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The Roman Empire - Episode 4 - Grasp Of An Empire (History Documentary)
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Jun 4, 2025
Rome conquered with the brute force of her military machine, sweeping entire peoples into her empire. With the wars over, the treaties signed, the bodies buried, whether you were a Gaul or a Carthaginian, whether you were from the East or the West, life as you had known it would never be the same again. At its height, the Roman Empire ruled 50 million people as a single civilisation. The Roman Empire was the largest and the most enduring of its kind. The trade it facilitated, the roads it built, the breath-taking infrastructure, both architectural and psychological, are all part of Rome's colossal legacy. In this fascinating programme; "Grasp of an Empire", the viewer will experience the exporting of the Roman world through the glory years of conquest into the stability of the longest peace the world had ever known; The Pax Romana.
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0:00
The war is over
0:06
The treaties are signed. The bodies are buried. You've just been conquered by the greatest empire on the planet
0:17
And whether you're a Gaul or a Carthaginian, whether your homeland is in the east or the west
0:24
life as you know it will never be the same again. Rome is coming to town
1:01
At its height, the empire ruled 50 million people. Greeks, Etruscans, Gauls, Egyptians, and countless others
1:13
came together as a single civilization. But no one became Roman overnight
1:31
Rome had to conquer the hearts and minds of her people, just as powerfully as she won her vast territories
1:39
But this conquest was a psychological one, and no effort was spared to win it
1:51
In a single year, 80 AD, the emperor Titus staged the slaughter of 9,000 wild animals
2:01
Countless lions, tigers, elephants and giraffes traveled fantastic distances to die before frenzied audiences
2:11
In a single celebration, the Emperor Trajan presented 10,000 gladiators slaves and criminals doomed to savage combat for the amusement of romance
2:22
The games were a kind of violent propaganda cruel displays full of drama and excitement
2:30
The games were considered successful the more brutal they were. So a man losing his eyes or a man losing his tongue
2:45
or a woman losing her eyes or her tongue or her fingers or her toes or whatever
2:51
that brought the people in the stands to their feet. The public became addicted to the games
3:00
and some ancient thinkers worried about the influence of so much violence on the viewer
3:08
There is nothing more harmful to one's character. When I return from the arena, I am greedier, more aggressive, and more addicted to pleasurable sensations
3:21
I am more cruel and inhumane. but the games were far more than just violent entertainments to thrill the masses
3:33
they were also the very essence of romanness decanted for all the empire to drink
3:40
i doubt if any emperor sat down and said let's have some games for good advertising
3:47
I don't think they did that, but I think that it worked to that end in that this showed what we could do
3:57
After all, you can't watch a battle. You couldn't watch those Roman troops going off to war because that was a long way away and there was no television and there wasn't any newspapers to tell you about that
4:09
But as much as anything, you could see the construction of the Colosseum and you could see people filling it up
4:14
And that would tell you, hey, that's our empire. That's what we're capable of
4:22
From Roman Africa to Britannia to the mysterious East, the message of the Roman arena was the same
4:31
Rome was the all-powerful conqueror of all she surveyed. Far-flung lands, exotic beasts, criminals, barbarians, slaves, Christians
4:41
all would perish at her command. But the games were just one of the ways Rome successfully seduced, cajoled, and coerced her many subjects
4:53
So vast an empire had to find ways to unify its diverse population
4:59
Everyone had to know what it meant to be Roman. Rome had a genius for assimilating different peoples into her empire
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a skill dating back to her modest beginnings. Once, Rome was just an insignificant village with little influence on the world
5:20
350 BC. Rome had existed as an independent power for more than a century
5:26
Her influence was spreading slowly but steadily into the lands surrounding the city
5:35
Rome's immediate neighbors, the Etruscans, Samnites, Latins, and others, were the first peoples absorbed into the young empire
5:43
Rome is quite extraordinary in that when it conquered Italy, instead of enslaving Italy
5:52
it made the people whom it first conquered, its allies, it gave them citizenship
5:57
So Rome was the only case in the ancient world in which its citizen body expanded and expanded
6:03
and brought more and more of its subjects. What's extraordinary about the people that had come into the empire
6:12
is the extent and the rapidity with which they adopt Roman customs
6:17
Roman law codes, Latin as a language. And indeed that becomes the basis of Western civilization for the next thousand years
6:27
It didn't hurt that Roman culture had so much to offer. Rome was a republic
6:34
Citizens had the right to vote and were protected by a sturdy legal system
6:39
Rome's military provided order and protection from invaders. And Rome's economy was thriving thanks to the spoils of war and the riches of nature
6:52
One of the secrets to Rome's early success was her very favorable location
6:59
Blessed by a gentle climate and a long growing season, Roman territory included some of the most fertile farmland in all of Europe
7:06
The Tuscany countryside basks in sunshine 2,400 hours a year, the most of any European region
7:16
In the 3rd century BC, most of the land was devoted to growing corn
7:21
or grain also wheat barley and a coarse cereal called all Corn is the staple diet of the vast majority of the Roman population Something like 70 to 80 of the diet
7:35
It's the equivalent of a third world country now. You ate a lot of porridge in ancient Rome
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Most people did. And very little else. Only meat very occasionally. A family might have grown a few vegetables
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rosemary and other herbs for flavoring and medicine. If they were lucky, maybe some apples or grapes
8:01
My farm is almost 10 acres, just 15 miles southeast of Rome
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I have one mule and just a few sheep. This land came from my wife's family
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and we work it with my brother and his sons. We grow mostly wheat and some vegetables for ourselves
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Several springs passed. I planted this small vineyard. This year, for the first time, we hope to make enough wine to sell
8:32
If we're successful, we'll plant more next year. If it fails, I won't be able to pay our debts
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At first, Rome was simply a collection of small family farms. But before long, the empire expanded well beyond the limits of a modest city-state
8:52
and entered the world stage. In 146 BC, when Rome finally conquered her first great enemy, Carthage, in North Africa
9:08
her destiny changed dramatically. Suddenly a world power, Rome commanded not only Italy
9:15
but most of the Mediterranean world. By 140 BC, Rome was still a democratic republic
9:25
but now she was also undeniably an empire, controlling more than a quarter of a million square miles
9:32
More than 4 million people lived under Roman rule. The great wars of expansion brought a tidal wave of riches back to Rome
9:43
a flood of instant wealth that acted like gasoline on the flames of a young economy
9:51
Spoils of war included art, jewelry, gold and other finery, along with a different kind of commodity, slaves
10:01
Now that Rome was a world power, the rules of the game changed dramatically
10:07
Conquered peoples were no longer guaranteed citizenship or any benefits of empire
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Now, if you lost the war, you were probably taken captive. If you were conquered by a Roman general and you weren't killed, you would be a slave
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And it didn't matter if you were a blonde, blue-eyed German or a dark-eyed Macedonian or a dark-skinned, dark-eyed Ethiopian
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That wasn't the point. The point was, you had been conquered. You were inferior because you had been conquered by the superior Romans
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About a quarter of a million soldiers were captured in the wars against Carthage
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and countless more slaves came from other battle zones. 150,000 Greeks, 100,000 Gauls
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tens of thousands of Germans, Spaniards, Syrians, Thracians, and Jews, all became Roman against their will
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At its peak, the empire's largest slave market on the Greek island of Delos
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is said to have sold 10,000 slaves a day. In Rome's farm economy
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this flood of slaves had a huge impact. While peasant soldiers were away fighting wars
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their land was often bought or stolen by aristocrats who farmed it with slave labor
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I have traveled many weeks to come home only to find disaster
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My farm has been taken over by a rich man. His slaves are harvesting my fields
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There are many like me whose farms went to ruin while we fought
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And now others have taken over our land. We have no place to go but the city as beggars
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I never thought I would come to this. I was Rome's loyal soldier for 14 years
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Now I am thrown away. The peasants were being driven off. So you get a consistent peasant displacement
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and the growth of large estates. The large estates which tended to use slave labour
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which was itself being generated to some extent by the successful warfare that was going on
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So you have a vicious circle in which the peasants were fighting for their own displacement
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Until the mid-2nd century BC, the countryside was dotted with countless small family farms
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But now, land was being consolidated into larger and larger estates. Owned by wealthy absentee landlords, these huge farms boasted hundreds, even thousands of slaves each
13:00
Family farms simply couldn't compete, and refugees by the thousand poured into cities in the desperate hope they'd find some way to make a living
13:13
I'm lucky to have found some work. Many in Rome must beg for their meals
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Still, wool processing is brutally hard and hot. We leave a stone basin out on the street to collect urine
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We mix it with fuller's clay and boil it to size and clean the wool
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Rough cloth comes in every day by an endless parade of wagons
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and it goes out as finished and dyed fabric, the very highest quality
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This wool will be made into the togas of scepters. As Rome grew, so too did the gap between rich and poor
13:58
a cruel inequity that would haunt the empire to its very end
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By the late 2nd century BC, so many of Rome's poor had been displaced from rural areas
14:17
that cities and towns were overrun. Incredibly, the city of Rome ballooned to nearly a million souls
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a city this size was unheard of in ancient times. Europe wouldn't again see a city as large as ancient Rome
14:35
until the Industrial Revolution. What I think you'd notice, when you approach the city
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you'd go through streets crowded on both sides with tools. You'd smell bodies burning
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It be like an American roast on a Saturday evening except it would be humans burning Contrast between rich and poor would be quite striking Rome appears like every city in the Roman Empire
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except it's bigger, grander, more luxurious. Everyone from all over the Mediterranean came pouring in
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slaves from the East, Greeks wanting to make a fortune. It was a place where you could make money
15:16
It was like New York is to America or to Europeans. It's a dream place
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People weren't the only thing that poured into Rome. The center of the known world was also the greatest importer of everything on the planet
15:35
Everything is shipped to you, from every land and from every sea
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You can see so many cargoes from India or from Arabia that you might think the trees in those countries had been left permanently bare
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Egypt, Sicily and Libya are your farms. The arrival and departure of ships never cease
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And consequently, it is quite amazing that there is enough room in the sea, much less in the harbor, for the ships
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Ilius Aristides If you were rich enough to enjoy it, Rome was indeed Rome
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the grand and glorious marketplace of the world. Cargo unloaded in the port was spectacular in both volume and quality
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Marble, papyrus, jewels, gold, spices, silk, ivory, fur and linen arrived by the shipload
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Romans were voracious consumers of wine, oil and wheat, and wealthy connoisseurs of the finest luxury goods their empire had to offer
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The only way in which we could have a city like Rome, a city of a million people perhaps
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The only way that could exist in the ancient world is if the goods from this huge empire flood into it to help it survive
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In a very basic way, you cannot feed a population of a million on the local hinterland of a city
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That's one of the first ways in which provinces are exploited. Fantastic amounts of grain now came from North Africa, Sicily and Sardinia
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The city of Rome alone devoured 400,000 tons each year, almost a quarter of which was now given away to the poor
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The army needed another 150,000 tons to stay on its feet. Rome also imported spices and perfume from the east
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olive oil and fish sauce from Spain, pottery from Gaul. Rome's appetites were insatiable
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and yet her exports were meager by any standards. A great many ships entered port full and left empty
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But for all the riches she consumed, the huge city did trade something of great worth
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What Rome exported to her colonies and provinces above all was Roman-ness
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The army spread a unifying language, Latin, throughout the empire, as well as a single currency
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something European countries are attempting again today. But Rome's influence went much deeper still
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It's hard to imagine what thoughts went through the minds of the recently conquered
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when their new colonizers set about building a Roman town. Surely they knew they were conquered when they saw their humble village transformed into a majestic city of marble and stone
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What's remarkable about the Roman Empire is that wherever you went, you found a Roman town
18:55
All towns were remarkably alike. So basically what the Romans succeeded in doing is spreading images of Rome all over the empire
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In fact, it's not unreasonable to credit the Roman Empire with inventing the city as we know it
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along with state-of-the-art technology, architecture, and building techniques. But it was sometime in the 2nd century BC that Roman builders discovered something truly momentous
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about what happens when you add volcanic ash to lime. When they first explained to me that we would use this ash to make a bridge, I didn't understand
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It's hard to believe until you see it, but when we mix it with water, limestone, and gravel, it'll turn into stone, harder than you can believe
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It's a fantastic thing. You can make a wall as hard as any stone
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They called it chimentum, the first true concrete. It's the key reason why so much of what Rome built still survives today
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Romans built cities in a very particular, very orderly fashion, usually laying out the streets in a grid
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The Roman city was so consistent, you could say they built the same city over and over
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over more than a thousand times, more than 600 times in Africa alone. Many modern cities
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including London, Paris and Bonn, were actually built directly on top of their Roman foundations
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And Roman architecture is still the image of power and order throughout the Western world today
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Curiously, the one Roman city that has no grid, but narrow, windy streets with twists and turns, is Rome herself
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The reason? It grew up organically, over centuries, unlike most Roman outposts, which were planned cities
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But Rome did serve as a model in many other ways. The perfect city, Romans believed, always had the same key elements
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Temples, theaters, baths, roads, and outdoor public spaces
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Of course, you needed a marketplace, and most certainly, a brothel. A traditional sign such as this one in the African city of Bularegia pointed the way for visitors
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Almost without fail, in a city of importance, there was at least one amphitheater
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Still the most recognized symbol of the empire, the famous Colosseum in Rome
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was the model for hundreds of amphitheaters throughout the provinces. The Egyptians left tombs behind, the pyramids, we think of that immediately
22:10
We think of Greek temples. But the Romans, I think the most famous thing that they left behind probably were the stadiums
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The Colosseum, the Circus Maximus, and also other stadiums around the empire
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And that what we have as our cathedrals today And any city that wants to really call itself a city now doesn build a skyscraper It doesn build a place of worship
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It's a stadium. In that sense, we're more connected with the Romans
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than I think in any other. There was a good reason arenas were so monumentally important
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for here was the true heart and soul of empire. It's a very good way to look at the games, it's a reflection of the ideals of empire
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The gladiators are there to display their courage, their bravery in front of the crowds
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Beast Hunts. What kind of person is able to bring a hippopotamus from Africa and put it on display in Rome
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What kind of person is able to take lions from one part of the empire and put them on in another
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The emperor not only controls people, but he controls all of nature
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A typical day at the arena began with a beast hunt in the morning
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Lions, tigers, bears, the more exotic the better, were pitted against men specially trained for the job
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hundreds of animals at a time would die before roaring crowds despite a few faint voices of
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dissent what pleasure can a civilized mind find when a magnificent animal is stabbed again and
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again with a hunting spear at midday criminals were put to death
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Crucifixion and burning at the stake were common punishments, but crowds seemed to prefer the sentence of
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damnatio ad bestias, condemned to the beasts. Terrified animals attacked prisoners chained to posts
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or bound up with fresh meat. Finally, afternoon to sunset brought the day's main event
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gladiators it's very difficult for people who admire the Romans and the
24:45
glory of Rome and all that to come to terms with the fact that Romans were
24:51
prepared to sit round and watch people kill each other the explanation I think
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is that even the poorest Roman citizen got some sense of a lift out of feeling
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well, at least I'm not like that. It was a way of expressing the other
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of getting a feeling that there is a world out there that is different from civilization
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Most gladiators were criminals, slaves or prisoners of war, specially trained to fight in the arena
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If they fought bravely and kept winning, they even stood a small chance of gaining their freedom
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Not quite as many died in these combats as Hollywood supposed, but there was always a pile of corpses to be hauled away at day's end
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The stench of death was so overpowering in the arenas that specially installed sprinkler systems sprayed perfume into the audience
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In time, the foul odor of Roman decadence would grow harder to disguise
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Lands that were once Roman are today divided among more than 40 nations
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From the Atlantic to the Euphrates. From the Sahara to Scotland, more than two million square miles
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Romans built a stunning network, 53,000 miles of paved roads connecting the empire
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Roman roads put end to end would have circled the earth twice
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And they were so well built, many survive to this day with the original paving stones
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Like the American interstate system, Roman roads made it possible to defend a huge territory
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The endless byways also accommodated tax collectors, traders and messengers as they traveled from exotic Egypt all the way to the hostile Scottish moors
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A fast courier could travel nearly 200 miles in a day. The army could reach anywhere in the empire in a matter of weeks
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The march from Rome to Spain was said to take just 27 days
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The phenomenon of Roman roads explains much about how Rome spread her influence around the world
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and even across the centuries to our own time. From the ruts carved into ancient roads by chariot wheels 2,000 years ago
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we get the modern railway gauge for American and European trains. Wherever three major roads crossed, news was often posted for travelers
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The Latin word for such a crossroads was trivia, or trivia, literally a three-road junction
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rhodes also carried roman culture throughout the empire we think of the spread of roman culture
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akin to the spread of blue jeans and mcdonald's i think we're looking at it very much the right way
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why is it now that we have football being played in europe or just look at the way the nba is able
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to export itself michael jordan as virgil i think there is a certain amount of connection here
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That's the best ogy, I think, for the spread of Greco-Roman culture
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and people could resent it in just the same way they resent Americanization now
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How you felt about the domination of Roman culture probably had everything to do with your lot in life
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The majority of Roman subjects were farmers, whose lives may have changed little under Roman rule
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The Roman Empire and Romanization, This use of Latin language as the creation of city cultures
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straight roads, Roman dress, the toga, and so on, is in fact very superficial
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Beneath it, in many societies, remained a local native culture. And when the Roman Empire breaks down, for example in Roman Britain
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What very quickly re-emerges is that native culture that has always been there
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On the other hand, if you were wealthy and lived in a provincial city like Bularegia or Londinium
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or Trier, you were in a position to enjoy the vast luxuries of empire
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Buildings, buildings, buildings, Roads, bridges, commerce and protection, all courtesy of the conquering Romans
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made life in a provincial city quite a bit more comfortable and healthy
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Romans enjoyed a technology boom unprecedented in ancient times. Their ingenuity brought the world everything from a two-cylinder pump used for firefighting
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to sophisticated weaponry, a rotary flour mill, water-powered machinery, pipe organs, padlocks, lightning rods, and even elevators
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But of all the wonders Rome brought to the world, to the common man
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perhaps the greatest luxury of all was fresh, clean, running water. Spectacular and brilliantly designed Roman aqueducts
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brought a continuous flow of water out of the mountains and into town
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Sophisticated engineering built an ingeniously simple structure, graded ever so gently, so gravity did all the work
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Thus, millions of gallons moved hundreds of miles to the spot where they'd be used
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all without need of fossil fuel, electric pumps, or human effort. Some ancient cities had two to three times as much water per person as many cities today
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The aqueduct was a feat of engineering so impressive, Romans themselves imagined we might marvel at them long after their builders were gone
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Will anyone compare the idol pyramids to these great aqueducts, these indispensable structures
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Anonymous. Public baths, fountains, and even the wealthiest homes were provided with clean running water
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Sewers channeled waste into rivers or seas, providing a level of sanitation not matched for nearly 2,000 years
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and still not met today in some parts of the world. On the whole, the provinces thrived under Roman rule
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But if many enjoyed the prosperity of empire, what of those who suffered cruelly to provide it
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There was a well-known saying in ancient Rome, Every slave is an enemy we harbor
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Indeed, every master feared his slaves, some with very good reason. By the first century A.D., the number of slaves had skyrocketed
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Now an astonishing one in three inhabitants of the Roman Empire was a slave, around 16 million people
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Slaves still worked the fields, but now many also toiled in mills, gold and silver mines, and other labor-intensive industries
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The slaves in the mines throng, all in chains, all kept at their work continuously day and night
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No one could look upon the squalor of these wretches without feeling compassion for their plight
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They may be sick or maimed or aged, but there is no indulgence
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All alike are kept at their labor by the lash until they die in their torments
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in their torments, and death is welcomed as a thing more desirable than life. Theodorus Sickness
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In the cities, the lot of a slave was often better. Some were well-educated tradesmen
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or doctors. A select few even had positions of power and influence. But the vast majority
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of slaves were laborers, bred and treated like farm animals. There are those who will say, well, it wasn't so bad to be a slave
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Look at slaves, educated slaves, who were treated very well by their owners
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Cicero treats certain slaves as a friend. Wet nurses were often very much favored by the children that they nursed, and so on
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But that, I think, is a pernicious way of looking at slavery. and excusing it
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The reality for the vast majority of the slaves in the Roman world
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was that life was nasty and short and brutish. Though some escaped and a few managed to buy their freedom
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most slaves had no real hope of liberty. For them, there was only one option left
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Organized rebellion. Sicily 140 BC The rich island was notorious for its savage treatment of slaves Over the previous decade a large number were imported to supply grain to an insatiable empire Many of the recent arrivals were former soldiers of high rank unaccustomed to being treated like animals
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The Sicilians, having grown very rich and elegant in their manner, bought up large numbers of slaves and immediately branded them
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They treated them harshly, worked them too hard, and cared nothing about their food or clothing
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Beaten and mistreated almost beyond reason, the slaves could no longer patiently endure
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Diodorus Siculus. There were large concentrations of slaves on these farms, and they were very often of the same nationality
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One of the pieces of advice that was given by later people to slave owners
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was to make sure that you mixed the nationalities, that you didn't have this sense of unity
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Among the newcomers was a Syrian named Yunus. He was a well-liked man who many believed had magical powers
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One day some slaves came to ask his advice. Was it wrong to kill a master whose cruelty and torture were beyond all endurance
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Eunice considered the question carefully. His answer was, action. He rallied and armed 400 fellow slaves
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Eunice led his rebel army on a rampage of pillage and murder
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killing every master they could find. The slaves proclaimed Eunice king, and their revolt caught fire
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Armed with axes, meat hooks, hatchets, clubs, whatever they could find, including kitchen utensils
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the slave army soon exploded into a force 70,000 strong. As word spread, uprisings broke out all over the empire, even in Rome
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Smaller revolts were put down quickly, but in Sicily, Finally, Eunice's troops often outnumbered the Roman soldiers they fought
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For seven bloody years, the war raged on. When Rome finally sent enough forces to quell the rebellion
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the legions massacred 20,000 slaves. They were crucified, hung in chains, or hurled from the city walls
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To the very end, Eunice fought on. But Roman legions captured the beloved slave king
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His gruesome fate was to die in prison, his body eaten away slowly by lice
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It was the first true slave revolt against Rome, but it wouldn't be the last
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The gap between rich and poor had become a gaping chasm. The poorest were wretched
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while the top of the heap were as wealthy as the empire herself. And the Roman Empire was rich
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While the empire grew, there was good reason for Rome's fantastic wealth
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With each new conquest, the spoils of the world flooded into Rome
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It was an unbeatable formula. Constant victory in war brought a steady flow of gold, riches, and slaves
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As long as Rome won rich new territories, she would continue to flourish
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In the first century AD, the empire's population was around 50 million people and still growing
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With little central planning and scant mass production, the empire managed not only to feed its huge army, but also its poor
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About half of all people living in cities depended on the government's grain dough
39:39
something the poor had come to think of as a right, along with games in the arena
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You hear the expression, bread and circuses, and really it's bread and games, food and games
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It was the government giving people what they wanted to keep them happy
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the same way that we have tax deductions and we have holidays
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and we have other things to keep our citizens happy, so did the Romans provide this kind of fund and games for people
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And ultimately, if anything, it was part of what drew down the empire
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Eventually in Rome, we had 170 days of games. That's really 170 holidays
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That's half the year figured out. Beginning in 31 B.C., the famous Pax Romana was a period of splendid prosperity for the
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great empire Two glorious centuries of peace and order blessed Rome and her colonies And even now the empire grew in the 2nd century AD shifting eastward to add Mesopotamia Syria and Arabia The empire now stretched 3 miles from end to distant end
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Riches continued to pour in. The population grew. People lived longer lives, and the land yet gave forth its generous bounty
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It must have seemed like Rome could go on forever. Prosperity is a quality difficult to measure
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And even harder to pinpoint is the moment prosperity begins to fade
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Did anyone, farmer, soldier, slave or craftsman, mark the day the Roman Empire ceased to rise
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Though far bigger than any other ancient city, Rome never grew much larger than one million people
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After 106 A.D., the empire too ceased to expand. On one front, growth was halted by the Atlantic Ocean
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In Africa, it was the Sahara Desert, a place Romans said had not a drop of water anywhere in ground or sky
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To the north, climate set the boundary. Expansion went well into present-day Germany, but Romans never ventured far from land where they could grow olives and grapes
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They went beyond the world of the olive and the vine into northern Europe, beyond the Black Sea
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and they thought this was a very strange world indeed because they crossed these sort of vegetable boundaries, if you like
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into a world that was full of beer drinkers in which people cooked with butter rather than olive oil
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Wheat are we no mess Life is wine. And that was true for most Romans
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Life was wine. So the final push took them eastward. The last great conquest was Dacia
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a rich empire in modern-day Romania. The emperor Trajan's great victory there in 106 AD
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brought spectacular spoils back to Rome. Tens of thousands of slaves, 182 tons of gold, 165,000 tons of silver
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Treasure enough to transform the city of Rome. Grand new monuments, including the spectacular Trajan's Column
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depicting every phase of the Dacian Wars. Treasure enough to stage the last great victory celebration
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35 days of non-stop games and partying. This great hall of spoils was spectacular and awe-inspiring
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but it was also the last. Never again would splendor on this scale rain down on the empire
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It was a grand and glorious time, a time of excess and celebration
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but did anyone notice a few small but significant changes
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prices had been steadily creeping up especially for two crucial expenses grain and the military
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inflation is rampant the government is desperately attempting to fund army by printing more money
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gold reserves are down prices rose daily you couldn't be sure of the real value of any of the
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money in your pocket meanwhile in the second century a.d the amount of silver in the coins
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themselves began to fall. Coins that had once been nearly pure silver eventually contained
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just 40% of the precious metal. In fact, the mines were running out of silver, and that
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wasn't the only natural resource running dry. Africa and the east had been so plundered
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for wild animals to supply the games that some were becoming hard to find. At least
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Just one species, the Moroccan elephant, was driven to extinction. There were other small, almost unnoticeable signs of a change in the winds of prosperity
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Ancient writers spoke of corruption and greed resulting from Rome's immeasurable wealth
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Fortune introduced an excess of wealth, and morals collapsed before prosperity. The spoils of war encouraged extravagance
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Public office was stolen through bribery. Trust was shattered and war was a source of profit for many Lucan Romans began to see extremes of wealth and luxury as a vice but at the same time a universal hatred for the tax collector made tax evasion something of a sport
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Should you wish to abuse a tax collector, you might try saying, burden, pack animal
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sneak thief, shark, oppressor of the downtrodden, strangler, nail in my coffin
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and all the other vile terms you can find. Petronius. Still, hatred for the taxman didn't keep taxes from rising
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maintaining the empire was expensive and now that it was no longer expanding
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there were no more spoils of war defense had become Rome's largest single expense
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the emperor Marcus Aurelius tried to solve the problem as Romans always had
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by going to war in 162 AD he invaded the Parthian Empire in the east
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It was the end of the Pax Romana, and it was a war the overextended and out-of-practice legions were destined to lose
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When the soldiers returned to Roman soil, they carried a few treasures and something else
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Of all the things Romans had brought home from abroad, this final import was as ironic as it was devastating
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We are soldiers of the 15th Legion. We've been at war against the King of Parthia
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We took the capital city, but held it only a short time. In retreat, we've had to hide our spoils along the way
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Most of the legionaries are sick. Soldiers who were hale and celebrating with us just a few days ago are dead
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The towns where we usually stop won't even let us in. They say we're doomed. They say it's the plague
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To this day, no one knows exactly what dread disease those soldiers carried home from the east
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Probably not the bubonic plague that ravaged Europe centuries later, but something just as horrible
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uncounted thousands died in rome and other cities across the empire such great pestilence devastated all italy that everywhere estates fields and towns were left
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deserted without farmers or inhabitants they reverted to ruins and woodland the disease spread like wildfire hitching a ride with those who traveled the great roads
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of empire. It is said a quarter of the population died. From the frontiers of the Persians as
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far as the Rhine and Gaul, the foul touch of plague polluted everything with contagion
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and death. Ammianus. At the same time, far to the north, Rome faced a different threat
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Barbarians had been massing along the borders for some time. It's impossible to know if the German tribes perceived the weakness of this moment
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some desperate change in Rome's luck in the throes of the plague
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What we do know is they chose this moment to attack. For the first time in 200 years, a foreign army crossed a boundary, Danube River, and invaded the Roman Empire
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The Roman legions chased them back, but it was only a taste of what was to come
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Rome was now and forever after looking over her shoulder. Did anyone actually notice the bloom was off the rose
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It's more likely the moment quietly came and went. The empire was by no means at an end
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Its fortunes would ebb and flow for centuries yet. But the greatest empire the world had ever known
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was now slipping through Rome's grasp. whatever you choose to call it
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arrogance, greed, corruption cynicism or simple bad luck whatever it was one day the slow decay of power and glory began
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and the Roman Empire ceased its splendid rise
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