Dreams of Augustus: The Story of the Roman Empire Read online

  When faced with a popular uprising, there are only two effective responses. One is to use overwhelming force to crush the rebellion. The other is to make significant concessions and negotiate. The Romans chose a third option, which was to send in an inadequate number of troops and suffer a humiliating defeat. The disaster emboldened the radicals among the Jews who wanted to fight and marginalized the moderates who wanted a negotiated solution. At the same time, the Romans were determined to avenge their humiliation. With both sides hardened, the only resolution could be carnage.

  Nero's response to the uprising was to appoint our old friend Vespasian to command an overwhelming force to retake Jerusalem. Vespasian sent his son Titus to Egypt to gather troops while he personally led an army through Turkey and Syria. Father and son met at Galilee and proceeded to conquer city after city from the rebels.

  Then the Jewish revolt became a part of a string of larger events that shook up the Empire.

  By 68, the hatred of Nero had expanded beyond Italy as new taxes were imposed to fund Nero's massive building campaign. The legions in France declared their commander emperor and successfully appealed to a general in Spain, an aging man named Galba, to join their revolt. While forces loyal to Nero successfully put down the revolt in France, Galba's support grew. Facing civil war, Nero appealed to the people of Rome to join his new army (which comprised of a core of prostitutes dressed in Amazonian clothes). Shockingly, no volunteers stepped forward.

  The Praetorian Guard realized that they would be massacred by the armies on the frontiers. They agreed to stand aside as the Senate moved to declare Nero a public enemy. Such a declaration meant that every Roman was obliged to kill, or aid in the killing of, their emperor. Nero fled to the countryside and toyed with the idea of fleeing to Parthia. When even his bodyguard abandoned him, Nero decided that suicide was his only option. On June 9, Nero drove a dagger into his own throat. He was the last emperor of Augustus’ Julio-Claudian Dynasty.

  With the death of Nero, Vespasian, who was preparing for a final assault on Jerusalem, decided to hang back and see how events played out in Rome. After entering Rome, Galba proceeded to massacre Nero's supporters. Since Nero was still very popular with the masses, this was an unpopular move. Galba was himself an old man, and the Senate hoped that he would adopt a successor who had enough legitimacy to unite the empire. Vespasian even sent Titus to Rome so that Galba could adopt him.

  Unfortunately, Galba adopted someone obscure, thus losing his legitimacy. The man who Nero had homewrecked, Otho, had Galba stabbed. Otho didn’t last long himself. He was overthrown by Vitellius, a fan of Nero who commanded troops on the Rhine.

  In less than a year since Nero's death, the Roman Empire had had a quick succession of three emperors. Now it was Vespasian’s turn. After supposedly being “convinced” by the governor of Egypt, Vespasian was declared emperor. He commanded the largest army, so his victory seemed inevitable. To cement his new rule, however, he needed to victoriously end the Jewish campaign. While Vespasian went to Rome, Titus stayed in Palestine to take the center of Jewish resistance: Jerusalem.

  The siege of Jerusalem was one of the most impressive in Roman history. Jerusalem had three walls and was so big that it was virtually impossible for an army to completely surround and cut off all supplies from entering it. The city was defended by religious fanatics who were committed to fighting to the death. Reducing Jerusalem was going to be hard, but, as they had in Britain, the Romans demonstrated how their discipline and patience could overcome any set of obstacles.

  To cut off food supplies, Titus had his troops construct a wall around the entire city. When the defenders sallied out to try and sneak in supplies, they were captured and crucified on top of the new Roman wall. As days turned into weeks, a line of crosses decorated the ring around Jerusalem. To further strain food and water supplies, pilgrims were allowed to enter the city but not permitted to leave.

  Finally, Titus had siege towers constructed and hoped that these would be enough to enter the city. The defenders outwitted the Romans by digging tunnels underneath the towers and undermining their bases. When the towers that had so painstakingly been constructed came crashing down, the Romans response was to simply try again. The second attempt failed as well, and for a brief moment Roman victory was in doubt.

  Frustrated by his progress, Titus had a small band of troops sneak to the walls at night, kill the sleeping guards and open the gates. Roman troops poured in, and the defenders fled to the confines of their most sacred possession: the Temple of Jerusalem.

  This was the second great temple that the Jews had built for their god. It was by far their most important cultural possession, and taking it by force would be extremely difficult for the Romans. The Jewish historian Josephus is said to have persuaded Titus to spare the Temple as a sort of trophy for his father. When the Romans launched their assault, however, a fire started and quickly grew out of control. The defenders were massacred, the Temple was destroyed and its riches were shipped off to Rome.

  Titus and his army carrying off spoils from the Temple.

  With the fall of Jerusalem, Titus declared victory and sailed back to Rome to join his father. There was, however, one last chapter in this Jewish revolt: Masada.

  A fanatical community of Jews resided in Masada which was, quite literally, on top of a mountain. The Jews stockpiled enough food to last indefinitely and cut off all entrances. The Roman legions amassed below had no way of getting up.

  What followed can only be described as totally badass. While under fire from anything the defenders could hurl at them, the Romans constructed a giant ramp. This ramp can, in fact, still be seen today. After spending months building this ramp and reaching the fortress, the Romans discovered that all but seven of the Jewish defenders had committed suicide rather than surrender.

  This discovery abruptly ended the bloodiest revolt in Roman history. It had destroyed the Jewish Temple and accelerated a Jewish diaspora that would not reverse itself until the early 20th century. The revolt had also led to the rise of a new family dynasty that would rule the Roman Empire in the coming decades. This was a dynasty that had come to power not because of merit, not aristocratic background.

  With the rise of Vespasian, a sequence of eight very capable emperors would lead the Roman Empire to the peak of its power.

  10

  Arenas and Volcanoes

  When the legions in Egypt declared themselves for Vespasian, his victory was all but assured. The legions loyal to his opponent Vitellius were defeated in battle and Vespasian himself entered Rome in triumph in mid-70.

  He had come to power in the first civil war in almost a century. In comparison to the devastating civil wars that had brought Augustus to power, it was a mild affair. If there were those concerned that Vespasian's rise would lead to a different style of governance than his predecessors, they were soon proven wrong. Vespasian was the first in a string of eight hardworking, competent emperors who would lead the Roman Empire for the next century.

  You can see the legacy of Vespasian when you go to Rome today. Using the spoils of his war in Palestine, Vespasian oversaw the construction of the greatest symbol of Ancient Rome: the Colosseum.

  It took eight years to build the Colosseum. Even today its appearance is large and majestic like the empire that created it. Even its seating arrangements reflected the deeply-rooted class structure in the Roman world: in the first rows you found senators and rich landowners, in the upper rows you found commoners. Gravediggers and slaves were, of course, not permitted to enter.

  Modern estimates suggest that the Colosseum could hold 50,000 people. Even compared to today's stadiums, this is an impressive number. The Romans, who themselves loved their games and circuses, had little trouble consistently filling up the stadium.

  There is a debate among historians about whether or not the Colosseum was ever filled with water so that sea battles could be reenacted. Given that there seems to be no way for water to have been drained and that there was a lake nearby that could serve the same function, the stories are probably not true.

  Vespasian ruled until 79. His ten year reign was relatively peaceful for the Empire. He was succeeded by Titus who, as his military feats in Palestine would suggest, proved to be a capable emperor.

  In August of 79, just two months after becoming emperor, Titus received word that Mount Vesuvius had erupted and completely destroyed the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in southern Italy. The Romans did not understand volcanoes, so the people in that area didn't understand the catastrophe that was coming their way when the volcano initially erupted. As a result, when the lava from the volcano swept in, thousands had failed to flee the area and were covered in some twelve layers of soil.

  Some ruins in Pompeii. Mount Vesuvius can be seen in the background.

  Because of the lava, when archaeologists began excavating the region many centuries later, they found a whole Roman society frozen in time. From this tragedy, we have a historian’s dream. People coated in plaster are in the exact poses and have the same expressions of terror that they had in the moment of their deaths. Some are even in the fetal position, sucking their thumbs.

  We also see a Roman city as it actually was. Graffiti covers the walls, and it is plainly evident that Roman sexuality was far more liberal than it is today. Penises and follatio is so ubiquitous that when King Francis I of Naples visited in 1819 with his wife and daughter, he was so embarrassed that he locked away the erotic artwork. With the exception of some brief reopenings, the artwork was not opened to the public until the year 2000.

  A typical image on the walls in Pompeii

  While a blessing to us, the disaster that befell Pompeii and Herculaneum was an utter catastrophe to contemporaries. A man by the name of Pliny the Elder commanded the Roman navy in the region. Pliny was a sort of Renaissance man who wrote extensively on practically every academic discipline and even produced the greatest encyclopedia before the modern era.

  When Mount Vesuvius erupted in August of 79, Pliny’s initial reaction was that of a scientist. Why was the mountain blowing up? What was blackening the sky? What of these reports of stones falling from the air?

  Pliny organized a relief effort. While his galleys rescued the refugees crowding the coast, Pliny’s curiosity got the better of his and he tried to get closer to the scene of the disaster. Even when cinders began pelting his ship, Pliny refused to turn around. After being forced by the winds to land, either Pliny’s asthma or the toxic fumes got the best of him, and his companions had to leave him behind to die.

  To this day, the term Plinian eruption is used to describe violent volcanic eruptions.

  Titus himself organized additional relief efforts and visited the site of the disaster on two separate occasions. The Mount Vesuvius disaster defined his short two year reign. When he died in 81, he was succeeded by his brother Domitian.

  11

  The Foundations of Stability

  Like his father and brother, Domitian proved to be a capable emperor.

  Domitian took the unusual step of restoring the value of Roman coins. Emperors had the constant temptation to devalue the currency so that they could make more coins and give important people ‘bonuses’. As basic economics would tell you, however, this had the predictable result of generating inflation over time. Nevertheless, emperors were usually more concerned with cementing their rule in the short term rather than looking out for the long-term health of their subjects.

  Domitian was one of the few emperors to reject this temptation and in fact increased the value of the currency during his reign. While this cost him some political points, it did lay the foundations for economic stability that would underlie the Roman Empire for the next century.

  In addition, Domitian ordered the construction of elaborate border defenses that would also hold for the next century in spite of increasingly powerful enemies across the frontiers.

  He did face a military threat from a group known as the Dacians. Led by their king Decebalus, the Dacians carved a formidable Germanic kingdom north of the Danube in modern day Rumania. In 85, the Dacians began raiding into Roman territory.

  For the rest of Roman history, barbarian raids into Roman territory would be a persistent problem. The barbarians were usually not interested in conquest; instead, the barbarians usually wanted to come in, steal some cool stuff and get back across the border before too many of them got killed by the Roman army.

  The Roman denarius was the most common coin in circulation. It was made of silver. This coin features the emperor Caligula

  The Roman response usually took the form of counter-raids, playing one tribe against another or trying to buy off the raiders with tribute.

  In their response to the Dacians, the Romans at first tried raiding Dacian territory. In 87, a Roman army led by Cornelius Fruscus raided into Dacia only to fall into a trap and get himself and his army annihilated, Varus style. Domitian sent another army led by Tettius Lulianus the following year, and he was much more successful.

  Domitian realized that fully defeating the Dacians would be too costly and would draw too many troops away from other threatened frontiers. In 89, he agreed to recognize Decebalus as a client king and pay him tribute to keep him quiet.

  While Domitian was very popular with the people and the army, he was absolutely despised by the Senate. The reason for this was that Domitian, like Caesar, was seen as acting too much like a king. He used propaganda extensively and created a cult of personality that rivaled that of Mao and Stalin. He was a ruthless, albeit effective, autocrat. This put a lot of Senators off.

  In 96, after ruling for 15 years, Domitian was at his desk signing some decrees when a servant approached him and stabbed him in the groin. Domitian fought back, but he was soon overpowered. He was the third emperor to be assassinated, and the Roman world braced itself for another civil war.

  12

  The Gilded Age

  For 90 years after the death of Domitian, five emperors ruled the Roman Empire who Machiavelli called the ‘5 Good Emperors.’

  On the surface, it was the peak of the Roman Empire. All the emperors died natural deaths, the Empire grew to its peak size, and the borders were as secure as they would ever be. Even the Chinese took notice of the distant land known to them as Daqin.

  The Silk Road that brought Asian luxuries to Europe opened up sometime during the second century BCE. When the Roman Empire firmly established itself in the Middle East, it brought itself into indirect trade with the Chinese, then ruled by the Han Dynasty. Among other things, the Chinese sent over silks while the Romans sent over high-quality glass from Egypt.

  Our old friend Pliny described it like this:

  The Seres [Chinese], are famous for the woolen substance obtained from their forests; after a soaking in water they comb off the white down of the leaves… So manifold is the labor employed, and so distant is the region of the globe drawn upon, to enable the Roman maiden to flaunt transparent clothing in public.

  Pliny, among other Romans, felt that the Roman’s desire for luxuriousness was a major drain on the economy. He was pretty crass about it:

  By the lowest reckoning, India, Seres [China] and the Arabian peninsula take from our Empire 100 millions of sesterces every year: that is how much our luxuries and women cost us.

  In 97, a Chinese military ambassador named Gan Ying reached the Persian Gulf which was a part of the Parthian Empire. Gan Ying had been dispatched to make contact with the mysterious Roman Empire, however Gan Ying chickened out and brought back accounts that the sailors in the region told him about the great empire to the west.

  An interesting thing that Gan Ying reported back to China about the Romans was how they chose their succession:

  Their kings are not permanent. They select and appoint the most worthy man. If there are unexpected calamities in 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.

  While definitely an idealistic portrayal of imperial succession, it does speak to something remarkable about the Roman Empire during this period. As we have seen, a great strength of the Roman Empire from the death of Augustus to that of Domitian is that its transitions of power have, however, flawed, been mostly peaceful and, most importantly, have not weakened the empire. There was one civil war, but that had been a mild affair that did little permanent damage.

  A map of the world by the Roman Ptolemy, an important Roman scientist, astronomer and geographer in Egypt. Ptolemy is most famous for providing the scientific basis for the theory that the Earth is the center of the universe.

  For almost a century after Domitian’s death, there would be an uninterrupted peaceful transfer of power between seven different people (five of them being considered the ‘good emperors’). It seems that Gan Ying’s idealistic portrayal of a stable empire ruled by a man who owed his position to merit, not inheritance, was realized during this period. Given how large the Roman Empire was and how many different armies were hanging around, it was a remarkable achievement that should not be minimized.

  Nevertheless, the golden surface of the empire covered up something rotten underneath: the curse of that very success: complacency.

  Now this is not to say that the popular narrative of the Romans getting weak and soft because of games and religion is true. That’s a pretty silly narrative that must be relegated to the “cool theory” box.