Between 500 BCE and 500 CE, the Roman civilization experienced changes both politically and culturally. Firstly, Rome’s government transitioned from a Republic to an Empire. Later, that empire was split into two parts; east and west. In terms of changes in culture, it was impacted by the shift in religion, as the Romans shifted from polytheism to monotheism. Despite all the changes, Rome still remained culturally diverse. The Romans overthrew the Etruscans in 509 B.C.E. The Etruscans had ruled over the Romans for hundreds of years. Once free, the Romans established a republic, a government in which citizens elected representatives to rule on their behalf. The highest positions in the government were held by two consuls who …show more content…
It was this refusal that caused its practice to be illegal and those who chose to stick with the faith were prosecuted. Although people were being killed for practicing, Christianity started to become even more popular. After seeing Christian martyrs risk their lives for the sake of Christianity, many Romans were compelled and attracted to the faith. Also, there were Apostles who traveled around the empire spreading the message of Christianity. Then in 312 CE, Emperor Constantine proposed the Edict of Milan that banned all laws against Christianity. That allowed people to freely worship, without the fear of harsh punishment. He eventually converted on his deathbed. Then in 392 CE, Emperor Theodosius made Christianity the official religion of Rome. Christianity went from being an illegal religion to the official religion of the Roman Empire. At the height of its power, Rome controlled the greatest empire ever seen in Europe at that time. Many of the conquered nations benefited from Rome. Roman public baths, roads, water supplies, all appeared in Western Europe. The sheer size of the empire was a major reason for the collapse of Rome. In AD 284, the Emperor Diocletian divided the Roman Empire in two parts to make it easier to rule. He created the Western Empire and the Eastern Empire, each with its own leader. Diocletian faced more than just administrative problems. More and
The Roman Empire was extremely large and difficult to maintain, which made it very weak. According to Doc: 2, “Borders became difficult to secure and the amount of gold needed to maintain roads and perform routine maintenance was never enough.” According to TCI chapter 13, section 1, “The huge size of the empire made it difficult to defend.” The empire’s size caused it to weaken, leaving it open to attack by the many enemies surrounding it.
For many years, Christianity was illegal. Often, it was essentially ignored, but there were time periods where the Christians in all the conquered areas were persecuted for not making sacrifices to the ancient gods. Finally, when Theodosius made Christianity the favored religion of the state and decided the orthodoxy of the New Testament, the era of European Christianity began. The idea of a fully human and yet fully divine messiah began at this time and also the idea of a Bishop in Rome presiding over the entirety of Christianity. All of this set the stage for the Christian beliefs still held today.
The Pax Romana allowed Rome to expand, and created a period of peace that would spread the important religion of Christianity throughout the strong empire. The new religion of Christianity was Jesus’ interpertation of monotheistic religion, Judiasm. Christianity was unlike the polytheistic Roman religion which infuriated many Roman rulers. Despite the hatred of rulers it spread quickly throughout the empire and continued even after Jesus died. Although Christianity followers were persecuted they felt strongly about their beliefs and eventually the Edict of Milan was passed whih meant that Christianity was a religion approved by the emperor. Christianity changed from a sect of persecution to a state religion within the Roman Empire because
At around 395 C.E. it was very clear that there were two different Rome’s, this was largely due to there being multiple people trying to govern Rome. Rome was split into eastern and western Rome, after this division, western Rome started to experience many troubles. Between cultural decay, military struggles, and a poor economy, western Rome eventually fell apart, on the other hand, there are some that strongly believe that the decline of Rome was caused by the rise of Christianity, this claim lacks strong evidence to support it, making other explanation much more reasonable.
Through the years 100 BCE and 600 CE, Rome underwent many political and cultural changes such as the changing of government systems multiple times over the 700 year span. However, many things also stayed the same politically and culturally such as the patriarchal rule over the people. A political change in Rome was that the systems of government they used changed multiple times.
Rome was the largest and most powerful empire of its time. Its reign from 27 CE to 200 CE was by far the greatest civilization at that point. However, at some point every empire falls. The primary reason for this was the people of Rome. Due to the citizen’s unhappiness, Rome slowly crumbled starting with its leaders, then its army, and finally its economy.
Rome kept conquering land and eventually gained control over the Mediterranean Sea and established colonies in Egypt, the Middle East, North Africa, and Asia Minor. The Roman empire also had an east side and west side that was barely connected (Document C). Since the Roman Empire covered a vast portion of land, it must have been really hard to communicate with both sides and be able to defend all the borders of the large empire. Also, since the empire was very large, chances are that they ended up creating a larger army meaning that there would have been a higher need for food, water, clothing, weapons, etc. Thus, overexpansion led to several other issues which, overall, resulted in the weakening of the Roman
Beginning in the eighth century B.C., Ancient Rome grew from a small town in the center of Italy near the Tiber River into an empire that, at its peak, defeated and conquered most of continental Europe, Britain, western Asia, northern Africa and the Mediterranean islands. From the start, the Romans showed a talent for borrowing and improving upon the skills and concepts of other cultures.The Kingdom of Rome grew rapidly from a trading town to a prosperous city between the 8th and 6th centuries BCE. Among the many expansions of the Roman empire, they started to gain dominance over other well-known practices and were able to widespread the Romance languages derived from Latin, the modern Western alphabet and calendar, and the emergence of Christianity
For a long period of time, Rome seemed like an unstoppable empire. It conquered the majority of the land surrounding it, including Greece, Turkey, Iraq, and many of its other neighboring countries. It seemed as though Rome would conquer the entire world, as it was the center of it, until it began to decline in 476 C.E. The very aspects that made it so successful were the ones that caused its collapse. Various political, religious, and economic reasons caused its downfall. The fact that the entire economy of Rome collapsed and money became worthless was a major reason for the empire’s collapse. In addition, the loss of a common religion and lack of efficient ruling in relation to its vast territory affected the empire. The Roman
Although Christianity was initially practiced within Semitic populations of the Roman Empire, by the 4th century A.D the Christian religion had a huge impact to the Greeks and also the early Byzantine Empire. But by this time Christian communities had been established in all the important cities in the Roman Empire. In 313 the next emperor Constantine legalized Christianity throughout the empire. He also
The War with Veii played a significant role in the expansion of the Roman Empire. The war, which ended in 410 B.C., set in motion an entirely different Roman army. No longer was the army a volunteer militia, instead it became a paying and contractual organization. The “Roman victory brought an end to Rome’s most threatening neighbor and began its rise to prominence in the central Italian peninsula” (www.warandgameinfo.com).
In 312 CE, Roman Emperor Constantine achieved a victory at the Milvian Bridge. The night previous to this battle, Constantine dreamt of a cross inscribed in hoc signo vinces, in this sign you will conquer. As trivial as this dream may seem, it ultimately signified the beginning of the rise of Christianity. With his victory, Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity and supported and encouraged it throughout the empire. In 313 CE, another milestone occurred as the emperors, both Constantine I of the West and Licinius of the East, signed the Edict of Milan declaring that the Diocletianic Persecution would end, and Christianity would be tolerated in the Roman Empire. This religion began to flourish as people quickly converted from pagan
Since its collapse, historians have attempted to explain the struggle for power and control over both the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire that followed. To explain the complexities of the Roman Republic, the Empire, and their political complexities can be a daunting task. For nearly ten centuries Rome would rule most of the known world before the fall of the Western Empire (Byzantine) in 476 C.E. Before that fall occurred, a fundamental change would take place that would transform the original Republic into the Roman Empire. Many factors would be directly and indirectly responsible for this transition. These would
The empire split up into two empires with their own emperors, the Western Roman Empire and the Eastern Roman Empire (also called the Byzantine Empire), when Emperor Diocletian felt that the empire was extremely unstable. Despite not having enough money to sustain the division of the Empire into two, Diocletian raised taxes to execute his plans, and that furthermore upset the citizens of Rome. After Diocletian died the two new empires were given to his two sons. The splitting of the Roman Empire was causing more problems at this point, since they were growing apart culturally, for example they started speaking different languages and followed different types of Christianity. So the splitting of the Roman Empire caused the whole empire to fall from within, since there was a lot of conflict between Diocletian and his citizens and the empire started to break apart culturally after Diocletian’s death. Therefore Diocletian mistakenly brought down his own empire by splitting it into
The era dominated by Roman empire is one the most well-known and influential periods of history, home to famous names from Julius Caesar to Jesus Christ. At its height, Rome’s territory stretched from the Atlantic coastline to the Middle East, reigning over 60 million people, one-fifth of the population of the ancient world. However, the Roman empire’s treatment of their conquered people’s and their own citizens ultimately led to the permanent downfall of Rome.