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509–27 bce
- Roman Republic, (509–27 bce), the ancient state centred on the city of Rome that began in 509 bce, when the Romans replaced their monarchy with elected magistrates, and lasted until 27 bce, when the Roman Empire was established.
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Main article: History of the Roman Empire. For a chronological guide, see Timeline of Roman history. See also: Campaign history of the Roman military and Roman Kingdom. Animated overview of the Roman territorial history from the Republic until the fall of its last remnant (the Byzantine Empire) in 1453.
- Overview
- Rise and consolidation of imperial Rome
Roman Empire, the ancient empire, centred on the city of Rome, that was established in 27 bce following the demise of the Roman Republic and continuing to the final eclipse of the empire of the West in the 5th century ce. A brief treatment of the Roman Empire follows. For full treatment, see ancient Rome.
A period of unrest and civil wars in the 1st century bce marked the transition of Rome from a republic to an empire. This period encompassed the career of Julius Caesar, who eventually took full power over Rome as its dictator. After his assassination in 44 bce, the triumvirate of Mark Antony, Lepidus, and Octavian, Caesar’s nephew, ruled. It was not long before Octavian went to war against Antony in northern Africa, and after his victory at Actium (31 bce) he was crowned Rome’s first emperor, Augustus. His reign, from 27 bce to 14 ce, was distinguished by stability and peace.
Augustus established a form of government known as a principate, which combined some elements from the republic with the traditional powers of a monarchy. The Senate still functioned, though Augustus, as princeps, or first citizen, remained in control of the government..
With a mind toward maintaining the structure of power entrusted to his rule, Augustus began thinking early about who should follow him. Death played havoc with his attempts to select his successor. He had no son and his nephew Marcellus, his son-in-law Agrippa, and his grandsons Gaius and Lucius each predeceased him. He eventually chose Tiberius, a scion of the ultra-aristocratic Claudia gens, and in 4 ce adopted him as his son.
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The Roman Empire
Tiberius (reigned 14–37) became the first successor in the Julio-Claudian dynasty and ruled as an able administrator but cruel tyrant. His great-nephew Caligula (37–41) reigned as an absolutist, his short reign filled with reckless spending, callous murders, and humiliation of the Senate. Claudius (41–54) centralized state finances in the imperial household, thus making rapid strides in organizing the imperial bureaucracy, but was ruthless toward the senators and equites. Nero (54–68) left administration to capable advisers for a few years but then asserted himself as a vicious despot. He brought the dynasty to its end by being the first emperor to suffer damnatio memoriae: his reign was officially stricken from the record by order of the Senate.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
The history of the Roman Empire covers the history of ancient Rome from the traditional end of the Roman Republic in 27 BC until the abdication of Romulus Augustulus in AD 476 in the West, and the Fall of Constantinople in the East in 1453.
- Origins of Rome. 8 Incredible Roman Technologies. As legend has it, Rome was founded in 753 B.C. by Romulus and Remus, twin sons of Mars, the god of war. Left to drown in a basket on the Tiber by a king of nearby Alba Longa and rescued by a she-wolf, the twins lived to defeat that king and found their own city on the river’s banks in 753 B.C.
- The Early Republic. The power of the monarch passed to two annually elected magistrates called consuls. They also served as commanders in chief of the army.
- Military Expansion. During the early republic, the Roman state grew exponentially in both size and power. Though the Gauls sacked and burned Rome in 390 B.C., the Romans rebounded under the leadership of the military hero Camillus, eventually gaining control of the entire Italian peninsula by 264 B.C.
- Internal Struggles in the Late Republic. Rome’s complex political institutions began to crumble under the weight of the growing empire, ushering in an era of internal turmoil and violence.
Jan 25, 2024 · 476 CE: Romulus Augustulus, the last Western Roman emperor, is deposed by Odoacer, a Germanic chieftain. This is traditionally considered the end of the Western Roman Empire, although the Eastern Roman Empire, also known as the Byzantine Empire, continued for another thousand years.
Building upon the foundation laid by the Roman Republic, the empire became the largest and most powerful political and military entity in the world up to its time and expanded steadily until its fall, in the west, in 476.
Oct 21, 2020 · Plus, the Western Roman empire was in military and economic disarray compared to its counterpart in the east. The latter would survive for a further thousand years. The western half, however, is usually given a date of death of AD 476, the year that the rule of the final emperor ended.
