Portal:Ancient Rome

In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman civilisation from the founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC), the Roman Republic (509‍–‍27 BC), and the Roman Empire (27 BC – 476 AD) until the fall of the western empire.

Ancient Rome began as an Italic settlement, traditionally dated to 753 BC, beside the River Tiber in the Italian peninsula. The settlement grew into the city and polity of Rome, and came to control its neighbours through a combination of treaties and military strength. It eventually controlled the Italian Peninsula, assimilating the Greek culture of southern Italy (Magna Graecia) and the Etruscan culture, and then became the dominant power in the Mediterranean region and parts of Europe. At its height it controlled the North African coast, Egypt, Southern Europe, and most of Western Europe, the Balkans, Crimea, and much of the Middle East, including Anatolia, the Levant, and parts of Mesopotamia and Arabia. That empire was among the largest empires in the ancient world, covering around 5 million square kilometres (1.9 million square miles) in AD 117, with an estimated 50 to 90 million inhabitants, roughly 20% of the world's population at the time. The Roman state evolved from an elective monarchy to a classical republic and then to an increasingly autocratic military dictatorship during the Empire.

Ancient Rome is often grouped into classical antiquity together with ancient Greece, and their similar cultures and societies are known as the Greco-Roman world. Ancient Roman civilisation has contributed to modern language, religion, society, technology, law, politics, government, warfare, art, literature, architecture, and engineering. Rome professionalised and expanded its military and created a system of government called res publica, the inspiration for modern republics such as the United States and France. It achieved impressive technological and architectural feats, such as the empire-wide construction of aqueducts and roads, as well as more grandiose monuments and facilities. (Full article...)

The Senate was the governing and advisory assembly of the aristocracy in the ancient Roman Republic. It was not an elected body, but one whose members were appointed by the consuls, and later by the censors, which were appointed by the aristocratic Centuriate Assembly. After a Roman magistrate served his term in office, it usually was followed with automatic appointment to the Senate. According to the Greek historian Polybius, the principal source on the Constitution of the Roman Republic, the Roman Senate was the predominant branch of government. Polybius noted that it was the consuls (the highest-ranking of the regular magistrates) who led the armies and the civil government in Rome, and it was the Roman assemblies which had the ultimate authority over elections, legislation, and criminal trials. However, since the Senate controlled money, administration, and the details of foreign policy, it had the most control over day-to-day life. The power and authority of the Senate derived from precedent, the high caliber and prestige of the senators, and the Senate's unbroken lineage, which dated back to the founding of the Republic in 509 BC. It developed from the Senate of the Roman Kingdom, and became the Senate of the Roman Empire.

Originally the chief magistrates, the consuls, appointed all new senators. They also had the power to remove individuals from the Senate. Around the year 318 BC, the "Ovinian Plebiscite" (plebiscitum Ovinium) gave this power to another Roman magistrate, the censor, who retained this power until the end of the Roman Republic. This law also required the censors to appoint any newly elected magistrate to the Senate. Thus, after this point in time, election to magisterial office resulted in automatic Senate membership. The appointment was for life, although the censor could impeach any senator. (Full article...)

List of selected articles

The following are images from various ancient Rome-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1A multigenerational banquet depicted on a wall painting from Pompeii (1st century AD) (from Roman Empire)
Image 2The Roman Empire under Hadrian (ruled 117–138) showing the location of the Roman legions deployed in 125 AD (from Roman Empire)
Image 3Fragmentary military diploma from Carnuntum; Latin was the language of the military throughout the Empire (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 4Eggs, thrushes, napkin, and vessels (wall painting from the House of Julia Felix, Pompeii) (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 5Silver cup, from the Boscoreale Treasure (early 1st century AD) (from Roman Empire)
Image 6Solidus issued under Constantine II, and on the reverse Victoria, one of the last deities to appear on Roman coins, gradually transforming into an angel under Christian rule (from Roman Empire)
Image 7Public toilets (latrinae) from Ostia Antica (from Roman Empire)
Image 8Winged Victory, ancient Roman fresco of the Neronian era from Pompeii (from Roman Empire)
Image 9Recreation of a deer hunt inspired by hunting scenes represented in Roman art. (from Roman Empire)
Image 10A 3rd-century funerary stele is among the earliest Christian inscriptions, written in both Greek and Latin. (from Roman Empire)
Image 11Gold earrings with gemstones, 3rd century (from Roman Empire)
Image 12Eighteenth century painting by Pompeo Batoni depicting Aeneas fleeing from Troy. Aeneas carries his father. (from Founding of Rome)
Image 13A fresco portrait of a man holding a papyrus roll, Pompeii, Italy, 1st century AD (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 14The Triumph of Neptune floor mosaic from Africa Proconsularis (present-day Tunisia) (from Roman Empire)
Image 15Reconstruction of a wax writing tablet (from Roman Empire)
Image 16Circus Maximus, a mass entertainment venue located in Rome (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 17Toga-clad statue, restored with the head of the emperor Nerva (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 18Statue in Constanța, Romania (the ancient colony Tomis), commemorating Ovid's exile (from Roman Empire)
Image 19A bust of Cicero, Capitoline Museums, Rome (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 20Glass cage cup from the Rhineland, 4th century (from Roman Empire)
Image 21Mosaic from Pompeii depicting the Academy of Plato (from Roman Empire)
Image 22The Colosseum in Rome (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 23A fresco from Pompeii depicting the foundation of Rome. Sol riding in his chariot; Mars descending from the sky to Rhea Silvia lying in the grass; Mercury shows to Venus the she-wolf suckling the twins; in the lower corners of the picture: river-god Tiberinus and water-goddess Juturna. 35–45 AD. (from Founding of Rome)
Image 24Excavation on the Palatine Hill has found the foundations of a hut believed to correspond to the Hut of Romulus, which the Romans themselves preserved into late antiquity (from Founding of Rome)
Image 25Fragment of a sarcophagus depicting Gordian III and senators (3rd century) (from Roman Empire)
Image 26Bread stall, from a Pompeiian wall painting (from Roman Empire)
Image 27Relief panel from Trajan's Column in Rome, showing the building of a fort and the reception of a Dacian embassy (from Roman Empire)
Image 28Capitoline Wolf, sculpture of the she-wolf feeding the twins Romulus and Remus, the most famous image associated with the founding of Rome. According to Livy, it was erected in 296 BC. (from Founding of Rome)
Image 29Landscape resulting from the ruina montium mining technique at Las Médulas, Spain, one of the most important gold mines in the Roman Empire (from Roman Empire)
Image 30Sestertius issued under Hadrian circa AD 134–138 (from Roman Empire)
Image 31Forum of Gerasa (Jerash in present-day Jordan), with columns marking a covered walkway (stoa) for vendor stalls, and a semicircular space for public speaking (from Roman Empire)
Image 32Finely decorated Gallo-Roman terra sigillata bowl (from Roman Empire)
Image 33The Zliten mosaic, from a dining room in present-day Libya, depicts a series of arena scenes: from top, musicians; gladiators; beast fighters; and convicts condemned to the beasts (from Roman Empire)
Image 34Romulus and Remus on the House of the She-wolf at the Grand Place of Brussels (from Founding of Rome)
Image 35A late Republican banquet scene in a fresco from Herculaneum, Italy, c. 50 BC; the woman wears a transparent silk gown while the man to the left raises a rhyton drinking vessel (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 36Still life on a 2nd-century Roman mosaic (from Roman Empire)
Image 37Trio of musicians playing an aulos, cymbala, and tympanum (mosaic from Pompeii) (from Roman Empire)
Image 38Condemned man attacked by a leopard in the arena (3rd-century mosaic from Tunisia) (from Roman Empire)
Image 39The Wedding of Zephyrus and Chloris (54–68 AD, Pompeian Fourth Style) within painted architectural panels from the Casa del Naviglio (from Roman Empire)
Image 40Model of archaic Rome, 6th century BC (from Founding of Rome)
Image 41The Flavian Amphitheatre, more commonly known as the Colosseum (from Roman Empire)
Image 42The Roman Empire by 476, noting western and eastern divisions (from Roman Empire)
Image 43Aeneas's route in Virgil's Aeneid. The epic poem was written in the early first century BC. (from Founding of Rome)
Image 44A segment of the ruins of Hadrian's Wall in northern England, overlooking Crag Lough (from Roman Empire)
Image 45Antoninus Pius (r. 138–161) wearing a toga (Hermitage Museum) (from Roman Empire)
Image 46A green Roman glass cup unearthed from an Eastern Han dynasty (25–220 AD) tomb in Guangxi, China (from Roman Empire)
Image 47The Pont du Gard aqueduct, which crosses the river Gardon in southern France, is on UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites. (from Roman Empire)
Image 48Pride in literacy was displayed through emblems of reading and writing, as in this portrait of Terentius Neo and his wife (c. 20 AD) (from Roman Empire)
Image 49On the Ludovisi sarcophagus (from Roman Empire)
Image 50Western Europe during its Middle Bronze Age, with the Apennine Culture in blue (from Founding of Rome)
Image 51Cinerary urn for the freedman Tiberius Claudius Chryseros and two women, probably his wife and daughter (from Roman Empire)
Image 52Head of Constantine the Great, part of a colossal statue. Bronze, 4th century, Musei Capitolini, Rome. (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 53Dressing of a priestess or bride, Roman fresco from Herculaneum, Italy (30–40 AD) (from Roman Empire)
Image 54The Barbarian invasions consisted of the movement of (mainly) ancient Germanic peoples into Roman territory. Historically, this event marked the transition between classical antiquity and the Middle Ages. (from Roman Empire)
Image 55Reconstructed peristyle garden based on the House of the Vettii (from Roman Empire)
Image 56The administrative divisions of the Roman Empire in 395 AD (from Roman Empire)
Image 57Roman portraiture fresco of a young man with a papyrus scroll, from Herculaneum, 1st century AD (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 58So-called "Bikini Girls" mosaic from the Villa del Casale, Roman Sicily, 4th century (from Roman Empire)
Image 59The Tabula Peutingeriana (Latin for "The Peutinger Map") an Itinerarium, often assumed to be based on the Roman cursus publicus (from Roman Empire)
Image 60Plato's Academy mosaic from Pompeii (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 61Mosaic depicting a theatrical troupe preparing for a performance (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 62Cityscape from the Villa Boscoreale (60s AD) (from Roman Empire)
Image 63Funerary urn of the Villanovan culture, precursor to Etruscan civilization (from Founding of Rome)
Image 64The Pantheon in Rome, a Roman temple originally built under Augustus, later converted into a Catholic church in the 7th century (from Roman Empire)
Image 65Aquae Sulis in Bath, England: architectural features above the level of the pillar bases are a later reconstruction. (from Roman Empire)
Image 66Wall painting (1st century AD) from Pompeii depicting a multigenerational banquet (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 67A fresco from Herculaneum depicting Heracles and Achelous from Greco-Roman mythology, 1st century CE (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 68Togate statue in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale d'Abruzzo (from Roman Empire)
Image 69All-male theatrical troupe preparing for a masked performance, on a mosaic from the House of the Tragic Poet (from Roman Empire)
Image 70Workers at a cloth-processing shop, in a painting from the fullonica of Veranius Hypsaeus in Pompeii (from Roman Empire)
Image 71The Temple of Saturn, a religious monument that housed the treasury in ancient Rome (from Roman Empire)
Image 72Augustus of Prima Porta (from Roman Empire)
Image 73A victor in his four-horse chariot (from Roman Empire)
Image 74The so-called Primavera of Stabiae, perhaps the goddess Flora (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 75Fresco of a seated woman from Stabiae, 1st century AD (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 76Musicians playing a Roman tuba, a water organ (hydraulis), and a pair of cornua, detail from the Zliten mosaic, 2nd century AD (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 77Slave holding writing tablets for his master (relief from a 4th-century sarcophagus) (from Roman Empire)
Image 78A teacher with two students, as a third arrives with his loculus, a writing case (from Roman Empire)
Image 79Marble relief of Mithras slaying the bull (2nd century, Louvre-Lens); Mithraism was among the most widespread mystery religions of the Roman Empire. (from Culture of ancient Rome)
Image 80Roman cities in the Imperial period (from Roman Empire)

Marble bust, Glyptothek, Munich

Trajan (/ˈtreɪdʒən/ TRAY-jən; born Marcus Ulpius Traianus, 18 September 53 – c. 9 August 117) was a Roman emperor from AD 98 to 117, remembered as the second of the Five Good Emperors of the Nerva–Antonine dynasty. He was a philanthropic ruler and a successful soldier-emperor who presided over one of the greatest military expansions in Roman history, during which, by the time of his death, the Roman Empire reached its maximum territorial extent. He was given the title of Optimus ('the best') by the Roman Senate.

Trajan was born in the municipium of Italica in the present-day Andalusian province of Seville in southern Spain, an Italic settlement in Hispania Baetica; his gens Ulpia came from the town of Tuder in the Umbria region of central Italy. His namesake father, Marcus Ulpius Traianus, was a general and distinguished senator. Trajan rose to prominence during the reign of Domitian; in AD 89, serving as a legatus legionis in Hispania Tarraconensis, he supported the emperor against a revolt on the Rhine led by Antonius Saturninus. He then served as governor of Germania and Pannonia. In September 96, Domitian was succeeded by the elderly and childless Nerva, who proved to be unpopular with the army. After a revolt by members of the Praetorian Guard, Nerva decided to adopt as his heir and successor the more popular Trajan, who had distinguished himself in military campaigns against Germanic tribes. (Full article...)

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...That when Caesar's troops hesitated to leave their ships for fear of the Britons, the aquilifer of the tenth legion threw himself overboard and, carrying the eagle, advanced alone against the enemy?
...That the most well paid athlete in human history, Gaius Appuleius Diocles, was an illiterate Roman Chariot racer, and earned the equivalent of $15 Billion US Dollars.
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The Roman Forum (Latin: Forum Romanum) was a rectangular forum at the heart of the city of Ancient Rome. The Forum was used for military triumphs, elections, criminal trials, gladiatorial matches, and as a meeting- and business-place. The Forum survives today in ruins, and is the oldest structure in the modern city of Rome.

Photo credit: Howard Hudson

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“

[...] Caesar is a god in his own city. Outstanding in war or peace, it was not so much his wars that ended in great victories, or his actions at home, or his swiftly won fame, that set him among the stars, a fiery comet, as his descendant. There is no greater achievement among Caesar's actions than that he stood father to our emperor. Is it a greater thing to have conquered the sea-going Britons; to have led his victorious ships up the seven-mouthed flood of the papyrus-bearing Nile; to have brought the rebellious Numidians, under Juba of Cinyps, and Pontus, swollen with the name of Mithridates, under the people of Quirinus; to have earned many triumphs and celebrated few; than to have sponsored such a man, with whom, as ruler of all, you gods have richly favoured the human race? Therefore, in order for the emperor not to have been born of mortal seed, Caesar needed to be made a god. [...]

Augustus, his 'son', will ensure that he ascends to heaven as a god, and is worshipped in the temples. Augustus, as heir to his name, will carry the burden placed upon him alone, and will have us with him, in battle, as the most courageous avenger of his father's murder. Under his command, the conquered walls of besieged Mutina will sue for peace; Pharsalia will know him; Macedonian Philippi twice flow with blood; and the one who holds Pompey's great name, will be defeated in Sicilian waters; and a Roman general's Egyptian consort, trusting, to her cost, in their marriage, will fall, her threat that our Capitol would bow to her city of Canopus, proved vain.

Why enumerate foreign countries or the nations living on either ocean shore? Wherever earth contains habitable land, it will be his: and even the sea will serve him!

”

— Ovid, Metamorphoses, XV, 745–842

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