Chapter 5: Imperial Rome, 146 B.C.E. - 192 C.E.

  • The Republic broke down after the Punic Wars
      * The following years were full of fighting, death, and destruction which brought many farmers to ruin
      * The war damaged the farmland leading the farmers to lose their land and sold it to the wealthy
      * Those that either lost or sold their land ended up becoming laborers, tenant farmers, etc. and since they were no longer landowners, they weren’t eligible for the army
  • There was an increase in the slave population after the Punic Wars due to the small wages paid to free laborers
      * Slaves made up for one-third of the total population in 1st century B.C.E.
  • Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus were the social reformers of the time with them wanting to help ordinary Romans
  • Tiberius Gracchus
      * First of the political leaders who appealed to the populace
      * He was the leader of an annually elected pleb assembly
      * Introduced a land reform program that would allow citizens to agriculture
      * Came up with a law that limited the amount of public land a person could hold as he wanted to distribute land recovered by the state to landless peasants
      * Was murdered alongside 300 of his supporters by a group of senators that broke into an assembly meeting during
  • Gaius Gracchus
      * Tiberius Gracchus’s younger brother
      * Tribune
      * Wanted to limit the Senate’s power
      * Replaced senators with equestrian class
      * Attempted to extend citizenship to non-Roman-Italians which the Senate didn’t like
      * Encouraged colonization to provide land for the poor
      * His ideas weren’t successful
      * Was murdered along with 3000 of his supporters at the hands of the Senate
  • Julius Caesar founded colonies in in Italy, Asia, Greece, Africa, Spain, and Gual
      * Extended Roman citizenship to parts of Spain and Gual
      * Was appointed dictator by the Senate
  • Declared himself dictator for life
  • Was turning Rome into a monarchy
  • Assassinated by group of senators to save the republic
  • His death led to civil war in Rome
  • Augustus, despite becoming the first emperor, wanted to keep the facade of Rome being a republic
      * Held 4 terms as consul
      * Was Tribune for life after 23 B.C.E.
      * Reduced number of senators from 1000 to 600
      * The empire experienced peace and stability for two centuries under his and his successors’ leadership
  • Augustus’ stepson, Tiberius was recognized as the ruler of Rome after his death
      * Tiberius was unpopular
  • Nero was a tyrannical ruler
  • Jews refused to be a part of the polytheistic cults of Rome and were allowed to keep their monotheistic cults and didn’t have to make sacrifices to Roman Gods
  • Jesus was raised as a Jew in Galilee
      * Preached messages of peace and love for God
  • Pontius Pilate, a Roman governor believed that Jesus posed a threat to law and order
      * In 30 C.E. Pontius Pilate ordered Jesus to be put to death by crucifixion
      * Jesus’s followers announced he had risen 3 days after death
      * To his followers, his resurrection was proof of him being the Messiah
  • Christianity spread past its origins as a Jewish sect because of Paul of Tarsus who was a Jew that had become an early Christian convert from Asia Minor