romans and Gauls had blooded one another, intermittent warfare was to continue between the two in Italy for more than two centuries, including the Battle of the Anio, the
Battle of Lake VadimoThe Battle of Lake Vadimo may refer to battles:*Battle of Lake Vadimo , a Roman Republic victory over an Etruscan civilization|Etruscan army*Battle of Lake Vadimo , a Roman Republic victory over a joint Etruscan -Gaulish army...
, the
Battle of FaesulaeThe Battle of Faesulae was fought in 225 BC between the Roman Republic and a group of Gauls living in Italy. The Gauls defeated the Romans, but later the same year, a decisive battle at Telamon had the opposite outcome....
in 225 BC, the
Battle of TelamonThe Battle of Telamon was fought between the Roman Republic and an alliance of Gauls in 225 BC. The Romans, led by the consuls Gaius Atilius Regulus and Lucius Aemilius Papus, defeated the Gauls, thus extending their influence over northern Italy....
in 224 BC, the
Battle of ClastidiumThe Battle of Clastidium was fought in 222 BC between a Roman Republican army led by the Roman consul Marcus Claudius Marcellus and the Insubres led by Viridomarus. The Romans won the battle, and in the process, Marcellus earned the Spolia opima, one of the highest honors in ancient Rome, by...
in 222 BC, the
Battle of CremonaThe Battle of Cremona was fought in 200 BC between the Roman Republic and Cisalpine Gaul. The Roman force was victorious.During the end of the Second Macedonian War, tribes in Cisalpine Gaul rebelled against the Republic, sacking the city of Placentia...
in 200 BC, the
Battle of MutinaThe Battle of Mutina was fought in 194 BC, near Modena, between the Roman Republic and the Gauls. The Roman army won the battle. This battle marked the end of the Gaulic campaign in Italy....
in 194 BC, the
Battle of ArausioThe Battle of Arausio took place on October 6, 105 BC, at a site between the town of Arausio and the Rhône River. Ranged against the migratory tribes of the Cimbri under Boiorix and the Teutoni were two Roman armies, commanded by the proconsul Quintus Servilius Caepio and consul Gnaeus Mallius...
in 105 BC, and the
Battle of VercellaeThe Battle of Vercellae, or Battle of the Raudine Plain, in 101 BC was the Roman victory of Consul Gaius Marius over the Germanic Cimbri invasion force near the settlement of Vercellae in Cisalpine Gaul....
in 101 BC. The Celtic problem would not be resolved for Rome until the final subjugation of all Gaul following the
Battle of AlesiaThe Battle of Alesia or Siege of Alesia took place in September, 52 BC around the Gallic oppidum of Alesia, a major town centre and hill fort of the Mandubii tribe...
in 52 BC.
Expansion into Italia (343–282 BC)
After recovering surprisingly swiftly from the sack of Rome, the Romans immediately resumed their expansion within Italy. Despite their successes so far, their mastery of the whole of Italy was by no means assured at this point: the Samnites were a people just as martial and as rich as the Romans and with an objective of their own of securing more lands in the fertile Italian plains on which Rome itself lay. The First Samnite War of between 343 BC and 341 BC that followed widespread Samnite incursions into Rome's territory was a relatively short affair: the Romans beat the Samnites in both the
Battle of Mount GaurusThe Battle of Mount Gaurus, a battle between the ancient Romans and the Samnites, was fought in 342 BC. The battle was a success for the Romans, who were led by Marcus Valerius Corvus...
in 342 BC and the Battle of Suessola in 341 BC but were forced to withdraw from the war before they could pursue the conflict further due to the revolt of several of their Latin allies in the
Latin WarThe Latin War was a conflict between the Roman Republic and its neighbors the Latin peoples of ancient Italy. It ended in the dissolution of the Latin League, and incorporation of its territory into the Roman sphere of influence, with the Latins gaining partial rights and varying levels of...
.
Rome was therefore forced to contend by around 340 BC against both Samnite incursions into their territory and, simultaneously, in a bitter war against their former allies. Rome bested the Latins in the
Battle of VesuviusThe Battle of Vesuvius in 340 BC saw the Roman army under Publius Decius Mus and Titus Manlius Torquatus defeat the Latins near Mount Vesuvius. It is described by Livy at 8.9-10...
and again in the
Battle of TrifanumThe Battle of Trifanum was fought in 339 BC between the Roman Republic and the Latins. The Roman force was led by Manlius Imperiosus, and they were victorious....
, after which the Latin cities were obliged to submit to Roman rule. Perhaps due to Rome's lenient treatment of their defeated foe, the Latins submitted largely amicably to Roman rule for the next 200 years.
The Second Samnite War, from 327 BC to 304 BC, was a much longer and more serious affair for both the Romans and Samnites, running for over twenty years and incorporating twenty-four battles that led to massive casualties on both sides. The fortunes of the two sides fluctuated throughout its course: the Samnites seized Neapolis in the
Capture of NeapolisThe Capture of Naples refers to the hostile military takeover of the city of Neapolis prior to or during the period known as the Second Samnite War....
in 327 BC, which the Romans then re-captured before losing at the
Battle of the Caudine ForksThe Battle of Caudine Forks, 321 BC, was a decisive event of the Second Samnite War. Its designation as a battle is a mere historical formality: there was no fighting and there were no casualties. The Romans were trapped in a waterless place by the Samnites before they knew what was happening and...
and the
Battle of LautulaeThe Battle of Lautulae was fought in 315 BC between the Romans and the Samnites. The Samnites won this battle....
. The Romans then proved victorious at the
Battle of BovianumThe Battle of Bovianum was fought in 305 BC between the Romans and the Samnites.- Battle :The Romans were led by two consuls, Curvus Paetinus and Postumius Megellus...
and the tide turned strongly against the Samnites from 314 BC onwards, leading them to
sue for peaceSuing for peace is an act by a warring nation to initiate a peace process in which the peace terms are more favorable than an unconditional surrender...
with progressively less generous terms. By 304 BC the Romans had effectively annexed the greater degree of the Samnite territory, founding several colonies. This pattern of meeting aggression in force and almost inadvertently gaining territory in strategic counter-attacks was to become a common feature of Roman military history.
Seven years after their defeat, with Roman dominance of the area looking assured, the Samnites rose again and defeated the Romans at the
Battle of CamerinumThe Battle of Camerinum in 298 BC was the first battle of the Third Samnite War. In the battle, the Samnites defeated the Romans, who were commanded by Lucius Cornelius Scipio Barbatus....
in 298 BC, to open the Third Samnite War. With this success in hand they managed to bring together a coalition of several previous enemies of Rome, all of whom were probably keen to prevent any one faction dominating the entire region. The army that faced the Romans at the
Battle of SentinumThe Battle of Sentinum was the decisive battle of the Third Samnite War, fought in 295 BC near Sentinum , in which the Romans were able to overcome a formidable coalition of Samnites, Etruscans, Umbrians, and their Gallic allies...
in 295 BC therefore included Samnites, Gauls, Etruscans and Umbrians. When the Roman army won a convincing victory over these combined forces it must have become clear that little could prevent Roman dominance of Italy. In the
Battle of PopuloniaThe Battle of Populonia was fought in 282 BC between Rome and the Etruscans. The Romans were victorious, and the Etruscan threat to Rome sharply diminished after this battle....
in 282 BC Rome finished off the last vestiges of Etruscan power in the region.
Pyrrhic War (280–275 BC)
By the beginning of the third century, Rome had established itself as a major power on the
Italian PeninsulaThe Italian Peninsula or Apennine Peninsula is one of the three peninsulas of Southern Europe , spanning 1,000 km from the Po Valley in the north to the central Mediterranean Sea in the south. The peninsula's shape gives it the nickname Lo Stivale...
, but had not yet come into conflict with the dominant military powers in the
MediterraneanThe Mediterranean Basin comprises the lands around and surrounded by the Mediterranean Sea. In biogeography, the Mediterranean Basin refers to the lands around the Mediterranean Sea that have a Mediterranean climate, with mild, rainy winters and hot, dry summers, which supports characteristic...
at the time:
CarthageCarthage refers both to an ancient city in present-day Tunisia, and a modern-day suburb of Tunis. The civilization that developed within the city's sphere of influence is referred to as Punic or Carthaginian...
and the
Greek kingdomsAncient Greece is the civilisation belonging to the period of Greek history lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth. It is generally considered to be the seminal culture which provided the...
. Rome had all but completely defeated the Samnites, mastered its fellow Latin towns, and greatly reduced
EtruscanEtruscan civilization is the modern English name given to the culture and way of life of a people of ancient Italy and Corsica, residing between the Apennines and the River Tiber, whom the ancient Romans called Etrusci or Tusci...
power in the region. However, the south of Italy was controlled by the
GreekAncient Greece is the civilisation belonging to the period of Greek history lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth. It is generally considered to be the seminal culture which provided the...
colonies of Magna Grecia who had been allied to the Samnites, and continued Roman expansion brought the two into inevitable conflict.
When a diplomatic dispute between Rome and the Greek colony of
TarentumTaranto is a coastal city in Puglia, Southern Italy. It is the capital of the Province of Taranto and is an important commercial port as well as the main Italian naval base.It is the third-largest continental city of southern Italy: according to the 2001 census, it has a population of...
erupted into open warfare in the naval
Battle of ThuriiThe naval Battle of Thurii was fought between Ancient Rome and the Greek colony of TarentumFollowing the battle, Tarentum appealed for aid to Pyrrhus, ruler of Epirus, for military aid...
, Tarentum appealed for military aid to
PyrrhusPyrrhus or Pyrrhos was a Greek general of the Hellenistic era. He was king of the Greek tribe of Molossians, of the royal Aeacid house , and later he became King of Epirus and Macedon . He was one of the strongest opponents of early Rome...
, ruler of
EpirusEpirus is a geographical and historical region of Greece in southeastern Europe, currently divided between the periphery of Epirus in Greece and the prefectures of Gjirokastër, Vlorë, Berat, and Korçë in southern Albania.-Name & Etymology:...
. Motivated by his diplomatic obligations to Tarentum, and a personal desire for military accomplishment, Pyrrhus landed a Greek army of some 25,000 men and a contingent of
war elephantA war elephant is an elephant trained and guided by humans for combat. Their main use was to charge the enemy, trampling them and breaking their ranks....
s on Italian soil in 280 B.C, where his forces were joined by some Greek colonists and a portion of the Samnites who revolted against Roman control.
The Roman army had not yet seen elephants in battle, and their inexperience turned the tide in Pyrrhus' favour at the
Battle of HeracleaThe Battle of Heraclea took place in 280 BC between the Romans under the command of Consul Publius Valerius Laevinus and the combined forces of Greeks from Epirus, Tarentum, Thurii, Metapontum, and Heraclea under the command of King Pyrrhus of Epirus....
in 280 BC, and again at the Battle of Ausculum in 279 BC. Despite these victories, Pyrrhus found his position in Italy untenable. Rome steadfastly refused to negotiate with Pyrrhus as long as his army remained in Italy. Furthermore, Rome entered into a treaty of support with
CarthageCarthage refers both to an ancient city in present-day Tunisia, and a modern-day suburb of Tunis. The civilization that developed within the city's sphere of influence is referred to as Punic or Carthaginian...
, and Pyrrhus found that despite his expectations, none of the other
Italic peoplesAncient peoples of Italy are all those peoples that lived in Italy before the Roman domination. Not all of these various peoples are linguistically or ethnically closely related...
would defect to the Greek and Samnite cause. Facing
unacceptably heavy lossesA Pyrrhic victory is a victory with devastating cost to the victor.-Origin:The phrase is named after King Pyrrhus of Epirus, whose army suffered irreplaceable casualties in defeating the Romans at Heraclea in 280 BC and Asculum in 279 BC during the Pyrrhic War...
with each encounter with the Roman army, and failing to find further allies in Italy, Pyrrhus withdrew from the peninsula and campaigned in
SicilySicily is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is an autonomous region of Italy. Several much smaller islands surrounding it are considered to be part of Sicily....
against Carthage, abandoning his allies to deal with the Romans.
When his Sicilian campaign was also ultimately a failure, and at the request of his Italian allies, Pyrrhus returned to Italy to face Rome once more. In 275 BC, Pyrrhus again met the Roman army at the Battle of Beneventum. This time the Romans had devised methods to deal with the war elephants, including the use of javelins, fire and, one source claims, simply hitting the elephants heavily on the head. While Beneventum was indecisive, Pyrrhus realised that his army had been exhausted and reduced by years of foreign campaigns, and seeing little hope for further gains, he withdrew completely from Italy.
The conflicts with Pyrrhus would have a great effect on Rome, however. Rome had shown that it was capable of pitting its armies successfully against the dominant military powers of the Mediterranean, and further showed that the Greek kingdoms were incapable of defending their colonies in Italy and abroad. Rome quickly moved into southern Italia, subjugating and dividing Magna Grecia. Effectively dominating the Italian peninsula, and with a proven international military reputation, Rome now began to look outwards at expansion from the Italian mainland. Since the Alps formed a natural barrier to the north, and Rome was none too keen to meet the fierce Gauls in battle once more, the city's gaze turned to Sicily and the islands of the Mediterranean, a policy that would bring it into direct conflict with its former ally
CarthageCarthage refers both to an ancient city in present-day Tunisia, and a modern-day suburb of Tunis. The civilization that developed within the city's sphere of influence is referred to as Punic or Carthaginian...
.
Middle (274 BC – 148 BC)
Rome first began to make war outside the Italian peninsula in the
Punic warsThe Punic Wars are a series of three wars fought between Rome and Carthage from 264 to 146 BC. They were probably the largest wars yet of the ancient world...
against
CarthageCarthage refers both to an ancient city in present-day Tunisia, and a modern-day suburb of Tunis. The civilization that developed within the city's sphere of influence is referred to as Punic or Carthaginian...
, a former
PhoeniciaPhoenicia what is now modern day Lebanon, was an ancient civilization centered in the north of ancient Canaan, with its heartland along the coastal regions of modern day Lebanon, extending to parts of Israel, Syria and Palestine...
n colony on the north coast of Africa that had developed into a powerful state. These wars, starting in 264 BC were probably the largest conflicts of the ancient world yet and saw Rome become the most powerful state of the Western Mediterranean, with territory in
SicilySicily is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is an autonomous region of Italy. Several much smaller islands surrounding it are considered to be part of Sicily....
,
North AfricaNorth Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa.Geopolitically, the UN definition of Northern Africa includes the following seven countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Sudan, Tunisia,Mauritania, and...
,
IberiaThe Iberian Peninsula, or Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of Europe and includes modern-day Spain, Portugal, Andorra and Gibraltar and a very small area of France. It is the westernmost of the three major southern European peninsulas—the Iberian, Italian, and Balkan peninsulas...
, and with the end of the
Macedonian warsThe Macedonian and Seleucid wars were a series of conflicts fought by Rome during and after the second Punic war, in the eastern Mediterranean, the Adriatic, and the Aegean...
(which ran concurrently with the Punic wars)
GreeceGreece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkan Peninsula....
as well. After the defeat of the Seleucid Emperor
Antiochus III the GreatAntiochus III the Great, , younger son of Seleucus II Callinicus, became the 6th ruler of the Seleucid Empire as a youth of about eighteen in 223 BC. Ascending the throne at young age, Antiochus was an ambitious ruler...
in the
Roman-Syrian WarThe Roman-Syrian War , also known as War of Antiochos or Syrian War, was a military conflict between two coalitions led by the Roman Republic and the Seleucid Empire under Antiochus the Great...
(Treaty of Apamea, 188 BC) in the eastern sea, Rome emerged as the dominant Mediterranean power and the most powerful city in the classical world.
Punic Wars (264–146 BC)
The
First Punic WarThe First Punic War was the first of three major wars fought between Carthage and the Roman Republic. For 23 years, the two powers struggled for supremacy in the western Mediterranean Sea. Carthage, located in what is today Tunisia, was the dominant Western Mediterranean power at the beginning of...
began in 264 BC when settlements on Sicily began to appeal to the two powers between which they lay – Rome and Carthage – in order to solve internal conflicts. The willingness of both Rome and Carthage to become embroiled on the soil of a third party may indicate a willingness to test each other's power without wishing to enter a full war of annihilation; certainly there was considerable disagreement within Rome about whether to prosecute the war at all. The war saw land battles in Sicily early on such as the
Battle of AgrigentumThe battle of Agrigentum was the first pitched battle of the First Punic War and the first large-scale military confrontation between Carthaginians and the Republic of Rome...
but the theatre shifted to naval battles around Sicily and Africa. For the Romans naval warfare was a relatively unexplored concept. Before the
First Punic WarThe First Punic War was the first of three major wars fought between Carthage and the Roman Republic. For 23 years, the two powers struggled for supremacy in the western Mediterranean Sea. Carthage, located in what is today Tunisia, was the dominant Western Mediterranean power at the beginning of...
in 264 BC there was no Roman navy to speak of as all previous Roman wars had been fought on land in
ItalyItaly , officially the Italian Republic , is a country located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe and on the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia. Italy shares its northern, Alpine boundary with France, Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia...
. The new war in
SicilySicily is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is an autonomous region of Italy. Several much smaller islands surrounding it are considered to be part of Sicily....
against
CarthageCarthage refers both to an ancient city in present-day Tunisia, and a modern-day suburb of Tunis. The civilization that developed within the city's sphere of influence is referred to as Punic or Carthaginian...
, a great naval power, forced Rome to quickly build a fleet and train sailors.
Rome took to naval warfare
"like a brick to water" and the first few naval battles of the
First Punic WarThe First Punic War was the first of three major wars fought between Carthage and the Roman Republic. For 23 years, the two powers struggled for supremacy in the western Mediterranean Sea. Carthage, located in what is today Tunisia, was the dominant Western Mediterranean power at the beginning of...
such as the
Battle of the Lipari IslandsThe Battle of the Lipari Islands or Lipara was the first encounter between the fleets of Carthage and the Roman Republic during the First Punic War...
were catastrophic disasters for
RomeRome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated municipality , with over 2.7 million residents in , while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat to be 3.46 million. The metropolitan area of Rome is estimated by OECD to have a population of 3.7 million...
, as might fairly be expected from a city that had no real prior experience of naval warfare. However, after training more sailors and inventing a grappling engine known as a
CorvusA corvus or harpago was a Roman military boarding device used in naval warfare during the First Punic War against Carthage....
, a Roman naval force under C. Duillius was able to roundly defeat a Carthaginian fleet at the
Battle of MylaeThe Battle of Mylae took place in 260 BC during the First Punic War and was the first real naval battle between Carthage and the Roman Republic. This battle was key in the Roman victory of Mylae as well as Sicily itself...
. In just 4 years, a state without any real naval experience had managed to better a major regional maritime power in battle. Further naval victories followed at the
Battle of TyndarisThe Battle of Tyndaris was a naval battle of the First Punic War, which took place off Tyndaris in 257 BC. Tyndaris was a Sicilian town founded as a Greek colony in 396 BC located on the high ground overlooking the Tyrrhenian Sea in the Gulf of Patti. Hiero II, the tyrant of Syracuse, allowed...
and
Battle of Cape EcnomusThe Battle of Cape Ecnomus was a naval battle, fought off Cape Ecnomus , between the fleets of Carthage and the Roman Republic, during the First Punic War...
.
After having won control of the seas, a Roman force landed on the African coast under
RegulusMarcus Atilius Regulus , a general and consul in the ninth year of the First Punic War . Regulus defeated the Salentini and captured Brundisium during his first term as consul in 267 BC....
, who was at first victorious, winning the
Battle of AdysThe Battle of Adys was fought in 255 BC between Carthage and a Roman army led by Marcus Atilius Regulus. Regulus inflicted a crushing defeat upon the Carthaginians, who then sued for peace...
and forcing Carthage to sue for peace. However the terms of peace that Rome proposed were so heavy that negotiations failed and, in response, the Carthaginians hired Xanthippus of Carthage, a mercenary from the martial Greek city-state of Sparta, to reorganise and lead their army. Xanthippus managed to cut off the Roman army from its base by re-establishing Carthaginian naval supremacy, then defeated and captured Regulus at the
Battle of TunisThe Battle of Tunis between the Roman Republic and Carthage occurred in the spring of 255 BC during the First Punic War. The battle ended in a decisive Carthaginian victory. The battle is also referred to as the first Battle of Bagradas River....
.
Despite being defeated on African soil, with their newfound naval abilities, the Romans roundly beat the Carthaginians in naval battle again – largely through the tactical innovations of the Roman fleet – at the
Battle of the Aegates IslandsThe Battle of the Aegates Islands or Aegusa was the final naval battle fought between the fleets of Carthage and the Roman Republic during the First Punic War...
and leaving Carthage without a fleet or sufficient coin to raise one. For a maritime power the loss of their access to the Mediterranean stung financially and psychologically, and the Carthaginians again sued for peace, during which Rome battled the
Ligures tribe in the Ligurian War and the
Insubres in the Gallic War.
Continuing distrust led to the renewal of hostilities in the
Second Punic WarThe Second Punic War, also referred to as The Hannibalic War and The War Against Hannibal, lasted from 218 to 201 BC and involved combatants in the western and eastern Mediterranean. This was the second major war between Carthage and the Roman Republic, who had three warring conflicts against each...
when
Hannibal BarcaHannibal, son of Hamilcar Barca, , commonly known as Hannibal , was a Carthaginian military commander and tactician who...
, a member of the
BarcidThe Barcid family was a notable family in the ancient city of Carthage; many of its members were fierce enemies of the Roman Republic. "Barcid" was coined by historians; the actual byname was Barca or Barcas, which means lightning...
family of Carthaginian nobility, attacked Saguntum, a city with diplomatic ties to Rome. Hannibal then raised an army in Iberia and famously crossed the Italian Alps with elephants to invade Italy. In the first battle on Italian soil at Ticinus in 218 BC Hannibal defeated the Romans under
Scipio the ElderPublius Cornelius Scipio was a general and statesman of the Roman Republic.A member of the Cornelia gens, Scipio served as consul in 218 BC, the first year of the Second Punic War, and sailed with an army from Pisa to Massilia , with the intention of arresting Hannibal's advance on Italy...
in a small cavalry fight. Hannibal's success continued with victories in the
Battle of the TrebiaThe Battle of the Trebia was the first major battle of the Second Punic War, fought between the Carthaginian forces of Hannibal and the Roman Republic in December of 218 BC, on or around the winter solstice...
, the
Battle of Lake TrasimeneThe Battle of Lake Trasimene was a Roman defeat in the Second Punic War between the Carthaginians under Hannibal and the Romans under the consul Gaius Flaminius...
, where he ambushed an unsuspecting Roman army, and the
Battle of CannaeThe Battle of Cannae was a major battle of the Second Punic War, taking place on August 2, 216 BC near the town of Cannae in Apulia in southeast Italy. The army of Carthage under Hannibal decisively defeated a numerically superior army of the Roman Republic under command of the consuls Lucius...
, in what is considered one of the great masterpieces of the tactical art, and for a while
"Hannibal seemed invincible", able to beat Roman armies at will.
In the three battles of Nola, Roman general
Marcus Claudius MarcellusMarcus Claudius Marcellus , five times elected as consul of the Roman Republic, was an important Roman military leader during the Gallic War of 225 BC and the Second Punic War...
managed to hold off Hannibal but then Hannibal smashed a succession of Roman consular armies at the First Battle of Capua, the
Battle of the SilarusThe Battle of the Silarus was fought in 212 BC between Hannibal's army and a Roman force led by praetor Marcus Centenius Penula. The Carthaginians were victorious, destroying the entire Roman army...
, the Second Battle of Herdonia, the
Battle of NumistroThe Battle of Numistro was fought in 210 BC between Hannibal's army and a Roman army led by consul Marcus Claudius Marcellus. The battle was inconclusive, since the long battle ended with Hannibal retreating, and Marcellus hunting him until Asculum the following year....
and the Battle of Asculum. By this time Hannibal's brother
Hasdrubal BarcaHasdrubal, son of Hamilcar Barca , was Hamilcar Barca's second son and a Carthaginian general in the Second Punic War. He was a younger brother of Hannibal, also son of Hamilcar.-Youth and Iberian leadership:...
sought to cross the Alps into Italy and join his brother with a second army. Despite being defeated in Iberia in the
Battle of BaeculaThe Battle of Baecula was Scipio Africanus’s first major field battle after he had taken command of Roman interests in Iberia during the Second Punic War, in which he routed the Carthaginian army under the command of Hasdrubal Barca.-Prelude:...
, Hasdrubal managed to break through into Italy only to be defeated decisively by
Gaius Claudius NeroGaius Claudius Nero was a Roman consul who fought in the Battle of the Metaurus . He was member of the gens Claudia.In 207 BC he was elected consul with Marcus Livius Salinator, and with his colleague he led the army that defeated the Carthaginians at the river Metaurus, killing their commander,...
and
Marcus Livius SalinatorMarcus Livius Salinator , the son of Marcus , was a Roman consul who fought in both the First Punic wars and Secon Punic wars most notably during the Battle of the Zama....
on the
Metaurus RiverThe Battle of the Metaurus was a pivotal battle in the Second Punic War between Rome and Carthage, fought in 207 BC near the Metauro River in present-day Italy....
.
| "Apart from the romance of Scipio's personality and his political importance as the founder of Rome's world-dominion, his military work has a greater value to modern students of war than that of any other great captain of the past.. His genius revealed to him that peace and war are the two wheels on which the world runs." |
| BH Liddell Hart on Scipio Africanus Major |
Unable to defeat Hannibal himself on Italian soil, and with Hannibal savaging the Italian countryside but unwilling or unable to destroy Rome itself, the Romans boldly sent an army to Africa with the intention of threatening the Carthaginian capital. In 203 BC at the Battle of Bagbrades the invading Roman army under Scipio Africanus Major defeated the Carthaginian army of
Hasdrubal GiscoHasdrubal Gisco or Hasdrubal son of Gisco was a Carthaginian general who fought against Rome in Iberia and North Africa during the Second Punic War. He should not be confused with Hasdrubal Barca, the brother of Hannibal....
and
SyphaxSyphax was a king of the ancient Libyan tribe Masaesyli of western Numidia during the last quarter of the third century BCE. When in 218, war broke out between Carthage and Rome, Syphax was originally sympathetic to the Romans and in 213, he concluded an alliance with the Romans and they sent...
and Hannibal was recalled to Africa. At the famous
Battle of ZamaThe Battle of Zama, fought around October 19, 202 BC, marked the final and decisive end of the Second Punic War. A Roman army led by Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus defeated a Carthaginian force led by Hannibal...
Scipio decisively defeated – perhaps even
"annihilated" – Hannibal's army in North Africa, ending the
Second Punic WarThe Second Punic War, also referred to as The Hannibalic War and The War Against Hannibal, lasted from 218 to 201 BC and involved combatants in the western and eastern Mediterranean. This was the second major war between Carthage and the Roman Republic, who had three warring conflicts against each...
.
Carthage never managed to recover after the Second Punic War and the
Third Punic WarThe Third Punic War was the third and last of the Punic Wars fought between the former Phoenician colony of Carthage, and the Roman Republic...
that followed was in reality a simple punitive mission to raze the city of Carthage to the ground. Carthage was almost defenceless and when besieged offered immediate surrender, conceding to a string of outrageous Roman demands. The Romans refused the surrender, demanding as their further terms of surrender the complete destruction of the city and, seeing little to lose, the Carthaginians prepared to fight. In the
Battle of CarthageThe Battle of Carthage was the major act of the Third Punic War between the Phoenician city of Carthage in Africa and the Roman Republic...
the city was stormed after a short siege and completely destroyed, its culture "almost totally extinguished".
Conquest of the Iberian peninsula (218–19 BC)
Rome's conflict with the Carthaginians in the
Punic WarsThe Punic Wars are a series of three wars fought between Rome and Carthage from 264 to 146 BC. They were probably the largest wars yet of the ancient world...
led them into expansion in the
Iberian peninsulaThe Iberian Peninsula, or Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of Europe and includes modern-day Spain, Portugal, Andorra and Gibraltar and a very small area of France. It is the westernmost of the three major southern European peninsulas—the Iberian, Italian, and Balkan peninsulas...
of modern-day
SpainSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain , is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula.
[The Spanish constitution does not establish any official denomination of the country, even though España , Estado español and Nación española are used interchangeably...]
and
PortugalPortugal , officially the Portuguese Republic , is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of mainland Europe and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and south and by Spain to the north and east...
. The Punic empire of the Carthaginian Barcid family consisted of territories in Iberia, many of which Rome gained control of during the Punic Wars. Italy remained the main theatre of war for much of the
Second Punic WarThe Second Punic War, also referred to as The Hannibalic War and The War Against Hannibal, lasted from 218 to 201 BC and involved combatants in the western and eastern Mediterranean. This was the second major war between Carthage and the Roman Republic, who had three warring conflicts against each...
, but the Romans also aimed to destroy the Barcid Empire in Iberia and prevent major Punic allies from linking up with forces in Italy.
Over the years Rome had gradually expanded along the southern Iberian coast until in 211 BC it captured the city of Saguntum. Following two major military expeditions to Iberia, the Romans finally crushed Carthaginian control of the peninsula in 206 BC, at the
Battle of IlipaThe Battle of Ilipa was arguably Scipio Africanus’s most brilliant victory in his military career during the Second Punic War. Though it may not seem to be as original as Hannibal’s tactic at Cannae, Scipio’s pre-battle maneuver and his Reverse Cannae formation was still a culmination of his...
, and the peninsula became a Roman province known as
HispaniaHispania was the name given by the Romans to the whole of the Iberian Peninsula . When Rome was a republic, Hispania was divided into two provinces: Hispania Citerior and Hispania Ulterior...
. From 206 BC onwards the only opposition to Roman control of the peninsula came from within the native
CeltiberianThe Celtiberians were a Celtic-speaking people of the Iberian Peninsula in the final centuries BC. The group originated when Celts migrated from Gaul and integrated with the local pre-Indo-European populations, in particular the Iberians....
tribes themselves, the disunity of which prevented security from Roman expansion.
Following two small-scale rebellions in 197 BC, in 195–194 BC, war broke out in between the Romans and the Lusitani people in the
Lusitanian WarThe Lusitanian War, called the Purinos Polemos , was a war of resistance fought between the advancing legions of the Roman Republic and the Lusitani tribes of Hispania Ulterior from 155 to 139 BC. The Lusitani revolted on two separate occasions and were pacified...
, in modern-day Portugal. By 179 BC, the Romans had mostly succeeded in pacifying the region and bringing it under their control.
In around 154 BC, a major revolt was re-ignited in
NumantiaNumantia is the name of an ancient Celtiberian settlement, whose remains are located 7 km north of the city of Soria, on a hill known as Cerro de la Muela in the municipality of Garray.In the year 153 B.C...
, which is known as the First Numantine War, and a long war of resistance was fought between the advancing forces of the Roman Republic and the Lusitani tribes of Hispania. The
praetorPraetor was a title granted by the government of Ancient Rome to men acting in one of two official capacities: the commander of an army, either before it was mustered or more typically in the field, or an elected magistrate assigned duties that varied depending on the historical period. The...
Servius Sulpicius GalbaServius Sulpicius Galba was a consul of Rome in 144 BC.He served as tribune of the soldiers in the second legion in Macedonia, under Lucius Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus, to whom he was personally hostile...
and the
proconsul-Ancient Rome:In the Roman Republic, a proconsul was a promagistrate who, after serving as consul, spent a year as a governor of a province...
Lucius Licinius LucullusThis article is on the Consul of 151 BC. For the descendent see Lucullus, and for others of this name see Licinius .Lucius Licinius Lucullus was a novus homo who became Consul in 151 BC. He was imprisoned by the Tribunes for attempting to enforce a troop levy too harshly...
arrived in 151 BC and began the process of subduing the local population. Galba betrayed the Lusitani leaders he had invited to peace talks and had them killed in 150 BC, ingloriously ending the first phase of the war.
The Lusitani revolted again in 146 BC under a new leader called
ViriathusViriathus was the most important leader of the Lusitanian people that resisted Roman expansion into the regions of Western Iberia , where the Roman province of Lusitania would be established...
, invading Turdetania (southern Iberia) in a guerilla war. The Lusitanians were initially successful, defeating a Roman army at the Battle of Tribola and going on to sack nearby Carpetania, and then besting a second Roman army at the First Battle of Mount Venus in 146 BC, again going on to sack another nearby city. In 144 BC, the general
Quintus Fabius Maximus AemilianusQuintus Fabius Maximus Aemilianus was a Roman statesman and consul .Fabius was by adoption a member of the patrician gens Fabia, but by birth he was the eldest son of Lucius Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus and Papiria Masonis and the elder brother of Scipio Aemilianus...
campaigned successfully against the Lusitani, but failed in his attempts to arrest Viriathus.
In 144 BC, Viriathus formed a league against Rome with several Celtiberian tribes and persuaded them to rise against Rome too, in the Second Numantine War. Viriathus' new coalition bested Roman armies at the Second Battle of Mount Venus in 144 BC and again at the failed Siege of Erisone. In 139 BC, Viriathus was finally killed in his sleep by three of his companions who had been promised gifts by Rome. In 136 and 135 BC, more attempts were made to gain complete control of the region of Numantia, but they failed. In 134 BC, the Consul Scipio Aemilianus finally succeeded in suppressing the rebellion following the successful
Siege of NumantiaThe Siege of Numantia was the culminating and pacifying action of the long-running Numantine War between the forces of the Roman Republic and those of the native Celtiberian population of Hispania Citerior. The Numantine War was the third of the Celtiberian Wars and it broke out in 143 BC...
.
Since the Roman invasion of the Iberian peninsula had begun in the south in the territories around the Mediterranean controlled by the Barcids, the last region of the peninsula to be subdued lay in the far north. The
Cantabrian WarsThe Cantabrian Wars or Astur-Cantabrian Wars occurred during the Roman conquest of the provinces of Cantabria, Asturias and León. They were the final stage of the conquest of Hispania.-Antecedents:...
or Astur-Cantabrian Wars, from 29 BC to 19 BC, occurred during the Roman conquest of these northern provinces of
CantabriaCantabria is a Spanish province and autonomous community with Santander as its capital city. It is bordered on the east by the Basque Autonomous Community , on the south by Castile and León , on the west by the Principality of Asturias, and on the north by the Cantabrian Sea.Cantabria belongs to...
and
AsturiasThe Principality of Asturias is an autonomous community within the kingdom of Spain, former Kingdom of Asturias in the Middle Ages...
. Iberia was fully occupied by 25 BC and the last revolt put down by 19 BC
Macedon, the Greek poleis, and Illyria (215–148 BC)
Rome's preoccupation with its war with Carthage provided an opportunity for
Philip VPhilip V was King of Macedon from 221 BC to 179 BC. Philip's reign was principally marked by an unsuccessful struggle with the emerging power of Rome.-Early life:...
of the kingdom of
MacedonMacedonia or Macedon was an ancient kingdom, centered in the northeastern part of the Greek peninsula, bordered by Epirus to the west, Paionia to the north, the region of Thrace to the east and Thessaly to the south...
in northern
GreeceGreece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkan Peninsula....
, to attempt to extend his power westward. Philip sent ambassadors to Hannibal's camp in Italy, to negotiate an alliance as common enemies of Rome. However, Rome discovered the agreement when Philip's emissaries, along with emissaries from Hannibal, were captured by a Roman fleet. Desiring to prevent Philip from aiding Carthage in Italy and elsewhere, Rome sought out land allies in Greece to fight a proxy war against Macedon on its behalf and found partners in the
Aetolian LeagueThe Aetolian League was a confederation of tribal communities and cities in ancient Greece centered on Aetolia in central Greece. Alternatively termed the Aitolian League, it was established probably during the early Hellenistic era in opposition to Macedon and the Achaean League. Two annual...
of Greek city-states, the
IllyriansThe Illyrians were a group of tribes who inhabited the Western Balkans during classical antiquity. The territory the tribes covered came to be known as Illyria to Greek and Roman authors, corresponding roughly to the area between Adriatic sea in west, Drava river in North, Morava river in east...
to the north of Macedon and the
kingdom of PergamonThe Kingdom of Pergamon was an Hellenistic kingdom founded by Attalus I in the 3rd century BC. The kingdom gradually expanded and reached its peak in 188 BC, after the Treaty of Apamea. In 133 BC, King Attalus III bequeathed the kingdom to the Roman people....
and the city-state of
RhodesRhodes is a Greek island approximately southwest of Turkey in eastern Aegean Sea...
, which lay across the Aegean from Macedon.
The
First Macedonian WarThe First Macedonian War was fought by Rome, allied with the Aetolian League and Attalus I of Pergamon, against Philip V of Macedon, contemporaneously with the Second Punic War against Carthage...
saw the Romans involved directly in only limited land operations and when the Aetolians sued for peace with Philip once more Rome's small expeditionary force, with no more allies in Greece, but having achieved their objective of pre-occupying Philip and preventing him from aiding Hannibal, was ready to make peace. A treaty was drawn up between Rome and Macedon at Phoenice in 205 BC which promised Rome a small indemnity, formally ending the First Macedonian War.
Macedon began to encroach on territory claimed by several other Greek city states in 200 BC and these states pleaded for help from their newfound ally Rome. Rome gave Philip an ultimatum that he must submit Macedonia to being essentially a Roman province. Philip, unsurprisingly, refused and, after initial internal reluctance for further hostilities, Rome declared war against Philip in the
Second Macedonian WarThe Second Macedonian War was fought between Macedon, led by Philip V of Macedon, and Rome, allied with Pergamon and Rhodes. The result was the defeat of Philip who was forced to abandon all his possessions in Greece...
. In the
Battle of the AousThe Battle of the Aous was fought in 198 BC between Rome and Macedon, at or near modern Tepelenë in Albania. The Roman force was led by Titus Quinctius Flamininus and the Macedonians were led by Philip V. Flamininus won the battle, and the two commanders would meet again at Cynoscephalae the next...
Roman forces under
Titus Quinctius FlamininusTitus Quinctius Flamininus was a Roman politician and general instrumental in the Roman conquest of Greece.Member of the gens Quinctia, and brother to Lucius Quinctius Flamininus, he served as a military tribune in the Second Punic war and in 205 BC he was appointed propraetor in Tarentum. He was...
defeated the Macedonians, and in a second larger battle under the same opposing commanders in 197 BC, in the
Battle of CynoscephalaeThe Battle of Cynoscephalae was fought in Thessaly in 197 BC between the Roman army, led by Titus Quinctius Flamininus, and the Antigonid dynasty of Macedon, led by Philip V.- Prelude :...
, Flamininus again beat the Macedonians decisively. Macedonia was forced to sign the
Treaty of TempeaThe Treaty of Tempe ended the Second Macedonian War between the Roman Republic and Philip V of Macedon. Rome won the decisive Battle of Cynoscephalae in 197 BC, and by the Treaty of Tempe, 196 BC, they forced Philip to give up Macedonia's possessions in Greece and Asia, and pay a war indemnity of...
, in which it lost all claim to territory in Greece and Asia, and had to pay a war indemnity to Rome.
Between the second and third Macedonian wars Rome faced further conflict in the region due to a tapestry of shifting rivalries, alliances and leagues all seeking to gain greater influence. After the Macedonians had been defeated in the Second Macedonian War in 197 BC, the Greek city-state of
SpartaSparta was a city-state in ancient Greece, situated on the River Eurotas in the southern part of the Peloponnese. From c. 650 BC it rose to become the dominant military power in the region and as such was recognized as the overall leader of the combined Greek forces during the Greco-Persian Wars...
stepped into the partial power vacuum in Greece. Fearing the Spartans would take increasing control of the region, the Romans drew on help from allies to prosecute the Roman-Spartan War, defeating a Spartan army at the
Battle of GythiumThe Battle of Gythium was fought in 195 BC between Sparta and the coalition of Rome, Rhodes, the Achaean League and Pergamum. As the port of Gythium was an important Spartan base the allies decided to capture it before they advanced inland to Sparta. The Romans and the Acheans were joined outside...
in 195 BC. They also fought their former allies the Aetolian League in the
Aetolian WarThe Aetolian War was fought between the Romans and their Achean and Macedonian allies and the Aetolian League and their allies, the kingdom of Athamania. The Aetolians had invited Antiochus the Great to Greece, who after his defeat by the Romans had returned to Asia. This left the Aetolians and...
, against the Istrians in the Istrian War, against the Illyrians in the Illyrian War, and against Achaia in the Achaean War.
Rome now turned its attentions to
Antiochus IIIAntiochus III the Great, , younger son of Seleucus II Callinicus, became the 6th ruler of the Seleucid Empire as a youth of about eighteen in 223 BC. Ascending the throne at young age, Antiochus was an ambitious ruler...
of the
Seleucid EmpireThe Seleucid Empire was a Hellenistic empire, i.e. a successor state of Alexander the Great's empire. The Seleucid Empire was centered in the near East and at the height of its power included central Anatolia, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Persia, today's Turkmenistan, Pamir and parts of Pakistan...
to the east. After campaigns as far abroad as Bactria, India, Persia and Judea, Antiochus moved to Asia Minor and Thrace to secure several coastal towns, a move that brought him into conflict with Roman interests. A Roman force under
Manius Acilius GlabrioManius Acilius Glabrio was a Roman consul, general, and member of a plebeian family.Glabrio became consul in 191 BC, defeated Antiochus the Great of Syria at the Battle of Thermopylae, and compelled him to leave Greece...
defeated Antiochus at the
Battle of ThermopylaeThe Battle of Thermopylae was fought in 191 BC between a Roman army led by consul Manius Acilius Glabrio and a Seleucid force led by King Antiochus III the Great. The Romans were victorious, and as a result, Antiochus was forced to flee Greece....
and forced him to evacuate Greece: the Romans then pursued the Seleucids beyond Greece, beating them again in naval battles at the
Battle of the EurymedonThe Battle of the Eurymedon was fought in 190 BC between a Seleucid fleet and Rhodian ships, who were allied with the Roman Republic. The Seleucids were led by the famous Carthaginian general Hannibal, who had gone into exile in the events following the Battle of Zama. The Rhodians were victorious,...
and
Battle of MyonessusThe naval Battle of Myonessus was fought in 190 BC during the war of Rome against Antiochus III the Great for the domination over Greece, between a Seleucid Empire fleet and a Roman plus Rhodian fleet. The Romans were victorious.The account of Appian:...
, and finally in a decisive engagement of the
Battle of MagnesiaThe Battle of Magnesia was fought in 190 BC near Magnesia ad Sipylum, on the plains of Lydia , between the Romans, led by the consul Lucius Cornelius Scipio and his brother, the famed general Scipio Africanus, with their ally Eumenes II of Pergamum against the army of Antiochus III the Great of the...
.
In 179 BC Philip died and his talented and ambitious son,
Perseus of MacedonPerseus was the last king of the Antigonid dynasty, who ruled the successor state in Macedon created upon the death of Alexander the Great...
, took his throne and showed a renewed interest in Greece. He also allied himself with the warlike
BastarnaeThe Bastarnae or Basternae were an ancient tribal group of probably mixed Celtic and Germanic origin which, between not later than 200 BC and until at least 300 AD, inhabited the region between the eastern Carpathian mountains and the Dnieper river...
, and both this and his actions in Greece possibly violated the treaty signed with the Romans by his father or, if not, certainly was not "
behaving as [Rome considered] a subordinate ally should". Rome declared war on Macedonia again, starting the
Third Macedonian WarThe Third Macedonian War was a war fought between Rome and King Perseus of Macedon. In 179 BC King Philip V of Macedon died and his talented and ambitious son, Perseus, took his throne. Perseus married Laodike, daughter of King Seleucus IV Keraunos of Asia, and increased the size of his army...
. Perseus initially had greater military success against the Romans than his father, winning the
Battle of CallicinusThe Battle of Callicinus was fought in 171 BC between Macedon and Rome. The Macedonians were led by their king, Perseus, while the Roman force was led by Consul Publius Licinius Crassus. The Macedonians were victorious. Livy describes this battle at 42.58-60...
against a Roman consular army. However, as with all such ventures in this period, Rome responded by simply sending another army. The second consular army duly defeated the Macedonians at the
Battle of PydnaThe Battle of Pydna in 168 BC between Rome and the Macedonian Antigonid dynasty saw the further ascendancy of Rome in the Hellenic/Hellenistic world and the end of the Antigonid line of kings, whose power traced back to Alexander the Great.-Campaign:...
in 168 BC and the Macedonians, lacking the reserve of the Romans and with King Perseus captured, duly capitulated, ending the
Third Macedonian WarThe Third Macedonian War was a war fought between Rome and King Perseus of Macedon. In 179 BC King Philip V of Macedon died and his talented and ambitious son, Perseus, took his throne. Perseus married Laodike, daughter of King Seleucus IV Keraunos of Asia, and increased the size of his army...
.
The Fourth Macedonian War, fought from 150 BC to 148 BC, was the final war between Rome and Macedon and began when
AndriscusAndriscus, , also spelt Andriskos and often called the "pseudo-Philip", was the last King of Macedonia , and ruler of Adramyttium in Aeolis ....
usurped the Macedonian throne. The Romans raise a consular army under Quintus Caecilius Metellus, who swiftly defeated Andriscus at the
Second battle of PydnaThe Battle of Pydna was fought in 148 BC between Rome and the forces of the Macedonian leader Andriscus. The Roman force was led by Quintus Caecilius Metellus, and was the winner of this engagement. The result of the battle played in important role in deciding the outcome of the Fourth Macedonian...
.
Under
Lucius MummiusLucius Mummius , was a Roman statesman and general, also known as Leucius Mommius. He later received the agnomen Achaicus.-Corinth:...
,
CorinthCorinth, or Korinth was a city-state on the Isthmus of Corinth, the narrow stretch of land that joins the Peloponnesus to the mainland of Greece, roughly halfway between Athens and Sparta...
was destroyed following a siege in 146 BC, leading to the surrender and thus conquest of the
Achaean LeagueThe Achaean League was a Hellenistic era confederation of Greek city states , on the northern and central Peloponnese, named after the Homeric Achaeans or rather the league that existed with the same name in the NW region of Achaea of unknown time of foundation.The regional Achaean League was...
(see
Battle of CorinthThe Battle of Corinth was a battle fought between the Roman Republic and the Greek state of Corinth and its allies in the Achaean League in 146 BC, that resulted in the complete and total destruction of the state of Corinth which was previously so famous for its fabulous wealth.- Preface :The 140's...
).
Jugurthine War (111–104 BC)
Rome had, in the earlier Punic Wars, gained large tracts of territory in Africa, which they had consolidated in the following centuries, and much of which had been granted to the kingdom of Numidia, a kingdom on the north African coast approximating to modern Algeria, in return for its past military assistance. The Jugurthine War of 111–104 BC was fought between Rome and
JugurthaJugurtha or Jugurthen was a Libyan King of Numidia, born in Cirta . The name Jugurthen is actually a Libyan name and phrase meaning: is greater than them.-Background:...
of
NumidiaNumidia was an ancient Berber kingdom in present-day Algeria and part of Tunisia that later alternated between being a Roman province and being a Roman client state, and is no longer in existence today...
and constituted the final Roman pacification of Northern Africa, after which Rome largely ceased expansion on the continent after reaching natural barriers of desert and mountain. Following Jugurtha's usurpation of the Numidian throne, a loyal ally of Rome since the Punic Wars, Rome felt compelled to intervene. Jugurtha impudently bribed the Romans into accepting his usurpation and was granted half the kingdom. Following further aggression and further bribery attempts, the Romans sent an army to tackle him. The Romans were defeated at the
Battle of SuthulThe Battle of Suthul was an episode of the Jugurthine War. The battle was fought in 110 BC between the Roman force led by the praetor Aulus Postumus Albinus and the army of Numidia, led by King Jugurtha. In 110 BC, the consul Spurius Postumus Albinus invaded Numidia, but left soon after to prepare...
but fared better at the
Battle of the MuthulThe Battle of the Muthul was an episode of the Jugurthine War. This battle was fought in 108 BC between the Numidians led by King Jugurtha, and a Roman force under Caecilius Metellus. The Romans were victorious, and four years later Jugurtha was dead, executed by the Romans following his capture...
and finally defeated Jugurtha at the
Battle of ThalaThe Battle of Thala was part of the Jugurthine War of 111-104 BC between Rome and Jugurtha of Numidia, a kingdom on the north African coast approximating to modern Algeria. The Romans defeated Jugurtha at the Battle of Thala....
, the Battle of Mulucha, and the Battle of Cirta (104 BC). Jugurtha was finally captured not in battle but by treachery, ending the war.
Resurgence of the Celtic threat (121 BC)
By 121 BC, memories of Rome itself being sacked by Celtic tribes from Gaul were still prominent despite their historical distance, having been made into a legendary account that was taught to each generation of Roman youth. However, Rome was, unknown at the time, to face a resurgent Celtic threat within the next year. In 121 BC, Rome came into contact with the Celtic tribes of the
AllobrogesThe Allobroges were a warlike Celtic tribe in Gaul located between the Rhône River and the Lake of Geneva in what later became Savoy, Dauphiné, and Vivarais. Their cities were in the areas of modern-day Lyon, Saint-Etienne and Grenoble, the modern of Isère, and modern Switzerland...
and the
ArverniThe Arverni were a Gallic tribe living in what is now the Auvergne region of France during the last centuries BC. One of the most powerful tribes in ancient Gaul, they opposed the Romans on several occasions...
, both of which they defeated with apparent ease in the First Battle of Avignon near the Rhone river and the Second Battle of Avignon, the same year.
New Germanic threat (113–101 BC)
The
Cimbrian WarThe Cimbrian War was fought between the Roman Republic and the Proto-Germanic tribes of the Cimbri and the Teutons , who migrated from northern Europe into Roman controlled territory, and clashed with Rome and her allies...
(113–101 BC) was a far more serious affair than the earlier clashes of 121 BC. The
GermanicThe Germanic peoples are a historical ethno-linguistic group, originating in Northern Europe and identified by their use of the Indo-European Germanic languages which diversified out of Common Germanic in the course of the Pre-Roman Iron Age...
tribes of the
CimbriThe Cimbri were a tribe from Northern Europe, who, together with the Teutones and the Ambrones threatened the Roman Republic in the late 2nd century BC. The Cimbri were probably Germanic, though some believe them to be of Celtic origin...
and the
TeutonsThe Teutons or Teutones were mentioned as a Germanic tribe by Greek and Roman authors, notably Strabo and Marcus Velleius Paterculus and normally in close connection with the Cimbri, whose ethnicity is contested between Gauls and Germani...
or
Teutones migrated from northern Europe into Rome's northern territories, and clashed with Rome and her allies. The Cimbrian War was the first time since the
Second Punic WarThe Second Punic War, also referred to as The Hannibalic War and The War Against Hannibal, lasted from 218 to 201 BC and involved combatants in the western and eastern Mediterranean. This was the second major war between Carthage and the Roman Republic, who had three warring conflicts against each...
that
ItaliaItalia, under the Roman Republic and later Empire, was the name of the Italian peninsula.-Under the Republic and Augustan organization :During the Republic and the first centuries of the empire, Italia was not a province, but rather the territory of the city of Rome, thus having a special status:...
and
RomeRome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated municipality , with over 2.7 million residents in , while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat to be 3.46 million. The metropolitan area of Rome is estimated by OECD to have a population of 3.7 million...
itself had been seriously threatened, and caused great fear in Rome for some time. The
Battle of NoreiaThe Battle of Noreia in 112 BC, was the opening action of the Cimbrian War fought between the Roman Republic and the migrating Proto-Germanic tribes the Cimbri and the Teutons . It ended in defeat, and near disaster, for the Romans.- Prelude :...
in 112 BC, was the opening action of the Cimbrian War fought between the Roman Republic and the migrating Proto-Germanic tribes of the Cimbri and the Teutons. It ended in defeat, and near disaster, for the Romans. In 105 BC the Romans suffered one of their worst defeats ever at the
Battle of ArausioThe Battle of Arausio took place on October 6, 105 BC, at a site between the town of Arausio and the Rhône River. Ranged against the migratory tribes of the Cimbri under Boiorix and the Teutoni were two Roman armies, commanded by the proconsul Quintus Servilius Caepio and consul Gnaeus Mallius...
. It was the costliest defeat Rome had suffered since the
Battle of CannaeThe Battle of Cannae was a major battle of the Second Punic War, taking place on August 2, 216 BC near the town of Cannae in Apulia in southeast Italy. The army of Carthage under Hannibal decisively defeated a numerically superior army of the Roman Republic under command of the consuls Lucius...
. After the Cimbri inadvertently granted the Romans a reprieve by diverting to plunder Iberia, Rome was given the opportunity to carefully prepare for and successfully meet the Cimbri and Teutons in battle in the
Battle of Aquae SextiaeThe Battle of Aquae Sextiae took place in 102 BC. After a string of Roman defeats , the Romans under Gaius Marius finally defeated the Teutones and Ambrones.- The Battle :...
and the
Battle of VercellaeThe Battle of Vercellae, or Battle of the Raudine Plain, in 101 BC was the Roman victory of Consul Gaius Marius over the Germanic Cimbri invasion force near the settlement of Vercellae in Cisalpine Gaul....
where both tribes were virtually annihilated, ending the threat.
Internal unrest (135–71 BC)
The extensive campaigning abroad by Roman generals, and the rewarding of soldiers with plunder on these campaigns, led to a general trend of soldiers becoming increasingly loyal to their generals rather than to the state, and to a willingness to follow their generals in battle against the state. Rome was also plagued by several slave uprisings during this period, in part because in the past century vast tracts of land had been given over to slave farming in which the slaves greatly outnumbered their Roman masters. In the last century BC at least twelve civil wars and rebellions occurred. This pattern did not break until Octavian (later
Caesar Augustus) ended it by becoming a successful challenger to the Senate's authority, and was made
princepsPrinceps is a Latin word meaning "first in time or order; the first, chief, the most eminent, distinguished, or noble; the first man, first person."...
(emperor).
Between 135 BC and 71 BC there were three
Servile WarsThe Servile Wars were a series of three slave revolts in the late Roman Republic. See:...
involving slave uprisings against the Roman state, the
thirdThe Third Servile War , also called the Gladiator War and The War of Spartacus by Plutarch, was the last of a series of unrelated and unsuccessful slave rebellions against the Roman Republic, known collectively as the Roman Servile Wars...
uprising the most serious, - estimates of the numbers involved include 120,000 and 150,000 revolting slaves. Additionally, in 91 BC the Social War broke out between Rome and its former allies in Italy, collectively known as the
Socii, over dissent among the allies that they shared the risk of Rome's military campaigns, but not its rewards. Despite defeats such as the
Battle of Fucine LakeThe Battle of Fucine Lake was fought in 89 BC between a Roman army and a rebel force during the Social War. Lucius Porcius Cato was the leader of the Roman army at this battle...
, Roman troops defeated the Italian
militiaThe term militia is commonly used today to refer to a military force composed of ordinary citizens to provide defense, emergency law enforcement, or paramilitary service, in times of emergency without being paid a regular salary or committed to a fixed term of service. It is a polyseme with...
s in decisive engagements, notably the
Battle of AsculumThe Battle of Asculum was fought in 89 BC during the Social War between Rome and its former Italian allies. The Romans were led by C. Pompeius Strabo, and were victorious over the rebels....
. Although they lost militarily, the
Socii achieved their objectives with the legal proclamations of the
Lex JuliaLex Julia are ancient Roman laws, introduced by any member of the Julian family....
and
Lex Plautia PapiriaThe Lex Plautia Papiria was a Roman plebiscite enacted amidst the Social War in 89 BCE. Sponsored by the Tribunes of the Plebs, M. Plautius Silvanus and C. Papirius Carbo, the law expanded civitas, or citizenship...
, which granted citizenship to more than 500,000 Italians.
The internal unrest reached its most serious, however, in the two civil wars or marches upon Rome of the consul
Lucius Cornelius SullaLucius Cornelius Sulla Felix , or simply Sulla, was a Roman general and politician, holding the office of consul twice as well as the dictatorship....
at the beginning of 82 BC. In the
Battle of the Colline GateThe battle of the Colline Gate, fought in November of 82 BC, was the final battle by which Sulla secured control of Rome following the civil war against his rivals. The Samnites led by Pontius Telesinus attacked Sulla's army at the Colline Gate on the northeastern wall, and fought all night before...
at the very door of the city of Rome, a Roman army under Sulla bested an army of the Roman senate, along with some Samnite allies. Whatever the rights and wrongs of his grievances against those in power of the state, his actions marked a watershed of the willingness of Roman troops to wage war against one another that was to pave the way for the wars of the
triumvirateA triumvirate is a political regime dominated by three powerful individuals, each a triumvir . The arrangement can be formal or informal, and though the three are usually equal on paper, in reality this is rarely the case...
, the overthrowing of the Senate as the
de facto head of the Roman state, and the eventual
endemic usurpation of the later EmpireUsurpers are individuals or groups of individuals who obtain and maintain the power or rights of another by force and without legal authority. Usurpers were a common feature of the late Roman Empire, especially from the crisis of the third century onwards, when political instability became the...
.
Conflicts with Mithridates (89–63 BC)
Mithridates the Great was the ruler of
PontusPontus or Pontos is a historical Greek designation for a region on the southern coast of the Black Sea, located in modern-day northeastern Turkey. The name was applied to the coastal region in antiquity by the Greeks who colonized the area, and derived from the Greek name of the Black Sea: Pontos...
, a large kingdom in Asia Minor, from 120 to 63 BC. He is remembered as one of Rome's most formidable and successful enemies who engaged three of the most prominent generals of the late Roman Republic: Sulla,
LucullusLucius Licinius Lucullus , was one of the canonical great men of Roman history, ever included in the biographical collections of leading generals and politicians, which originated in the biographical compendium of famous Romans published by his contemporary Marcus Terentius Varro...
, and Pompey the Great. In a pattern familiar from the Punic Wars, the Romans came into conflict with him after the two states' spheres of influence began to overlap. Mithridates antagonised Rome by seeking to expand his kingdom, and Rome for her part seemed equally keen for war and the spoils and prestige that it might bring. After conquering western
AnatoliaAnatolia is a geographic region of Western Asia, comprising most of the modern Republic of Turkey. The region is bounded by the Black Sea to the north, the Caucasus to the northeast, the Iranian plateau to the southeast, the Mediterranean Sea to the south and the Aegean Sea to the west...
(modern Turkey) in 88 BC, Roman sources state that Mithridates ordered the killing of the majority of the 80,000 Romans living there. The massacre may have been greatly exaggerated by the Romans but it was the official reason given for the commencement of hostilities in the
First Mithridatic WarThe First Mithridatic War was a conflict fought between the Kingdom of Pontus and revolting Greek cities—Athens being the most prominent—led by Mithridates VI of Pontus against the Roman Republic and the Kingdom of Bithynia...
. The Roman general
Lucius Cornelius SullaLucius Cornelius Sulla Felix , or simply Sulla, was a Roman general and politician, holding the office of consul twice as well as the dictatorship....
forced Mithridates out of Greece proper after the
Battle of ChaeroneaFor the earlier battle, see Battle of Chaeronea The Battle of Chaeronea was the victory of the Roman forces of Lucius Cornelius Sulla over King Mithridates VI of Pontus near Chaeronea, in Boeotia, in 86 BC during the First Mithridatic War. This battle is described in three ancient texts, although...
and later
Battle of OrchomenusThe Battle of Orchomenus was fought in 85 BC between Rome and the forces of Mithridates VI of Pontus. The Roman army was led by Lucius Cornelius Sulla, while Mithridates' army was led by Archelaus. The Roman force was victorious, and Archelaus later defected to Rome...
but then had to return to Italy to answer the internal threat posed by his rival Marius; consequently, Mithridates VI was defeated but not beaten. A peace was made between Rome and Pontus, but this proved only a temporary lull.
The
Second Mithridatic WarThe Second Mithridatic War was one of three wars fought between Pontus and the Roman Republic. The second Mithridatic war was fought between King Mithridates VI of Pontus and the Roman general Lucius Licinius Murena....
began when Rome tried to annex Bithnyia as a province. In the
Third Mithridatic WarThe Third Mithridatic War was the last and longest of three Mithridatic Wars fought between Mithridates VI of Pontus and his allies and the Roman Republic...
, first
Lucius Licinius LucullusThis article is on the Consul of 151 BC. For the descendent see Lucullus, and for others of this name see Licinius .Lucius Licinius Lucullus was a novus homo who became Consul in 151 BC. He was imprisoned by the Tribunes for attempting to enforce a troop levy too harshly...
and then Pompey the Great were sent against Mithridates. Mithridates was finally defeated by Pompey in the night-time
Battle of the LycusThe Battle of the Lycus was fought in 66 BC between the Roman Republic army of Pompey and the forces of Mithridates VI of Pontus. The Romans easily won the battle with few losses. Mithridates later committed suicide, finally ending the Third Mithridatic War....
.
Campaign against the Cilician pirates (67 BC)
The Mediterranean had at this time fallen into the hands of pirates, largely from
CiliciaIn antiquity, Cilicia now known as Çukurova, was a commonly used name of the south coastal region of Asia Minor south of the central Anatolian plateau. It existed as a political entity from Hittite times into the Byzantine empire...
. Rome had destroyed many of the states that had previously policed the Mediterranean with fleets, but had failed to step into the gap created. The pirates had seized the opportunity of a relative power vacuum and had not only strangled shipping lanes but had plundered many cities on the coasts of Greece and Asia, and had even made descents upon Italy itself. After the Roman admiral
Marcus Antonius CreticusMarcus Antonius Creticus was a Roman politician, member of the Antonius family. Creticus was son of Marcus Antonius Orator and by his marriage to Julia Antonia he had three sons triumvir Mark Antony, Gaius Antonius and Lucius Antonius.He was elected praetor in 74 BC and in the next year he...
(father of the triumvir Marcus Antonius) failed to clear the pirates to the satisfaction of the Roman authorities,
PompeyGnaeus Pompeius Magnus, also known as Pompey /'pɑmpi/, Pompey the Great or Pompey the Triumvir , was a military and political leader of the late Roman Republic...
was nominated his successor as commander of a special naval task force to campaign against the pirates. It supposedly took Pompey just forty days to clear the western portion of the sea of pirates, and restore communication between Iberia, Africa, and Italy. Plutarch describes how Pompey first swept their craft from the Mediterranean in a series of small actions and through promise of honouring the surrender of cities and craft. He then followed the main body of the pirates to their strongholds on the coast of
CiliciaIn antiquity, Cilicia now known as Çukurova, was a commonly used name of the south coastal region of Asia Minor south of the central Anatolian plateau. It existed as a political entity from Hittite times into the Byzantine empire...
, and destroyed them there in the naval
Battle of KorakesionThe Battle of Korakesion, also known as the Battle of Coracesium, was a naval battle fought in 67 BC between the pirates of Cilicia and Pompey of ancient Rome. Plutarch describes it as the key battle of Pompey's clearing of the Mediterranean of pirates after several smaller battles...
.
Caesar's early campaigns (59–50 BC)
During a term as praetor in Iberia, Pompey's contemporary
Julius CaesarGaius Julius Caesar , , was a Roman military and political leader. He played a critical role in the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....
of the Roman Julii clan defeated the Calaici and Lusitani in battle. Following a consular term, he was then appointed to a five year term as Proconsular Governor of Transalpine Gaul (current southern France) and Illyria (the coast of Dalmatia). Not content with an idle governorship, Caesar strove to find reason to invade Gaul, which would give him the dramatic military success he sought. To this end he stirred up popular nightmares of the first sack of Rome by the Gauls and the more recent spectre of the Cimbri and Teutones. When the
HelvetiiThe Helvetii were a Celtic tribe or, probably more accurately, a confederation of Celtic tribes. Although originating in what is now Germany, they occupied most of the Swiss plateau at the time of their contact with the Roman Republic in the 1st century BC...
and
TiguriniThe Tigurini were a tribe of the Gauls, originally from Bavaria, and a clan of the Helvetii. They crossed the Rhine together with the Helvetii to invade Gaul in 109 BC...
tribes began to migrate on a route that would take them near (not into) the Roman province of Transalpine Gaul, Caesar had the barely sufficient excuse he needed for his
Gallic WarsThe Gallic Wars were a series of military campaigns waged by the Roman proconsul Julius Caesar against several Gallic tribes, lasting from 58 BC to 51 BC. The Romans would also raid Britannia and Germania, but these expeditions never developed into full-scale invasions...
, fought between 58 BC and 49 BC. After slaughtering the Helvetii tribe, Caesar prosecuted a
"long, bitter and costly" campaign against other tribes across the breadth of Gaul, many of whom had fought alongside Rome against their common enemy the
HelvetiiThe Helvetii were a Celtic tribe or, probably more accurately, a confederation of Celtic tribes. Although originating in what is now Germany, they occupied most of the Swiss plateau at the time of their contact with the Roman Republic in the 1st century BC...
, and annexed their territory to that of Rome. Plutarch claims that the campaign cost a million Gallic lives. Although
"fierce and able" the Gauls were handicapped by internal disunity and fell in a series of battles over the course of a decade.
Caesar defeated the
HelvetiiThe Helvetii were a Celtic tribe or, probably more accurately, a confederation of Celtic tribes. Although originating in what is now Germany, they occupied most of the Swiss plateau at the time of their contact with the Roman Republic in the 1st century BC...
in 58 BC at the
Battle of the Arar and
Battle of BibracteThe Battle of Bibracte was fought between the Helvetii and six Roman legions, under the command of Gaius Julius Caesar. It was the first major battle of the Gallic Wars....
, the Belgic confederacy known as the
Belgae at the
Battle of the AxonaThe Battle of the Axona was fought in 57 BC, between the Roman army of Gaius Julius Caesar and the Belgae. The Belgae, led by King Galba of Suessiones, attacked, only to be repelled by Caeser. Fearing an ambush, the Romans delayed their pursuit...
, the
Nervii in 57 BC at the
Battle of the SabisThe Battle of the Sabis, also known as the Battle of the Sambre or the Battle against the Nervians , was fought in 57 BC in the area known today as Wallonia, between the legions of the Roman Republic and an association of Belgic tribes, principally the Nervii...
, the
Aquitani,
Treviri,
Tencteri,
Aedui and
Eburones in unknown battles, and the
Veneti in 56 BC. In 55 and 54 BC he made
two expeditions to BritainBy AD 43, the time of the main Roman invasion of Britain, Great Britain had already frequently been the target of invasions, planned and actual, by forces of the Roman Republic and Roman Empire...
. In 52 BC, following the Siege of Avaricum and a string of inconclusive battles, Caesar defeated a union of Gauls led by
VercingetorixVercingetorix was the chieftain of the Arverni tribe known as the man who united the Gauls in an ultimately unsuccessful revolt against Roman forces during the last phase of Julius Caesar's Gallic Wars. Vercingetorix came to power in 52 BC, when he raised an army and was proclaimed king at Gergovia...
at the
Battle of AlesiaThe Battle of Alesia or Siege of Alesia took place in September, 52 BC around the Gallic oppidum of Alesia, a major town centre and hill fort of the Mandubii tribe...
, completing the Roman conquest of Transalpine Gaul. By 50 BC, the entirety of Gaul lay in Roman hands. Caesar recorded his own accounts of these campaigns in
Commentarii de Bello GallicoCommentarii de Bello Gallico is Julius Caesar's firsthand account of the Gallic Wars, written as a third-person narrative. In it Caesar describes the battles and intrigues that took place in the nine years he spent fighting local armies in Gaul that opposed Roman domination...
("Commentaries on the Gallic War").
Gaul never regained its Celtic identity, never attempted another nationalist rebellion, and remained loyal to Rome until the fall of the Western Empire in 476. However, although Gaul itself was to thereafter remain loyal, cracks were appearing in the political unity of Rome's governing figures – partly over concerns over the loyalty of Caesar's Gallic troops to his person rather than the state – that were soon to drive Rome into a lengthy series of civil wars.
Triumvirates, Caesarian ascension, and revolt (53–30 BC)
By 59 BC an unofficial political alliance known as the
First TriumvirateThe First Triumvirate was the political alliance of Gaius Julius Caesar, Marcus Licinius Crassus, and Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus. Unlike the Second Triumvirate, the First Triumvirate had no official status whatsoever – its overwhelming power in the Roman Republic was strictly unofficial...
was formed between
Gaius Julius CaesarGaius Julius Caesar , , was a Roman military and political leader. He played a critical role in the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....
,
Marcus Licinius CrassusMarcus Licinius Crassus was a Roman general and politician who commanded Sulla's decisive victory at Colline gate, suppressed the slave revolt led by Spartacus and entered into a secret pact, known as the First Triumvirate, with Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus and Gaius Julius Caesar...
, and Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus to share power and influence. It was always an uncomfortable alliance given that Crassus and Pompey intensely disliked one another. In 53 BC, Crassus launched a Roman invasion of the
Parthian EmpireThe Parthian Empire , was a major Iranian political and cultural power in the ancient Near East, and a counterweight to the Roman Empire in the region....
. After initial successes, he marched his army deep into the desert; but here his army was cut off deep in enemy territory, surrounded and slaughtered at the
Battle of CarrhaeThe Battle of Carrhae, fought in 53 BC near the town of Carrhae, was a major battle between the Parthian Empire and the Roman Republic. A Roman invasion force led by Marcus Licinius Crassus was decisively crushed by the Parthian Spahbod Surena...
in
"the greatest Roman defeat since Hannibal" in which Crassus himself perished. The death of Crassus removed some of the balance in the Triumvirate and, consequently, Caesar and Pompey began to move apart. While Caesar was fighting against Vercingetorix in Gaul, Pompey proceeded with a legislative agenda for Rome that revealed that he was at best ambivalent towards Caesar and perhaps now covertly allied with Caesar's political enemies. In 51 BC, some Roman senators demanded that Caesar would not be permitted to stand for Consul unless he turned over control of his armies to the state, and the same demands were made of Pompey by other factions. Relinquishing his army would leave Caesar defenceless before his enemies. Caesar chose Civil War over laying down his command and facing trial. The triumvirate was shattered and conflict was inevitable.
Pompey initially assured Rome and the senate that he could defeat Caesar in battle should he march on Rome. However, by the spring of 49 BC, when Caesar crossed the Rubicon river with his invading forces and swept down the Italian peninsula towards Rome, Pompey ordered the abandonment of Rome. Caesar's army was still under-strength, with certain units remaining in Gaul, but on the other hand Pompey himself only had a small force at his command, and that with uncertain loyalty having served under Caesar. Tom Holland attributes Pompey's willingness to abandon Rome to waves of panicking refugees stirring ancestral fears of invasions from the north. Pompey's forces retreated south towards Brundisium, and then fled to Greece. Caesar first directed his attention to the Pompeian stronghold of Iberia but following campaigning by Caesar in the
Siege of MassiliaThe Siege and naval Battle of Massilia was an episode of Caesar's civil war, fought in 49 BC.Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, who was an Optimate, had become proconsul of Gaul and sent to gain control of Massilia in order to oppose Caesar and the Populares...
and
Battle of IlerdaThe Battle of Ilerda took place in June 49 BC between the forces of Julius Caesar and the Spanish army of Pompey the Great, led by his legates Lucius Afranius and Marcus Petreius...
decided to tackle Pompey himself in Greece. Pompey initially defeated Caesar at the
Battle of DyrrachiumThe Battle of Dyrrachium on 10 July 48 BC, was a battle of Caesar's civil war in the area of Dyrrachium . In the battle Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus defeated Gaius Julius Caesar....
in 48 BC but failing to follow up on the victory, Pompey was decisively defeated in the
Battle of PharsalusThe Battle of Pharsalus was a decisive battle of Caesar's Civil War. On 9 August 48 BC, the battle was fought at Pharsalus in central Greece between forces of the Populares faction and forces of the Optimates faction. Both factions fielded armies from the Roman Republic...
in 48 BC despite outnumbering Caesar's forces two to one. Pompey fled again, this time to Egypt, where he was murdered in an attempt to ingratiate the country with Caesar and avoid a war with Rome.
Pompey's death did not see the end of the civil wars since initially Caesar's enemies were manifold and Pompey's supporters continued to fight on after his death. In 46 BC Caesar lost perhaps as much as a third of his army when his former commander
Titus LabienusTitus Labienus was a professional Roman soldier in the late Roman Republic. He served as Tribune of the Plebs in 63 BC, and is remembered as one of Julius Caesar's lieutenants, mentioned frequently in the accounts of his military campaigns...
, who had defected to the Pompeians several years earlier, defeated him at the
Battle of RuspinaThe Battle of Ruspina was fought on January 4, 46 BC between competing political factions of the late Roman Republic, the Optimates and the Populares. Julius Caesar commanded the Populares, while the Optimates were commanded by Titus Labienus, a former Caesar supporter who defected to the side of...
. However, after this low point Caesar came back to defeat the Pompeian army of Metellus Scipio in the
Battle of ThapsusThe Battle of Thapsus took place on April 6, 46 BC near Thapsus . The Army of the Optimates political faction, led by Quintus Caecillius Metellus Scipio clashed with the forces of the Populares faction led by Julius Caesar, who won the battle...
, after which the Pompeians retreated yet again to Iberia. Caesar defeated the combined forces of Titus Labienus and Gnaeus Pompey the Younger at the
Battle of MundaThe Battle of Munda took place on March 17, 45 BC in the plains of Munda, modern southern Spain. This was the last battle of Julius Caesar's civil war against the conservative republicans. After this victory, and the death of Titus Labienus and Gnaeus Pompeius , Caesar was free to return to Rome...
in Iberia. Labienus was killed in the battle and the Younger Pompey captured and executed.
| "The Parthians began to shoot from all sides. They did not pick any particular target since the Romans were so close together that they could hardly miss...If they kept their ranks they were wounded. If they tried to charge the enemy, the enemy did not suffer more and they did not suffer less, because the Parthians could shoot even as they fled...When Publius urged them to charge the enemy's mail-clad horsemen, they showed him that their hands were riveted to their shields and their feet nailed through and through to the ground, so that they were helpless either for flight or for self-defence." |
PlutarchPlutarch, born Plutarchos then, on his becoming a Roman citizen, Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus , c. AD 46 – 120, was a Greek historian, biographer, essayist, and Middle Platonist known primarily for his Parallel Lives and Moralia...
on the Battle of CarrhaeThe Battle of Carrhae, fought in 53 BC near the town of Carrhae, was a major battle between the Parthian Empire and the Roman Republic. A Roman invasion force led by Marcus Licinius Crassus was decisively crushed by the Parthian Spahbod Surena...
|
Despite his military success, or probably because of it, fear spread of Caesar, now the primary figure of the Roman state, becoming an autocratic ruler and ending the Roman Republic. This fear drove a group of senators naming themselves The Liberators to assassinate him in 44 BC. Further civil war followed between those loyal to Caesar and those who supported the actions of the Liberators. Caesar's supporter
Mark AntonyMarcus Antonius , known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman politician and General. He was an important supporter and the loyal friend of Gaius Julius Caesar as a military commander and administrator, being Caesar's second cousin, once removed, by his mother Julia Antonia...
condemned Caesar's assassins and war broke out between the two factions. Antony was denounced as a public enemy, and
OctavianGaius Julius Caesar Augustus was the first emperor of the Roman Empire, which he ruled alone from 27 BC until his death in AD 14.
[These are the contemporary dates; Augustus lived under two calendars, the Roman Republican until 45 BC, and the Julian after 45 BC...]
was entrusted with the command of the war against him. In the
Battle of Forum GallorumThe Battle of Forum Gallorum was fought near a village in northern Italy , on April 14, 43 BC, between the forces of Mark Antony and the legions of the Roman Republic under the overall command of consul Gaius Vibius Pansa Caetronianus, aided by Aulus Hirtius and the untested Octavian...
Antony, besieging Caesar's assassin Decimus Brutus in Mutina, defeated the forces of the consul Pansa, who was killed, but Antony was then immediately defeated by the army of the other consul, Hirtius. At the
Battle of MutinaThe Battle of Mutina was fought on April 21, 43 BC between the forces of Mark Antony and the forces of Gaius Vibius Pansa Caetronianus and Aulus Hirtius, who were providing aid to one of Caesar's assassins, Decimus Junius Brutus Albinus.-Prelude:...
Antony was again defeated in battle by Hirtius, who was killed. Although Antony failed to capture Mutina, Decimus Brutus was murdered shortly thereafter.
Octavian betrayed his party, and came to terms with Caesarians Antony and
LepidusMarcus Aemilius Lepidus , was a Roman patrician who rose to become a member of the Second Triumvirate and Pontifex Maximus. His father, Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, had been involved in a rebellion against the Roman Republic which led to his death.Lepidus was among Julius Caesar's greatest...
and on 26 November 43 BC the
Second TriumvirateThe Second Triumvirate is the name historians give to the official political alliance of Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus , Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, and Mark Antony, formed on 26 November 43 BC with the enactment of the Lex Titia, the adoption of which marked the end of the Roman Republic...
was formed, this time in an official capacity. In 42 BC Triumvirs
Mark AntonyMarcus Antonius , known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman politician and General. He was an important supporter and the loyal friend of Gaius Julius Caesar as a military commander and administrator, being Caesar's second cousin, once removed, by his mother Julia Antonia...
and
OctavianGaius Julius Caesar Augustus was the first emperor of the Roman Empire, which he ruled alone from 27 BC until his death in AD 14.
[These are the contemporary dates; Augustus lived under two calendars, the Roman Republican until 45 BC, and the Julian after 45 BC...]
fought the indecisive
Battle of PhilippiThe Battle of Philippi was the final battle in the Wars of the Second Triumvirate between the forces of Mark Antony and Octavian against the forces of Julius Caesar's assassins Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus in 42 BC, at Philippi in Macedonia...
with Caesar's assassins Marcus Brutus and
CassiusGaius Cassius Longinus was a Roman senator, a leading instigator of the plot to kill Julius Caesar, and the brother in-law of Marcus Brutus.-Early life:...
. Although Brutus defeated Octavian, Antony defeated Cassius, who committed suicide. Brutus also committed suicide shortly afterwards.
However, civil war flared again when the Second Triumvirate of Octavian, Lepidus and
Mark AntonyMarcus Antonius , known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman politician and General. He was an important supporter and the loyal friend of Gaius Julius Caesar as a military commander and administrator, being Caesar's second cousin, once removed, by his mother Julia Antonia...
failed just as the first had almost as soon as its opponents had been removed. The ambitious Octavian built a power base and then launched a campaign against Mark Antony. Together with Lucius Antonius, Mark Antony's wife
FulviaFulvia was a Roman woman who lived in the 1st century BC. According to Plutarch, Fulvia had no interest in spinning nor managing a household nor ruling a husband with no ambition for public life; Fulvia wanted to govern or to command and be a commander-in-chief. Fulvia is remembered in the history...
raised an army in Italy to fight for Antony's rights against Octavian but she was defeated by Octavian at the
Battle of PerugiaThe Battle of Perugia was fought in the winter of 41 BC and 40 BC between Octavian and Lucius Antonius, the brother of Mark Antony, who was aided by Antony's wife, Fulvia. Octavian's forces were victorious, obtaining the surrender of Perugia. Fulvia was exiled, and died of illness while in exile...
. Her death led to partial reconciliation between Octavian and Anthony who went on to crush the army of
Sextus PompeiusSextus Pompeius Magnus Pius, in English Sextus Pompey , was a Roman general from the late Republic . He was the last focus of opposition to the Second Triumvirate....
, the last focus of opposition to the second triumvirate, in the naval
Battle of NaulochusThe naval Battle of Naulochus was fought on 3 September 36 BC between the fleets of Sextus Pompeius and Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, off Naulochus, Sicily...
.
As before, once opposition to the triumvirate was crushed, it started to tear at itself. The triumvirate expired on the last day of 33 BC and was not renewed in law and in 31 BC, war began again. At the
Battle of ActiumThe Battle of Actium was the decisive confrontation of the Final War of the Roman Republic. It was fought between the forces of Octavian and the combined forces of Mark Antony and Cleopatra. The battle took place on 2 September 31 BC, on the Ionian Sea near the Roman colony of Actium in Greece...
,
OctavianGaius Julius Caesar Augustus was the first emperor of the Roman Empire, which he ruled alone from 27 BC until his death in AD 14.
[These are the contemporary dates; Augustus lived under two calendars, the Roman Republican until 45 BC, and the Julian after 45 BC...]
decisively defeated Antony and
CleopatraCleopatra VII Philopator was the last effective pharaoh of Egypt's Ptolemaic dynasty. She originally shared power with her father Ptolemy XII and later with her brothers Ptolemy XIII and Ptolemy XIV, whom she also married, but eventually gained sole rule...
in a naval battle near Greece, using fire to destroy the enemy fleet.
Octavian went on to become Emperor under the name Augustus and, in the absence of political assassins or usurpers, was able to greatly expand the borders of the Empire.
Imperial expansion (40 BC – 117)
Under emperors secure from interior enemies, such as
AugustusGaius Julius Caesar Augustus was the first emperor of the Roman Empire, which he ruled alone from 27 BC until his death in AD 14.
[These are the contemporary dates; Augustus lived under two calendars, the Roman Republican until 45 BC, and the Julian after 45 BC...]
and
TrajanMarcus Ulpius Nerva Traianus, commonly known as Trajan , was a Roman Emperor who reigned from A. D. 98 until his death in A. D. 117...
, the military achieved great territorial gains in both the East and the West. In the West, following humiliating defeats at the hands of the Sugambri, Tencteri and Usipetes tribes in 16 BC, Roman armies pushed north and east out of Gaul to subdue much of Germania. The Pannonian revolt in AD 6 forced the Romans to cancel their plan to cement their conquest of Germania by invading
BohemiaBohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands, currently the Czech Republic...
for the moment. Despite the loss of a large army almost to the man in
VarusPublius Quinctilius Varus was a Roman politician and general under emperor Augustus, mainly remembered for having lost three Roman legions and his own life when attacked by Germanic leader Arminius in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest.-Life:His paternal grandfather was senator Sextus Quinctilius...
' famous defeat at the hands of the Germanic leader
ArminiusGaius Julius Arminius, also known as Arminius, Armin or Hermann was a chieftain of the Cherusci who defeated a Roman army in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest...
in the
Battle of the Teutoburg ForestThe Battle of the Teutoburg Forest took place in A.D. 9 when an alliance of Germanic tribes led by Arminius , the son of Segimer of the Cherusci, ambushed and destroyed three Roman legions led by Publius Quinctilius Varus.The...
in AD 9, Rome recovered and continued its expansion up to and beyond the borders of the known world. Roman armies under
GermanicusGermanicus Julius Caesar was a member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty of the early Roman Empire. He was born in Lugdunum, Gaul . At birth he was named either Nero Claudius Drusus after his father or Tiberius Claudius Nero after his uncle...
pursued several more campaigns against the Germanic tribes of the
MarcomanniThe Marcomanni were a Germanic tribe, probably related to the Buri, Suebi or Suevi.- Origin :Scholars believe their name derives from one of two possible sources: old Germanic forms of "march" and "men"; or the name of a Roman legate, Marcus Fabius Romanus, who deserted Drusus' legions during...
,
HermunduriThe Hermunduri, Hermanduri, Hermunduri, Hermunduli, Hermonduri, or Hermonduli were an ancient tribe of Germanic people who occupied the area around what is now Thuringia, Saxony, and Northern Bavaria, from the first to the third century. The Thuringii may have been the descendants of the Hermunduri....
,
ChattiThe Chatti were an ancient Germanic tribe whose homeland was near the upper Weser. They settled in central and northern Hesse and southern Lower Saxony, along the upper reaches of the Weser River and in the valleys and mountains of the Eder, Fulda and Weser River regions, a district approximately...
,
CherusciThe Cherusci were a Germanic tribe that inhabited parts of the northern Rhine valley and the plains and forests of northwestern Germany, in the area between present-day Osnabrück and Hanover), during the 1st century BC and 1st century. The name refers to a sword and *skaz, from Indo-European -skos...
,
BructeriThe Bructeri were a Germanic tribe located in northwestern Germany , between the Lippe and Ems rivers south of the Teutoburg Forest, in present-day North Rhine-Westphalia around 100 BC through 350 AD....
, and
MarsiThe Marsi were an ancient people of Italy, whose chief centre was Marruvium, on the eastern shore of Lake Fucinus. The area in which they lived is now called Marsica....
. Overcoming several mutinies in the armies along the Rhine, Germanicus defeated the Germanic tribes of Arminius in a series of battles culminating in the
Battle of the Weser RiverThe Battle of the Weser River, sometimes known as a first Battle of Minden, was fought in 16 A.D. between Roman legions commanded by Emperor Tiberius' heir and adopted son Germanicus, and an alliance of Germanic tribes commanded by Arminius...
.
After
preliminary low-scale invasions of BritainDuring his Gallic Wars, Julius Caesar invaded Britain twice, in 55 and 54 BC. The first invasion, made late in summer, was either intended as a full invasion or a reconnaissance-in-force expedition...
, the Romans
invaded Britain in forceBy AD 43, the time of the main Roman invasion of Britain, Great Britain had already frequently been the target of invasions, planned and actual, by forces of the Roman Republic and Roman Empire...
in 43 AD, forcing their way inland through several battles against British tribes, including the
Battle of the MedwayThe Battle of the Medway took place in 43 on the River Medway in the lands of the Iron Age tribe of the Cantiaci, now the English county of Kent...
, the Battle of the Thames, the
Battle of Caer CaradocThe Battle of Caer Caradoc was the final battle in Caratacus's resistance to Roman rule. Fought in 50, the Romans defeated the Britons and thus secured the southern areas of the province of Britannia....
and the Battle of Mona. Following a general uprising in which the Britons sacked Colchester, St Albans and London, the Romans suppressed the rebellion in the
Battle of Watling StreetThe Battle of Watling Street took place in Roman-occupied Britain in AD 60 or 61 between an alliance of indigenous British peoples, led by Boudica, and a Roman army led by Gaius Suetonius Paulinus. Although hugely outnumbered, the Romans decisively defeated the allied tribes, inflicting huge losses...
and went on to push as far north as central Scotland in the
Battle of Mons GraupiusAccording to Tacitus, the Battle of Mons Graupius took place in 83 or 84 AD. Gnaeus Julius Agricola, the Roman governor and Tacitus' father-in-law, had sent his fleet ahead to panic the Caledonians, and, with light infantry reinforced with British auxiliaries, reached the site, which he found...
. Tribes in modern-day Scotland and Northern England repeatedly rebelled against Roman rule and two military bases were established in
BritanniaRoman Britain was those parts of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire between AD 43 and about 410. The Romans referred to their province as Britannia...
to protect against rebellion and incursions from the north, from which Roman troops built and manned
Hadrian's WallHadrian's Wall is a stone or turf and timber fortification built by the Roman Empire across the width of what is now northern England. Begun in 122, during the rule of emperor Hadrian, it was the first of two fortifications built across Great Britain, the second being the Antonine Wall in what is...
.
On the continent, the extension of the Empire's borders beyond the Rhine hung in the balance for some time, with the emperor
CaligulaGaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus , more commonly known by his cognomen Caligula , was the third Roman Emperor, reigning from 16 March 37 until his assassination on 24 January 41...
apparently poised to invade Germania in AD 39, and Cnaeus Domitius Corbulo crossing the Rhine in AD 47 and marching into the territory of the Frisii and
ChauciThe Chauci were a populous Germanic tribe that inhabited the extreme northwestern shore of Germany between Frisia in the west and the Elbe estuary in the east...
before his successor
ClaudiusTiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus was the fourth Roman Emperor, a member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, ruling from 24 January AD 41 to his death in AD 54...
ordered the suspension of further attacks across the Rhine, setting what was to become the permanent limit of the Empire's expansion in this direction.
| "Never was there slaughter more cruel than took place there in the marshes and woods, never were more intolerable insults inflicted by barbarians, especially those directed against the legal pleaders. They put out the eyes of some of them and cut off the hands of others; they sewed up the mouth of one of them after first cutting out his tongue, which one of the barbarians held in his hand, exclaiming At last, you viper, you have ceased to hiss!." |
FlorusFlorus, Roman historian, lived in the time of Trajan and Hadrian.He compiled, chiefly from Livy, a brief sketch of the history of Rome from the foundation of the city to the closing of the temple of Janus by Augustus . The work, which is called Epitome de T...
on the loss of VarusPublius Quinctilius Varus was a Roman politician and general under emperor Augustus, mainly remembered for having lost three Roman legions and his own life when attacked by Germanic leader Arminius in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest.-Life:His paternal grandfather was senator Sextus Quinctilius...
' force |
Further east,
TrajanMarcus Ulpius Nerva Traianus, commonly known as Trajan , was a Roman Emperor who reigned from A. D. 98 until his death in A. D. 117...
turned his attention to
DaciaIn ancient geography, especially in Roman sources, Dacia was the land in East-Central Europe inhabited by the Dacians. Ancient Greeks called the same people "Getae"...
, an area north of Macedon and Greece and east of the Danube that had been on the Roman agenda since before the days of Caesar when they had beaten a Roman army at the Battle of Histria. In AD 85, the Dacians had swarmed over the Danube and pillaged
MoesiaMoesia was an ancient region and Roman province situated in the Balkans, along the south bank of the Danube River...
and initially defeated an army the Emperor
DomitianTitus Flavius Domitianus , known as Domitian, was a Roman Emperor who reigned from 14 September 81 until his death...
sent against them, but the Romans were victorious in the Battle of Tapae in AD 88 and a truce was drawn up.
Emperor Trajan recommenced hostilities against Dacia and, following an uncertain number of battles, defeated the Dacian general
DecebalusDecebalus or "The Brave One" was a king of Dacia
in the Second Battle of Tapae in 101. With Trajan's troops pressing towards the Dacian capital Sarmizegethusa, Decebalus once more sought terms. Decebalus rebuilt his power over the following years and attacked Roman garrisons again in 105. In response Trajan again marched into Dacia, besieging the Dacian capital in the Siege of Sarmizethusa, and razing it to the ground. With Dacia quelled, Trajan subsequently invaded the Parthian empire to the east, his conquests taking the Roman Empire to its greatest extent. Rome's borders in the east were indirectly governed through a system of client states for some time, leading to less direct campaigning than in the west in this period.
The land of Armenia between the Black Seaur a loser!The Black Sea is an inland sea bounded by Europe, Anatolia and the Caucasus and is ultimately connected to the Atlantic Ocean via the Mediterranean and Aegean Seas and various straits. The Bosporus strait connects it to the Sea of Marmara, and the strait of the Dardanelles connects it to...
and Caspian SeaThe Caspian Sea is the largest enclosed body of water on Earth by area, variously classed as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. It has a surface area of 371,000 square kilometres and a volume of 78,200 cubic kilometres...
became a focus of contention between Rome and the Parthian Empire, and control of the region was repeatedly gained and lost. The Parthians forced Armenia into submission from AD 37 but in AD 47 the Romans retook control of the kingdom and offered it client kingdomClient state is one of several terms used to describe the subordination of one state to a more powerful state in international affairs. It is the least specific of these terms and may be treated as a broad category which includes satellite state, puppet state, neo-colony, protectorate, vassal...
status. Under Nero, the Romans fought a campaign between AD 55 and 63The Roman–Parthian War of 58–63 was fought between the Roman Empire and the Parthian Empire over control of Armenia, a vital buffer state between the two realms...
against the Parthian Empire, which had again invaded Armenia. After gaining Armenia once more in AD 60 and subsequently losing it again in AD 62, the Romans sent Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo-Descent:Corbulo was born in Italy into a senatorial family. His father had the same name and his mother was named Vistilia, who came from a family who held the praetorship.-Under Caligula:...
in AD 63 into the territories of Vologases I of ParthiaParthia is a region of north-eastern Iran, best known for having been the political and cultural base of the Arsacid dynasts, after which the Arsacid Empire is then also known as the 'Parthian Empire'....
. Corbulo succeeded in returning Armenia to Roman client status, where it remained for the next century.
Year of the Four Emperors (69)
In 69 AD, Marcus Salvius Otho had the Emperor GalbaServius Sulpicius Galba , also called Servius Sulpicius Galba Caesar Augustus, was Roman Emperor for seven months, from 8 June 68 until his murder...
murdered and claimed the throne for himself. However, VitelliusAulus Vitellius Germanicus, born Aulus Vitellius and commonly known as Vitellius , was a Roman Emperor who reigned from 16 April 69 to 22 December of the same year...
, governor of the province of Germania InferiorGermania Inferior was a Roman province located on the left bank of the Rhine, in today's southern and western Netherlands, parts of Flanders, and Nordrhein-Westfalen left of the Rhine...
, had also claimed the throne and marched on Rome with his troops. Following an inconclusive battle near Antipolis, Vitellius' troops attacked the city of Placentia in the Assault of Placentia, but were repulsed by the Othonian garrison.
Otho left Rome on March 14, and marched north towards Placentia to meet his challenger. In the Battle of Locus CastrorumThe Battle of Locus Castrorum took place during the Year of the Four Emperors between the armies of the rival Roman emperors Otho and Vitellius. Locus Castorum was a village that existed in the 1st century Roman Empire roughly 15 kilometers from Cremona...
the Othonians had the better of the fighting, and Vitellius' troops retreated to Cremona. The two armies met again on the Via Postunia, in the First Battle of Bedriacum, after which the Othonian troops fled back to their camp in Bedriacum, and the next day surrendered to the Vitellian forces. Otho decided to commit suicide rather than fight on.
Meanwhile, the forces stationed in the Middle East provinces of JudaeaIudaea is the term used by historians to refer to the Roman province that extended over parts of the former regions of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdoms of Israel...
and SyriaSyria was a Roman province, annexed in 64 BC by Pompey, as a consequence of his military presence after pursuing victory in the Third Mithridatic War...
had acclaimed VespasianTitus Flavius Vespasianus, commonly known as Vespasian , was a Roman Emperor who reigned from 69 AD until his death in 79 AD...
as emperor and the Danubian armies of the provinces of RaetiaRaetia was a province of the Roman Empire, bounded on the west by the country of the Helvetii, on the east by Noricum, on the north by Vindelicia, and on the south by Cisalpine Gaul...
and MoesiaMoesia was an ancient region and Roman province situated in the Balkans, along the south bank of the Danube River...
also acclaimed Vespasian as Emperor. Vespasians' and Vitellius' armies met in the Second Battle of Bedriacum, after which the Vitellian troops were driven back into their camp outside Cremona, which was taken. Vespasian's troops then attacked Cremona itself, which surrendered.
Under pretence of siding with Vespasian, CivilisGaius Julius Civilis was the leader of the Batavian rebellion against the Romans in 69. By his nomen, it can be told that he was made a Roman citizen by either Augustus or Caligula....
of BataviaThe Batavians were a Germanic tribe, originally part of the Chatti, reported by Tacitus to have lived around the Rhine delta, in the area that is currently the Netherlands, "an uninhabited district on the extremity of the coast of Gaul, and also of a neighbouring island, surrounded by the ocean...
had taken up arms and induced the inhabitants of his native country to rebel. The rebelling Batavians were immediately joined by several neighbouring German tribes including the FrisiansThe Frisians are an ethnic group of Germanic people living in coastal parts of The Netherlands, Denmark and Germany. They are concentrated in the Dutch provinces of Friesland and Groningen and, in Germany, East Frisia and North Frisia. They inhabit an area known as Frisia...
. These forces drove out the Roman garrisons near the Rhine and defeated a Roman army at the Battle of Castra Vetera, after which many Roman troops along the Rhine and in Gaul defected to the Batavian cause. However, disputes soon broke out amongst the different tribes, rendering co-operation impossible; Vespasian, having successfully ended the civil war, called upon Civilis to lay down his arms, and on his refusal his legions met him in force, defeating him in the Battle of Augusta Treverorum.
Jewish revolts (66–135)
The first Jewish-Roman War, sometimes called The Great Revolt, was the first of three major rebellions by the Jews of Judaea Province against the Roman Empire. Judea was already a troubled region with bitter violence among several competing Jewish sects and a long history of rebellion The Jews' anger turned on Rome following robberies from their temples and Roman insensitivity – Tacitus says disgust and repulsion – towards their religion. The Jews began to prepare for armed revolt. Earlier successes including the repulse of the First Siege of Jerusalem and the Battle of Beth-HoronThe Battle of Beth Horon was a battle fought in 66 AD between Roman and Jewish rebel forces in the First Jewish-Roman War.-Background:Roman influence in Judea first began around 63 B.C., when the Roman general Pompey arrived in the Middle East as part of the Roman campaign against Mithridates, the...
only attracted greater attention from Rome and Emperor Nero appointed general Vespasian to crush the rebellion. Vespasian led his forces in a methodical clearance of the areas in revolt. By the year 68, Jewish resistance in the North had been crushed. A few towns and cities held out for a few years before falling to the Romans, leading to the Siege of Masada in 73 AD and the Second Siege of JerusalemThe Siege of Jerusalem in the year 70 AD was a decisive event in the First Jewish-Roman War. It was followed by the fall of Masada in 73 AD. The Roman army, led by the future Emperor Titus, with Tiberius Julius Alexander as his second-in-command, besieged and conquered the city of Jerusalem, which...
.
In 115, revolt broke out again in the province, leading to the second Jewish-Roman war known as the Kitos WarThe Kitos War is the name given to the second of the Jewish-Roman wars. The name comes from the Mauretanian Roman general Lusius Quietus who suppressed a Jewish revolt in Mesopotamia and was sent to Iudaea to handle the revolt there as procurator under Trajan...
, and again in 132 in what is known as Bar Kokhba's revoltThe Bar Kokhba revolt against the Roman Empire was the third major rebellion by the Jews of Iudaea Province and the last of the Jewish-Roman Wars....
. Both were brutally crushed.
Struggle with Parthia (161–217)
By the second century AD the territories of Persia were controlled by the Arsacid dynasty and known as the Parthian EmpireThe Parthian Empire , was a major Iranian political and cultural power in the ancient Near East, and a counterweight to the Roman Empire in the region....
. Due in large part to their employment of powerful heavy cavalry and mobile horse-archers, Parthia was the most formidable enemy of the Roman Empire in the east. As early as 53 BC, the Roman general Crassus had invaded Parthia, but he was killed and his army was defeated at the Battle of CarrhaeThe Battle of Carrhae, fought in 53 BC near the town of Carrhae, was a major battle between the Parthian Empire and the Roman Republic. A Roman invasion force led by Marcus Licinius Crassus was decisively crushed by the Parthian Spahbod Surena...
. In the years following Carrhae, the Romans were divided in civil war and hence unable to campaign against Parthia. Trajan also campaigned against the Parthians and briefly captured their capital, putting a puppet ruler on the throne, but rebellions with the province and the Jewish revolts in Judea made it difficult to maintain the captured province and the territories were abandoned.
A revitalised Parthian Empire renewed its assault in 161, defeating two Roman armies and invading Armenia and Syria. Emperor Lucius VerusLucius Aurelius Verus , born as Lucius Ceionius Commodus, known simply as Lucius Verus, was Roman co-emperor with Marcus Aurelius , from 161 until his death.-Early life and career:...
and general Gaius Avidius Cassius were sent in 162 to counter the resurgent Parthia. In this war, the Parthian city of Seleucia on the Tigris was destroyed and the palace at the capital Ctesiphon was burned to the ground by Avidius CassiusGaius Avidius Cassius was a Roman usurper who briefly ruled Egypt and Syria in 175.A native of Cyrrhus, Syria, he was the son of Gaius Avidius Heliodorus, a noted orator who was prefect of Egypt from 137 to 142 under Hadrian...
in 164. The Parthians made peace but were forced to cede western Mesopotamia to the Romans.
In 197, Emperor Septimius SeverusLucius Septimius Severus was a Roman Emperor who reigned from 14 April, 193 until his death in 211. Severus was the first emperor of the troubled Severan dynasty, the last imperial dynasty of the Roman principate before the Crisis of the Third Century...
waged a brief and successful war against the Parthian Empire in retaliation for the support given to rival for the imperial throne Pescennius NigerGaius Pescennius Niger was a Roman usurper from 193 to 194 during the Year of the Five Emperors. Niger was born of an old Italian equestrian family....
. The Parthian capital Ctesiphon was sacked by the Roman army, and the northern half of Mesopotamia was restored to Rome.
Emperor CaracallaCaracalla , born Lucius Septimius Bassianus and later called Marcus Aurelius Antoninus and Marcus Aurelius Severus Antoninus, was the eldest son of Septimius Severus and Roman Emperor from 211 to 217. He was one of the most nefarious of Roman emperors...
, the son of Severus, marched on Parthia in 217 from Edessa to begin a war against them, but he was assassinated while on the march. In 224, the Parthian Empire was crushed not by the Romans but by the rebellious Persian vassal king Ardashir, who revolted, leading to the establishment of Sassanid EmpireThe Sassanid Empire or Sasanian Empire, known to its inhabitants as Ērānshahr, was the last pre-Islamic Persian Empire, ruled by the Sasanian Dynasty who reigned from 224 to 651 CE...
of Persia, which replaced Parthia as Rome's major rival in the East.
Throughout the Parthian wars, tribal groups along the Rhine and Danube took advantage of Rome's preoccupation with the eastern frontier (and the plague that the Romans suffered from after bringing it back form the east) and launched a series of raids and incursions into Rome's territories, including the Marcomannic WarsThe Marcomannic Wars were a series of wars lasting over a dozen years from about AD 166 until 180. These wars pitted the Roman Empire against the Marcomanni, Quadi and other Germanic peoples, along both sides of the upper and middle Danube...
.
Migration period (163–378)
After Varus' defeat in Germania in the first century, Rome had adopted a largely defensive strategy along the border with Germania, constructing a line of defences known as limesA limes was a border defense or delimiting system of Ancient Rome. It marked the boundaries of the Roman Empire....
along the Rhine. Although the exact historicity is unclear, since the Romans often assigned one name to several distinct tribal groups, or conversely applied several names to a single group at different times, some mix of Germanic peoples, Celts, and tribes of mixed Celto-Germanic ethnicity were settled in the lands of Germania from the first century onwards. The CherusciThe Cherusci were a Germanic tribe that inhabited parts of the northern Rhine valley and the plains and forests of northwestern Germany, in the area between present-day Osnabrück and Hanover), during the 1st century BC and 1st century. The name refers to a sword and *skaz, from Indo-European -skos...
, BructeriThe Bructeri were a Germanic tribe located in northwestern Germany , between the Lippe and Ems rivers south of the Teutoburg Forest, in present-day North Rhine-Westphalia around 100 BC through 350 AD....
, Tencteri, UsipiThe Usipi were a German tribe whose territory lay on the right bank of the Rhine , probably between the valleys of the Lahn and Sieg...
, MarsiThe Marsi were an ancient people of Italy, whose chief centre was Marruvium, on the eastern shore of Lake Fucinus. The area in which they lived is now called Marsica....
, and ChattiThe Chatti were an ancient Germanic tribe whose homeland was near the upper Weser. They settled in central and northern Hesse and southern Lower Saxony, along the upper reaches of the Weser River and in the valleys and mountains of the Eder, Fulda and Weser River regions, a district approximately...
of Varus' time had by the third century either evolved into or been displaced by a confederacy or alliance of Germanic tribes collectively known as the AlamanniThe Alamanni, Allemanni, or Alemanni were originally an alliance of Germanic tribes located around the upper Main river . One of the earliest references to them is the cognomen Alamannicus assumed by Roman Emperor Caracalla, who ruled the Roman Empire from 211–17 and claimed thereby to be their...
, first mentioned by Cassius Dio describing the campaign of Caracalla in 213.
In around 166 AD, several Germanic tribes pushed across the Danube, striking as far as Italy itself in the Siege of Aquileia in 166 AD, and the heartland of Greece in the Sack of Eleusis.
Although the essential problem of large tribal groups on the frontier remained much the same as the situation Rome faced in earlier centuries, the third century saw a marked increase in the overall threat, although there is disagreement over whether external pressure increased, or Rome's ability to meet it declined. The CarpiThe Carpi or Carpiani were a Dacian tribe that were located, between not later than ca. 100 and until at least ca. 400 AD, in the central eastern Carpathian Mountains, and in what is today central Moldavia...
and SarmatiansThe Sarmatians, Sarmatæ or Sauromatæ were a people of Ancient Iranian origin. Mentioned by classical authors, they migrated from Central Asia to the Ural Mountains around fifth century B.C...
whom Rome had held at bay were replaced by the GothsThe Goths were a heterogeneous East Germanic tribe. The historian Jordanes claimed that the Goths arrived from semi-legendary Scandza, believed to be somewhere in modern Götaland , and that a Gothic population had crossed the Baltic Sea before the 2nd century, lending their name to the region of...
and likewise the QuadiThe Quadi were a smaller Germanic tribe, about which little definitive information is known. The history of non-literate peoples is written by their opponents, and we can only know the Germanic tribe the Romans called the 'Quadi' through Roman eyes...
and MarcomanniThe Marcomanni were a Germanic tribe, probably related to the Buri, Suebi or Suevi.- Origin :Scholars believe their name derives from one of two possible sources: old Germanic forms of "march" and "men"; or the name of a Roman legate, Marcus Fabius Romanus, who deserted Drusus' legions during...
that Rome had defeated were replaced by the greater confederation of the AlamanniThe Alamanni, Allemanni, or Alemanni were originally an alliance of Germanic tribes located around the upper Main river . One of the earliest references to them is the cognomen Alamannicus assumed by Roman Emperor Caracalla, who ruled the Roman Empire from 211–17 and claimed thereby to be their...
.
The assembled warbands of the Alamanni frequently crossed the limes, attacking Germania Superior such that they were almost continually engaged in conflicts with the Roman Empire, whilst Goths attacked across the Danube in battles such as the Battle of Beroa and Battle of PhilippopolisThe Battle of Philippopolis was fought in 250 AD between Rome and the Goths. The Goths were led by King Cniva, and after a long siege, they were victorious. The king subsequently allied himself with the town commander and governor of Thrace, Lucius Priscus, to take on the Roman Emperor Decius...
in 250 and the Battle of AbrittusThe Battle of Abritus , also known as the Battle of Forum Terebronii, occurred in the Roman province of Moesia Inferior probably in July, 251, between the Roman Empire and a federation of "Scythian" tribesmen under the Goth King Cniva. The Romans were soundly defeated, and Roman Emperors Decius and...
in 251, and both Goths and HeruliThe Heruli were a nomadic Germanic people, who were subjugated by the Ostrogoths, Huns, and Byzantines in the 3rd to 5th centuries. The name is related to earl and was probably an honorific military title...
ravaged the Aegean and, later, Greece, Thrace and Macedonia. However, their first major assault deep into Roman territory came in 268. In that year the Romans were forced to denude much of their German frontier of troops in response to a massive invasion by another new Germanic tribal confederacy, the GothsThe Goths were a heterogeneous East Germanic tribe. The historian Jordanes claimed that the Goths arrived from semi-legendary Scandza, believed to be somewhere in modern Götaland , and that a Gothic population had crossed the Baltic Sea before the 2nd century, lending their name to the region of...
, from the east. The pressure of tribal groups pushing into the Empire was the end result of a chain of migrations with its roots far to the east: HunsThe Huns were a group of nomadic pastoral people who, appearing from beyond the Volga, migrated into Europe c.AD 370 and built up an enormous empire in Europe. They were possibly the descendants of the Xiongnu who had been northern neighbours of China three hundred years before and may be the first...
from the Russian steppe attacked the GothsThe Goths were a heterogeneous East Germanic tribe. The historian Jordanes claimed that the Goths arrived from semi-legendary Scandza, believed to be somewhere in modern Götaland , and that a Gothic population had crossed the Baltic Sea before the 2nd century, lending their name to the region of...
, who in turn attacked the DaciansThe Dacians were an Indo-European people, the ancient inhabitants of Dacia , present-day Romania and Moldova, parts of Sarmatia and Scythia Minor in southeastern Europe...
, AlansThe Alans or Alani were a group of Sarmatian tribes, nomadic pastoralists of the 1st millennium AD who spoke an Eastern Iranian language which derived from Scytho-Sarmatian and which in turn evolved into modern Ossetian.-Name:The various forms of Alan — Greek: Αλανοί, Αλαννοί; Chinese: 阿蘭聊...
and SarmatiansThe Sarmatians, Sarmatæ or Sauromatæ were a people of Ancient Iranian origin. Mentioned by classical authors, they migrated from Central Asia to the Ural Mountains around fifth century B.C...
at or inside Rome's borders. The Goths first appeared in history as a distinct people in this invasion of 268 when they swarmed over the Balkan peninsula and over-ran the Roman provinces of Pannonia and Illyricum and even threatened Italia itself.
The Alamanni seized the opportunity to launch a major invasion of Gaul and northern Italy. However, the Visigoths were defeated in battle that summer near the modern Italian-Slovenian border and then routed in the Battle of NaissusThe Battle of Naissus was the defeat of a Gothic coalition by the Roman Empire under Emperor Gallienus near Naissus...
that September by GallienusPublius Licinius Egnatius Gallienus ruled the Roman Empire as co-emperor with his father Valerian from 253 to 260, and then as the sole Roman Emperor from 260 to 268. He took control of the empire at a time when it was undergoing great crisis...
, ClaudiusMarcus Aurelius Claudius , often referred to as Claudius Gothicus or Claudius II, was a Roman Emperor. He ruled the Roman Empire for less than two years , but during that brief time he managed to obtain some successes. He was later given divine status.-Origin and rise to power:Claudius' origin...
and AurelianLucius Domitius Aurelianus , known in English as Aurelian, Roman Emperor , was the second of several highly successful "soldier-emperors" who helped the Roman Empire regain its power during the latter part of the third century and the beginning of the fourth.During his reign, the Empire was...
, who then turned and defeated the Alemanni at the Battle of Lake BenacusThe Battle of Lake Benacus was one of the decisive battles that marked the beginning of the Roman Empire's emergence from the Crisis of the Third Century...
. Claudius' successor AurelianLucius Domitius Aurelianus , known in English as Aurelian, Roman Emperor , was the second of several highly successful "soldier-emperors" who helped the Roman Empire regain its power during the latter part of the third century and the beginning of the fourth.During his reign, the Empire was...
defeated the Goths twice more in the Battle of Fanum Fortunae and the Battle of Ticinum. The Goths remained a major threat to the Empire but directed their attacks away from Italy itself for several years after their defeat. By 284 AD, Gothic troops were serving on behalf of the Roman military as federated troops.
The Alamanni on the other hand resumed their drive towards Italy almost immediately. They defeated AurelianLucius Domitius Aurelianus , known in English as Aurelian, Roman Emperor , was the second of several highly successful "soldier-emperors" who helped the Roman Empire regain its power during the latter part of the third century and the beginning of the fourth.During his reign, the Empire was...
at the Battle of PlacentiaThe Battle of Placentia was fought in January 271 between a Roman army led by Emperor Aurelian and the Alamanni , near modern Piacenza....
in 271 but were beaten back for a short time after they lost the battles of FanoThe Battle of Fano - also known as the Battle of Fanum Fortunae - was fought in January 271 between the Roman Empire and the Alamanni. The Romans were led by Emperor Aurelian, and they were victorious....
and PaviaThe Battle of Pavia was fought in 271 near Pavia , and resulted in the Roman Emperor Aurelian destroying the retreating Alamanni army.- The Battle :...
later that year. They were beaten again in 298 at the battles of LingonesThe Battle of Lingones was fought in 298 between the Roman Empire and the Alamanni. The Roman force was led by Constantius Chlorus, and was victorious....
and VindonissaThe Battle of Vindonissa was fought in 298 between the Roman Empire army, led by Emperor Constantius Chlorus, and the Alemanni. The Romans won the battle, fought in Vindonissa, strengthening Rome's defenses along the Rhine....
but fifty years later they were resurgent again, making incursions in 356 at the Battle of ReimsThe Battle of Reims was fought in 356 between the Roman army led by Emperor Julian the Apostate and the Alemanni. The Alemanni were victorious....
, in 357 at the Battle of StrasbourgThe Battle of Strasbourg, also known as the Battle of Argentoratum, was fought in 357 between the Late Roman army under the Caesar Julian and the Alamanni tribal confederation led by the joint paramount king Chnodomar...
, in 367 at the Battle of SoliciniumThe Battle of Solicinium was fought in 367 between a Roman Empire army and the Alamanni. The Roman force was led by Emperor Valentinian I, and they managed to repel the Alamanni, but suffered heavy losses during the battle....
and in 378 at Battle of ArgentovariaThe Battle of Argentovaria was fought in May 378 between the Roman emperor Gratian and the invading army of the Lentienses, at Argentovaria . With this defeat, the Lentienses disappear from history....
. In the same year the GothsThe Goths were a heterogeneous East Germanic tribe. The historian Jordanes claimed that the Goths arrived from semi-legendary Scandza, believed to be somewhere in modern Götaland , and that a Gothic population had crossed the Baltic Sea before the 2nd century, lending their name to the region of...
inflicted a crushing defeat on the Eastern Empire at the Battle of AdrianopleThe Battle of Adrianople , sometimes known as the Battle of Hadrianopolis, was fought between a Roman army led by the Roman Emperor Valens and Gothic rebels led by Fritigern...
, in which the Eastern Emperor ValensFlavius Julius Valens was Roman Emperor , after he was given the Eastern part of the empire by his brother Valentinian I...
was massacred along with tens of thousands of Roman troops.
At the same time, FranksThe Franks or Frankish people were a West Germanic tribal confederation first attested in the 3rd century as living north and east of the Lower Rhine River. From the third to fifth centuries some Franks raided Roman territory while other Franks joined the Roman troops in Gaul...
raided through the North Sea and the English ChannelThe English Channel is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest, to only in the Strait of Dover...
, VandalsThe Vandals were an East Germanic tribe that entered the late Roman Empire during the 5th century. The Goth Theodoric the Great, king of the Ostrogoths and regent of the Visigoths, was allied by marriage with the Vandals as well as with the Burgundians and the Franks under .The Vandals are perhaps...
pressed across the Rhine, Iuthungi against the Danube, IazygesThe Iazyges were a nomadic tribe. Known also as Jaxamatae, Ixibatai, Iazygite, Jászok, Ászi. They were a branch of the Sarmatian people who, c. 200 BC, swept westward from central Asia onto the steppes of what is now Ukraine...
, CarpiThe Carpi or Carpiani were a Dacian tribe that were located, between not later than ca. 100 and until at least ca. 400 AD, in the central eastern Carpathian Mountains, and in what is today central Moldavia...
and Taifali harassed Dacia, and Gepids joined the Goths and Heruli in attacks round the Black Sea. At around the same time, lesser-known tribes such as the Bavares, Baquates and Quinquegentanei raided Africa.
At the start of the fifth century AD, the pressure on Rome's western borders was growing intense. However, it was not only the western borders that were under threat: Rome was also under threat both internally and on its eastern borders.
Usurpers (193–394)
A military that was often willing to support its commander over its emperor meant that commanders could establish sole control of the army they were responsible for and usurp the imperial throne. The so-called Crisis of the Third CenturyThe Crisis of the Third Century was a period in which the Roman Empire nearly collapsed under the combined pressures of invasion, civil war, plague, and economic depression...
describes the turmoil of murder, usurpation and in-fighting that is traditionally seen as developing with the murder of the Emperor Alexander SeverusMarcus Aurelius Severus Alexander , commonly called Alexander Severus, was the last Roman emperor of the Severan dynasty...
in 235. However, Cassius Dio marks the wider imperial decline as beginning in 180 AD with ascension of CommodusLucius Aurelius Commodus Antoninus was a Roman Emperor who ruled from 180 to 192 . The name given here was his official name at his accession to sole rule; see Changes of name for earlier and later forms...
to the throne, a judgement with which GibbonEdward Gibbon was an English historian and Member of Parliament. His most important work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, was published in six volumes between 1776 and 1788...
concurred, and MatyszakPhilip Matyszak is a British non-fiction author, primarily of historical works relating to ancient Rome .-Personal biography:Matyszak has a doctorate in Roman history from St John's College, Oxford. In addition to being a professional author, he also teaches ancient history for Madingley Hall...
states that "the rot... had become established long before" even that.
Though the crisis of the third century was not the absolute beginning of Rome's decline, nevertheless it did mark a severe strain on the empire as Romans waged war on one another as they had not done since the final days of the Republic. Within the space of a single century, twenty-seven military officers claimed themselves emperors and reigned over parts of the empire for months or days, all but two meeting with a violent end. The time was characterised by a Roman army that was as likely to be attacking itself as an outside invader, reaching a low point around 258 AD. Ironically, while it was these usurpations that led to the break up of the Empire during the crisis, it was the strength of several frontier generals that helped reunify the empire through force of arms.
The situation was complex, often with 3 or more usurpers in existence at once. Septimius SeverusLucius Septimius Severus was a Roman Emperor who reigned from 14 April, 193 until his death in 211. Severus was the first emperor of the troubled Severan dynasty, the last imperial dynasty of the Roman principate before the Crisis of the Third Century...
and Pescennius NigerGaius Pescennius Niger was a Roman usurper from 193 to 194 during the Year of the Five Emperors. Niger was born of an old Italian equestrian family....
, both rebel generals promoted as emperors by the troops they commanded, clashed for the first time in 193 AD at the Battle of CyzicusThe Battle of Cyzicus was fought in 193 between the forces of Septimus Severus and his rival for the empire, Pescennius Niger.The battle took place in the context of the Year of the Five Emperors, a tumultuous period in the Roman Empire when Emperor Pertinax was assassinated by the Praetorian Guards...
, in which Niger was defeated. However, it took two further defeats at the Battle of NicaeaThe Battle of Nicaea was fought in 193 between the forces of Septimus Severus and his eastern rival, Pescennius Niger. It took place at Nicaea in Asia Minor...
later that year and the Battle of IssusThe Battle of Issus was the third major battle, following the Battle of Nicaea, in 194 between the forces of Emperor Septimus Severus and his rival, Pescennius Niger, part of the Year of the Five Emperors. Pescennius Niger was the Roman governor of Syria who had been acclaimed Emperor by his...
the following year, for Niger to be definitively defeated. Almost as soon as Niger's hopes of the imperial crown had been laid to rest, Severus was forced to deal with another rival for the throne in the person of Clodius AlbinusDecimus Clodius Septimius Albinus was a Roman usurper proclaimed emperor by the legions in Britain and Hispania upon the murder of Pertinax.-Life:...
, who had originally been allied to Severus. Albinus was proclaimed emperor by his troops in Britain and, crossing over to Gaul, defeated Severus' general Virius LupusVirius Lupus was a Roman soldier and politician of the late second and early 3rd century.He served as a legatus of one of the German provinces and supported Septimus Severus during the civil war that followed the murder of Pertinax...
in battle, before being in turn defeated and killed himself in the Battle of LugdunumThe Battle of Lugdunum, also called the Battle of Lyon, was fought on 19 February 197 at Lugdunum , between the armies of the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus and of the Roman usurper Clodius Albinus...
by Severus himself.
After this turmoil, Severus faced no more internal threats for the rest of his reign, and the reign of his successor CaracallaCaracalla , born Lucius Septimius Bassianus and later called Marcus Aurelius Antoninus and Marcus Aurelius Severus Antoninus, was the eldest son of Septimius Severus and Roman Emperor from 211 to 217. He was one of the most nefarious of Roman emperors...
passed uninterrupted for a while until he was murdered by MacrinusMarcus Opellius Macrinus was Roman emperor for fourteen months in 217 and 218. Macrinus was the first emperor to become so without membership in the senatorial class...
, who proclaimed himsef emperor in his place. Despite Macrinus having his position ratified by the Roman senate, the troops of Varius AvitusElagabalus , also known as Heliogabalus or Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, was a Roman Emperor of the Severan dynasty who reigned from 218 to 222...
declared him to be emperor instead, and the two met in battle at the Battle of AntiochThe Battle of Antioch took place between two Roman armies of the Roman Emperor Macrinus and his contender Elagabalus, whose troops were commanded by general Gannys. Elagabalus won and was crowned emperor.- History :...
in 218 AD, in which Macrinus was defeated. However, Avitus himself – taking the imperial name Elagabalus – was murdered shortly afterwards and Alexander SeverusMarcus Aurelius Severus Alexander , commonly called Alexander Severus, was the last Roman emperor of the Severan dynasty...
was proclaimed emperor by both the Praetorian Guard and the senate who, after a short reign, was murdered in turn. His murderers were working on behalf of the army who were unhappy with their lot under his rule and who raised in his place Maximinus ThraxGaius Iulius Verus Maximinus , also known as Maximinus Thrax and Maximinus I, was Roman Emperor from 235 to 238....
. However, just as he had been raised by the army, Maximinus was also brought down by them and despite winning the Battle of CarthageThe Battle of Carthage was fought in 238 between a Roman army loyal to Emperor Maximinus Thrax and the forces of Emperors Gordian I and Gordian II....
against the senate's newly-proclaimed Gordian IIMarcus Antonius Gordianus Sempronianus Romanus Africanus , known in English as Gordian II, was Roman Emperor during the year 238....
, he was murdered when it appeared to his forces as though he would not be able to best the next senatorial candidate for the throne, Gordian IIIMarcus Antonius Gordianus Pius , known in English as Gordian III, was Roman Emperor from 238 to 244. Gordian was the son of Antonia Gordiana and his father was an unnamed Roman Senator who died before 238. Antonia Gordiana was the daughter of Emperor Gordian I and younger sister of Emperor Gordian II...
.
Gordian III's fate is not certain, although he may have been murdered by his own successor, Philip the ArabMarcus Julius Philippus or Philippus I Arabs , known in English as Philip the Arab or formerly in English as Philip the Arabian, was a Roman Emperor from 244 to 249.-Early life:...
, who ruled for only a few years before the army again raised a general to proclaimed emperor, this time DeciusGaius Messius Quintus Decius was the Emperor of Rome from 249 to 251. In the last year of his reign, he co-ruled with his son Herennius Etruscus until both of them were killed in the Battle of Abrittus.-Early life and rise to power:...
, who defeated Philip in the Battle of VeronaThe Battle of Verona was fought in June of 403 by Alaric's Visigoths, and a Roman force led by Stilicho. Alaric was defeated and subsequently withdrew from Italy....
to seize the throne. Several succeeding generals avoided battling usurpers for the throne chiefly by virtue of being murdered by their own troops before battle could commence, which at least relieved the empire momentarily of manpower losses to internal strife. The lone exception to this rule was GallienusPublius Licinius Egnatius Gallienus ruled the Roman Empire as co-emperor with his father Valerian from 253 to 260, and then as the sole Roman Emperor from 260 to 268. He took control of the empire at a time when it was undergoing great crisis...
, emperor from 260 AD to 268 AD, who saw a remarkable array of usurpersThe Gallienus usurpers were the usurpers who claimed imperial power during the reign of Gallienus...
, most of whom he defeated in pitched battle. The army was therefore mostly spared further infighting until around 273 AD, when Aurelian defeated the Gallic usurper TetricusCaius Pius Esuvius Tetricus was Emperor of the Gallic Empire from 270/271 to 273, following the murder of Victorinus. Tetricus, who ruled with his son, Tetricus II, was the last of the Gallic emperors.-Biography:...
in the Battle of ChalonsThe Battle of Châlons was fought in 274 between Roman Emperor Aurelian and Emperor Tetricus I of the Gallic Empire. Fought in what is now Châlons-en-Champagne, France, it was the battle that marked the end of the independent Gallic Empire, and its unification back to the Roman Empire, after...
. The next decade saw a barely credible number of usurpers, sometimes 3 at the same time, all vying for the imperial throne. Most of the battles are not recorded, primarily due to the turmoil of the time, until DiocletianGaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus , born Diocles and commonly known as Diocletian , was Roman Emperor from 20 November 284 to 1 May 305. Born to a Dalmatian family of low status, he rose through the ranks of the military to become cavalry commander to the emperor Carus...
, a usurper himself, defeated CarinusMarcus Aurelius Carinus was Roman Emperor and elder son of the Emperor Carus, on whose accession he was appointed governor of the western portion of the empire....
at the Battle of the MargusThe Battle of the Margus was fought in July 285 between the armies of Roman Emperors Diocletian and Carinus in the valley of the Margus River in Moesia ....
to become emperor.
Some small measure of stability again returned at this point, with the empire split into a Tetrarchy of two greater and two lesser emperors, a system that staved off civil wars for a short time until 312 AD. In that year, relations between the tetrarchy collapsed for good and Constantine ICaesar Flavius Valerius Aurelius Constantinus Augustus , commonly known in English as Constantine I, Constantine the Great, or Saint Constantine , was Roman emperor from 306, and the sole holder of that office from 324 until his death in...
, LiciniusValerius Licinianus Licinius was Roman emperor from 308 to 324.Of Dacian peasant origin, born in Moesia Superior, Licinius accompanied his close childhood friend, the Emperor Galerius, on the Persian expedition in 297. After the death of Flavius Valerius Severus, Galerius elevated Licinius to the...
, MaxentiusMarcus Aurelius Valerius Maxentius was Western Roman Emperor from 306 to 312. He was the son of former emperor Maximian, and the son-in-law of Galerius, also an emperor.-Birth and early life:...
and MaximinusGaius Valerius Galerius Maximinus Roman emperor from 308 to 313, was originally named Daia. He was born of peasant stock to the half sister of the Roman emperor Galerius near their family lands around Felix Romuliana; a rural area now in the Danubian region of Serbia, then the newly reorganised...
jostled for control of the empire. In the Battle of TurinThe Battle of Turin was fought in 312 between Roman emperor Constantine and the troops of his rival augustus, Maxentius. Constantine won the battle, giving an impressive display of the tactical skill which was to characterise his whole military career...
Constantine defeated Maxentius, and in the Battle of TzirallumThe Battle of Tzirallum was one of the Civil Wars of the Tetrarchy fought in 313 near Heraclea between the Roman armies of emperors Licinius and Maximinus.-Background:...
LiciniusValerius Licinianus Licinius was Roman emperor from 308 to 324.Of Dacian peasant origin, born in Moesia Superior, Licinius accompanied his close childhood friend, the Emperor Galerius, on the Persian expedition in 297. After the death of Flavius Valerius Severus, Galerius elevated Licinius to the...
defeated MaximinusGaius Valerius Galerius Maximinus Roman emperor from 308 to 313, was originally named Daia. He was born of peasant stock to the half sister of the Roman emperor Galerius near their family lands around Felix Romuliana; a rural area now in the Danubian region of Serbia, then the newly reorganised...
. From 314 AD onwards, Constantine defeated Licinius in the Battle of CibalaeThe Battle of Cibalae was fought on October 8, 314 , between the two Roman emperors Constantine I and Licinius. The site of the battle was approximately 350 kilometers within the territory of Licinius...
, then the Battle of MardiaThe Battle of Mardia, also known as Battle of Campus Mardiensis or Battle of Campus Ardiensis, was fought, probably at modern Harmanli in Thrace, in late 316/early 317 between the forces of Roman Emperors Constantine I and Licinius....
, and then again at the Battle of AdrianopleThe Battle of Adrianople was fought on July 3, 324 during a Roman civil war, the second to be waged between the two emperors Constantine I and Licinius; Licinius suffered a heavy defeat.-Background:...
, the Battle of the HellespontThe Battle of the Hellespont, consisting of two separate naval clashes, was fought in 324 between a Constantinian fleet, led by the eldest son of Constantine I, Flavius Julius Crispus; and a larger fleet under Licinius' admiral, Abantus...
and the Battle of ChrysopolisThe Battle of Chrysopolis was fought on 18 September 324 at Chrysopolis , near Chalcedon , between the two Roman emperors Constantine I and Licinius. The battle was the final encounter between the two emperors. After his navy's defeat in the Battle of the Hellespont, Licinius withdrew his forces...
.
Constantine then turned to Maxentius, beating him in the Battle of VeronaThe Battle of Verona was fought in 312 between the forces of the Roman emperors Constantine I and Maxentius. Maxentius' forces were defeated, and Ruricius Pompeianus, the most senior Maxentian commander, was killed in the fighting.-Background:...
and the Battle of Milvian BridgeThe Battle of the Milvian Bridge took place between the Roman Emperors Constantine I and Maxentius on 28 October 312. Constantine won the battle and started on the path that led him to end the Tetrarchy and become the sole ruler of the Roman Empire...
in the same year. Constantine's son Constantius IIFlavius Iulius Constantius, known in English as Constantius II was a Roman Emperor of the Constantinian dynasty.-Early life:...
inherited his father's rule and later defeated the usurper MagnentiusFlavius Magnus Magnentius was a usurper of the Western Roman Empire .-Early life and career:...
in first the Battle of Mursa MajorThe Battle of Mursa Major was fought in 351 between the Eastern Roman army led by Constantius II and the western forces supporting the usurper Magnentius.The action took place along the valley of the Drava River, a Danube tributary in present day Croatia....
and then the Battle of Mons SeleucusThe Battle of Mons Seleucus was fought in 353 between the forces of the legitimate Roman emperor Constantius II of the line of Constantine I the Great and the forces of the usurper Magnentius. Constantius' forces were victorious, and Magnentius later committed suicide.It took place in today's...
.
Successive emperors ValensFlavius Julius Valens was Roman Emperor , after he was given the Eastern part of the empire by his brother Valentinian I...
and Theodosius IFlavius Theodosius , also called Theodosius I and Theodosius the Great , was Roman Emperor from 379 to 395. Reuniting the eastern and western portions of the empire, Theodosius was the last emperor of both the Eastern and Western Roman Empire...
also defeated usurpers in, respectively, the Battle of ThyatiraThe Battle of Thyatira was fought in 366 at Thyatira, Phrygia , between the army of the Roman Emperor Valens and the army of the usurper Procopius, led by his general Gomoarius....
, and the battles of the SaveThe Battle of the Save was fought in 388 between the forces of Roman usurper Magnus Maximus and the Eastern Roman Empire . Emperor Theodosius I defeated Magnus Maximus's army in battle. Later Maximus was captured and executed at Aquileia.-References:...
and the FrigidusThe Battle of the Frigidus, also called the Battle of the Frigid River, was fought between September 5–6 394, between the army of the Eastern Emperor Theodosius I and the army of Western Roman ruler Eugenius....
.
Struggle with the Sassanid Empire (230–363)
After overthrowing the Parthian confederacy, the Sassanid EmpireThe Sassanid Empire or Sasanian Empire, known to its inhabitants as Ērānshahr, was the last pre-Islamic Persian Empire, ruled by the Sasanian Dynasty who reigned from 224 to 651 CE...
that arose from its remains pursued a more aggressive expansionist policy than their predecessors and continued to make war against Rome. In 230 AD, the first Sassanid emperor attacked Roman territory first in ArmeniaArmenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...
and then in MesopotamiaMesopotamia "land between the rivers" is a name for the Tigris–Euphrates region in the eastern Mediterranean, largely corresponding to Iraq, as well as northeastern Syria, some parts of southeastern Turkey, and some parts of the Khūzestān Province of southwestern...
but Roman losses were largely restored by SeverusMarcus Aurelius Severus Alexander , commonly called Alexander Severus, was the last Roman emperor of the Severan dynasty...
within a few years. In 243, Emperor Gordian IIIMarcus Antonius Gordianus Pius , known in English as Gordian III, was Roman Emperor from 238 to 244. Gordian was the son of Antonia Gordiana and his father was an unnamed Roman Senator who died before 238. Antonia Gordiana was the daughter of Emperor Gordian I and younger sister of Emperor Gordian II...
's army retook the Roman cities of Hatra, Nisibis and Carrhae from the Sassanids after defeating the Sassanids at the Battle of ResaenaThe Battle of Resaena or Resaina, near Ceylanpinar TR, was fought in 243 between the forces of the Roman Empire, led by Praetorian Prefect Timesitheus, and a Sassanid Empire army, led by King Shapur I. The Romans were victorious....
but what happened next is unclear: Persian sources claim that Gordian was defeated and killed in the Battle of MisikheIn 243, Emperor Gordian III of Rome's army retook the Roman cities of Hatra, Nisibis and Carrhae from the Sassanid Empire after defeating the Sassanids at the Battle of Resaena. What happened next is unclear: Persian sources claim that Gordian III was defeated and killed in the Battle of Misikhe,...
but Roman sources mention this battle only as an insignificant setback and suggest that Gordian died elsewhere.
Certainly, the Sassanids had not been cowed by the previous battles with Rome and in 253 the Sassanids under Shapur IShapur I was the second Sassanid King of the Second Persian Empire. The dates of his reign are commonly given as 241 - 272, but it is likely that he also reigned as co-regent prior to his father's death in 241.-Early years:...
penetrated deeply into Roman territory several times, defeating a Roman force at the Battle of BarbalissosThe Battle of Barbalissos was fought between the Sassanid Persians and Romans at Barbalissos. Shapur I used Roman incursions into Armenia as pretext and resumed hostilities with the Romans. The Romans and Sassanids clashed at Barbalissos. The defeat of this large Roman force lead to the eventual...
and conquering and plundering AntiochiaAntiochia or Antiocheia or Antiochea or Antiokheia may refer any of several Hellenistic cities in the Near East most of which were founded or rebuilt by Antiochus I:...
in 252 following the Siege of Antiochia. The Romans recovered Antioch by 253 AD, and Emperor Valerian gathered an army and marched eastward to the Sassanid borders. In 260 at the Battle of EdessaThe Battle of Edessa took place between the armies of the Roman Empire under the command of Emperor Valerian and Sassanid forces under King Shapur I in 259...
the Sassanids defeated the Roman army and captured the Roman Emperor ValerianPublius Licinius Valerianus , commonly known in English as Valerian or Valerian I, was the Roman Emperor from 253 to 260.-Origins and rise to power:...
.
There was a lasting peace between Rome and the Sassanid Empire between 297 and 337 following a treaty between NarsehNarseh was the seventh Sassanid King of Persia , and son of Shapur I ....
and Emperor DiocletianGaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus , born Diocles and commonly known as Diocletian , was Roman Emperor from 20 November 284 to 1 May 305. Born to a Dalmatian family of low status, he rose through the ranks of the military to become cavalry commander to the emperor Carus...
. However, just before the death of Constantine ICaesar Flavius Valerius Aurelius Constantinus Augustus , commonly known in English as Constantine I, Constantine the Great, or Saint Constantine , was Roman emperor from 306, and the sole holder of that office from 324 until his death in...
in 337, Shapur IIShapur II the Great was the ninth King of the Persian Sassanid Empire from 309 to 379. During his long reign, the Sassanid Empire saw its first golden era since the reign of Shapur I .- Early childhood :...
broke the peace and began a twenty-six year conflict, attempting with little success to conquer Roman fortresses in the region. After early Sassanid successes including the Battle of Amida in 359 AD and the Siege of PirisaboraThe Siege of Pirisabora was part of the war between ancient Rome and the Sassanid Empire. It was an early Sassanid successes when they defeated the Romans at Pirisabora in 363 AD....
in 363 AD, Emperor JulianFlavius Claudius Julianus, known also as Julian, Julian the Apostate or Julian the Philosopher , was Roman Emperor , last of the Constantinian dynasty...
met Shapur in 363 in the Battle of CtesiphonThe Battle of Ctesiphon took place on May 29, 363 between the armies of Roman Emperor Julian and the Sassanid King Shapur II outside the walls of the Persian capital Ctesiphon...
outside the walls of the Persian capital. The Romans were victorious but were unable to take the city, and were forced to retreat due to their vulnerable position in the middle of hostile territory. Julian was killed in the Battle of SamarraThe battle of Samarra took place on 26 June of 363, after the invasion of Sassanid Persia by the Romans. It was a major skirmish with the Persians with indecisive results...
during the retreat, possibly by one of his own men.
There were several future wars, although all brief and small-scale, since both the Romans and the Sassanids were forced to deal with threats from other directions during the fifth century. A war against Bahram VBahram V was the fourteenth Sassanid King of Persia . Also called Bahramgur, he was a son of Yazdegerd I , after whose sudden death he gained the crown against the opposition of the grandees by the help of Mundhir, the Arabic dynast of al-Hirah...
in 420 over the persecution of the Christians in Persia led to a brief war that was soon concluded by treaty and in 441 a war with Yazdegerd IIYazdegerd II, , fifteenth Sassanid King of Persia, was the son of Bahram V and reigned from 438 to 457....
was again swiftly concluded by treaty after both parties battled threats elsewhere.
Collapse of the Western Empire (402–476)
Many theories have been advanced in explanation of the decline of the Roman EmpireThe decline of the Roman Empire refers to both the gradual disintegration of the economy of Rome and the barbarian invasions that were its final doom...
, and many dates given for its fall, from the onset of its decline in the third century to the fall of Constantinople in 1453. Militarily, however, the Empire finally fell after first being overrun by various non-Roman peoples and then having its heart in Italy seized by Germanic troops in a revolt. The historicity and exact dates are uncertain, and some historians do not consider that the Empire fell at this point. Disagreement persists since the decline of the Empire had been a long and gradual process rather than a single event.
The Empire became gradually less Romanised and increasingly Germanic in nature: although the Empire buckled under Visigothic assault, the overthrow of the last Emperor Romulus AugustusRomulus Augustus , more known by his nickname Romulus Augustulus , was the last Western Roman Emperor reigning from the 31 October 475 until his deposition on the 4 September 476...
was carried out by federated Germanic troops from within the Roman army rather than by foreign troops. In this sense had Odoacer not renounced the title of Emperor and named himself "King of Italy" instead, the Empire might have continued in name. Its identity, however, was no longer Roman – it was increasingly populated and governed by Germanic peoples long before 476. The Roman people were by the fifth century "bereft of their military ethos" and the Roman army itself a mere supplement to federated troops of Goths, Huns, Franks and others fighting on their behalf.
Rome's last gasp began when the Visigoths revolted around 395 AD. Led by Alaric IAlaric I , was likely born about 370 on an island named Peuce at the mouth of the Danube. He was king of the Visigoths from 395–410 and the first Germanic leader to take the city of Rome...
, they attempted to seize Constantinople, but were rebuffed and instead plundered much of Thrace in northern Greece. In 402 AD they besieged Mediolanum, the capital of Roman Emperor HonoriusFlavius Honorius was Roman Emperor and then Western Roman Emperor from 395 until his death. He was the younger son of Theodosius I and his first wife Aelia Flaccilla, and brother of the Eastern Emperor Arcadius....
, defended by Roman Gothic troops. The arrival of the Roman StilichoFlavius Stilicho was a high-ranking general , Patrician and Consul of the Western Roman Empire, notably of semi-barbarian birth.- Career :...
and his army forced Alaric to relieve the siege and move towards Hasta (modern Asti) in western Italy, where Stilicho attacked it at the Battle of PollentiaThe Battle of Pollentia was fought on 6 April 402 between the Romans and the Visigoths.Since February, the Visigoths, led by Alaric I, had been besieging Mediolanum, the capital of Roman Emperor Honorius, defended by Roman Gothic troops...
, capturing Alaric's camp. Stilicho offered to return the prisoners in exchange for the Visigoths returning to Illyricum but upon arriving at Verona, Alaric halted his retreat. Stilicho again attacked at the Battle of VeronaThe Battle of Verona was fought in June of 403 by Alaric's Visigoths, and a Roman force led by Stilicho. Alaric was defeated and subsequently withdrew from Italy....
and again defeated Alaric, forcing him to withdraw from Italy.
In 405 AD, the Ostrogoths invaded Italy itself, but were defeated. However, in 406 AD an unprecedented number of tribes took advantage of the freezing of the Rhine to cross en masse: Vandals, Suevi, Alans and Burgundians swept across the river and met little resistance in the Sack of Moguntiacum and the Sack of Treviri, completely over-running Gaul. Despite this grave danger, or perhaps because of it, the Roman army continued to be wracked by usurpation, in one of which Stilicho, Rome's foremost defender of the period, was put to death.
It is in this climate that, despite his earlier setback, Alaric returned again in 410 and managed to sack RomeThe Sack of Rome occurred on August 24, 410. The city was attacked by the Visigoths, led by Alaric I. The Roman capital had been moved to the Italian city of Ravenna by the young emperor Honorius, after the Visigoths entered Italy....
. The Roman capital had by this time moved to the Italian city of RavennaRavenna is a city and comune in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy. The city is inland, but is connected to the Adriatic Sea by a canal. Ravenna was the capital of the Western Roman Empire till 476. It was later the capital ofKingdom of the Ostrogoths and the Exarchate of Ravenna till 751...
, but some historians view 410 as an alternative date for the true fall of the Roman Empire. Without possession of Rome or many of its former provinces, and increasingly Germanic in nature, the Roman Empire after 410 had little in common with the earlier Empire. By 410 AD, Britain had been mostly denuded of Roman troops, and by 425 AD was no longer part of the Empire, and much of western Europe was beset "by all kinds of calamities and disasters", coming under barbarian kingdoms ruled by VandalsThe Vandals were an East Germanic tribe that entered the late Roman Empire during the 5th century. The Goth Theodoric the Great, king of the Ostrogoths and regent of the Visigoths, was allied by marriage with the Vandals as well as with the Burgundians and the Franks under .The Vandals are perhaps...
, Suebians, Visigoths and BurgundiansThe Burgundians were an East Germanic tribe which may have emigrated from mainland Scandinavia to the island of Bornholm, whose old form in Old Norse still was Burgundarholmr , and from there to mainland Europe. In Þorsteins saga Víkingssonar, Veseti settled in an island or holm, which was called...
.
| "The fighting became hand-to-hand, fierce, savage, confused and without the slightest respite.... Blood from the bodies of the slain turned a small brook which flowed through the plain into a torrent. Those made desperately thirsty by their injuries drank water so augmented with blood that in their misery it seemed as though they were forced to drink the very blood which had poured from their wounds" |
| Jordanes Jordanes , was a 6th century Roman bureaucrat , who turned his hand to history later in life.Though he also wrote Romana, a book about the history of Rome, his most known work is his Getica, written in Constantinople about AD 551...
on the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains |
The remainder of Rome's territory, if not its nature, was defended for several decades following 410 largely by Flavius AëtiusFlavius Aëtius or simply Aëtius, , dux et patricius, was a Roman general of the closing period of the Western Roman Empire. He was an able military commander and the most influential man in the Western Roman Empire for two decades . He managed policy in regard to the attacks of barbarian peoples...
, who managed to play off each of Rome's barbarian invaders against one another. In 436 he led a Hunnic army against the Visigoths at the Battle of Arles, and again in 436 at the Battle of Narbonne. In 451 he led a combined army, including his former enemy the Visigoths, against the Huns at the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains, beating them so soundly that although they later sacked Concordia, AltinumAltinum is the name of an ancient coastal town of the Veneti in Venetia, 15 km SE of Tarvisium , in Italy, on the edge of the lagoons. It is reported to have been very wealthy...
, MediolanumMediolanum, the ancient Milan, was an important Celtic and then Roman centre of northern Italy. This article charts the history of the city from its settlement by the Insubres around 600 BC, through its conquest by the Romans and its development into a key centre of Western Christianity and capital...
, TicinumTicinum was an ancient city of Gallia Transpadana, founded on the banks of the river of the same name a little way above its confluence with the Padus ....
, and Patavium, they never again directly threatened Rome. Despite being the only clear champion of the Empire at this point Aëtius was slain by the Emperor Valentinian IIIFlavius Placidus Valentinianus , known in English as Valentinian III, was among the last Western Roman Emperors .-Family:...
's own hand, leading Sidonius ApollinarisGaius Sollius Apollinaris Sidonius or Saint Sidonius Apollinaris , a poet, diplomat, and bishop. Sidonius was "the single most important surviving author from fifth-century Gaul" according to Eric Goldberg...
to observe, "I am ignorant, sir, of your motives or provocations; I only know that you have acted like a man who has cut off his right hand with his left".
Carthage, the second largest city in the empire, was lost along with much of North Africa in 439 AD to the Vandals, and the fate of Rome seemed sealed. By 476, what remained of the Empire was completely in the hands of federated Germanic troops and when they revolted led by OdoacerOdoacer , also known as Odovacer, was a Germanic foederati general and the first non-Roman ruler of Italy after AD 476. He deposed the last Western Roman Emperor, Romulus Augustus on 4 September of that year, but continued to rule first as a nominal client of Julius Nepos and, after Nepos' death in...
and deposed Emperor Romulus AugustusRomulus Augustus , more known by his nickname Romulus Augustulus , was the last Western Roman Emperor reigning from the 31 October 475 until his deposition on the 4 September 476...
there was nobody to stop them. Odoacer happened to hold the part of the Empire around Italy and Rome but other parts of the Empire were ruled by Visigoths, Ostrogoths, Franks, Alans and others. The Empire in the West had fallen, and its remnant in Italy was no longer Roman in nature. The Byzantine EmpireThe Byzantine Empire or Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire during the Middle Ages, centered on the capital of Constantinople, and ruled by Emperors in direct and de jure succession to the ancient Roman Emperors...
and the Goths continued to fight over Rome and the surrounding area for many years, though by this point Rome's importance was negligible. Following years of grinding war the city was by 540 AD near-abandoned and desolate with much of its environment turned into an unhealthy marsh, an inglorious end for a city that once ruled much of the known world.
At this point in time, the Eastern Roman Empire stands alone, and events in Roman military history fall under the category of Byzantine military history.
Primary sources
(print: Penguin BooksPenguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Allen Lane. Lane's idea was to provide quality writing cheaply, for the same price as a packet of cigarettes. He also wanted them to be sold not only in bookshops but in railway stations, general stores and corner shops. Its most emblematic products...
, 1976, (tr. Jane Mitchell), ISBN 0-140-44187-5)
(print: Penguin BooksPenguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Allen Lane. Lane's idea was to provide quality writing cheaply, for the same price as a packet of cigarettes. He also wanted them to be sold not only in bookshops but in railway stations, general stores and corner shops. Its most emblematic products...
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(print: Book 1 as The Rise of Rome, Oxford University PressOxford house Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. they are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as OUP's...
, 1998, ISBN 0-19-282296-9)
(print: Jacques AmyotJacques Amyot , French Renaissance writer and translator, was born of poor parents, at Melun.He found his way to the university of Paris, where he supported himself by serving some of the richer students. He was nineteen when he became M.A. at Paris, and later he graduated doctor of civil law at...
and Thomas NorthSir Thomas North was an English translator of Plutarch, second son of the 1st Baron North.-Life:He is supposed to have been a student of Peterhouse, Cambridge, and was entered at Lincoln's Inn in 1557. In 1574 he accompanied his brother, Lord North, on a visit to the French court. He served as...
(tr.), Plutarch, Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans, Southern Illinois University PressSouthern Illinois University Press, founded in 1956, is a university press located in Carbondale, Illinois.The press publishes approximately 50 titles annually, among its more than 1,200 titles currently in print....
, 1963, ISBN 0-404-51870-2 )
(print: Harvard University PressHarvard University Press is a publishing house, a division of Harvard University, that is highly respected in academic publishing. It was established on January 13, 1913. In 2005, it published 220 new titles. It is a member of the Association of American University Presses . The current director...
, 1927. (Translation by W. R. Paton), unknown ISBN
(print: John Carew RolfeJohn Carew Rolfe, Ph.D. was an American classical scholar, the son of William J. Rolfe.He graduated from Harvard University in 1881 and from Cornell University in 1885....
(tr.), Sallust, Loeb Classical LibraryThe Loeb Classical Library is a series of books, today published by Harvard University Press, which presents important works of ancient Greek and Latin Literature in a way designed to make the text accessible to the broadest possible audience, by presenting the original Greek or Latin text on each...
, 1940, ISBN 0-674-99128-1 )
(print: Penguin BooksPenguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Allen Lane. Lane's idea was to provide quality writing cheaply, for the same price as a packet of cigarettes. He also wanted them to be sold not only in bookshops but in railway stations, general stores and corner shops. Its most emblematic products...
, 1975, ISBN 0-140-44150-6)
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Gerard ChaliandGérard Chaliand is a French-Armenian expert in armed-conflict studies and in international and strategic relations, especially asymmetric conflicts . He is one of the most prolific international theoricians on these subjects...
(ed.), The Art of War in World History, University of California PressUniversity of California Press, also known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish books and papers for the faculty of the University of California, established 25 years earlier in 1868...
, 1994, ISBN 0-520-07964-7
Winston ChurchillSir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill KG, OM, CH, TD, FRS, PC was a British politician known chiefly for his leadership of the United Kingdom during World War II. He served as Prime Minister from 1940 to 1945 and again from 1951 to 1955. A noted statesman and orator, Churchill was also an officer...
, A History of the English-Speaking Peoples, Cassell, 1998, ISBN 0-304-34912-7
Tony Clunn, In Quest of the Lost Legions, Arminius Publishing, 1999, ISBN 0-954-41900-6
Arther Ferrill, The Fall of the Roman Empire: The Military Explanation, Thames and Hudson, 1988, ISBN 0-500-27495-9
James Fraser, The Roman Conquest Of Scotland: The Battle Of Mons Graupius AD 84, Tempus Publishing, 2005, ISBN 0-752-43325-3 (print: Penguin BooksPenguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Allen Lane. Lane's idea was to provide quality writing cheaply, for the same price as a packet of cigarettes. He also wanted them to be sold not only in bookshops but in railway stations, general stores and corner shops. Its most emblematic products...
, 1985, ISBN 0-14-043189-6)
Adrian GoldsworthyAdrian Goldsworthy is a British historian and military writer. Goldsworthy went to college in Westbourne School, Penarth. Later, after studying ancient and modern history at St John's College, Oxford, he completed a D.Phil in ancient military history from Oxford University in 1994, using his...
, The Complete Roman Army, Thames and Hudson, 2003, ISBN 0-500-05124-0
Victor Davis HansonVictor Davis Hanson is a military historian, columnist, political essayist and former classics professor, notable as a scholar of ancient warfare. He has been a commentator on modern warfare and contemporary politics for National Review and other media outlets, and was a strong supporter of the...
, Carnage and Culture, Hanson Press, 2002, ISBN 0-385-72038-6
Albert HarknessAlbert Harkness was an American classical scholar and educator, born at Mendon, Mass. He graduated at Brown University in 1842, was senior master of the Providence High School from 1846 to 1853, pursued studies in Germany at the universities of Berlin, Bonn, and Göttingen, and was the first...
, The Military System Of The Romans, University Press of the Pacific, 2004, ISBN 1-410-21153-3
Peter HeatherPeter Heather is an historian of Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, currently Professor of Medieval History at King's College London.Heather was born in Northern Ireland in 1960. He was educated at Maidstone Grammar School and New College, Oxford...
, The Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History, Macmillan PublishersMacmillan Publishers Ltd, also known as The Macmillan Group, is a privately-held international publishing company owned by Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group. It has offices in 41 countries worldwide and operates in more than thirty others....
, 2005, ISBN 0-330-49136-9
Tom HollandTom Holland may refer to:*Tom Holland , American film director*Tom Holland , British author*Tom Holland , English football player...
, Rubicon, Little Brown, 2003, ISBN 0-316-86130-8
Arnold Hugh Martin JonesArnold Hugh Martin Jones was a prominent 20th century British historian of classical antiquity, particularly of the later Roman Empire....
, The Later Roman Empire, Johns Hopkins University PressThe Johns Hopkins University Press is the publishing division of the Johns Hopkins University. It was founded in 1878 and holds the distinction of being the oldest continuously running university press in the United States. The Press publishes books, journals, and electronic databases...
, 1964, ISBN 0-801-83285-3
Robin Lane FoxRobin Lane Fox is an English historian, currently a Fellow of New College, Oxford and University of Oxford Reader in Ancient History.-Life:Lane Fox was educated at Eton and Magdalen College, Oxford....
, The Classical World, Penguin BooksPenguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Allen Lane. Lane's idea was to provide quality writing cheaply, for the same price as a packet of cigarettes. He also wanted them to be sold not only in bookshops but in railway stations, general stores and corner shops. Its most emblematic products...
, 2005, ISBN 0-141-02141-1
Basil Liddell HartSir Basil Henry Liddell Hart , usually known before his knighthood as Captain B. H. Liddell Hart was an English soldier, military historian and leading inter-war theorist.-Life:...
, Scipio Africanus, Da Capo Press, 1994, ISBN 0-306-80583-9
Philip MatyszakPhilip Matyszak is a British non-fiction author, primarily of historical works relating to ancient Rome .-Personal biography:Matyszak has a doctorate in Roman history from St John's College, Oxford. In addition to being a professional author, he also teaches ancient history for Madingley Hall...
, The Enemies of Rome, Thames and Hudson, 2004, ISBN 0-500-25124-X
Nigel Rodgers, The Roman Army: Legions, Wars and Campaigns: A Military History of the World's First Superpower From the Rise of the Republic and the Might of the Empire to the Fall of the West , Southwater, 2005, ISBN 1-844-76210-6
Henry William Frederick Saggs, Civilization Before Greece and Rome, Yale University PressYale University Press is a book publisher founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day. It became an official department of Yale University in 1961, but remains financially and operationally autonomous....
, 1989, ISBN 0-300-05031-3
Antonio SantosuossoAntonio Santosuosso is a Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario.-Assessment of the Battle of Tours:...
, Storming the Heavens: Soldiers, Emperors and Civilians in the Roman Empire, Westview Press, 2001, ISBN 0-8133-3523-X
Michael Wood, In Search of the First Civilizations, BBC BooksBBC Books is an imprint majority owned and managed by Random House. The minority shareholder is BBC Worldwide, the commercial subsidiary of the British Broadcasting Corporation...
, 1992, ISBN 0-563-52266-6
George Patrick WelchGeorge Patrick Welch is a historian and author, whose works include Britannia: The Roman conquest and occupation of Britain . He was born in 1929 in Minneapolis, in the United States....
, Britannia: The Roman Conquest & Occupation of Britain, Hale, 1963, ISBN 0-158-79256-5