AUGUSTUS

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AUGUSTUS

• Rome achieved great glory under
  Octavian/Augustus. He restored peace after 100
  years of civil war maintained an honest
  government and a sound currency system extended
  the highway system connecting Rome with its
  far-flung empire developed an efficient postal
  service fostered free trade among the provinces
  and built many bridges, aqueducts and buildings
  adorned with beautiful works of art created in
  the classical style. Literature flourished with
  writers including Virgil, Horace, Ovid, and Livy
  all living under the emperor's patronage.The
  empire expanded under Augustus with his generals
  subduing Spain, Gaul (now France), Panonia and
  Dalmatia (now parts of Hungary and Croatia). He
  annexed Egypt and most of southwestern Europe up
  to the Danube River. After his death, the people
  the Roman Empire worshipped Augustus as a god.
  Rome achieved great glory under
  Octavian/Augustus. He restored peace after 100
  years of civil war maintained an honest
  government and a sound currency system extended
  the highway system connecting Rome with its
  far-flung empire developed an efficient postal
  service fostered free trade among the provinces
  and built many bridges, aqueducts and buildings
  adorned with beautiful works of art created in
  the classical style. Literature flourished with
  writers including Virgil, Horace, Ovid, and Livy
  all living under the emperor's patronage.The
  empire expanded under Augustus with his generals
  subduing Spain, Gaul (now France), Panonia and
  Dalmatia (now parts of Hungary and Croatia). He
  annexed Egypt and most of southwestern Europe up
  to the Danube River. After his death, the people
  the Roman Empire worshipped Augustus as a god.

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TIBERIUS

• The reign of Tiberius (b. 42 B.C., d. A.D. 37,
  emperor A.D. 14-37) is a particularly important
  one for the Principate, since it was the first
  occasion when the powers designed for Augustus
  alone were exercised by somebody else. In
  contrast to the approachable and tactful
  Augustus, Tiberius emerges from the sources as an
  enigmatic and darkly complex figure, intelligent
  and cunning, but given to bouts of severe
  depression and dark moods that had a great impact
  on his political career as well as his personal
  relationships. His reign abounds in
  contradictions. Despite his keen intelligence, he
  allowed himself to come under the influence of
  unscrupulous men who, as much as any actions of
  his own, ensured that Tiberius's posthumous
  reputation would be unfavorable despite his vast
  military experience, he oversaw the conquest of
  no new region for the empire and despite his
  administrative abilities he showed such
  reluctance in running the state as to retire
  entirely from Rome and live out his last years in
  isolation on the island of Capri. His reign
  represents, as it were, the adolescence of the
  Principate as an institution. Like any
  adolescence, it proved a difficult time.

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CALIGULA

• Whatever damage Tiberius?s later years had done
  to the carefully crafted political edifice
  created by Augustus, Caligula multiplied it a
  hundred-fold. When he came to power in 37 AD,
  Caligula had no administrative experience beyond
  his honorary quaestorship, and had spent an
  unhappy early life far from the public eye. He
  appears, once in power, to have realized the
  boundless scope of his authority and acted
  accordingly. For the elite, this situation proved
  intolerable and ensured the blackening of
  Caligula's name in the historical record they
  would dictate. The sensational and hostile nature
  of that record, however, should in no way
  trivialize Caligula's importance. His reign
  highlighted an inherent weakness in Augustus?s
  Principate, now openly revealed for what it was
  -- a raw monarchy in which only the
  self-discipline of the incumbent acted as a
  restraint on his behavior rather than the "first
  among equals" Augustus had intended. That the
  only means of retiring the wayward Princeps was
  murder marked another important revelation Roman
  emperors could not relinquish their powers
  without simultaneously relinquishing their lives.
  Caligula would be the first of many emperors to
  be brutally executed in the years to come.

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CLAUDIUS

• Claudius Nero Germanicus (b. 10 BC, d. 54 A.D.
  emperor, 41-54 A.D.) was the third emperor of the
  Julio-Claudian dynasty. His reign represents a
  turning point in the history of the Principate
  for a number of reasons, not the least for the
  manner of his accession and the implications it
  carried for the nature of the office. During his
  reign he promoted administrators who did not
  belong to the senatorial or equestrian classes,
  and was later vilified by authors who did. He
  followed Caesar in carrying Roman arms across the
  English Channel into Britain but, unlike his
  predecessor, he initiated the full-scale
  annexation of Britain as a province, which
  remains today the most closely studied corner of
  the Roman Empire. His relationships with his
  wives and children provide detailed insights into
  the perennial difficulties of the succession
  problem faced by all Roman Emperors. His final
  settlement in this regard was not lucky he
  adopted his fourth wife's son, L. Domitius
  Ahenobarbus, who was to reign catastrophically as
  Nero and bring the dynasty to an end. Claudius's
  reign, therefore, was a mixture of successes and
  failures that leads into the last phase of the
  Julio-Claudian line.

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NERO

• Nero, last of the Julio-Claudians, had been
  placed in the difficult position of absolute
  authority at a young age coupled with the
  often-contradictory efforts of those in a
  position to manipulate him. Augustus, however,
  had not been much older when he began his bid for
  power, and so a great deal of the responsibility
  for Nero's conduct must also rest with the man
  himself. Nero's reign was not without military
  operations (e.g., the campaigns of Corbulo
  against the Parthians, the suppression of the
  revolt of Boudicca in Britain), but his neglect
  of the armies was a critical error. He left Rome
  not to review his troops but to compete in Greek
  games, and as a further slight had left a
  freedman, Helius, in his place at Rome to govern
  in his absence. The suspicion which surrounded
  him after the treason trials and the conspiracy
  set the stage for a series of civil upheavals,
  "the Year of the Four Emperors," which included
  the rise to power of men, such as Otho in
  Lusitania and Vespasian in Judaea, whom Nero
  himself had sent to the frontiers, unaware that
  they were to become his successors.

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VESPASIAN

• Titus Flavius Vespasianus (b. A.D. 9, d. A.D. 79,
  emperor A.D. 69-79) restored peace and stability
  to an empire in disarray following the death of
  Nero in A.D. 68. In the process he established
  the Flavian dynasty as the legitimate successor
  to the Imperial throne. Although we lack many
  details about the events and chronology of his
  reign, Vespasian provided practical leadership
  and a return to stable government -
  accomplishments which, when combined with his
  other achievements, make his emperorship
  particularly notable within the history of the
  Principate.

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TITUS

• Titus was the beneficiary of considerable
  intelligence and talent, endowments that were
  carefully cultivated at every step of his career,
  from his early education to his role under his
  father's principate. Cassius Dio suggested that
  Titus' reputation was enhanced by his early
  death. It is true that the ancient sources tend
  to heroicize Titus, yet based upon the evidence,
  his reign must be considered a positive one. He
  capably continued the work of his father in
  establishing the Flavian dynasty and he
  maintained a high degree of economic and
  administrative competence in Italy and beyond. In
  so doing, he solidified the role of the emperor
  as paternalistic autocrat, a model that would
  serve Trajan and his successors well.

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DOMITIAN

• On 18 September, A.D. 96, Domitian was
  assassinated and was succeeded on the very same
  day by M. Cocceius Nerva, a senator and one of
  his amici. The sources are unanimous in stressing
  that this was a palace plot, yet it is difficult
  to determine the level of culpability among the
  various potential conspirators. In many ways,
  Domitian is still a mystery - a lazy and
  licentious ruler by some accounts, an ambitious
  administrator and keeper of traditional Roman
  religion by others. As many of his economic,
  provincial, and military policies reveal, he was
  efficient and practical in much that he
  undertook, yet he also did nothing to hide the
  harsher despotic realities of his rule. This
  fact, combined with his solitary personality and
  frequent absences from Rome, guaranteed a harsh
  portrayal of his rule. The ultimate truths of his
  reign remain difficult to know.

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NERVA

• Nerva's reign was more concerned with the
  continuation of an existing political system than
  with the birth of a new age. Indeed, his economic
  policies, his relationship with the senate, and
  the men whom he chose to govern and to offer him
  advice all show signs of Flavian influence. In
  many respects, Nerva was the right man at the
  right time. His immediate accession following
  Domitian's murder prevented anarchy and civil
  war, while his age, poor health and moderate
  views were perfect attributes for a government
  that offered a bridge between Domitian's stormy
  reign and the emperorships of the stable rulers
  to follow.

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TRAJAN

• Early in his principate, he had unofficially been
  honored with the title optimus, "the best," which
  long described him even before it became, in 114,
  part of his official titulature. His
  correspondence with Pliny enables posterity to
  gain an intimate sense of the emperor in action.
  His concern for justice and the well-being of his
  subjects is underscored by his comment to Pliny,
  when faced with the question of the Christians,
  that they were not to be sought out, "nor is it
  appropriate to our age." At the onset of his
  principate, Tacitus called Trajan's accession the
  beginning of a beatissimum saeculum, and so it
  remained in the public mind. Admired by the
  people, respected by the senatorial aristocracy,
  he faced no internal difficulties, with no rival
  nor opposition. His powers were as extensive as
  Domitian's had been, but his use and display of
  these powers were very different from those of
  his predecessor, who had claimed to be deus et
  dominus. Not claiming to be a god, he was
  recognized in the official iconography of
  sculpture as Jupiter's viceregent on earth, so
  depicted on the attic reliefs of the Beneventan
  arch. The passage of time increased Trajan's aura
  rather than diminished it. In the late fourth
  century, when the Roman Empire had dramatically
  changed in character from what it had been in
  Trajan's time, each new emperor was hailed with
  the prayer, felicior Augusto, melior Traiano,
  "may he be luckier than Augustus and better than
  Trajan." That reputation has essentially
  survived into the present day.

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HADRIAN

• 117-138 CE
• Placed in the list of "good" emperors, a worthy
  successor to the optimus princeps Trajan. Hadrian
  played a significant role both in developing the
  foreign policies of the empire and in its
  continuing centralization in administration. Few
  would disagree that he was one of the most
  remarkable men Rome ever produced, and that the
  empire was fortunate to have him as its head.

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Antoninus Pius

• 138-161CE
• Antoninus Pius is regarded as one of the "Five
  Good Emperors" in Roman history. Antoninus
  believed the Empire needed no further conquests.
  Antonius believed that he should remain in Rome
  for the duration of his reign so as to receive
  news and messages from the provinces quickly and
  easily.. He was respected by his neighbors and
  generally kept the peace with the border
  territories. news and messages from the provinces
  quickly and easily.

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MARCUS AURELIUS

• 161-180 CE
• Gibbon called Marcus "that philosophic monarch,
  a combination of adjective and noun which sets
  Marcus apart from all other Roman emperors. His
  renown has, in subsequent centuries, suffered
  little, although he was by no means a "perfect"
  person. He was perhaps too tolerant of other
  people's failings, he himself used opium. The
  abundance of children whom his wife bore him
  included, alas, a male who was to prove one of
  Rome's worst rulers. How much better it would
  have been if Marcus had had no son and had chosen
  a successor by adoption, so that the line of the
  five good emperors, Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian,
  Antoninus, Marcus, could have been extended. It
  was not to be, and for that Marcus must accept
  some responsibility.Yet he was a man of ability
  and a sense of duty who sacrificed his own
  delights and interests to the well-being of the
  state. He was capax imperii, he did his best, and
  history has been kind to him. As Hamlet said to
  Horatio, when awaiting the appearance of the
  ghost of his father,"He was a man! Take him for
  all in all, I shall not look upon his like
  again." (I 2, 187-88)His memory remains vivid and
  tactile because of the famous column, the
  equestrian statue, and his slender volume of
  thoughts, written in Greek, the Meditations.

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THE FIVE GOOD EMPERORS 96-180

• Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and
  Marcus Aurelius, known as the Five Good Emperors,
  were a series of excellent emperors who ruled in
  Rome from 96-180 AD. following the Flavian
  Dynasty. They were so called because they
  succeeded in winning the support and cooperation
  of the senate, which is something their
  predecessors had failed to accomplish.The first
  of these great emperors was Marcus Cocceius
  Nerva, ruling from 96-98 AD, who was chosen to
  take the throne by the assassins of the previous
  emperor, Domitian. He was a conservative man who
  promised to deal with the senate fairly and never
  put one of its members to death. The main things
  that characterize the reign of Nerva are his
  excellent relations with the senate, his
  completion of Dominitan's projects, his vast
  amount of spending on securing public good will,
  his attempt to increase civilian dislike for
  Dominitan, and the fact that he initiated a
  system of adopting heirs to ensure the succession
  of the best candidates. He adopted Trajan to be
  his heir, and thus inheriting the throne after
  him.The second emperor, Trajan, was in power from
  98-117 and began his reign with pomp, killing all
  the leaders of the group who had shamed Nerva. He
  was named Optimus Maximus, meaning the best
  because of his respect for the senate and a
  series of foreign wars in which he attempted to
  extend the empire. He is well known for his
  contributions to public services, including an
  increase in the free distribution of food, the
  repair of roads, and the construction of the
  Forum, Market, and baths of Trajan. He adopted
  Hadrian, who became his successor.

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THE FIVE GOOD EMPERORS 96-180

• Publius Aelius Hadrianus (Hadrian), the third of
  the great emperors to rule Rome, was in power
  from 117-138. His first accomplishment was the
  termination of Trajan's attempts at expansion. He
  also abandoned military conquests because they
  were too expensive, and paid more attention to
  the provinces, traveling and listening to them.
  Regarding government and law, he developed the
  Frumentarii, or Secret Service, and established
  the Equestrian Order which took the major burden
  of civil service and amassed secretariat
  positions. Intellectually, he was an author
  surrounded with fine minds who encouraged art,
  literature, and culture.Hadrian's successor was
  Antonius Pius, ruling from 138-161. His name
  arose from his refusing to executing the list
  that was waiting when he came to power. He had no
  desire to conquer so his reign was very
  prosperous and he restored the status of the
  senate. Some other of his accomplishments include
  improving bureaucratic machinery, watching the
  development of foreign crises, and founding the
  dynasty of Antoninus, and being a great
  builder.The last of the famous emperors was
  Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, who ruled from
  161-180, in an era of intense hardship. There was
  incessant warfare and financial suffering during
  his reign as well as an outbreak of plague from
  the East. He was part of the Marcomannic Wars of
  Marcomanni, Langobardi and others and broke into
  the Danube provinces, routed an army and besieged
  Aquileia as a prelude to Italy's invasion. The
  end of the reign of the Five Good Emperors was
  characterized by Aurelius's death on the frontier
  in 180 AD.