Throughout the year I have had the opportunity to study the Roman Republic
and Empire. During the course I created three artifacts in the form of essays. In
each of these three essays I gained an insight into a different aspect of Rome that I
have not previously known. This first pertains to the famous Roman politician and
general, Marcus Antonius.
I learned many of things about the man himself, the positions he held, his
drive for power and his ultimate untimely death. However the most important
thing I learned concerned the political dynamic in Rome. I already knew to some
extent the corruption and greed that existed in Roman society, but I did not realize
just how bad it was. The first example I saw of this was immediately following the
assassination of Julius Caesar. Marc Antony had restored a modicum of peace and
even brokered a deal with the faction of the assassins. However, instead of leaving
it at that and ending the civil war in Rome, he put himself in power in Rome by
turning the city against the other factions. What follows in the rest of his life is a
show of political corruption, murderous intent and greed. Senators frequently
seized public land for their own personal use. The great orator Marcus Tullius
Cicero was killed because Marc Antony did not like several speeches that he gave.
In the end Marc Antony was killed because a political rival, namely Octavian,
wanted absolute control of Rome. In café Roma it would seem that political
maneuvering and murder for your own gain was the special of the day, every day.
The second artifact I created was on Hadrian’s wall, during the process of
writing, I came to understand how impressive Roman engineering was. Hadrian’s
wall is an excellent example of this as it is a display of Roman engineering its finest.
It spanned 73 miles from coast to coast in northern Britain. It was not just a wall
however; it contained dozens of forts, towers and gates. One of the more impressive
pieces of information regarding its construction is that it was built almost entirely
by the soldiers themselves. The average Roman soldier was well versed in
engineering due to the way that the Roman army would build a fort wherever they
stayed. This allowed the individual soldiers to become very well trained in the art
that is engineering. Because of the way the wall itself was built the garrison was
able to be very small compared to the overall garrison of Britain. Seven thousand
men were stationed over the entire seventy-three miles that the wall spanned.
However due to the forts and towers they were spread in such a way that one
hundred to three hundred and fifty soldiers could be at any point on the wall within
an hour. This number was deemed enough to stop an invading force of one
thousand men. This Roman construction allowed the Romans the protection they
wanted from the north and can remains today in many parts of Britain as an
impressive piece of Roman engineering.
The last aspect of Rome I gained an insight to pertained to the conquering
and occupation of Roman Britain. It was here that I began to realize the
importance of the process Romanization in the provinces. Romanization was the
process of turning the conquered provinces into a land that was as similar to Rome
in culture as possible. The first step of this process was building towns. The life of
Mediterranean culture was one that surrounded cities and city-states. Therefore it
was important for Rome to build towns and cities in cultures that did not already
live like that. You can see evidence of these towns in Britain still existing now as
some of their largest cities such as London and Manchester. The next part was
using the army to help transition the province into a more Rome like state. This
was achieved by two means. The regular soldiers of the army would settle in the
newly conquered province, this allowed the cultures to intermingle. The second was
allowing locals to join the army as auxiliary soldiers. Once their time in the army
was up, these auxiliaries could become Roman citizens furthering the process of
Romanization. The final step of Romanization was integrating the local religion.
The Roman Empire very rarely banned other religions from practicing. They would
encourage the worship of Roman gods, but would allow the worship of the local gods
as long as it was done in a normal or “Roman” way. Because of this the local
population would be more passive because they realized the Romans were not
taking everything from them.
This year I have learned much on the Roman Empire. I learned of the
corrupt and murderous political dynamic through studying the life of Marc Antony.
Hadrian’s wall showed me the impressive feats of engineering the Romans were
capable of. Lastly, I learned the importance of the process of Romanization and how
they used it to absorb the provinces into the Empire. The Roman Empire did much
in its time, so much that it is leaving impacts on us all 1500 years later.