Timeline of the Roman Empire
The Roman Empire succeeded the Roman Republic and was distinguished from it by its form of government—power was held by an emperor instead of elected officials. The Roman Empire was established in the first century bce, and its western half fell in the 5th century ce. The eastern half continued until the 15th century (see also: List of Roman emperors).
Key events in ancient Roman history that preceded the empire:
- 753 bce: According to tradition, Romulus and Remus found Rome; the city is ruled by a series of kings.
- 509 bce: Roman monarchy is replaced by elected officials.
- 133–31 bce: This period of internal strife and civil wars encompasses the careers of Sulla, Pompey, and Julius Caesar. Other events during this time include Spartacus’s rebellion.
- 44 bce: Julius Caesar is assassinated.
- 31 bce: Octavian defeats Mark Antony and Cleopatra in the Battle of Actium, gaining complete control of Roman territory. Egypt officially becomes a Roman province in 30 bce, joining other parts of North Africa, Italy, Gaul, much of present-day Spain, Greece, Asia Minor, and Syria.
The principate (27 bce–284 ce)
Julio-Claudian dynasty
28 bce: Octavian is given the title of princeps, or “first citizen,” by the Senate.
27 bce: Octavian is elevated as Augustus Caesar and granted immense power by the Senate. Over the following years, he brings Spain fully under Roman rule and reorganizes the administration of Spain and Gaul.
23 bce: The Senate gives Augustus complete control, officially ending the Republic. He establishes the principate, which is derived from princeps and is a form of government blending traditional monarchy with elements from the Republic. Rome enjoys two centuries of peace under the Pax Romana, which lasts through the reign of Marcus Aurelius (161–180 ce).
12 bce: Roman commander Nero Claudius Drusus Germanicus begins a series of campaigns in German territory and occupies land between the Rhine and Elbe rivers.
6 ce: Judaea becomes a Roman province after Augustus deposes Herod Archelaus, son of Herod the Great.
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9 ce: German leader Arminius defeats three Roman legions under Publius Quinctilius Varus in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, checking the Roman advance into German territory beyond the Rhine.
14–37 ce: Tiberius is made emperor after the death of Augustus, his adoptive father. Rome prospers under Tiberius, who is an efficient ruler. He annexes Cappadocia in 17 ce but becomes a tyrant in his final years.
37 ce: Caligula, son of Tiberius’s nephew and adoptive son, Germanicus Caesar, accedes to the throne after Tiberius dies. He proves to be tyrannical and extravagant, claiming divinity and showing signs of insanity. He is popularly believed to have made his horse a consul, an account that is likely untrue.
41 ce: Claudius becomes emperor after Caligula, his nephew, is assassinated by members of his Praetorian Guard.
43 ce: Claudius begins the conquest of Britain by invading the southeastern part of the island. Londinium (London) is founded, and roads are built in 47–50 ce.
About 44 ce: Claudius annexes Mauretania, which had been ruled by Roman vassals since the late 2nd century bce.
54 ce: Nero accedes to the throne after his mother, Julia Agrippina (Agrippina the Younger), poisons Claudius, who was both her uncle and her husband. She is, in turn, murdered on Nero’s orders in 59 ce.
60 or 61 ce: Queen Boudicca of the Iceni tribe leads a revolt against Roman rule in Britain and is eventually defeated.
64 ce: The great fire of Rome destroys much of the city, killing hundreds and leaving thousands homeless. Nero is popularly supposed to have played the fiddle as the inferno raged. He uses the fire as a pretext to begin a persecution of Christians, for which he will become infamous.
66 ce: Judaea rebels against Roman rule, beginning the First Jewish Revolt.
Year of the Four Emperors and the Flavian dynasty (69–96 ce)
68–69 ce: Nero dies by suicide, and Rome is ravaged by civil war. Four leaders seize power in quick succession—Galba, Otho, Aulus Vitellius, and Vespasian. Each is defeated by his successor, and Vespasian, the final victor, establishes the Flavian dynasty and rules until 79 ce.
70 ce: Vespasian’s son Titus takes Jerusalem and burns the Temple, ending the First Jewish Revolt.
79 ce: Titus becomes emperor after his father’s death. Vesuvius erupts in the same year. Roman general Gnaeus Julius Agricola invades Scotland, having consolidated Roman rule of England and Wales as the province of Britannia.
80 ce: The Colosseum is inaugurated in grand fashion with 100 days of games.
81 ce: Titus dies suddenly at the age of 41 after reigning for just two years. His death is possibly engineered by his brother, Domitian, who succeeds him.
93–96 ce: Domitian unleashes a reign of terror against the Senate, executing many and expelling others regarded as “philosophers” for their Stoic views. A conspiracy against him, in which his wife, Domitia Longina, is complicit, is hatched after the execution of his cousin Flavius Clemens in 95 ce. Domitian is murdered by conspirators the following year.
Five Good Emperors (96–180 ce)
96 ce: Nerva is elected emperor by the Senate after Domitian’s murder. He adopts Trajan as coruler and successor the following year.
98 ce: Trajan becomes sole emperor after Nerva’s death. During his reign he extends the boundaries of the empire in the east.
101–114 ce: Trajan conquers Dacia and Armenia, advances into Arabia and Mesopotamia, and attacks Parthia.
117 ce: Trajan dies in Selinus and is succeeded by Hadrian, who consolidates and unifies the empire.
121–134 ce: Hadrian undertakes two tours of parts of the empire, including Gaul, Germany, Britain (where construction begins on Hadrian’s Wall), Spain, North Africa, Athens, and Egypt.
138–161 ce: Antoninus Pius succeeds Hadrian after his death. He suppresses rebellions in Britain, Mauretania, Germany, Dacia, and Egypt. He extends the British frontier into Scotland once again, with the construction of the Antonine Wall. The wall is abandoned in the 160s ce, and the army returns to Hadrian’s Wall.
161 ce: Antoninus Pius dies and is succeeded by Marcus Aurelius, who makes his adopted brother, Lucius Verus, co-emperor. Marcus is regarded by many as symbolic of the golden age of the empire.
167 or 168 ce: The emperors set off on an expedition across the Danube, during which Italy is besieged by German tribes. The attackers are repelled first by Marcus and Verus and then, after Verus’s death in 169 ce, by Marcus alone.
177 ce: Marcus appoints his 16-year-old son, Commodus, co-emperor, and they resume the wars against the Germanic tribes along the Danube.
Commodus, Year of Five Emperors, and the Severan dynasty (180–235 ce)
180 ce: Commodus becomes sole emperor after the death of Marcus Aurelius, comes to terms with the Germans, and returns to Rome. A plot against Commodus, led by his sister Lucilla, is discovered in 182 ce, and his rule thereafter becomes arbitrary and cruel.
192 ce: Commodus’s advisers have him strangled on December 31. By this time he has lapsed into insanity, imagining himself as Hercules and renaming Rome as Colonia Commodiana (Colony of Commodus). The Senate proclaims Publius Helvius Pertinax emperor.
193–194 ce: Pertinax is murdered less than three months into his reign, and over the next year four claimants fight for succession—Decimus Clodius Septimus Albinus, Pescennius Niger, Marcus Didius Severus Julianus, and Septimius Severus. The crisis ends with the eventual accession of Severus, although it is not until 197 ce that the last of the contenders, Albinus, is defeated.
211 ce: Caracalla, who had ruled jointly with his father, Severus, since 198 ce, becomes sole emperor after Severus dies. He proves to be a bloodthirsty tyrant, putting his wife and brother, among others, to death.
212 ce: Caracalla grants Roman citizenship to all free inhabitants of the empire.
217 ce: Severan rule is disrupted when Caracalla is murdered while fighting the Parthians. Macrinus, who led the plot against Caracalla, briefly seizes power.
218 ce: Macrinus becomes unpopular after securing a peace with the Parthians that is unfavorable to Rome and cutting soldiers’ pay. Elagabalus accedes to the throne, reestablishes the Severan dynasty, and captures and executes Macrinus, who had fled. Julia Maesa, Elagabalus’s grandmother and Caracalla’s aunt, is the real authority and persuades Elagabalus to adopt his cousin, Severus Alexander, as his son and heir.
222 ce: Elagabalus attempts to depose Alexander and is killed by his Praetorian Guard. Alexander succeeds him as emperor. Julia Maesa continues to hold the real power until her death in 226 ce.
230–235 ce: Persian King Ardashīr I invades the Roman province of Mesopotamia, and Alexander’s counteroffensive fails. However, heavy losses force the Persians to withdraw, allowing Alexander to claim victory. He then attempts to buy peace with the Alemanni, an invading Germanic tribe, alienating his army.
Crisis of the Third Century (235–284 ce)
235 ce: Severus Alexander is assassinated by his soldiers, and a period of political instability follows the end of the Severan dynasty. Parts of the Roman Empire temporarily break off to form the Gallic Empire and the Palmyrene Empire, and Rome is ruled by a succession of more than 20 emperors in 50 years:
- Maximinus (235–238 ce)
- Gordian I (March–April 238 ce)
- Gordian II (March–April 238 ce)
- Pupienus Maximus (April 22–July 29, 238 ce)
- Balbinus (April 22–July 29, 238 ce)
- Gordian III (238–244 ce)
- Philip (244–249 ce)
- Decius (249–251 ce)
- Hostilian (251 ce)
- Gallus (251–253 ce)
- Aemilian (253 ce)
- Valerian (253–260 ce)
- Gallienus (253–268 ce)
- Claudius II Gothicus (268–270 ce)
- Quintillus (270 ce)
- Aurelian (270–275 ce)
- Tacitus (275–276 ce)
- Florian (June–September 276 ce)
- Probus (276–282 ce)
- Carus (282–283 ce)
- Numerian (283–284 ce)
- Carinus (283–285 ce)
The dominate (284–476 ce)
Crisis ends
284 ce: Political stability is restored with the accession of Diocletian, who institutes an authoritarian system of government known as the dominate, in which the role of the emperor evolves from princeps, or “first citizen,” to dominus, or “master.” He reorganizes the fiscal, administrative, and military machinery of the empire, laying the foundation for the Byzantine Empire in the East and temporarily revitalizing the decaying empire in the West. The last persecution of Christians occurs during his reign.
293 ce: Diocletian establishes a tetrarchy, or rule of four, sharing power with Maximian (who had been made augustus in 286 ce) and appointing Constantius I and Galerius as caesars.
Fall of the Western Empire
305 ce: Diocletian and Maximian abdicate and are succeeded by Galerius and Constantius I. The empire is thrown into turmoil, with several claimants vying for the title of augustus, including Constantius’s son Constantine (who would rule as Constantine I, or Constantine the Great), Maximian’s son Maxentius, Licinius, and Galerius Valerius Maximinus.
312 ce: After some years of civil war Constantine I becomes Western emperor, and Licinius and Maximinus share power in the East. The following year Licinius defeats Maximinus and becomes sole emperor in the East.
313 ce: The Edict of Milan, establishing tolerance of Christianity throughout the empire, is proclaimed as the result of an agreement between Constantine I, the first Christian emperor, and Licinius.
324 ce: Constantine I attacks and defeats Licinius, unifying and becoming emperor of both the Western and Eastern empires. He Christianizes the empire, and he moves the capital to Constantinople (now Istanbul) in 330 ce. His bloodline continues but is unable to prevent the decline of the empire.
395 ce: The death of Theodosius I, the last ruler of a unified empire, leads to a renewed division between the Eastern and Western empires. The Western Empire, assailed by political turbulence, economic difficulties, and repeated invasion by Germanic tribes, had grown weak compared with the East, which had become wealthy from spices and other exports.
410 ce: The city of Rome is sacked by the Visigoths, severely destabilizing the Western Empire under Honorius, the younger son of Theodosius I.
451 ce: A combined force of Romans and Visigoths checks the advancement of Attila and the Huns in the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains.
476 ce: The fall of Rome is completed when German chieftain Odoacer defeats Romulus Augustulus, the last Western emperor.
Byzantine, or Eastern Roman, Empire
The Eastern Empire continues for nearly 1,000 years. Key events include the following:
- 482 ce: Emperor Zeno issues the Henotikon (Greek: “Edict of Union”), an edict that aims to reconcile two opposing factions of Christianity. However, this causes the Acacian Schism with Pope Felix III, which lasts from 484–519 ce.
- 527–565 ce: During his reign Justinian I attempts to regain the Western Empire, sponsors a set of laws known as the Code of Justinian, and builds the Hagia Sophia.
- 610–641 ce: During the reign of Heraclius the official language is changed from Latin to Greek, and the empire achieves a decisive victory in the Byzantine-Sasanian war (602–628 ce), the final phase in the Roman struggle against the Persians. Arab conquests begin about 633 ce, and the empire loses Egypt, Syria, and Palestine.
- 726 ce: Iconoclasm, or the banning of religious images, begins under Leo III and becomes official policy in 730 ce. It ends in 843 ce under Empress Theodora (widow of Theophilus) and is celebrated as the Feast of Orthodoxy.
- 867–1025 ce: The declining empire revives during the Macedonian renaissance, a period of cultural and military progress. Expansions are made in Eastern Europe.
- 1054 ce: The East-West Schism between the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches, respectively led by the patriarch of Constantinople and the pope, marks a watershed moment in church history.
- 1095–1261 ce: The empire plays a complex role during the Crusades. The First Crusade takes place as a result of Emperor Alexius I Comnenus’s appeal for Western help against Seljuq expansion into Byzantine territory. There is an erosion of trust between the empire and the West over the next Crusades, culminating in the sack of Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade in 1204 ce. The Latin empire is established from territory seized from the Byzantines. Constantinople is regained, and Byzantine rule, now greatly weakened, is restored in 1261 ce.
- 1354 ce: Turkish tribes cross into Europe and make incursions into the disintegrating empire, which is fragmented by civil war.