Roman Empire (L'Uniona Homanus)

Etymology
The name 'Roman' comes from the city which gre to control a large Empire in three continents. The city of Rome, 'Roma' in the native language of Latin, was the origin of the Empire and was its largest city throughout its history. The Germanic people of the north of Europe call themselves 'Romisch' as translated to their vernacular. In the Balkan Peninsula the greek language refers to the citizens of this Empire as 'Romanoi' a term which includes themselves, despite their national pride and history. In the Parthian provinces the people of the Empire are 'Romali' and that is the same term in North Africa, Arabia, and Ethiopia. In the porvinces of the far edge of the Mare Suebicum (Baltic Sea), the Roman people fall under the term of 'Romer' or 'Romski'. All of these languages are heavily influenced by the native Latin of the Empire but over time the languages have blended.

Geography, Climate, and Environment
Being so large, the climate and environment of the Roman Empire are different from province to province. The Center of the Empire is the Mare Mediterrani (Mediterranean Sea) whic functioned as the original domain of the early Empire and the Republic prior. In only the European provinces can be found several rivers, mountain chains, vast coast, diverse resources, plains, tundra, and an almost tropical climate in places.

European Rome
In the Italian Peninsula, the origin of the Roman Empire, lies the Appenine Moutnains which used to be a barrier to interaction from the Mare Adriaticus to Tyrhennius. Above Italia sits the great defensive chain of mountains known as the Alpes. From the Moutnains come the major Rivers of Europe, most notably the Ister (Danube) and the Rhinus (Rhine). In the large region of western Europe called Gallia (Gaul) is mostly Plains and Pasture. On the Iberian Peninsula in the north is the Pyrenees Moutnains and west of them is the Cantabri on the shores of the peninsula. Despite these large chains and some smaller ones throughout the rest of the land, much of the land of Hispania, Lusitania, and Baetica was arable and became a source of food and wealth for the Western European Provinces and those of Northern Europe. In Britannia and Caledonia there are a great number of rivers, lochs, cliffs, and mountains, especially in Caledonia. Similar features can be found in Scandinavia, Suebia, Islia and the Campus Asius, however all of these have glaciers. The Carpathian Mountains are found in the eastern European province and play a large role in the economy of that region as well as providing rivers for the surrounding area. Overall, Europe is the msot fertile of the areas under Roman control, Rome itself lies there. However the other regions provide many other resources and information taht would not otherwise be available if Rome were only a European Empire.

African Rome
North Africa is rich with grain in the Northern Shore and along rivers like the Nilus (Nile) and Nigerus (Niger). Despite these, the Desertum Africanum (Sahara) is a large obstacle to the development of Africa. The cities of African provinces are in a way trapped along rivers, shores, or lakes in order to fight the desert which could consume their city at any time. Mauretania is the best example of how people can fight their predicament and improve upon it. The great canal system that leads from the Mediterranean into the Sahara brings in not only water and fertilizers so that things can grow around the canal but also trade and acess to the resources underneath the desert. This canal system and several others have fought the largest and most persistent problem for the African Romans, the great desert on the continent. Without the money from the tremendous trade and development of the Roman Empire these would not be possible and the cities of the Romans might be reclaimed by the sands and the desolation of the Desertum Africanum.

Asian and Arabian Rome
The provinces of what were the Persian and then Parthian Empires were incorporated into Roman hegemony after the conquest of their central city in Ctesiphon. The Arabian Peninsula was taken first with claims to the open desert of teh area and later bribing what civilizations did exist to move north into the more developed areas of the emprie. From the Tigris and Euphrates rivers came most of the fertile land of these provinces. Many other parts were filled with further desert lands. The ancient knowledge of these civilizations, which developed much earlier than Rome, became a great resource for the scholars, astrologists, and other scientiests. The biggest change between Asia and Africa was the closeness to a foreign coutnry. India and, not so far off, Sinica effected the Asian Provinces first and then spread to the other parts of the empire. This bridge effect made the culture of this area not simply from Parthia, or Rome, or India, or Sinica but a mixing pot. The prerogatives and attitudesof their leaders was an even further unique quality for the Provinces furthest from Rome.

Early Rome
Rome was established, or was first recorded, in the year 1 (753 BC) in the AUC calendar. AUC meaning "ab urbe condita" or "from the founding of the city [of Rome]". According to the traditional Roman Mythology, twins named Romulus and Remus, descendents of the Trojan prince Aeneas, were abandonned as children and were raised by a she-wolf. Romulus killed his brother and named his new city after himself, the city of Roma. The city lay on a border between the Etruscan people and the Latins. They adopted the Latin language but also many Etruscan myths and practices of governing. Romulus ruled as the first King of Rome and invited many different people of different cultures into his city. Among these were not only other cultures but also refugees, escaped prisoners, fugitives, and people who have for some otehr reason abandonned their own homeland. From 1-36 (753-717 BC) Romulus built his city and teh other kings would not extend it much past the original seven hills.

Regnum Romanum
The Kingdom of Rome lasted from its founding in 1 (753 BC) to the dexile of the last king in 244 (509 BC). The traditional list of Kings has seven rulers starting with Romulus who built much of the founding institutions of Rome. He selected the first one hundred men to form the Senate of Rome and these became the founders of the Patrician families, the most powerful and noble in the territory of Rome. The Sabines, another tribe, also lived in the city and Romulus actually shared his Kingship with the Sabine leader Titus Tatius after a war with the Sabines started by the abduction of their women. The city was also divided into thirty curiae who were the voting order in the Comitia Curiata a part of the complex, and in many ways unfair, government of the Romans. Romulus ruled until the year 37 (716 BC)

Numa Pompilius, the second King and a native Sabine, was chosen as the next King after a one year interregnum. His reign was marked by peace and religious reform, such as the construction of a new temple to the goddess Janus. Numa also reformed the calendar of Rome and established many sacred offices in the nation such as the Pontifex Maximus and the Vastal Virgins. His reign ended in a peaceful manner, with much respect in his honor, in the year 80 (673 BC).

Tullus Hostilius, as his name may suggest, was a warlike man and destroyed the city of Alba Longa thus extenduing the power of Rome. He held little respect for the gods and religion. The wars with the Sabines, the city of Fidenae and Veii also proved successful, this continued a tradition of conquest beign important to the roman leadership. Tullus died in 111 (642 BC) shortly after the first century of Romes establishment.

The Senate then appointed, after two years, a more peaceful and religious King. His name was Ancus Marcius and he was the grandson of Numa Pompilius. During his reign the hill of rome were furtehr fortified to protect the city and maintain a secure base for a government. The latins, an ethnic tribe of the penninsula were made part of the Plebian, lowere and working, class of people in the Kingdom. This division between the Etruscan and Sabine people as the Patricians and the Latins as the Plebians would remain for centuries to come. Ancus died a natural death much like Numa in the year 137 (616 BC).

Lucius Tarquinius Priscus was the first Etruscan King of Rome and would reign from the years 137 (616 BC), after convincing the Comitia Curiata to elect him rather than teh teenage sons of Ancus Marius, to 174 (579 BC). Lucius appointed another one hundred senators from the lower patrician families, among these were the Octavii teh family of the future first Emperor, Augustus. This betrayal of the sons of the previous kings would come to have consequences for Lucius, however, as he was killed by one of these sons. They would not become the next kings despite this, as this would fall to the son-in-law of Lucius Priscus names Servius Tullius.

Servius Tullius ascended to the throne of Rome in the year 175 (578 BC) and died in 218 (535 BC) and would be mostly remembered for the construction of the first wall to fully encircle the city of Rome, the Pomerium. He also developed the government of Rome by splitting the citizens of the city into five economic classes which formed the Century Assembly; as well as splitting them into four tribal groups based on their location and thus creating the Tribal Assembly. The roman elite gained most of the power of voting as it was now based on their status within the city. Servius appeared to favor the poor and plebian class to build up support in the city, this would lead to a conspiracy to kill him and replace him with the son of Lucius Priscus, named Lucius Tarquinius Superbus.

The last King of Rome was Tarquinius Superbus who reigned from 218 (535 BC) to 244 (509 BC). Because he ascended to power on the assassination of the previous King, a tradition which he connected back to Romulus and Remus at the foudning of the City, Tarquinius Superbus was very paranoid about his own life. He executed many senators, suspected of still holding loyalty to Servius. These were in soe ways mitigated by the development of one of the world's first sewage systems, the cloaca maxima, as well as the great stadium of the Circus Maximus. The wars of Tarquinius Superbus against the Vosci, Galbi, and Rutuli, would not give him a long reign in Rome. The son of Tarquinius Superbus, Sextus Tarquinius, held about as much repect for Roman custom and tradition as his father did. He is most remembered for the Rape of Lucretia, a daughter and a wife of a powerful noble family, which led to her suicide.

The last king would be expelled from the city, along with all of his family, in the year 244 (509 BC). This rather peaceful coup by four men, led by Lucius Junius Brutus and including Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus, Publis Valerius Poplicola, and Spurius Lucretius Tricipitinus, would found the Roman Republic with Brutus and Collatinus as the first consuls of Rome.

Senatus Populusque Romanus
SPQR was the motto of the Roman Republic and could be found on standards and flags across the Empire during the Republican Era. This was found on shields and on buildings to represent the Senate's supremacy in the Republic, but what made it so. In 259 (494 BC) after a series of internal struggle the plebians, lower class, were given the ability to elect a Plebian Tribune. Other offices were made to assist these Tribunes, these were called Plebian Aediles. These worked within the Curia Centuriata, the principle legislative assembly in the republic during the early years. The Tribunes and Aediles were created in each tribe of the Plebians, all of these together became the Pleabian Council which was for many years only able to act negatively and veto laws of the Curian Centuriata. In the Fourth Century BC the Plebian Council was for the first time able to make laws. The Patricians were by no means satisfied with this development and from the year 386-466 (367-287 BC) in what was called the Conflict of the Orders, the order of the patrician and plebian classes, class struggle dominated the political developments of Rome.

As the Tribunes and the Senate became closer, the Tribunes began to depend on the Senate and the Tribunate became little more than a stepping stone to other offices. The closeness resulted in the growth of families of the Plebians which became the main actors in Plebian Politics and became very patrician-like in all but name. The average Plebians were in poor conditions and the only way out for them, as they saw it, was to take some power from the Senate. The Plebian Council had been able to pass laws without the consent of the Senate according to earlier acts, but these were not recognized or followed. At the end of the Conflict of the Orders in 466 (287 BC) the Plebians were effectively free of the patrician class but the standard of living or the average plebian di not rise. The new nobility and the old nobility found it mroe convenient to cooperate with eachother. This made the Plebians, with their new power, unwilling to use any of it. The Senate was left with the real power of law and the Plebians were little more than an associate. No major political changes occurred after 466.

The view of Senate became one of detachedaristocracy in the face of a poor people. There grew two new political camps which worked against each other. One for the improvement of the everyday people and another for the continuity of the current regime. These were called populares, those for the people, and the optimates, the aristocratic and powerful. A major shift which made brought the optimates back into power was a series of events called collectively the Catallinarian Conspiracy. Catallina, an aristocratic member of the populares, wanted to assassinate the current consul and many Senators, enough so that he could enact the reforms that he saw necessary to assist the other classes. The Consul for the year 690 (63 BC), Marcus Tullius Cicero, interecepted messages that came into Rome and followed them to the place of the highest conspirators and Cicero followed by taking an army to Catallina and destroying him and his army. This move by the optimates secured their hold on power by destroying the reputation of the populares in Rome.

The reign of Julius Caesar as a dictator and the civil war which followedwould lay the ground for the next period in Roman History. When Gaius Octavius, the nephew of Julius Caesar, brought peace again to the Roman Empire, he was declared Augustus, meaning god-like, and rules as the first Emperor of Rome. Efforts to reestablish the Republic after Augustus would fail.