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145-657: Chinese sources describe several ancient Roman embassies arriving in China , beginning in 166 AD and lasting into the 3rd century. These early embassies were said to arrive by a maritime route via the South China Sea in the Chinese province of Jiaozhi (now northern Vietnam ). Archaeological evidence such as Roman coins points to the presence of Roman commercial activity in Southeast Asia . Later recorded embassies arriving from

290-504: A luxury item in the Tang dynasty ), their tiles were covered with coral , their " king " had 5 palaces, all huge, and all far from each other, just as what was heard in one palace took time to reach another and so on. Starting in the 1st century BC with Virgil , Horace , and Strabo , Roman histories offer only vague accounts of China and the silk-producing Seres of the distant east. The 2nd-century historian Florus seems to have conflated

435-469: A "feather bag" and thrown into the sea. This seems to correspond with the Romano-Byzantine punishment of poena cullei (from Latin "punishment of the sack"), where those who committed parricide (i.e. murder of a father or mother) were sewn up into a sack, sometimes with wild animals, and thrown into either a river or sea. The History of Song also mentioned how it was forbidden by law to counterfeit

580-575: A Daqin embassy to Sun Quan of Eastern Wu in 226, while the Book of Jin records a Daqin embassy to Emperor Wu of Jin in 284. Although Emperor Yang of Sui (r. 604–618) had desired to send an embassy to Daqin, this never came to fruition. Instead, an embassy from a country that was now called Fulin (拂菻, i.e. the Byzantine Empire), which the Old Book of Tang and New Book of Tang identified as being

725-710: A Gallic army under the leadership of tribal chieftain Brennus , defeated the Romans at the Battle of the Allia and marched to Rome. The Gauls looted and burned the city, then laid siege to the Capitoline Hill, where some Romans had barricaded themselves, for seven months. The Gauls then agreed to give the Romans peace in exchange for 1000 pounds of gold. According to later legend, the Roman supervising

870-406: A Republic. Augustus ( r.  27 BC – AD 14 ) gathered almost all the republican powers under his official title, princeps , and diminished the political influence of the senatorial class by boosting the equestrian class . The senators lost their right to rule certain provinces, like Egypt, since the governor of that province was directly nominated by the emperor. The creation of

1015-552: A banquet for its notable citizens, after which his soldiers killed all the guests. From the security of the temple of Sarapis, he then directed an indiscriminate slaughter of Alexandria's people. In 212, he issued the Edict of Caracalla , giving full Roman citizenship to all free men living in the Empire, with the exception of the dediticii , people who had become subject to Rome through surrender in war, and freed slaves. Mary Beard points to

1160-530: A derivational morphology and syntax that was also affected by language contact but to a lesser extent. Many ancient Parthian words were preserved and now survive only in Armenian. The Semnani or Komisenian languages may descend from Parthian directly or be a Caspian language with Parthian influences, but the topic lacks sufficient research. Parthian was a Western Middle Iranian language . Language contact made it share some features of Eastern Iranian languages ,

1305-458: A fine cloth which some people say is made from the down of "water sheep" , but which is made, in fact, from the cocoons of wild silkworms . They blend all sorts of fragrances, and by boiling the juice, make a compound perfume. [They have] all the precious and rare things that come from the various foreign kingdoms. They make gold and silver coins. Ten silver coins are worth one gold coin. They trade with Anxi and Tianzhu by sea. The profit margin

1450-479: A free path to reestablish his own power. In 83 BC he made his second march on Rome and began a time of terror: thousands of nobles, knights and senators were executed. Sulla held two dictatorships and one more consulship, which began the crisis and decline of Roman Republic. In the mid-1st century BC, Roman politics were restless. Political divisions in Rome split into one of two groups, populares (who hoped for

1595-650: A half century after these events, Carthage was left humiliated and the Republic's focus was now directed towards the Hellenistic kingdoms of Greece and revolts in Hispania . However, Carthage, having paid the war indemnity, felt that its commitments and submission to Rome had ceased, a vision not shared by the Roman Senate . The Third Punic War began when Rome declared war against Carthage in 149 BC. Carthage resisted well at

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1740-511: A hundred days. These games included gladiatorial combats , horse races and a sensational mock naval battle on the flooded grounds of the Colosseum. Titus died of fever in 81 AD, and was succeeded by his brother Domitian . As emperor, Domitian showed the characteristics of a tyrant . He ruled for fifteen years, during which time he acquired a reputation for self-promotion as a living god. He constructed at least two temples in honour of Jupiter,

1885-610: A large proletariat often of impoverished farmers. The latter groups supported the Catilinarian conspiracy —a resounding failure since the consul Marcus Tullius Cicero quickly arrested and executed the main leaders. Gaius Julius Caesar reconciled the two most powerful men in Rome: Marcus Licinius Crassus , who had financed much of his earlier career, and Crassus' rival, Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (anglicised as Pompey), to whom he married his daughter . He formed them into

2030-531: A letter of correspondence to Byzantine emperor John V Palaiologos . The term Daqin ( Chinese : 大秦 ; pinyin : Dà qín ; Wade–Giles : Ta-ch'in , Middle Chinese : /dɑi d͡ziɪn/), meaning "Great Qin", is derived from the dynasty founded by Qin Shi Huang , ruler of the State of Qin and China's first emperor who unified China's Warring States by 221 BC. The prefix da (大) or "great" signified that

2175-528: A long time to reach the north west coast, and in 60 AD he finally crossed the Menai Strait to the sacred island of Mona ( Anglesey ), the last stronghold of the druids . His soldiers attacked the island and massacred the druids: men, women and children, destroyed the shrine and the sacred groves and threw many of the sacred standing stones into the sea. While Paulinus and his troops were massacring druids in Mona,

2320-555: A man of Fulin named Ai-sie (transliteration of either Joshua or Joseph), initially in the service of Güyük Khan , was well-versed in Western languages and had expertise in the fields of medicine and astronomy . This convinced Kublai Khan , founder of the Yuan dynasty, to offer him a position as the director of medical and astronomical boards, eventually honoring him with the title of Prince of Fulin (Chinese: 拂菻王; Fú lǐn wáng ). His biography in

2465-686: A military leader to defeat the Cimbri and the Teutones , who were threatening Rome. After Marius's retirement, Rome had a brief peace, during which the Italian socii ("allies" in Latin) requested Roman citizenship and voting rights. The reformist Marcus Livius Drusus supported their legal process but was assassinated, and the socii revolted against the Romans in the Social War . At one point both consuls were killed; Marius

2610-644: A new informal alliance including himself, the First Triumvirate ("three men"). Caesar's daughter died in childbirth in 54 BC, and in 53 BC, Crassus invaded Parthia and was killed in the Battle of Carrhae ; the Triumvirate disintegrated. Caesar conquered Gaul , obtained immense wealth, respect in Rome and the loyalty of battle-hardened legions. He became a threat to Pompey and was loathed by many optimates . Confident that Caesar could be stopped by legal means, Pompey's party tried to strip Caesar of his legions,

2755-510: A pair of tribunes who attempted to pass land reform legislation that would redistribute the major patrician landholdings among the plebeians. Both brothers were killed and the Senate passed reforms reversing the Gracchi brother's actions. This led to the growing divide of the plebeian groups ( populares ) and equestrian classes ( optimates ). Gaius Marius soon become a leader of the Republic, holding

2900-527: A period of turbulence. Archaeological evidence implies some degree of large-scale warfare. According to tradition and later writers such as Livy , the Roman Republic was established c.  509 BC , when the last of the seven kings of Rome, Tarquin the Proud , was deposed and a system based on annually elected magistrates and various representative assemblies was established. A constitution set

3045-495: A physician from the land of Babylon." [Fragment missing in which Mani seems to describe his miraculous healing of the Shah's handmaiden] and in ⟨her⟩ whole body the handmaiden became healthy ⟨again⟩. In great joy ⟨she⟩ said to me: "From where are you, my lord and saviour?" Although Parthian was quite similar to Middle Persian in many aspects, clear differences in lexical, morphological and phonological forms can still be observed. In

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3190-564: A prelude to Caesar's trial, impoverishment, and exile. To avoid this fate, Caesar crossed the Rubicon River and invaded Rome in 49 BC. The Battle of Pharsalus was a brilliant victory for Caesar and in this and other campaigns, he destroyed all of the optimates leaders: Metellus Scipio , Cato the Younger , and Pompey's son, Gnaeus Pompeius . Pompey was murdered in Egypt in 48 BC. Caesar

3335-571: A region situated in present-day northeastern Iran and Turkmenistan . Parthian was the language of state of the Arsacid Parthian Empire (248 BC – 224 AD), as well as of its eponymous branches of the Arsacid dynasty of Armenia , Arsacid dynasty of Iberia , and the Arsacid dynasty of Caucasian Albania . Parthian had a significant impact on Armenian , a large part of whose vocabulary was formed primarily from borrowings from Parthian, and had

3480-603: A revolt in Mauretania and the Bar Kokhba revolt in Judea. This was the last large-scale Jewish revolt against the Romans, and was suppressed with massive repercussions in Judea. Hundreds of thousands of Jews were killed. Hadrian renamed the province of Judea " Provincia Syria Palaestina ", after one of Judea's most hated enemies. He constructed fortifications and walls, like the celebrated Hadrian's Wall which separated Roman Britannia and

3625-452: A rich Arabian city. Severus killed his legate, who was gaining respect from the legions; and his soldiers fell victim to famine. After this disastrous campaign, he withdrew. Severus also intended to vanquish the whole of Britannia. To achieve this, he waged war against the Caledonians . After many casualties in the army due to the terrain and the barbarians' ambushes, Severus himself went to

3770-626: A sea voyage to found a new Troy after the Trojan War . They landed on the banks of the Tiber River and a woman travelling with them, Roma, torched their ships to prevent them leaving again. They named the settlement after her. The Roman poet Virgil recounted this legend in his classical epic poem the Aeneid , where the Trojan prince Aeneas is destined to found a new Troy. Literary and archaeological evidence

3915-671: A series of checks and balances , and a separation of powers . The most important magistrates were the two consuls , who together exercised executive authority such as imperium , or military command. The consuls had to work with the Senate , which was initially an advisory council of the ranking nobility, or patricians , but grew in size and power. Other magistrates of the Republic include tribunes , quaestors , aediles , praetors and censors . The magistracies were originally restricted to patricians , but were later opened to common people, or plebeians . Republican voting assemblies included

4060-668: A statue of Apollo and the temple of Divus Claudius ("the deified Claudius"), both initiated by Nero. Buildings destroyed by the Great Fire of Rome were rebuilt, and he revitalised the Capitol . Vespasian started the construction of the Flavian Amphitheater, commonly known as the Colosseum . The historians Josephus and Pliny the Elder wrote their works during Vespasian's reign. Vespasian

4205-539: 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. Archaeological evidence of settlement around Rome starts to emerge c.  1000 BC . Large-scale organisation appears only c.  800 BC , with

4350-493: A territory of some 780 square kilometres (300 square miles) with a population perhaps as high as 35,000. A palace, the Regia , was constructed c.  625 BC ; the Romans attributed the creation of their first popular organisations and the Senate to the regal period as well. Rome also started to extend its control over its Latin neighbours. While later Roman stories like the Aeneid asserted that all Latins descended from

4495-493: A very idealistic view of Roman governance which is likely the result of some story he was told while visiting the Persian Gulf in 97 AD. He also described, less fancifully, Roman products: 「其王無有常人，皆簡立賢者。國中災異及風雨不時，輒廢而更立，受放者甘黜不怨。其人民皆長大平正，有類中國，故謂之大秦......土多金銀奇寶，有夜光璧、明月珠、駭雞犀、珊瑚、虎魄、琉璃、琅玕、朱丹、青碧。刺金縷繡，織成金縷罽、雜色綾。作黃金塗、火浣布。」 Their kings are not permanent. They select and appoint the most worthy man . If there are unexpected calamities in

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4640-591: Is also called Lijian. As it is found to the west of the sea, it is also called the Kingdom of Haixi ("West of the Sea"). The territory extends for several thousands of li . It has more than four hundred walled towns. There are several tens of smaller dependent kingdoms. The walls of the towns are made of stone. They have established postal relays at intervals, which are all plastered and whitewashed. There are pines and cypresses, as well as trees and plants of all kinds. Gan Ying gives

4785-448: Is clear on there having been kings in Rome, attested in fragmentary 6th century BC texts. Long after the abolition of the Roman monarchy, a vestigial rex sacrorum was retained to exercise the monarch's former priestly functions. The Romans believed that their monarchy was elective, with seven legendary kings who were largely unrelated by blood. Evidence of Roman expansion is clear in the sixth century BC; by its end, Rome controlled

4930-520: Is recorded in the Book of Later Han as having arrived by sea in 166 AD and came by way of Jiaozhou , later known as Annam ( northern Vietnam ), as would later embassies. Its members claimed to be representatives of the Daqin ruler "Andun" (安敦), either Antoninus Pius or more likely his co-emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus , and offered gifts to the court of Emperor Huan of Han . Other embassies arrived sporadically afterwards. The Book of Liang mentions

5075-672: Is ten to one. ... The king of this country always wanted to send envoys to the Han, but Anxi, wishing to control the trade in multi-coloured Chinese silks, blocked the route to prevent [the Romans] getting through [to China]. In the Weilüe written by Yu Huan ( c.  239 –265), a text that is preserved in the Records of the Three Kingdoms by Pei Songzhi (published in 429), a more detailed description of

5220-501: Is usually taken by historians as the beginning of Roman Empire. Officially, the government was republican, but Augustus assumed absolute powers. His reform of the government brought about a two-century period colloquially referred to by Romans as the Pax Romana . The Julio-Claudian dynasty was established by Augustus . The emperors of this dynasty were Augustus, Tiberius , Caligula , Claudius and Nero . The Julio-Claudians started

5365-663: The Historia Augusta give many accounts of his notorious extravagance. Elagabalus adopted his cousin Severus Alexander , as Caesar, but subsequently grew jealous and attempted to assassinate him. However, the Praetorian guard preferred Alexander, murdered Elagabalus, dragged his mutilated corpse through the streets of Rome, and threw it into the Tiber. Severus Alexander then succeeded him. Alexander waged war against many foes, including

5510-653: The History of Song record that the Byzantine emperor Michael VII Parapinakēs Caesar ( Mie li sha ling kai sa 滅力沙靈改撒) of Fulin (i.e. Byzantium) sent an embassy to China that arrived in 1081, during the reign of Emperor Shenzong of Song (r. 1067–1085). During the subsequent Yuan dynasty (1271–1368), an unprecedented number of Europeans started to visit and live in China , such as Marco Polo and Katarina Vilioni , and papal missionaries such as John of Montecorvino and Giovanni de Marignolli . The History of Yuan recounts how

5655-510: The comitia centuriata (centuriate assembly), which voted on matters of war and peace and elected men to the most important offices, and the comitia tributa (tribal assembly), which elected less important offices. In the 4th century BC, Rome had come under attack by the Gauls , who now extended their power in the Italian peninsula beyond the Po Valley and through Etruria. On 16 July 390 BC,

5800-615: The History of Yuan lists his children by their Chinese names , which are similar to the Christian names Elias ( Ye-li-ah ), Luke ( Lu-ko ), and Antony ( An-tun ), with a daughter named A-na-si-sz . The History of Ming explains how the founder of the Ming dynasty (1368–1644), the Hongwu Emperor , sent a merchant of Fulin named "Nieh-ku-lun" (捏古倫) back to his home country with a letter announcing

5945-609: The Jo-shui was in the west of T'iao-chih; now the Jo-shui is believed to be in the west of Ta-ts'in. Formerly it was wrongly believed that, going over two hundred days west of T'iao-chih, one came near the place where the sun sets; now, one comes near the place where the sun sets by going west of Ta-ts'in. The country of Ta-ts'in, also called Li-kan , is on the west of the great sea [the Indian Ocean ] west of Ar-hsi and T'iao-chih. From

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6090-484: The Palatine hill . However, other scholars, including Hirth and Hoppál, identify it with Antioch. It has also been suggested that the capital of Daqin described in those works is a conflation of multiple cities, chiefly Rome, Antioch and Alexandria. In Gan Ying's report the capital of Daqin is "An-tu", Antioch . However, the Old Book of Tang and New Book of Tang , which identified Daqin and "Fulin" (拂菻; i.e. Primus ,

6235-582: The Parthian Empire and the Roman Empire, the Book of Jin , as well as the later Wenxian Tongkao , noted how ten ancient Roman silver coins were worth one Roman gold coin. With fluctuations, the Roman golden aureus was worth about twenty-five silver denarii . The History of Song notes how the Byzantines made coins of either silver or gold, without holes in the middle yet with an inscription of

6380-631: The Persian Gulf and captured Characene , the capital of which was Charax Spasinu. The Weilüe provides the traveling directions and approximate distances between each of these cities, counted in ancient Chinese miles ( li ) , and along with the Book of Later Han even mentions the pontoon bridge ("flying bridge") across the Euphrates at the Roman city of Zeugma, Commagene (in modern-day Turkey). Hirth and Arkenberg identified Si-fu (Chinese: 汜復) with Emesa. However, John E. Hill provides evidence that it

6525-649: The Praetorian Guard and his reforms in the military, creating a standing army with a fixed size of 28 legions, ensured his total control over the army. Compared with the Second Triumvirate's epoch, Augustus' reign as princeps was very peaceful, which led the people and the nobles of Rome to support Augustus, increasing his strength in political affairs. His generals were responsible for the field command, gaining such commanders as Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa , Nero Claudius Drusus and Germanicus much respect from

6670-669: 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

6815-405: The Roman church . So, for example, when the Taoist Emperor Wuzong of Tang closed Christian monasteries in the mid-9th century, the imperial edict commanded: As for the Tai-Ch'in (Syrian Christian) and Muh-hu (Zoroastrian) forms of worship, since Buddhism has already been cast out, these heresies alone must not be allowed to survive. The name "Daqin" for Rome was used on Chinese maps as late as

6960-466: The Roman naming conventions ) tried to align himself with the Caesarian faction. In 43 BC, along with Antony and Marcus Aemilius Lepidus , Caesar's best friend, he legally established the Second Triumvirate . Upon its formation, 130–300 senators were executed, and their property was confiscated, due to their supposed support for the Liberatores . In 42 BC, the Senate deified Caesar as Divus Iulius ; Octavian thus became Divi filius ,

7105-513: The Southwestern Iranian language group. The Parthian language was rendered using the Pahlavi writing system , which had two essential characteristics. Firstly, its script derived from Aramaic , the script (and language) of the Achaemenid chancellery ( Imperial Aramaic ). Secondly, it had a high incidence of Aramaic words, which are rendered as ideograms or logograms ; they were written as Aramaic words but pronounced as Parthian ones (See Arsacid Pahlavi for details). The Parthian language

7250-426: The Umayyad Caliphate . The encyclopedic part of the Book of Jin classified the appearance of the Romans as being genuinely Xirong , a barbaric people who lived west of the Zhou dynasty , however, the characteristics attributed to Daqin tend to be more positive than the others, saying that their people when they reached adulthood looked like the Chinese , they used glass on the walls of their houses (considered

7395-438: The accusative form of Konstantinoupolis , the Greek name of Constantinople , or rather its paraphrase hē Pólis ("the City"), giving (in the accusative) (tḕn) Pólin . Using historical phonetic pronunciations of Cantonese and Japanese , Hirth also speculated that Fulin in Middle Chinese was pronounced Butlim or Butlam and thus might have also come from the Syriac pronunciation for Bethlehem . While some scholars of

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7540-450: The ancient Romans imported Han Chinese silk while the Han-dynasty Chinese imported Roman glasswares as discovered in their tombs, Valerie Hansen (2012) claimed that no Roman coins from the Roman Republic (507–27 BC) or the Principate (27 BC–284 AD) era of the Roman Empire have been found in China. Yet this assumption has been overturned; Warwick Ball (2016) notes the discovery of sixteen Roman coins found at Xi'an , China (site of

7685-422: The founding of a new dynasty . It is speculated that this "merchant" was actually a former bishop of Khanbaliq named Nicolaus de Bentra. The History of Ming goes on to explain that contacts between China and Fulin ceased thereafter, whereas an envoy of the great western sea (i.e. the Mediterranean Sea ) did not arrive again until the 16th century, with the Italian Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci . Although

7830-399: The reservoir and cistern flood-control system harnessing the many streams running through the settlement and nearby canyons, or wadis, such as the Wadi Musa ("Valley of Moses"). In later eras, starting in AD 550, as Syriac Christians settled along the Silk Road and founded mission churches, Daqin or Tai-Ch'in is also used to refer to these Christian populations rather than to Rome or

7975-592: The "five good emperors" Nerva , Trajan , Hadrian , Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius . Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius were part of Italic families settled in Roman colonies outside of Italy: the families of Trajan and Hadrian had settled in Italica ( Hispania Baetica ), that of Antoninus Pius in Colonia Agusta Nemausensis ( Gallia Narbonensis ), and that of Marcus Aurelius in Colonia Claritas Iulia Ucubi (Hispania Baetica). The Nerva-Antonine dynasty came to an end with Commodus , son of Marcus Aurelius. Nerva abdicated and died in 98 AD, and

8120-422: The "luminous" religion (i.e. Christianity) was practiced there. In the Hou Hanshu and the Weilüe , the chief city of Daqin is said to be more than 100 li around. It is described as being located near a river and having five palaces, with the king travelling to one of these palaces each day. Some scholars have identified in this description the city of Rome , the Tiber river and the Imperial residences of

8265-424: The 16th century, such as the Sihai Huayi Zongtu . The identification of "Daqin" with the Western Roman Empire, Eastern Roman Empire, or the Church of the East varies with the era and context of the document. The Nestorian Stele erected in 781 in the Tang capital Chang'an contains an inscription that briefly summarizes the knowledge about Daqin in the Chinese histories written up to that point and notes how only

8410-616: The 20th century believed that Fulin was a transliteration of Ephrem , an ancient word for Israel , Samuel N. C. Lieu highlights how more recent scholarship has deduced that Fulin is most likely derived from the Persianate word for the Roman Empire shared by several contemporaneous Iranian languages ( Middle Persian : hrwm ; Parthian : transl.  xpr  – transl.  frwm ; Sogdian : [βr'wm-] Error: {{Transliteration}}: transliteration text not Latin script ( help ) ; Bactrian : [ φρομο ] Error: {{Transliteration}}: transliteration text not Latin script ( help ) ). Following

8555-536: The 2nd century BC, the Romans became the dominant people of the Mediterranean Sea . The conquest of the Hellenistic kingdoms brought the Roman and Greek cultures in closer contact and the Roman elite, once rural, became cosmopolitan. At this time Rome was a consolidated empire—in the military view—and had no major enemies. Foreign dominance led to internal strife. Senators became rich at the provinces ' expense; soldiers, who were mostly small-scale farmers, were away from home longer and could not maintain their land; and

8700-408: The Byzantine Empire , lasting from the 7th to 11th centuries, ostensibly took an overland route following the Silk Road , alongside other Europeans in Medieval China . Byzantine Greeks are recorded as being present in the court of Kublai Khan (1260–1294), the Mongol ruler of the Yuan dynasty in Khanbaliq ( Beijing ), while the Hongwu Emperor (r. 1368–1398), founder of the Ming dynasty , sent

8845-408: The Byzantine Empire) as the same countries, noted a different capital city ( Constantinople ), one that had walls of "enormous height" and was eventually besieged by the commander "Móyì" ( Chinese : 摩拽伐之; Pinyin : Móyì fá zhī ) of the Da shi (大食; i.e. the Arabs ). Friedrich Hirth identifies this commander as Mu'awiyah I , who was first governor of Syria before becoming caliph and founder of

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8990-430: The Capitoline and expanding to the Forum Boarium located between the Capitoline and Aventine Hills . The Romans themselves had a founding myth , attributing their city to Romulus and Remus , offspring of Mars and a princess of the mythical city of Alba Longa . The sons, sentenced to death, were rescued by a wolf and returned to restore the Alban king and found a city. After a dispute, Romulus killed Remus and became

9135-420: The Carthaginian intercession, Messana asked Rome to expel the Carthaginians. Rome entered this war because Syracuse and Messana were too close to the newly conquered Greek cities of Southern Italy and Carthage was now able to make an offensive through Roman territory; along with this, Rome could extend its domain over Sicily . Carthage was a maritime power, and the Roman lack of ships and naval experience made

9280-404: The Chinese term for Transoxiana . The name given for either Antoninus Pius or Marcus Aurelius Antoninus in the Chinese histories was "An Dun" (安敦). 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

9425-427: The Eastern part of the Roman territories. However, Marius's partisans managed his installation to the military command, defying Sulla and the Senate . To consolidate his own power, Sulla conducted a surprising and illegal action: he marched to Rome with his legions, killing all those who showed support to Marius's cause. In the following year, 87 BC, Marius, who had fled at Sulla's march, returned to Rome while Sulla

9570-463: The Eastern portion of the Roman Empire is given, particularly the province of Roman Egypt . The 19th-century sinologist Friedrich Hirth translated the passages and identified the places named in them, which have been edited by Jerome S. Arkenberg in 2000 (with Wade-Giles spelling): Formerly T'iao-chih was wrongly believed to be in the west of Ta-ts'in ; now its real position is known to be east. [...] Formerly it was, further, wrongly believed that

9715-413: The Empire in 165–180 AD. From Nerva to Marcus Aurelius, the empire achieved an unprecedented status. The powerful influence of laws and manners had gradually cemented the union of the provinces. All the citizens enjoyed and abused the advantages of wealth. The image of a free constitution was preserved with decent reverence. The Roman senate appeared to possess the sovereign authority, and devolved on

9860-419: 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

10005-463: The Flavian period was the siege and destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD by Titus . The destruction of the city was the culmination of the Roman campaign in Judea following the Jewish uprising of 66 AD. The Second Temple was completely demolished, after which Titus' soldiers proclaimed him imperator in honour of the victory. Jerusalem was sacked and much of the population killed or dispersed. Josephus claims that 1,100,000 people were killed during

10150-452: The Han capital Chang'an ) minted during the reign of various emperors from Tiberius (14–37 AD) to Aurelian (270–275 AD). The earliest gold solidus coins from the Eastern Roman Empire found in China date to the reign of Byzantine emperor Theodosius II (r. 408–450) and altogether only forty-eight of them have been found (compared to thirteen hundred silver coins) in Xinjiang and the rest of China. However, Roman golden medallions from

10295-444: The Italian Alps , causing panic among Rome's Italian allies. The best way found to defeat Hannibal's purpose of causing the Italians to abandon Rome was to delay the Carthaginians with a guerrilla war of attrition, a strategy propounded by Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus . Hannibal's invasion lasted over 16 years, ravaging Italy, but ultimately Carthage was defeated in the decisive Battle of Zama in October 202 BC. More than

10440-823: The Italian Peninsula, assimilating the Greek culture of southern Italy ( Magna Grecia ) 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 , Levant , and parts of Mesopotamia and Arabia . That empire

10585-411: The Mediterranean, Italy maintained a special status which made it domina provinciarum ("ruler of the provinces"), and – especially in relation to the first centuries of imperial stability – rectrix mundi ("governor of the world") and omnium terrarum parens ("parent of all lands"). The Flavians were the second dynasty to rule Rome. By 68 AD, the year of Nero's death, there

10730-450: The Nile]. There are three great divisions of the country [i. e., Delta , Heptanomis , Thebaid ]. From the city of Ar-ku one goes by land due north to the north of the sea; and again one goes due west to the west of the sea; and again you go due south to arrive there. At the city of Ali-san, you travel by river on board ship one day, then make a round at sea, and after six days' passage on

10875-509: The Parthian language. Those Manichaean manuscripts contain no ideograms. Attestations of the Parthian language include: This sample of Parthian literature is taken from a Manichaean text fragment: Šāh wāxt ku: Až ku ay? – Man wāxt ku: Bizišk hēm až Bābel zamīg. [...] ud pad hamāg tanbār hō kanīžag društ būd. Pad wuzurg šādīft ō man wāxt ku: Až ku ay tū, man baγ ud anžīwag? Plural)!" The Shah said: "From where are you?" I said: "I am

11020-637: The Roman Empire was on par with the might of the Qin dynasty and was viewed as a utopian land located to the northwest of the Parthian Empire . The title Daqin does not seem to have any phonetic derivation from Latin Roma or Greek Romaikē . On the other hand, it is possible that the Latin term used for China, Serica (derived from Greek Serikon , commonly understood as "Land of Silk", from Chinese si Chinese : 絲 ; pinyin : sī , meaning silk ), originated from

11165-465: The Senate, they were severely restricted in political power. The Senate squabbled perpetually, repeatedly blocked important land reforms and refused to give the equestrian class a larger say in the government. Violent gangs of the urban unemployed, controlled by rival Senators, intimidated the electorate through violence. The situation came to a head in the late 2nd century BC under the Gracchi brothers,

11310-515: The Seres with peoples of India , or at least noted that their skin complexions proved that they both lived "beneath another sky" than the Romans. The 1st-century geographer Pomponius Mela noted that their lands formed the center of the coast of an eastern ocean , flanked by India to the south and the Scythians of the northern steppe , while the historian Ammianus Marcellinus (c. 330 – c. 400) wrote that

11455-564: The aid of Pyrrhus of Epirus in 281 BC, but this effort failed as well. The Romans secured their conquests by founding Roman colonies in strategic areas, thereby establishing stable control over the region. In the 3rd century BC Rome faced a new and formidable opponent: Carthage , the other major power in the Western Mediterranean. The First Punic War began in 264 BC, when the city of Messana asked for Carthage's help in their conflicts with Hiero II of Syracuse . After

11600-597: The architect Apollodorus of Damascus . He remodelled the Pantheon and extended the Circus Maximus . When Parthia appointed a king for Armenia without consulting Rome, Trajan declared war on Parthia and deposed the king of Armenia. In 115 he took the Northern Mesopotamian cities of Nisibis and Batnae , organised a province of Mesopotamia (116), and issued coins that claimed Armenia and Mesopotamia were under

11745-470: The arts and sciences, and bestowed honours and financial rewards upon the teachers of rhetoric and philosophy . On becoming emperor, Antoninus made few initial changes, leaving intact as far as possible the arrangements instituted by his predecessor. Antoninus expanded Roman Britannia by invading what is now southern Scotland and building the Antonine Wall . He also continued Hadrian's policy of humanising

11890-488: The authority of the Roman people. In that same year, he captured Seleucia and the Parthian capital Ctesiphon (near modern Baghdad ). After defeating a Parthian revolt and a Jewish revolt , he withdrew due to health issues, and in 117, he died of edema . Trajan's successor Hadrian withdrew all the troops stationed in Parthia, Armenia and Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq ), abandoning Trajan's conquests. Hadrian's army crushed

12035-537: The changes to the calendar promoted by Caesar , and the month of August is named after him. Augustus brought a peaceful and thriving era to Rome, known as Pax Augusta or Pax Romana . Augustus died in 14 AD, but the empire's glory continued after his era. The Julio-Claudians continued to rule Rome after Augustus' death and remained in power until the death of Nero in 68 AD. Influenced by his wife, Livia Drusilla , Augustus appointed her son from another marriage, Tiberius , as his heir. The Senate agreed with

12180-466: The character Aeneas , a common culture is attested to archaeologically. Attested to reciprocal rights of marriage and citizenship between Latin cities—the Jus Latii —along with shared religious festivals, further indicate a shared culture. By the end of the 6th century, most of this area had become dominated by the Romans. By the end of the sixth century, Rome and many of its Italian neighbours entered

12325-522: The city of Ar-ku , on the boundary of Ar-hsi one takes passage in a ship and, traversing the west of the sea, with favorable winds arrives [at Aelana, modern Elat , on the Gulf of Aqaba] in two months; with slow winds, the passage may last a year, and with no wind at all, perhaps three years. This country is on the west of the sea whence it is commonly called Hai-hsi . There is a river [the Nile ] coming out from

12470-465: The city's sole founder. The area of his initial settlement on the Palatine Hill was later known as Roma Quadrata ("Square Rome"). The story dates at least to the third century BC, and the later Roman antiquarian Marcus Terentius Varro placed the city's foundation to 753 BC. Another legend, recorded by Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus , says that Prince Aeneas led a group of Trojans on

12615-522: The coast of a large sea, because "sailor(s) of the Parthian west border" told him that the voyage to cross the sea might take a long time and be dangerous. Gan Ying left a detailed account of the Roman Empire, but it is generally considered to have been based on second-hand information from Parthians : 「大秦國一名犂鞬，以在海西，亦云海西國。地方數千里，有四百餘城。小國役屬者數十。以石為城郭。列置郵亭，皆堊塈之。有松柏諸木百草。」 The Kingdom of Da Qin (the Roman Empire)

12760-644: The coins minted by Fulin . These descriptions from the History of Song are also found in the Wenxian Tongkao . In the Chinese histories , the names of Romans and Byzantines were often transliterated into Chinese as they were heard, yet occasionally the surname stemmed from their country of origin, Daqin (大秦). For instance, the Roman merchant Qin Lun (秦論), who visited the Eastern Wu court of Sun Quan in 226 AD, bears

12905-488: The country, they elect as king a worthier man, while discharging the old king, who does not even dare to feel angry at this decision. The people are tall, and upright in their dealings, like the Han [Chinese], but wear foreign dress; they call their country another " Middle Kingdom " [probably from "Mediterranean" or "Middle of the Land"]. The Weilüe also noted that the Daqin had small "dependent" vassal states, too many to list as

13050-785: The death of Tiberius, and, with belated support from the senators, proclaimed his uncle Claudius as the new emperor. Claudius was not as authoritarian as Tiberius and Caligula. Claudius conquered Lycia and Thrace ; his most important deed was the beginning of the conquest of Britannia . Claudius was poisoned by his wife, Agrippina the Younger in 54 AD. His heir was Nero , son of Agrippina and her former husband, since Claudius' son Britannicus had not reached manhood upon his father's death. Nero sent his general, Suetonius Paulinus , to invade modern-day Wales , where he encountered stiff resistance. The Celts there were independent, tough, resistant to tax collectors, and fought Paulinus as he battled his way across from east to west. It took him

13195-406: The destruction of republican values, but on the other hand, they boosted Rome's status as the central power in the Mediterranean region. While Caligula and Nero are usually remembered in popular culture as dysfunctional emperors, Augustus and Claudius are remembered as successful in politics and the military. This dynasty instituted imperial tradition in Rome and frustrated any attempt to reestablish

13340-579: The edict as a fundamental turning point, after which Rome was "effectively a new state masquerading under an old name". Macrinus conspired to have Caracalla assassinated by one of his soldiers during a pilgrimage to the Temple of the Moon in Carrhae, in 217 AD. Macrinus assumed power, but soon removed himself from Rome to the east and Antioch. His brief reign ended in 218, when the youngster Bassianus, high priest of

13485-462: The emperors all the executive powers of government. Gibbon declared the rule of these "Five Good Emperors" the golden era of the Empire. During this time, Rome reached its greatest territorial extent. Commodus , son of Marcus Aurelius, became emperor after his father's death. He is not counted as one of the Five Good Emperors, due to his direct kinship with the latter emperor; in addition, he

13630-519: The end of the Triumvirate, Antony was living in Ptolemaic Egypt , ruled by his lover, Cleopatra VII . Antony's affair with Cleopatra was seen as an act of treason, since she was queen of another country. Additionally, Antony adopted a lifestyle considered too extravagant and Hellenistic for a Roman statesman. Following Antony's Donations of Alexandria , which gave to Cleopatra the title of " Queen of Kings ", and to Antony's and Cleopatra's children

13775-492: The field. However, he became ill and died in 211 AD, at the age of 65. Upon the death of Severus, his sons Caracalla and Geta were made emperors. Caracalla had his brother, a youth, assassinated in his mother's arms, and may have murdered 20,000 of Geta's followers. Like his father, Caracalla was warlike. He continued Severus' policy and gained respect from the legions. Knowing that the citizens of Alexandria disliked him and were denigrating his character, Caracalla served

13920-700: The first graves in the Esquiline Hill 's necropolis, along with a clay and timber wall on the bottom of the Palatine Hill dating to the middle of the 8th century BC. Starting from c.  650 BC , the Romans started to drain the valley between the Capitoline and Palatine Hills, where today sits the Roman Forum . By the sixth century BC, the Romans were constructing the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus on

14065-516: The first of his seven consulships (an unprecedented number) in 107 BC by arguing that his former patron Quintus Caecilius Metellus Numidicus was not able to defeat and capture the Numidian king Jugurtha . Marius then started his military reform: in his recruitment to fight Jugurtha, he levied the very poor (an innovation), and many landless men entered the army. Marius was elected for five consecutive consulships from 104 to 100 BC, as Rome needed

14210-564: The first persecutor of Christians and for the Great Fire of Rome , rumoured to have been started by the emperor himself. A conspiracy against Nero in 65 AD under Calpurnius Piso failed, but in 68 AD the armies under Julius Vindex in Gaul and Servius Sulpicius Galba in modern-day Spain revolted. Deserted by the Praetorian Guards and condemned to death by the senate, Nero killed himself. As Roman provinces were being established throughout

14355-465: The first strike but could not withstand the attack of Scipio Aemilianus , who entirely destroyed the city, enslaved all the citizens and gained control of that region, which became the province of Africa . All these wars resulted in Rome's first overseas conquests (Sicily, Hispania and Africa) and the rise of Rome as a significant imperial power. After defeating the Macedonian and Seleucid Empires in

14500-469: The frontier legions to save them. The legions of three frontier provinces— Britannia , Pannonia Superior , and Syria —resented being excluded from the " donative " and replied by declaring their individual generals to be emperor. Lucius Septimius Severus Geta, the Pannonian commander, bribed the opposing forces, pardoned the Praetorian Guards and installed himself as emperor. He and his successors governed with

14645-527: The great sea [the Mediterranean], arrive in this country. There are in the country in all over four hundred smaller cities; its size is several thousand li in all directions of the compass. The residence of their king lies on the banks of a river estuary [ Antioch-on-the-Orontes ]. They use stone in making city walls. In this country there are the trees sung [pine], po [cypress], huai [sophora?], tzu [a kind of euphorbia?]; bamboos, rushes, poplars, willows,

14790-469: The imperial dignity. Pertinax, a member of the senate who had been one of Marcus Aurelius's right-hand men, was the choice of Laetus, and he ruled vigorously and judiciously. Laetus soon became jealous and instigated Pertinax's murder by the Praetorian Guard, who then auctioned the empire to the highest bidder, Didius Julianus, for 25,000 sesterces per man. The people of Rome were appalled and appealed to

14935-433: The increased reliance on foreign slaves and the growth of latifundia reduced the availability of paid work. Income from war booty, mercantilism in the new provinces, and tax farming created new economic opportunities for the wealthy, forming a new class of merchants, called the equestrians . The lex Claudia forbade members of the Senate from engaging in commerce, so while the equestrians could theoretically join

15080-492: The influence of which is attested primarily in loanwords . Some traces of Eastern influence survive in Parthian loanwords in Armenian. Parthian loanwords appear in everyday Armenian vocabulary; nouns, adjectives, adverbs, denominative verbs, and administrative and religious lexicons. Taxonomically, Parthian, an Indo-European language , belongs to the Northwestern Iranian language group while Middle Persian belongs to

15225-456: The king's name. The History of Song described forms of punishment in criminal law as they were carried out in Daqin ( Roman Empire ) and Fulin (Byzantine Empire). It states that they made a distinction between minor and major offenses, with 200 strikes from a bamboo rod being reserved for major crimes. It described their form of capital punishment as having the guilty person being stuffed into

15370-902: The kingdom, such as frequent extraordinary winds or rains , he is unceremoniously rejected and replaced. The one who has been dismissed quietly accepts his demotion, and is not angry. The people of this country are all tall and honest. They resemble the people of the Middle Kingdom and that is why this kingdom is called Da Qin. This country produces plenty of gold [and] silver, [and of] rare and precious they have luminous jade, "bright moon pearls", Haiji rhinoceroses, coral , yellow amber , opaque glass, whitish chalcedony [i.e., langgan ], red cinnabar , green gemstones , gold-thread embroideries, woven gold-threaded net, delicate polychrome silks painted with gold, and asbestos cloth. 「又有細布，或言水羊毳，野蠶繭所作也。合會諸香，煎其汁以為蘇合。凡外國諸珍異皆出焉。以金銀為錢，銀錢十當金錢一。與安息、天竺交巿於海中，利有十倍。[...]其王常欲通使於漢，而安息欲以漢繒綵與之交市，故遮閡不得自達。」 They also have

15515-826: The land of the Seres was enclosed by great natural walls around a river called Bautis, perhaps the Yellow River . In his Geography , Ptolemy also provided a rough sketch of the Gulf of Thailand and South China Sea , with a port city called Cattigara lying beyond the Golden Chersonese (i.e. Malay Peninsula ) visited by a Greek sailor named Alexander. Among the proposed sites for Ptolemy's Cattigara are Oc Eo , Vietnam, where Roman artefacts have been found. In contrast, Chinese histories offer an abundance of source material about their interactions with alleged Roman embassies and descriptions of their country. The first of these embassies

15660-699: The laws. He died in 161 AD. Marcus Aurelius , known as the Philosopher, was the last of the Five Good Emperors . He was a stoic philosopher and wrote the Meditations . He defeated barbarian tribes in the Marcomannic Wars as well as the Parthian Empire . His co-emperor, Lucius Verus , died in 169 AD, probably from the Antonine Plague , a pandemic that killed nearly five million people through

15805-682: The legions' support. The changes on coinage and military expenditures were the root of the financial crisis that marked the Crisis of the Third Century . Severus was enthroned after invading Rome and having Didius Julianus killed. Severus attempted to revive totalitarianism and, addressing the Roman people and Senate, praised the severity and cruelty of Marius and Sulla, which worried the senators. When Parthia invaded Roman territory, Severus successfully waged war against that country. Notwithstanding this military success, Severus failed in invading Hatra ,

15950-568: The name Qin using Early Middle Chinese pronunciation (with the final consonant pronounced with an -r sound). The term Daqin was used from the Han dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) onwards, but by the beginning of the Tang dynasty (618–907 AD) a new name emerged in Chinese historical records for distinguishing the Eastern Roman Empire : Fulin ( Chinese : 拂菻 ; pinyin : Fú lǐn ). Friedrich Hirth surmised that Fulin may have been based on

16095-543: The opening of the Silk Road in the 2nd century BC, the Chinese thought of the Roman Empire as a civilized counterpart to the Chinese Empire. The Romans occupied one extreme position on the trade route, with the Chinese located on the other. China never managed to reach the Roman Empire directly in antiquity, although general Ban Chao sent Gan Ying as an envoy to "Daqin" in 97 AD. Gan Ying did not reach Daqin: he stopped at

16240-534: The path to the victory a long and difficult one for the Roman Republic . Despite this, after more than 20 years of war, Rome defeated Carthage and a peace treaty was signed. Among the reasons for the Second Punic War was the subsequent war reparations Carthage acquiesced to at the end of the First Punic War. The war began with the audacious invasion of Hispania by Hannibal , who marched through Hispania to

16385-697: The populace and the legions. Augustus intended to extend the Roman Empire to the whole known world, and in his reign, Rome conquered Cantabria , Aquitania , Raetia , Dalmatia , Illyricum and Pannonia . Under Augustus' reign, Roman literature grew steadily in what is known as the Golden Age of Latin Literature . Poets like Virgil , Horace , Ovid and Rufus developed a rich literature, and were close friends of Augustus. Along with Maecenas , he sponsored patriotic poems, such as Virgil's epic Aeneid and historiographical works like those of Livy . Augustus continued

16530-461: The populace. Emperors were no longer men linked with nobility; they usually were born in lower-classes of distant parts of the Empire. These men rose to prominence through military ranks, and became emperors through civil wars. Parthian language The Parthian language , also known as Arsacid Pahlavi and Pahlawānīg , is an extinct ancient Northwestern Iranian language once spoken in Parthia ,

16675-400: The regal titles to the newly conquered Eastern territories, war between Octavian and Antony broke out . Octavian annihilated Egyptian forces in the Battle of Actium in 31 BC. Antony and Cleopatra committed suicide . Now Egypt was conquered by the Roman Empire. In 27 BC and at the age of 36, Octavian was the sole Roman leader. In that year, he took the name Augustus . That event

16820-528: The reign of Antoninus Pius , and possibly his successor Marcus Aurelius , have been discovered at Óc Eo in southern Vietnam , which was then part of the Kingdom of Funan bordering the Chinese province of Jiaozhi in northern Vietnam. This was the same region where Chinese historical texts claim the Romans first landed before venturing further into China to conduct diplomacy. Chinese histories offer descriptions of Byzantine coins. In discussing trade with India ,

16965-546: The revitalised Persia and also the Germanic peoples , who invaded Gaul. His losses generated dissatisfaction among his soldiers, and some of them murdered him during his Germanic campaign in 235 AD. A disastrous scenario emerged after the death of Alexander Severus : the Roman state was plagued by civil wars, external invasions , political chaos, pandemics and economic depression . The old Roman values had fallen, and Mithraism and Christianity had begun to spread through

17110-501: The same as Daqin, arrived in 643 at the court of Emperor Taizong of Tang and claimed to represent their king Bo duoli (波多力; i.e. Kōnstantinos Pogonatos, "Constantine the Bearded", the nickname of Constans II ). Several other Fulin (i.e. Byzantium ) embassies during the Tang dynasty are mentioned for the years 667, 701, and 719. The Wenxian Tongkao written by Ma Duanlin (1245–1322) and

17255-732: The siege, of whom a majority were Jewish. 97,000 were captured and enslaved , including Simon bar Giora and John of Giscala . Many fled to areas around the Mediterranean. Vespasian was a general under Claudius and Nero and fought as a commander in the First Jewish-Roman War . Following the turmoil of the Year of the Four Emperors , in 69 AD, four emperors were enthroned in turn: Galba , Otho , Vitellius , and, lastly, Vespasian, who crushed Vitellius' forces and became emperor. He reconstructed many buildings which were uncompleted, like

17400-491: The son of the deified. In the same year, Octavian and Antony defeated both Caesar's assassins and the leaders of the Liberatores , Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus , in the Battle of Philippi . The Second Triumvirate was marked by the proscriptions of many senators and equites : after a revolt led by Antony's brother Lucius Antonius , more than 300 senators and equites involved were executed, although Lucius

17545-514: The succession, and granted to Tiberius the same titles and honours once granted to Augustus: the title of princeps and Pater patriae , and the Civic Crown . However, Tiberius was not an enthusiast for political affairs: after agreement with the Senate, he retired to Capri in 26 AD, and left control of the city of Rome in the hands of the praetorian prefect Sejanus (until 31 AD) and Macro (from 31 to 37 AD). Tiberius died (or

17690-429: The support of the people) and optimates (the "best", who wanted to maintain exclusive aristocratic control). Sulla overthrew all populist leaders and his constitutional reforms removed powers (such as those of the tribune of the plebs ) that had supported populist approaches. Meanwhile, social and economic stresses continued to build; Rome had become a metropolis with a super-rich aristocracy, debt-ridden aspirants, and

17835-527: The supreme deity in Roman religion . He was murdered following a plot within his own household. Following Domitian's murder, the Senate rapidly appointed Nerva as Emperor. Nerva had noble ancestry, and he had served as an advisor to Nero and the Flavians. His rule restored many of the traditional liberties of Rome's upper classes, which Domitian had over-ridden. The Nerva–Antonine dynasty from 96 AD to 192 AD included

17980-529: The surname "Qin" followed a common Chinese naming convention for foreign peoples. For instance, people from the Parthian Empire of ancient Persia such as An Shigao were often given the surname "An" (安) derived from Anxi (安息), the Arsacid dynasty . The Sogdians , an Eastern Iranian people from Central Asia, were also frequently given the surname "An" (e.g. An Chongzhang ), especially those from Bukhara , while Sogdians from Samarkand were surnamed "Kang" (康; e.g. Kang Senghui ), derived from Kangju ,

18125-514: The surname derived from the name for his homeland, while having a given name that is perhaps derived from the Greek name Leon (e.g. Leon of Sparta ). In the Han-era stage of the spoken language intermediate between Old Chinese and Middle Chinese , the pronunciation for his given name "Lun" (論) would have sounded quite different from modern spoken Mandarin : K. 470b *li̯wən / li̯uĕn or *lwən / luən; EMC lwən or lwənh. Granting Roman individuals

18270-445: The temple of the Sun at Emesa, and supposedly illegitimate son of Caracalla, was declared Emperor by the disaffected soldiers of Macrinus. He adopted the name of Antoninus but history has named him after his Sun god Elagabalus , represented on Earth in the form of a large black stone. An incompetent and lascivious ruler, Elagabalus offended all but his favourites. Cassius Dio , Herodian and

18415-461: The text above, the following forms can be noticed: Other prominent differences, not found in the text above, include the personal pronoun ⟨az⟩, I , instead of ⟨an⟩ and the present tense root of the verb ⟨kardan⟩, to do , ⟨kar-⟩ instead of Middle Persian ⟨kun-⟩. Also, the Middle Persian linking particle and relative pronoun ⟨ī(g)⟩ was not present in Parthian, but the relative pronoun ⟨čē⟩, what ,

18560-550: The text claims, yet it mentions some as being the Alexandria-Euphrates or Charax Spasinu ("Ala-san"), Nikephorium ("Lu-fen"), Palmyra ("Ch'ieh-lan"), Damascus ("Hsien-tu"), Emesa ("Si-fu"), and Hira ("Ho-lat"). Perhaps some of these are in reference to certain states that were temporarily conquered during the Roman–Parthian Wars (66 BC – 217 AD) when, for instance, the army of Roman Emperor Trajan reached

18705-460: The tribes of modern-day East Anglia staged a revolt led by queen Boadicea of the Iceni . The rebels sacked and burned Camulodunum , Londinium and Verulamium (modern-day Colchester , London and St Albans respectively) before they were crushed by Paulinus . Boadicea, like Cleopatra before her, committed suicide to avoid the disgrace of being paraded in triumph in Rome. Nero is widely known as

18850-486: The tribes of modern-day Scotland. Hadrian promoted culture, especially the Greek. He forbade torture and humanised the laws. His many building projects included aqueducts, baths, libraries and theatres; additionally, he travelled nearly every province in the Empire to review military and infrastructural conditions. Following Hadrian's death in 138 AD, his successor Antoninus Pius built temples, theatres, and mausoleums, promoted

18995-562: The weighing noticed that the Gauls were using false scales. The Romans then took up arms and defeated the Gauls. Their victorious general Camillus remarked "With iron, not with gold, Rome buys her freedom." The Romans gradually subdued the other peoples on the Italian peninsula, including the Etruscans . The last threat to Roman hegemony in Italy came when Tarentum , a major Greek colony, enlisted

19140-470: The west of this country, and there is another great sea [the Mediterranean ]. In the west of the sea there is the city of Ali-san . Before one arrives in the country one goes straight north from the city of U-tan . In the south-west one further travels by a river which on board ship one crosses in one day [again the Nile]; and again south-west one travels by a river which is crossed in one day [still

19285-423: The wu-t'ung tree, and all kinds of other plants. The people are given to planting on the fields all kinds of grain. Their domestic animals are: the horse, the donkey, the mule, the camel, and the mulberry silk-worm. There are many jugglers who can issue fire from their mouths, bind and release themselves, and dance on twenty balls. In this country they have no permanent rulers, but when an extraordinary calamity visits

19430-636: Was Josephus' sponsor and Pliny dedicated his Naturalis Historia to Titus, son of Vespasian. Vespasian sent legions to defend the eastern frontier in Cappadocia , extended the occupation in Britannia (modern-day England, Wales and southern Scotland ) and reformed the tax system. He died in 79 AD. Titus became emperor in 79. He finished the Flavian Amphitheater, using war spoils from the First Jewish-Roman War, and hosted victory games that lasted for

19575-444: 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

19720-470: Was appointed to command the army together with Lucius Julius Caesar and Lucius Cornelius Sulla . By the end of the Social War, Marius and Sulla were the premier military men in Rome and their partisans were in conflict, both sides jostling for power. In 88 BC, Sulla was elected for his first consulship and his first assignment was to defeat Mithridates VI of Pontus , whose intentions were to conquer

19865-502: Was campaigning in Greece. He seized power along with the consul Lucius Cornelius Cinna and killed the other consul, Gnaeus Octavius , achieving his seventh consulship. Marius and Cinna revenged their partisans by conducting a massacre. Marius died in 86 BC, due to age and poor health, just a few months after seizing power. Cinna exercised absolute power until his death in 84 BC. After returning from his Eastern campaigns, Sulla had

20010-490: Was killed) in 37 AD. The male line of the Julio-Claudians was limited to Tiberius' nephew Claudius , his grandson Tiberius Gemellus and his grand-nephew Caligula . As Gemellus was still a child, Caligula was chosen to rule the empire. He was a popular leader in the first half of his reign, but became a crude and insane tyrant in his years controlling government. The Praetorian Guard murdered Caligula four years after

20155-469: Was militarily passive. Cassius Dio identifies his reign as the beginning of Roman decadence : "(Rome has transformed) from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust." Commodus was killed by a conspiracy involving Quintus Aemilius Laetus and his wife Marcia in late 192 AD. The following year is known as the Year of the Five Emperors , during which Helvius Pertinax , Didius Julianus , Pescennius Niger , Clodius Albinus and Septimius Severus held

20300-406: Was most likely Petra (in the Nabataean Kingdom ), given the directions and distance from "Yuluo" (i.e. Al Karak ) and the fact that it fell under Roman dominion in 106 AD when it was annexed by Trajan. Even more convincing for Hill is the fact that Si-fu in Chinese means "an arm of a river which rejoins the main stream" or more aptly "rejoined water courses". He believes this is directly related to

20445-570: Was no chance of a return to the Roman Republic , and so a new emperor had to arise. After the turmoil in the Year of the Four Emperors , Titus Flavius Vespasianus (anglicised as Vespasian) took control of the empire and established a new dynasty. Under the Flavians, Rome continued its expansion, and the state remained secure. Under Trajan, the Roman Empire reached the peak of its territorial expansion. Rome's dominion now spanned 5.0 million square kilometres (1.9 million square miles). The most significant military campaign undertaken during

20590-504: Was now pre-eminent over Rome: in five years he held four consulships, two ordinary dictatorships, and two special dictatorships, one for perpetuity. He was murdered in 44 BC, on the Ides of March by the Liberatores . Caesar's assassination caused political and social turmoil in Rome; the city was ruled by his friend and colleague, Marcus Antonius . Soon afterward, Octavius , whom Caesar adopted through his will, arrived in Rome. Octavian (historians regard Octavius as Octavian due to

20735-453: Was spared. The Triumvirate divided the Empire among the triumvirs: Lepidus was given charge of Africa , Antony, the eastern provinces, and Octavian remained in Italia and controlled Hispania and Gaul . The Second Triumvirate expired in 38 BC but was renewed for five more years. However, the relationship between Octavian and Antony had deteriorated, and Lepidus was forced to retire in 36 BC after betraying Octavian in Sicily . By

20880-482: Was succeeded by the general Trajan . Trajan is credited with the restoration of traditional privileges and rights of commoner and senatorial classes, which later Roman historians claim to have been eroded during Domitian's autocracy. Trajan fought three Dacian wars , winning territories roughly equivalent to modern-day Romania and Moldova . He undertook an ambitious public building program in Rome, including Trajan's Forum , Trajan's Market and Trajan's Column , with

21025-438: Was the language of the old Satrapy of Parthia and was used in the Arsacids courts. The main sources for Parthian are the few remaining inscriptions from Nisa and Hecatompylos , Manichaean texts, Sasanian multilingual inscriptions and remains of Parthian literature in the succeeding Middle Persian . The later Manichaean texts, composed shortly after the demise of the Parthian power, play an important role for reconstructing

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