Rome's Greatest
Republic to Empire
The generals, emperors, orators, and thinkers who built and ruled the most powerful empire the ancient world had ever seen.
Profiles in this collection
Hannibal Barca
Carthaginian general who led one of the most audacious military campaigns in history, crossing the Alps with war elephants to invade Italy. For over fifteen years he ravaged the Italian peninsula, inflicting catastrophic defeats on Rome and forever changing the art of war.
Scipio Africanus
The Roman general who defeated Hannibal Barca at the Battle of Zama in 202 BCE, ending the Second Punic War and establishing Rome as the dominant power of the Mediterranean. Bold, charismatic, and unconventional, he transformed Roman military strategy by taking the war to Africa.
Marcus Tullius Cicero
The greatest orator Rome ever produced and one of the most influential prose writers in Western history. Statesman, philosopher, and fierce defender of the Roman Republic, his writings shaped Latin style for centuries and helped transmit Greek philosophy to the Western world.
Julius Caesar
Roman general and dictator whose conquest of Gaul, crossing of the Rubicon, and seizure of power transformed the Roman Republic into the foundation for an empire. His assassination on the Ides of March is one of the most dramatic events in Western history.
Augustus
Born Gaius Octavius, he was adopted by Julius Caesar and rose from teenager to master of the Roman world. As the first Roman emperor, he transformed the Republic into the Principate and inaugurated the Pax Romana - two centuries of relative peace and prosperity.
Trajan
The emperor under whom Rome reached its greatest territorial extent. A soldier-emperor from Spain, Trajan conquered Dacia and Mesopotamia, built magnificent public works including his famous column and forum, and was honored by the Senate as Optimus Princeps - the Best of Rulers.
Hadrian
The most traveled emperor in Roman history, Hadrian consolidated the empire's frontiers - most famously with his wall across northern Britain - and was a passionate builder, patron of Greek culture, and restless intellectual whose architectural vision produced the Pantheon and his extraordinary villa at Tivoli.
Marcus Aurelius
The closest the ancient world came to Plato's ideal of the philosopher-king, Marcus Aurelius governed Rome during a time of plague, war, and crisis while composing the Meditations - a private journal of Stoic self-reflection that became one of the most beloved works of philosophy in any language.
Constantine the Great
The emperor who transformed Christianity from a persecuted sect into the favored religion of the Roman Empire. He reunified the empire, founded Constantinople as a new eastern capital, and convened the Council of Nicaea - decisions that shaped the course of Western and Eastern civilization for the next millennium and beyond.