Empire

After the death of Augustus in 14 AD, Rome underwent a series of profound changes. The Empire itself grew dramatically; from Augustus to the time of Trajan (98-117 AD), Rome acquired more of northern Africa, most of Great Britain, parts of Germany, eastern Europe around the Black Sea, as well as Mesopotami and the northern part of the Arabian peninsula. At home, Rome struggled with its new institution of quasi-monarchical
rule. Augustus had fudged the issue by declaring himself "first among equals," or simply, princeps , but his successors stopped pretending and simply called themselves either Caesar, to indicate descent from the royal house, or imperator , since they derived their power from the imperium over Rome and the military. The institution became more like a monarchy after Augustus's death; Augustus had been elected by the Senate, and this practice remained—in truth, the early emperors were simply hand-picked by the current emperor.

The first emperors of Rome were all from the Julian line. Augustus was immediately succeeded by Tiberius (emperor 14-37 AD), who was followed by Gaius, nicknamed Caligula ("little boot") (37-41), Claudius ("cripple, lame") (41-54 AD), and Nero (54-68 AD). Tiberius and then Caligula
demonstrated how arbitrarily power could be wielded by the emperor; Caligula, in particular, probably had a nervous breakdown on the death of his sister and was famous throughout Roman history for his cruelty and
delusive behavior. The imperiate of Caligula, however, demonstrated how the emperor's rule was based on sheer military power; after the assassination of Caligula in 41 AD, the Praetorian Guard found Claudius cowering in the palace and declared him emperor. All vestiges of Republican rule had been removed.

1) Baetica	19) Noricum	37) Cappadocia
2) Lusitania	20) Pannonia	38) Pontus
3) Tarraconesis	21) Dalmatia	39) Armenia Inferior
4) Narbonensis	22) Dacia	40) Sophene
5) Aquitania	23) Moesia	41) Osroene
6) Lugdunensis	24) Thracia	42) Commagene
7) Belgica	25) Macedonia	43) Armenia
8) Britannia	26) Epirus	44) Assyria
9) Germania Inferior	27) Achaea	45) Mesopotamia
10) Germania Superior	28) Asia	46) Syria
11)Langobardi/Cherusci/Sugambri	29) Bithynia	47) Judaea
12) Rhaetia	30) Galatia	48) Arabia Petraea
13) Italia	31) Lycaonia	49) Aegyptus
14) Sicilia	32) Lycia	50) Cyrenaica
15) Corsica and Sardinia	33) Pisidia	51) Numidia
16) Alpes Penninae	34) Pamphylia	52) Africa
17) Alpes Cottiae	35) Cyprus	53) Mauretania
18) Alpes Maritimae	36) Cilicia	54) Baleares

This was a frightening discovery in the administration of the government; now that it was apparent that military force alone produced and legitimated the emperor's rule, there was nothing to stop ambitious generals from using their armies to advance their political careers dramatically. The final Julian emperor to sit on the throne was Nero, who
had begun as a brilliantly talented and highly moral youth. It was in the time of Nero that the Romans began to actively persecute, and execute, Roman members of a new eastern, mystical religion: Christianity. Among those executed was one of the founders of Christianity, Paul of Tarsus. He soon, however, proved himself unconcerned and incompetent, and the frontier armies began to grow restless. In 68 AD, the armies revolted in
Gaul and Nero was overthrown. The next year, 69 AD, no fewer than four emperors mounted the throne, each backed by a powerful army.

Rome was spinning into chaos, but a Roman general, Vespasian (69-79 AD), managed to hold onto the imperiate long enough to found his own dynasty: the Flavian dynasty. Neither Vespasian or his successors were from a noble or aristocratic Roman family. In many ways, this was Vespasian's strength. He was a hard-headed and practical soldier and administrator who ridiculed most of the trappings of the office he held.This hard-headed practicality translated into a highly effective imperiate. He was succeeded by his son, Titus (79-81 AD) and then Domitian (81-96 AD), who began the second wave of persecutions of Christians.

Domitian was assassinated in 96 AD (it was hard to die a natural death as emperor of Rome; very few seemed to have achieved it), and since he had no successor, the Senate elected the senator Nerva (96-98 AD). The Flavian dynasty was at an end, but Nerva began a period that later Roman historians would call the five good emperors: Nerva, Trajan (98-117), Hadrian (117-138), Antoninus Pius (138-161), and Marcus Aurelius (161-180). All of these emperors died without passing the succession on
(except Marcus Aurelius), so each of these emperors were elected by the Senate from within its own ranks. This period was the period of the greatest political stability in Imperial Rome after the age of Augustus;
when Marcus Aurelius broke the pattern and was succeeded by his son, Commodus (180-192), all hell broke loose again.

This period saw the widespread exporting of Roman culture, government, and law. The Romans actively built up large urban centers throughout the Empire and granted these cities all the rights and privileges granted to
Romans. These cities were ruled by the upper classes who, as a result, grew increasingly loyal to the emperor. At the same time, Rome began to exercise more control over these municipalities; unlike earlier empires which were more or less loose confederacies, the Roman Empire was converted into what amounted as a single state under the centralized control of a Roman bureaucracy.