It's still hard for me to really grasp that you can find Roman towns and architecture from Britain to Morocco to the Caucuses. The sheer scale of the Roman Empire at its height is mind-boggling to me--especially given the limited technology available at the time.
I've been to The Temple of Augustus in Ankara and I've been to Roman ruins in the north west of Spain. It's mental how big the empire was. And how they communicated is just amazing. A different concept of time.
@Sydney Stout Why is Moscow the third Rome? They have almost 0 connection as far as I'm aware. If anything, America is the third Rome and even that is a very shaky analogy at best...
@Sydney StoutWould it be fair to give an acknowledgement to China? It may have less territory but it's population isn't mostly centered in one portion of their territory like the western populations of the RF and they seem to be in a state of expansion, claiming and even making new territory in the South China Sea
@Sydney Stout I don't really understand the direction of this comment. How does this in any way relate to the person you're replying to? Are you just a poorly programmed Russian bot? If your point is that Russia claims to defend the Orthodox faith then by extension yes it is incredible the cultural impact that European (including Russia/Soviet) nations and their former colonial holdings are still to this day defined by Rome
I've regularly seen Antoninus Pius called "uninteresting" or "boring". I'd say he's likely one of the most under-rated Emperors. Managing the Roman Empire for over 22 years in a sufficiently stable and uneventful way so as to be called "boring" is a pretty impressive achievement in itself. It's kind of like when we think of the greatest achievement of Diocletian, people often point to his reforms - many seem to forget that he managed to **abdicate/retire peacefully** and die of old age in his palace as opposed to, like, get knifed. That has to count for something.
@@jwtubification if you've seen the new GoT show it's like Viserys. He didn't do anything drastic or change the world significantly, but what he did do was arguably the most important of all, and that's maintain peace, which like you said, is an achievement of its own. I believe most people would have boring but peaceful as opposed to exciting with a risk of dying, but that's not how history remembers things
My wife and I were staring at the statue of Hadrian in the Istanbul museum earlier today and she asked me “was Hadrian good?” I didn’t have a great answer other than that he has been called one of the ‘five good emperors’ but I couldn’t help but think “what would Marcus Aurelius think of him?” What a perfectly timed video!
Hadrian was a brilliant engineer, oversaw construction of roads and aquaducts (not to mention his wall). Was not without scandal: on a romantic river cruise threw his lover overboard into the Nile to be eaten alive by crocs. Never even regretted losing him.
Hadrian had taken ill during the Nile cruise and the general historical opinion is that his lover, Antinous, threw himself in the Nile as a sacrifice to make him well again. No one has ever suggested he was murdered. Hadrian was famously distraught for years, having Antinous declared a god, establishing cults in his honor and naming new cities after him. The scandal for the Roman aristocracy was that he showed too much emotion over a lover. and that was unseemly. The actual scandal and bad relations with the senate was when he was first acclaimed emperor in Asia Minor where Trajan died, his agent in Rome, Attianus, killed four high ranking senators who he claimed were conspiring against Hadrian. The senate always held the belief that Hadrian ordered it. Overall his reputation has only increased over the years among historians.
Knowing how incredibly well Marcus Aurelius handled the Antonine plague, which killed up to 10% of the population living within the empire, effectively recovering from it better than anyone could have imagined, he truly deserves the title "great". Add to it that he's perhaps the only person in world history who defies the line "absolute power corrupts absolutely."
I really have got a lot out of his Meditations amongst other works. I only got about half way through that though! I am the ADHD ASD Court Jester Drill Sergeant of the Left now at the moment. Just LARPing cos I feel like it. Though it is pretty funny watching Lefty Snowflakes to aggressively volunteer, daily, to be cannon fodder, for "propaganda" for AnCaps pretending to be Nationalists the other end. I can't take it seriously anymore. I see The Joke. We are all chimps and too often we all forget we are. Then forget to keep a lid on it including me! LOL!
Some funny stuff happens! Truly something comical I cannot explain is this first one in particular. Wlliam E Gladstone, Liberal Prime Minister - "FACTS AND LOGIC!" Legendary Social Democrat Sir Clement Attlee - Tories are Terrible and the only things worse is Tankies. Churchill - "history will be kind to me for I will be sure to write it" - The absolute arrogance for any human being to EVER say something like that. But he did
@@H.G.Halberd My opinion of Marcus Aurelius is quite the opposite. He was a largely incompetent military commander; his meditations are basically porn for people with no understanding of philosophy.
Establishing the facts of the premise and then dividing the question into more precise chunks is why this channel is so good and fits so much knowledge and understanding into such a short package.
I've seen it argued that in some circles Domitian would have been worth adding as a sixth good emperor, as once you look outside the Senatorial Historians who he clearly disdained his reign was based on rational decisions and vigorous reforming. He just had no patience for the polite fiction that the Emperor was just the First Citizen of the Senate, and saw no need to flatter wealthy old men. In some regards he was the proto-Hadrian, literally laying the foundations of all the construction Hadrian would do, and putting his foot down when some of the empire called to conquer Dacia or Scotland or wherever. Now this only goes so far, given that towards the end of his reign he grew paranoid and cruel, and his attempts at stamping down on sexual morality went as well as Augustus before him or Constantine after him, but along with Claudius and to a lesser extend Gallienus he's probably done the most dirty by contemporaneous sources.
In addition he was THE ONLY EMPEROR in 5 centuries of the Empire's existence to revalue the Roman currency. He can be placed in the category of wise emperors just by that fact alone. He also increased the pay of the Roman Army despite revaluing the currency which indicates how financially well the empire was at that time. In addition to that, Corruption during his reign was extremely low, much to the annoyance of the corrupt people,obv. He was the most prolific builder since Augustus and was surpassed only by Hadrian. Thus, he was very popular among the plebians and the Army. Which is the reason why Nerva was forced to choose Trajan as his successor, as after his assassination the praetorians pressurised Nerva thus in order to appease them he chose a Roman General.
Marcus Aurelius was one of the best emperors during his reign but I feel like his decision to name Commodus his successor puts a huge asterisk next to his legacy. As important as governing is, naming a suitable successor is probably the most important single decision an emperor makes. Choosing to name his own son heir rather than adopt an heir was a fatal mistake for the empire.
They got crushed by Plague on top of everything else. Also Islam was at it's most scariest back then too. It's been erased from Western History education, but basically they finished off the Roman Empire, swallowed it, and as a result: Preserved Greco Roman Stoic Philosophy and other schools into the present day. People who accuse whole other groups of being the ones always doing the book burning, always at it and painting them as evil in some way; Themselves *always* have something to hide.
Senator: "Now that the tyrant Domitian is no more, we have decided to proclaim Marcus Cocceius Nerva as the new Emperor!" Nerva: "What?! Me?!" Senator: "Of course, you old fool. Don't stand there and come here to make a speech!" Nerva: "Oh, gods! It is my great honor to have been chosen by this assembly to determine the fate of the Empire! First of all, I would like to thank my mother for encouraging me to rise to where I am..." *Dies of old age* Senator: *Sighs* "Ok, you win...Put the Spaniard on the throne." Trajan: "Ole" 😎
Domitian has to be the most underrated emperor. He was the only guy who actually improved the economy. But all anyone remembers about him was that he liked to stab flies with a pen.
I don’t know if you’d see this, but I wanted to say thank you for continuing to make these wonderful videos. I am enthralled by classical history and it makes me very happy to have such easy access to such a profoundly fascinating subject through an equally fantastic narrator. This channel is a gift to the world. Thank you.
A story I was told in high school Latin class. Marcus Aurelius was traveling through Asia Minor with his army, he stopped one night and a farmer sent a 12-year-old slave to fetch the freshest, biggest apples from his orchard. The boy brought the apples, Marcus took a moment to speak to him and found out that he had become a slave at 8-years-old when his mom and dad died. He was bright and lively in his conversation. The next morning, Marcus left with his army. A few months later, the farmer received an order to send the boy to Rome. When the boy arrived in Rome, he was assigned to a school for bright, intelligent orphans, to train them to be civil engineers and public servants. It is the little stories, which tell you the most about who people really are.
America has developed a pretty robust system for identifying and elevating talent (take JD Vance rising from Appalachia for example) and this story here exemplifies how the Roman emperors of the time also understood this. Awesome story.
Sometimes I wistfully imagine if I could have been born in the Roman Empire during the prosperous reign of Marcus Aurelius. Then I remember that I probably would have been a slave with no rights, serving a wealthy master.
Probably not. Even the highest estimates have slavery well below the 50% mark. More like 15% in the empire as a whole, rising to maybe 25% in Italy and perhaps a little higher again in the major cities. You'd probably be born as an illiterate peasant who didn't the have the foggiest idea who Marcus Aurelius was.
This video should be 2h long! It's such a good subject and I really like the conclusion, but it's really worth a whole book! Any sources you recommend? Thank you, nice work as always
As I've gotten more and more into roman history, he's become one of my favorites. An excellent orator, well loved by the people, and even though he enjoyed a good game of dice it never interfered with his abilities as an administrator. when you take a closer look at the picture historians paint against him as being indolent or lazy because he took his time getting to the front of the war against parthia, it falls apart under scrutiny. if he sped there, it would've just been him, a man with no military experience with a minimal presence in a hostile land. the roman campaigning season wasn't for months and it took time to move the proper people and supplies into place. lucius verus was a man who knew when and how to delegate matters to other more experienced people and that alone is a very rare quality.
It’s cause in reality he was more of a second in command. Never at any point would his word be final over Marcus’s so it’s hard to really see him as an emperor.
Amazing video, thanks for always giving me a few minutes of being transported to just a whisp of a dream of what it’d may have been like to have been there. Very fortunate to have found you!
Awesome video! Also the expansive markets and the general creation of wealth by millions of individuals is really by far the most important thing to the success of an empire. I'm glad you touched on that in regard to dampened effects of local famines. It is severely underrecognized by most historians and indeed most people.
Enjoyed this particularly good video. You could pick any one of these Emperors and do a video devoted to him. In fact, you could do that with any important emperor. 10 to 15 minute videos are the ones on which I click.
I wouldn't say it's "just for dying quickly." It's mostly because he chose Trajan (who was undoubtedly a great emperor) as his heir, but it's also because in the year(ish) that he ruled there were no civil wars over the throne. Given the Roman Empire's tendency to devolve into endless civil wars after an emperor died, as had happened less than a century before when Nero died and as would happen a century later and continue for... basically the rest of the empire's existence... that was quite a feat. Nerva must have been incredibly highly respected to have achieved it. An old man, soon to die, no doubt seen as an illegitimate emperor by many (especially the legions who loved Domitian), who would've been suspected in the plot to kill Domitian... and still reigned in peace and had his chosen heir succeed him without issue.
Hats off to the recently departed J. G. A. Pocock, one of the greatest historians of his own or any generation, and whose six-volume study of the contexts, composition, and reception of the first three volumes of Gibbon's Decline and Fall I have yet to get beyond the first volume of 😂. Not only a profound account of Gibbon, his life and times, and his great literary achievement, but a profound study of the concept itself of "decline and fall", and the intricate historical layers of thinking about thinking about Rome.
The "apogee" is an interesting term. Because although it is the highest point of a trajectory, it typically happens only quite a while _after_ the engines were shut off.
I saw a post argue that Antoninus Pius shouldn't be on the list of 5 good emperors since many of the military problems that Marcus Aurelius faced were in part due to his passivity to meet threats on the borders.
In that regard he was merely following the defensive policy Hadrian initiated by giving up Trajan's eastern conquests and focusing on defending static borders. Hadrian dropped the ball big time.
Thanks for the great video, Im writing my a level nea on the accuracy of Pax Romana to the period of good emperors and was glad to see you included some similar points. Would love to hear what you think about the slogan
Nicely done! One comment: I think you badly underestimate the benefit of the Roman Peace to the subsistence farmers. We don't hear from them today as they left behind no writings, but when order breaks down the powerless at the base of the societal pyramid suffer the most. (E.g., an army passing by during a civil leaves starvation in its wake -- assuming anyone survives unmolested to do the starving. A Senator might lose some of his villas. A peasant farmer lost everything.)
Titus was at least as good as Trajan and Aurelius, too bad he had the bad manners of leaving the party just as it was getting started. But as others have said, Domitian was at the least, a competent and stable ruler, effectively continuing Titus' ideas, if perhaps not raising the bar himself. That counts as good to me. That he didn't care for the humble lie and wanted to be called Domitus or was incredibly aloof in regards to banquets and receiving subjects, well that's not really a slight on his abilities or how good the Empire had it under him. He was an arrogant bastard who liked to piss off the richest people in the Empire, and was maybe less diplomatic towards outsiders. But, is that inherently bad? The senatorial class were themselves incredibly destructive to society, maybe he had understood that? Maybe he wanted to 'eat the rich' to use a popular phrase? Unlikely, but possible. What is certain is that we do not have the luxury of having good sources on him. So we should look at how the entire realm did, and it did well. And both he and Titus drew on their father's great recovery of a weakened state after a lot of chaos. They were all just what the doctor ordered. Finally we can't ignore Pertinax. He would have been good, only marred by his murder by the corrupt Praetorians. They literally killed him for trying to fix things. He revalued the currency and tried to get back to the Aurelian way of things. Given how Semptimius Severus kept things both relatively prosperous and stable, despite being a very harsh man, it is almost certain that Pertinax would have done incredibly well if given just five years.
Just a bit of trivia: the most preserved Roman amphitheatre in Jordan had been built during the reign of Emperor Antonius Pius. And Jerash's arch was meant to celebrate emperor Hadrian's visit to the city that never took place.
I would like to add that as some emperors like majorian aurelian or Constantine show emperors could make excellent use of a bad situation, whereas conversely emperors like valens could through single poor decisions cause extreme crises.
@@SDArgo_FoC The fact that Aurelius insisted that his spoiled, inept son succeed him and not elect a competent successor was bad. The fact that Commodus is considered an f tier emperor and complete failure by pretty much everyone is worse. The fact that Commodus sucked so bad that his reign is marks the beginning of the decline from which Rome would never recover is enough to get Aurelius kicked off the "Good" emperor list.
Quick guide for future emperors: don’t lose any wars, don’t tax people too much (the important ones), don’t let the peasants starve, and don’t piss of the elites. Also, hope that God doesn’t smite you with bad weather or a plague. The rulebook hasn’t changed at all.
Unity would be great! One thing that wasn't touched in the video is the issue of the sacraments and by extension, apostolic succession. We can agree on creeds and conventions/agreements but the heart of the Apostolic churches (Catholic, Eastern, Oriental, Church of the East) is the Eucharist.
Marcia: "Happy New Year, my love!" Commodus: "Thank you, my dear! Have you brought me a gift to celebrate the start of my 13th reign?" Marcia: "The best one. Close your eyes!" 😉 Commodus: "He, I always knew that, in the end, you would end up showing me your most lustful facet" *Closes his eyes* Marcia: *Gives the signal to Narcissus*
I have no idea if it already is, but I hope that "climate history" becomes a thing. It's becoming clearer every year how much the changes in the climate affected basically everything. One reason the Mongol Empire happened when it did, for example, was because of a period of unusually favourable conditions in and around Mongolia at that time, which allowed for an increase in herd sizes, as well as an increase in the number of horses that could be supported.
It was 3 degrees celzius hotter on average during Roman hold on Britain. Enough so that grape wines cpuld be tended to even in Scotland. No clear explanation why this was.
He buit a couple of things, but given how vast the empire was and how slow transporation and communications were on a literally a continent-sized empire I guess keeping the daily working of the empire functioning properly took most of their time.
My favorite emperor was the one who died from an aneurysm by yelling at some barbarians who misunderstood him Yes he was known for his temper Yes he yelled at everyone Yes he's the best, lol
@@ComandoX-cd9hy using CE is pointless. Especially when AD and CE are based on the same event, Christs birth. Either use a different calendar not based on Christ's birth or just use AD and BC. Using such "sophisticated" terms does not make one sophisticated.
@@Michael_the_Drunkard Not speaking native english, i always read CE as "Christ Era". Always seemed weird that there wasn't a standard in english, especially when the Era is defined by a singular, well documented event.
dude .... do not underestimate Antonius Pius ..... that guy managed to have peace in the Roman Empire for 20 years ..... 20 YEARS ....OF PEACE IN ROME!!! .... they normally struggle to keep peace for more than 20 minutes, yet alone 20 years .... all that happened was like one small hastily defeated border raid in Scotland and that's it .... if that didn't help the common farmer ....i don't know what will
As for Marcus not adopting a successor, I believe the last thing he wanted was his son Commodus to rule, but unfortunately all of his other sons had passed away before it was time for a new heir.
So the conclusion of this was “at least half of them were good; they were all lucky”? I don’t feel like I learned a lot. But I do know about masterworks now!
Trajan executed those senators for a good reason, those senators during Nervas rule were hated by the military for killing the previous emperor, Domitian. Nerva chose Trajan from the military to succeed him
Do you remember which classic movie scene was filmed on location in a Roman bathhouse with original marble panels still attached to the interior walls? Yule Brynner starred in the film but the title escapes me. It was stunning to see the level of preservation, considering how popular it was to strip marble cladding for reuse over the centuries.
You have access to the internet. Why not search yourself? Not exactly hard. Seems ridiculous you know someone who starred in this movie, yet you haven’t looked up their back catalogue and found it yourself, you just expect someone else to do that for you?
@@numberonehater1239 I looked and couldn't find it. The bath complex was a footnote to my main field of study. Sorry you got so butthurt over a question.
Love this take that an Emperor is only remembered as "good" if daily realities of life were also good at that time. A Corn King sacrificed for a bad harvest, or a US President re-elected or not based on the economy, the more things change, the more they stay the same!
Most major historians of Hadrian's reign argue about what the early senatorial conspiracy was about, but those 4 senators were the only ones he killed in absentia, while he was out of Rome. (The Senate's prerogative to try and kill people was otherwise unmolested.) Hadrian was not "in the habit" of killing senators, unlike, say, Commodus. Saying Rome "avoided pandemics until the Antonine Plague" seems rather contradictory to your point that everything was easy-peasy in the 2nd century. I would agree with you that Antoninus Pius was the luckiest man who ever lived - at least as far as we know, and we know virtually nothing about his reign. But, honestly, I think we need to reconsider just how great the 2nd century was. Consider the City of Rome's population: 1M at the end of Domitian's reign, 800K at the end of Marcus' reign. A fifth of the City's pop gone within a century, and during the so-called "best years". The Plague, yes, but note how that fifth of the population of the city was not replaced. The bubbles were already off the wine in the City, I'd assert. And really, to tackle your last segment, leaders really do matter. I realize modern historians have an urge to blame "societal changes" and, of late, even the weather for the rise and fall of states (I wonder how these folks explain Napoleon), but individual people still matter. Consider Marcus. He failed in his first Imperial task: securing the succession by assigning the best heir available, who was not his wretched son, obviously. By that metric, Nerva was the better emperor.
I think that while Nero and Caligula didn't do damage during their lifetime to empire, their behvior did have lasting conciquenses that carried to next emperors. By acting as bad as they did they dragged the consept of emperor through the mud, making it the position less pristine. If emperor is supposed to be a god, then god that can be flawed and bad is much more acceptable to kill.
I’d have liked to have seen what would have happened to Rome if they kept the election of rulers by the rulers, instead of the monarchic system they went by after Marcus Aurelius’ death.
I agree completely with several of the contributors in the comments section. Marcus Aurelius was one of the greatest Emperors in the Roman Empire and the last of the five good Emperors. However, his legacy will always be defined by his choice to name his son Commudus as his successor. I understand his reasoning that if he had named anyone else that person probably would have had Commudus as soon as possible. A man in his position during that time has to LOVE his country MORE than his own son. His decision to name Commudus as his successor doomed the Empire and precipitated the fall of the Roman Empire. In addition, he should have found the time to train and mould his son and excuse me for saying this however he should have taught him the stoic philosophy that he so vehemently preached about. I guess the old saying of "spare the rod, spoil the child" is totally applicable in this instance. He had time for everyone except for his own family!
I'd argue that all the Roman Emperors had one chief failing: none of them envisioned and built a lasting succession system. There were periods of rather long stability to be sure, but they all eventually collapsed into civil war due to a crisis of legitimacy. This is perhaps one area where the late medieval and early modern periods were, taken as a whole, a tiny bit better. However, I'm not sure how much we can credit the rulers of that time for a better system. Most of these rulers were dragged kicking and screaming into constitutional systems.
All these emperors, excluding Marcus Aurelius, faced good economic times. But even with a troubling economy Marcus did great. His founded distrust in men led to unstable times for the empire.
I sometimes find very intriguing calling Marcus Aurelius good when it was his poor planning which led to Comoddus to ascend to power, which was an overall negative, and simultaneously to discount Domitia as a good emperor, as one could argue he helped set the basis for the next 5. Just an observation, I still like Marcus Aurelius as much as the next guy.
It’s not rocket science. Being stupid and doing nothing will not be good for the empire, not to mention a good ruler is suppose to unite the people and the senate.
I’ve never seen why Nerva is considered the first “good” emperor compared to the other four that preceded him. To me, his best accomplishment was setting up Trajan after looking at who would likely win in a civil war and picking the strongman. His reputation must come in large part to the Senate given he was their pick. Does he really deserve the title “good”? Overrated in my option but I’m sure others will disagree. One of the best parts of history is hearing other peoples interpretations! This is just mine.
If we're going to deal in facts then an important point is that in the U.S. the wealthiest 1% pay 45% of the income taxes. In fact, the top 50% of taxpayers paid 97.7% of the taxes while only the bottom half paid only 2.3%. The prescription has never been taxation for the purpose of redistribution alone. Policies that encourage innovation, create economic mobility, incentivize giving, create stable family situations, and lower barriers to marketplace entry create economic equality.
Personally, I believe enperor Aurelian (not Aurelius) should be one of the five, if not one of the six good emperors. He restored the empire during his reign, only to be assasinated
It's still hard for me to really grasp that you can find Roman towns and architecture from Britain to Morocco to the Caucuses. The sheer scale of the Roman Empire at its height is mind-boggling to me--especially given the limited technology available at the time.
I've been to The Temple of Augustus in Ankara and I've been to Roman ruins in the north west of Spain. It's mental how big the empire was. And how they communicated is just amazing. A different concept of time.
@Sydney Stout Why is Moscow the third Rome? They have almost 0 connection as far as I'm aware. If anything, America is the third Rome and even that is a very shaky analogy at best...
@Sydney StoutWould it be fair to give an acknowledgement to China? It may have less territory but it's population isn't mostly centered in one portion of their territory like the western populations of the RF and they seem to be in a state of expansion, claiming and even making new territory in the South China Sea
@Sydney Stout I think you've missed a few bit of history out. China and the British Empire definitely usurp the Russian attempt
@Sydney Stout I don't really understand the direction of this comment. How does this in any way relate to the person you're replying to?
Are you just a poorly programmed Russian bot?
If your point is that Russia claims to defend the Orthodox faith then by extension yes it is incredible the cultural impact that European (including Russia/Soviet) nations and their former colonial holdings are still to this day defined by Rome
I've regularly seen Antoninus Pius called "uninteresting" or "boring". I'd say he's likely one of the most under-rated Emperors. Managing the Roman Empire for over 22 years in a sufficiently stable and uneventful way so as to be called "boring" is a pretty impressive achievement in itself.
It's kind of like when we think of the greatest achievement of Diocletian, people often point to his reforms - many seem to forget that he managed to **abdicate/retire peacefully** and die of old age in his palace as opposed to, like, get knifed. That has to count for something.
He's become one of my favorites. A quiet leader is a good leader
Antoninus Pius - the Jimmy Carter of Roman emperors?
Well, Diocletian may have died of suicide out of frustration and depression about how quickly his "system" collapsed.
@@michaelhoffmann2891 Fair enough. He still did retire without getting knifed, though.
@@jwtubification if you've seen the new GoT show it's like Viserys. He didn't do anything drastic or change the world significantly, but what he did do was arguably the most important of all, and that's maintain peace, which like you said, is an achievement of its own. I believe most people would have boring but peaceful as opposed to exciting with a risk of dying, but that's not how history remembers things
My wife and I were staring at the statue of Hadrian in the Istanbul museum earlier today and she asked me “was Hadrian good?” I didn’t have a great answer other than that he has been called one of the ‘five good emperors’ but I couldn’t help but think “what would Marcus Aurelius think of him?” What a perfectly timed video!
Marcus wrote quite positiively about Hadrian and Antoninus in his Meditations
Hadrian was a brilliant engineer, oversaw construction of roads and aquaducts (not to mention his wall). Was not without scandal: on a romantic river cruise threw his lover overboard into the Nile to be eaten alive by crocs. Never even regretted losing him.
"We'll build a wall and make the celts pay for it"
~ Hadrian probably
They all revered each other
Hadrian had taken ill during the Nile cruise and the general historical opinion is that his lover, Antinous, threw himself in the Nile as a sacrifice to make him well again. No one has ever suggested he was murdered. Hadrian was famously distraught for years, having Antinous declared a god, establishing cults in his honor and naming new cities after him. The scandal for the Roman aristocracy was that he showed too much emotion over a lover. and that was unseemly. The actual scandal and bad relations with the senate was when he was first acclaimed emperor in Asia Minor where Trajan died, his agent in Rome, Attianus, killed four high ranking senators who he claimed were conspiring against Hadrian. The senate always held the belief that Hadrian ordered it. Overall his reputation has only increased over the years among historians.
Knowing how incredibly well Marcus Aurelius handled the Antonine plague, which killed up to 10% of the population living within the empire, effectively recovering from it better than anyone could have imagined, he truly deserves the title "great". Add to it that he's perhaps the only person in world history who defies the line "absolute power corrupts absolutely."
I really have got a lot out of his Meditations amongst other works. I only got about half way through that though! I am the ADHD ASD Court Jester Drill Sergeant of the Left now at the moment. Just LARPing cos I feel like it. Though it is pretty funny watching Lefty Snowflakes to aggressively volunteer, daily, to be cannon fodder, for "propaganda" for AnCaps pretending to be Nationalists the other end. I can't take it seriously anymore. I see The Joke. We are all chimps and too often we all forget we are. Then forget to keep a lid on it including me! LOL!
Some funny stuff happens! Truly something comical I cannot explain is this first one in particular.
Wlliam E Gladstone, Liberal Prime Minister - "FACTS AND LOGIC!"
Legendary Social Democrat Sir Clement Attlee - Tories are Terrible and the only things worse is Tankies.
Churchill - "history will be kind to me for I will be sure to write it" - The absolute arrogance for any human being to EVER say something like that. But he did
@@TheHorseshoePartyUK Jesse what the fuck are you talking about
Marcus Aurelius is one of the most important historical people to me, his quotes and meditations get me through the toughest of situations
@@H.G.Halberd
My opinion of Marcus Aurelius is quite the opposite. He was a largely incompetent military commander; his meditations are basically porn for people with no understanding of philosophy.
Establishing the facts of the premise and then dividing the question into more precise chunks is why this channel is so good and fits so much knowledge and understanding into such a short package.
I've seen it argued that in some circles Domitian would have been worth adding as a sixth good emperor, as once you look outside the Senatorial Historians who he clearly disdained his reign was based on rational decisions and vigorous reforming. He just had no patience for the polite fiction that the Emperor was just the First Citizen of the Senate, and saw no need to flatter wealthy old men. In some regards he was the proto-Hadrian, literally laying the foundations of all the construction Hadrian would do, and putting his foot down when some of the empire called to conquer Dacia or Scotland or wherever. Now this only goes so far, given that towards the end of his reign he grew paranoid and cruel, and his attempts at stamping down on sexual morality went as well as Augustus before him or Constantine after him, but along with Claudius and to a lesser extend Gallienus he's probably done the most dirty by contemporaneous sources.
Excellent comment. My opinions as well.
In addition he was THE ONLY EMPEROR in 5 centuries of the Empire's existence to revalue the Roman currency. He can be placed in the category of wise emperors just by that fact alone. He also increased the pay of the Roman Army despite revaluing the currency which indicates how financially well the empire was at that time.
In addition to that, Corruption during his reign was extremely low, much to the annoyance of the corrupt people,obv. He was the most prolific builder since Augustus and was surpassed only by Hadrian. Thus, he was very popular among the plebians and the Army. Which is the reason why Nerva was forced to choose Trajan as his successor, as after his assassination the praetorians pressurised Nerva thus in order to appease them he chose a Roman General.
Could we add Vespasian and Titus while we’re at it? Call them them the “Great 8”
Domitian did nothing wrong
@@elistavinger3059 Domitian murdered his brother. Pertinax is another Emperor who revalued the currency, although he didn't last long.
Marcus Aurelius was one of the best emperors during his reign but I feel like his decision to name Commodus his successor puts a huge asterisk next to his legacy. As important as governing is, naming a suitable successor is probably the most important single decision an emperor makes. Choosing to name his own son heir rather than adopt an heir was a fatal mistake for the empire.
Unfortunately any other choice would have provoked civil war. Rome was lucky that the predecessors of Marcus Aurelius did not have natural sons.
I like to believe he was trying to make sure there wasn’t a civil war, making someone emperor that wasn’t Commodus would’ve sparked conflict
@@haevans or he could have killed his son. But can we really expect a father to kill his own son? Constantine would have done it though
Amen.
They got crushed by Plague on top of everything else. Also Islam was at it's most scariest back then too. It's been erased from Western History education, but basically they finished off the Roman Empire, swallowed it, and as a result:
Preserved Greco Roman Stoic Philosophy and other schools into the present day. People who accuse whole other groups of being the ones always doing the book burning, always at it and painting them as evil in some way;
Themselves *always* have something to hide.
Senator: "Now that the tyrant Domitian is no more, we have decided to proclaim Marcus Cocceius Nerva as the new Emperor!"
Nerva: "What?! Me?!"
Senator: "Of course, you old fool. Don't stand there and come here to make a speech!"
Nerva: "Oh, gods! It is my great honor to have been chosen by this assembly to determine the fate of the Empire! First of all, I would like to thank my mother for encouraging me to rise to where I am..." *Dies of old age*
Senator: *Sighs* "Ok, you win...Put the Spaniard on the throne."
Trajan: "Ole" 😎
Domitian has to be the most underrated emperor. He was the only guy who actually improved the economy. But all anyone remembers about him was that he liked to stab flies with a pen.
Well that’s what happens when you piss off the very class of people who write the histories.
@@jeffreyhenion4818 the same thing happened to Nero. but he was not as good...
@@jeffreyhenion4818 Tell that to Gallienus. Except the Senate's attempt to defame him, failed
@@iDeathMaximuMII worked for a while, but modern historians didn’t take long to see through the BS.
He fixed the economy, however you should keep in mind that there's more to ruling than mere economics.
I don’t know if you’d see this, but I wanted to say thank you for continuing to make these wonderful videos. I am enthralled by classical history and it makes me very happy to have such easy access to such a profoundly fascinating subject through an equally fantastic narrator. This channel is a gift to the world. Thank you.
A story I was told in high school Latin class. Marcus Aurelius was traveling through Asia Minor with his army, he stopped one night and a farmer sent a 12-year-old slave to fetch the freshest, biggest apples from his orchard. The boy brought the apples, Marcus took a moment to speak to him and found out that he had become a slave at 8-years-old when his mom and dad died. He was bright and lively in his conversation. The next morning, Marcus left with his army. A few months later, the farmer received an order to send the boy to Rome. When the boy arrived in Rome, he was assigned to a school for bright, intelligent orphans, to train them to be civil engineers and public servants. It is the little stories, which tell you the most about who people really are.
America has developed a pretty robust system for identifying and elevating talent (take JD Vance rising from Appalachia for example) and this story here exemplifies how the Roman emperors of the time also understood this. Awesome story.
Sometimes I wistfully imagine if I could have been born in the Roman Empire during the prosperous reign of Marcus Aurelius.
Then I remember that I probably would have been a slave with no rights, serving a wealthy master.
But there was that plague... and the Marcomannic wars, and worse to come. Might want to back that up an emperor or two.
hi, and so it goes. shut up, get in your box and be grateful.
Probably not. Even the highest estimates have slavery well below the 50% mark. More like 15% in the empire as a whole, rising to maybe 25% in Italy and perhaps a little higher again in the major cities. You'd probably be born as an illiterate peasant who didn't the have the foggiest idea who Marcus Aurelius was.
You deserve that for your next life: you'll be slave in the salt mines... while the philosopher king rules in his remote palace. Enjoy.
An eques during Antoninus Pius' reign instead maybe?
You put a lot of work into these. Appreciate you toldinstone, always a great source of information.
This video should be 2h long! It's such a good subject and I really like the conclusion, but it's really worth a whole book! Any sources you recommend? Thank you, nice work as always
I always feel kind of sad that Lucius Verus gets left off the list, as his time as emperor was in this span, and he seems like a pretty fun guy
As I've gotten more and more into roman history, he's become one of my favorites. An excellent orator, well loved by the people, and even though he enjoyed a good game of dice it never interfered with his abilities as an administrator. when you take a closer look at the picture historians paint against him as being indolent or lazy because he took his time getting to the front of the war against parthia, it falls apart under scrutiny. if he sped there, it would've just been him, a man with no military experience with a minimal presence in a hostile land. the roman campaigning season wasn't for months and it took time to move the proper people and supplies into place. lucius verus was a man who knew when and how to delegate matters to other more experienced people and that alone is a very rare quality.
It’s cause in reality he was more of a second in command. Never at any point would his word be final over Marcus’s so it’s hard to really see him as an emperor.
I know, but if he wasn't a co emperor with Marcus Aurelius he would've been a disaster
Amazing video, thanks for always giving me a few minutes of being transported to just a whisp of a dream of what it’d may have been like to have been there. Very fortunate to have found you!
I love your videos. There always very unique and well researched information one doesn’t usually hear.
Domitian was a pretty good emperor, as were all Flavians, so it was 8 good emperors.
It wasn't stable tho, mostly in his late reign
@@tuskact4overheaven873 Depends how one defines a stable reign. Marcus Aurelius reigned over many years of large scale wars and devastating plague.
Awesome job, per usual Garrett 👏
Awesome video! Also the expansive markets and the general creation of wealth by millions of individuals is really by far the most important thing to the success of an empire. I'm glad you touched on that in regard to dampened effects of local famines. It is severely underrecognized by most historians and indeed most people.
Episodes like this feel like they flow so effortlessly that by the time they've concluded, you wonder where the time went.
Even better than usual. Thanks indeed.
Enjoyed this particularly good video. You could pick any one of these Emperors and do a video devoted to him. In fact, you could do that with any important emperor. 10 to 15 minute videos are the ones on which I click.
Love the use of maps to really bring the story to life
Awwwwww yeah....... a great way to kick off the weekend is with some Told in Stone.... thanks Garrett!
Simply living in peace for an entire lifetime was a huge boon for the subsistence farmers during this era.
I love how Nerva gets in just for dying quickly
I wouldn't say it's "just for dying quickly." It's mostly because he chose Trajan (who was undoubtedly a great emperor) as his heir, but it's also because in the year(ish) that he ruled there were no civil wars over the throne. Given the Roman Empire's tendency to devolve into endless civil wars after an emperor died, as had happened less than a century before when Nero died and as would happen a century later and continue for... basically the rest of the empire's existence... that was quite a feat.
Nerva must have been incredibly highly respected to have achieved it. An old man, soon to die, no doubt seen as an illegitimate emperor by many (especially the legions who loved Domitian), who would've been suspected in the plot to kill Domitian... and still reigned in peace and had his chosen heir succeed him without issue.
Thanks to this video I found out that the bust in Mr Sheffield office is Lucius Verus. Have a great day.
Hats off to the recently departed J. G. A. Pocock, one of the greatest historians of his own or any generation, and whose six-volume study of the contexts, composition, and reception of the first three volumes of Gibbon's Decline and Fall I have yet to get beyond the first volume of 😂.
Not only a profound account of Gibbon, his life and times, and his great literary achievement, but a profound study of the concept itself of "decline and fall", and the intricate historical layers of thinking about thinking about Rome.
Nice video, didn't really answer your own question, but it was thought-provoking. Have you done The Twelve Caesars?
Beautifully done
Great!!!!!! good episode! are you really a New Yorker? you have a long time fan from Rockaway Beach here.
The "apogee" is an interesting term. Because although it is the highest point of a trajectory, it typically happens only quite a while _after_ the engines were shut off.
Fall of the republic FTW
I heard you almost laugh when you said "the baths in bath" :D.
I love your videos ❤❤
Thanks
Alex
I've always said, what makes a good leader is 20% talent, and 80% circumstance.
Disagree. Maybe if you change the statement to what gives a leader a good historical reputation it is a lot of circumstance.
Weird statement. Simply say they’re lucky and bestow the title of a “good ruler” to whoever you wish.
10% Luck
20% Skill
15% concentrated power of will
5% pleasure
50% pain
And a 100% reason to remember the name...
I can't imagine saying that aloud in any circumstance
I saw a post argue that Antoninus Pius shouldn't be on the list of 5 good emperors since many of the military problems that Marcus Aurelius faced were in part due to his passivity to meet threats on the borders.
In that regard he was merely following the defensive policy Hadrian initiated by giving up Trajan's eastern conquests and focusing on defending static borders. Hadrian dropped the ball big time.
Fab as always ❤️
I love how your intro is the Roman version of 'the lick'
Excellent video, thank you
Thanks for the great video, Im writing my a level nea on the accuracy of Pax Romana to the period of good emperors and was glad to see you included some similar points. Would love to hear what you think about the slogan
Wonderful video!
Nicely done! One comment: I think you badly underestimate the benefit of the Roman Peace to the subsistence farmers. We don't hear from them today as they left behind no writings, but when order breaks down the powerless at the base of the societal pyramid suffer the most. (E.g., an army passing by during a civil leaves starvation in its wake -- assuming anyone survives unmolested to do the starving. A Senator might lose some of his villas. A peasant farmer lost everything.)
Sadly, Masterworks is even more of a scam than Established Titles is. There are some good videos on RUclips explaining why.
Dude had the opportunity to name the video "Ancient Rome had Five Guys"
Titus was at least as good as Trajan and Aurelius, too bad he had the bad manners of leaving the party just as it was getting started. But as others have said, Domitian was at the least, a competent and stable ruler, effectively continuing Titus' ideas, if perhaps not raising the bar himself. That counts as good to me. That he didn't care for the humble lie and wanted to be called Domitus or was incredibly aloof in regards to banquets and receiving subjects, well that's not really a slight on his abilities or how good the Empire had it under him. He was an arrogant bastard who liked to piss off the richest people in the Empire, and was maybe less diplomatic towards outsiders. But, is that inherently bad? The senatorial class were themselves incredibly destructive to society, maybe he had understood that? Maybe he wanted to 'eat the rich' to use a popular phrase? Unlikely, but possible. What is certain is that we do not have the luxury of having good sources on him. So we should look at how the entire realm did, and it did well.
And both he and Titus drew on their father's great recovery of a weakened state after a lot of chaos. They were all just what the doctor ordered.
Finally we can't ignore Pertinax. He would have been good, only marred by his murder by the corrupt Praetorians. They literally killed him for trying to fix things. He revalued the currency and tried to get back to the Aurelian way of things. Given how Semptimius Severus kept things both relatively prosperous and stable, despite being a very harsh man, it is almost certain that Pertinax would have done incredibly well if given just five years.
Augustus' greatest mistake really was the creation of that blasted coven of rats.
That freeze of Joachim Phoenix as Commodus really reminded me of someone else, some other erratic leader, hmmm, let me think.
That was one smooth transition to the sponsor
I've long wondered whether Marcus Aurelius' stoicism, a philosophy that was not very hopeful, contributed to the chaos that followed him.
I read Marcus Aurelius Meditations every day... Maybe the most powerful and beautiful book I've ever read.... Memento mori!
Just a bit of trivia: the most preserved Roman amphitheatre in Jordan had been built during the reign of Emperor Antonius Pius. And Jerash's arch was meant to celebrate emperor Hadrian's visit to the city that never took place.
Does the thumbnail sing barbershop quartet?
💈
Barbershop *quintet*
I would like to add that as some emperors like majorian aurelian or Constantine show emperors could make excellent use of a bad situation, whereas conversely emperors like valens could through single poor decisions cause extreme crises.
Counterpoint, Can Marcus Aurelius be considered a good emperor when he did not line up a good successor?
At the end of the day he was a great ruler, even with the one mistake he has made
@@SDArgo_FoC The fact that Aurelius insisted that his spoiled, inept son succeed him and not elect a competent successor was bad. The fact that Commodus is considered an f tier emperor and complete failure by pretty much everyone is worse.
The fact that Commodus sucked so bad that his reign is marks the beginning of the decline from which Rome would never recover is enough to get Aurelius kicked off the "Good" emperor list.
@@babyramses5066 Who would he have chosen? Completely unreasonable to judge a person due to another’s actions
Quick guide for future emperors: don’t lose any wars, don’t tax people too much (the important ones), don’t let the peasants starve, and don’t piss of the elites. Also, hope that God doesn’t smite you with bad weather or a plague.
The rulebook hasn’t changed at all.
Unity would be great! One thing that wasn't touched in the video is the issue of the sacraments and by extension, apostolic succession. We can agree on creeds and conventions/agreements but the heart of the Apostolic churches (Catholic, Eastern, Oriental, Church of the East) is the Eucharist.
Marcia: "Happy New Year, my love!"
Commodus: "Thank you, my dear! Have you brought me a gift to celebrate the start of my 13th reign?"
Marcia: "The best one. Close your eyes!" 😉
Commodus: "He, I always knew that, in the end, you would end up showing me your most lustful facet" *Closes his eyes*
Marcia: *Gives the signal to Narcissus*
I have no idea if it already is, but I hope that "climate history" becomes a thing. It's becoming clearer every year how much the changes in the climate affected basically everything. One reason the Mongol Empire happened when it did, for example, was because of a period of unusually favourable conditions in and around Mongolia at that time, which allowed for an increase in herd sizes, as well as an increase in the number of horses that could be supported.
It was 3 degrees celzius hotter on average during Roman hold on Britain.
Enough so that grape wines cpuld be tended to even in Scotland.
No clear explanation why this was.
Why is the written record of Trajan lacking so much? What happened to the stories of the guy that ruled over Rome at its greatest extent?
He buit a couple of things, but given how vast the empire was and how slow transporation and communications were on a literally a continent-sized empire I guess keeping the daily working of the empire functioning properly took most of their time.
Very Good. 👍🏼
This is a good video idea
My favorite emperor was the one who died from an aneurysm by yelling at some barbarians who misunderstood him
Yes he was known for his temper
Yes he yelled at everyone
Yes he's the best, lol
Valentinian I. (r. 364-375 CE), for those wondering
that s kind of a pathetic death
@@ALEJANDROARANDARICKERT Much better than dying old and miserable
@@ComandoX-cd9hy using CE is pointless. Especially when AD and CE are based on the same event, Christs birth. Either use a different calendar not based on Christ's birth or just use AD and BC. Using such "sophisticated" terms does not make one sophisticated.
@@Michael_the_Drunkard Not speaking native english, i always read CE as "Christ Era". Always seemed weird that there wasn't a standard in english, especially when the Era is defined by a singular, well documented event.
1:09 “here’s Justice for you! And Justice for you!”
8:11 Battle of Milvian Bridge (the background)😂
dude .... do not underestimate Antonius Pius ..... that guy managed to have peace in the Roman Empire for 20 years ..... 20 YEARS ....OF PEACE IN ROME!!! .... they normally struggle to keep peace for more than 20 minutes, yet alone 20 years .... all that happened was like one small hastily defeated border raid in Scotland and that's it ....
if that didn't help the common farmer ....i don't know what will
As for Marcus not adopting a successor, I believe the last thing he wanted was his son Commodus to rule, but unfortunately all of his other sons had passed away before it was time for a new heir.
So the conclusion of this was “at least half of them were good; they were all lucky”? I don’t feel like I learned a lot. But I do know about masterworks now!
Have you ever considered covering later Roman history? I feel that that era of the empire is pretty underappreciated
History of Byzantium podcast does an okay job. The host drags it out and losses the narrative a few times. But its good.
There is a YT channel called Maiorianus that focuses on the late Roman Empire.
The great pool looks like the Lazarus pit.
Trajan executed those senators for a good reason, those senators during Nervas rule were hated by the military for killing the previous emperor, Domitian. Nerva chose Trajan from the military to succeed him
Do you remember which classic movie scene was filmed on location in a Roman bathhouse with original marble panels still attached to the interior walls? Yule Brynner starred in the film but the title escapes me. It was stunning to see the level of preservation, considering how popular it was to strip marble cladding for reuse over the centuries.
You have access to the internet. Why not search yourself? Not exactly hard. Seems ridiculous you know someone who starred in this movie, yet you haven’t looked up their back catalogue and found it yourself, you just expect someone else to do that for you?
@@numberonehater1239 I looked and couldn't find it. The bath complex was a footnote to my main field of study. Sorry you got so butthurt over a question.
@@numberonehater1239 Name checks out
Love this take that an Emperor is only remembered as "good" if daily realities of life were also good at that time. A Corn King sacrificed for a bad harvest, or a US President re-elected or not based on the economy, the more things change, the more they stay the same!
Most major historians of Hadrian's reign argue about what the early senatorial conspiracy was about, but those 4 senators were the only ones he killed in absentia, while he was out of Rome. (The Senate's prerogative to try and kill people was otherwise unmolested.) Hadrian was not "in the habit" of killing senators, unlike, say, Commodus. Saying Rome "avoided pandemics until the Antonine Plague" seems rather contradictory to your point that everything was easy-peasy in the 2nd century. I would agree with you that Antoninus Pius was the luckiest man who ever lived - at least as far as we know, and we know virtually nothing about his reign. But, honestly, I think we need to reconsider just how great the 2nd century was. Consider the City of Rome's population: 1M at the end of Domitian's reign, 800K at the end of Marcus' reign. A fifth of the City's pop gone within a century, and during the so-called "best years". The Plague, yes, but note how that fifth of the population of the city was not replaced. The bubbles were already off the wine in the City, I'd assert. And really, to tackle your last segment, leaders really do matter. I realize modern historians have an urge to blame "societal changes" and, of late, even the weather for the rise and fall of states (I wonder how these folks explain Napoleon), but individual people still matter. Consider Marcus. He failed in his first Imperial task: securing the succession by assigning the best heir available, who was not his wretched son, obviously. By that metric, Nerva was the better emperor.
Love the video but that ad was sketchy af.
I think that while Nero and Caligula didn't do damage during their lifetime to empire, their behvior did have lasting conciquenses that carried to next emperors. By acting as bad as they did they dragged the consept of emperor through the mud, making it the position less pristine. If emperor is supposed to be a god, then god that can be flawed and bad is much more acceptable to kill.
I’d have liked to have seen what would have happened to Rome if they kept the election of rulers by the rulers, instead of the monarchic system they went by after Marcus Aurelius’ death.
I agree completely with several of the contributors in the comments section.
Marcus Aurelius was one of the greatest Emperors in the Roman Empire and the last of the five good Emperors. However, his legacy will always be defined by his choice to name his son Commudus as his successor. I understand his reasoning that if he had named anyone else that person probably would have had Commudus as soon as possible. A man in his position during that time has to LOVE his country MORE than his own son. His decision to name Commudus as his successor doomed the Empire and precipitated the fall of the Roman Empire.
In addition, he should have found the time to train and mould his son and excuse me for saying this however he should have taught him the stoic philosophy that he so vehemently preached about. I guess the old saying of "spare the rod, spoil the child" is totally applicable in this instance. He had time for everyone except for his own family!
8:39 It makes me wonder if prosperity in modern Europe can also be attributed to the stability of its political institutions
I'd argue that all the Roman Emperors had one chief failing: none of them envisioned and built a lasting succession system. There were periods of rather long stability to be sure, but they all eventually collapsed into civil war due to a crisis of legitimacy. This is perhaps one area where the late medieval and early modern periods were, taken as a whole, a tiny bit better. However, I'm not sure how much we can credit the rulers of that time for a better system. Most of these rulers were dragged kicking and screaming into constitutional systems.
Why Augustus not in this category?
The map of the empire in 117 AD seems a little off - did it ever extend to the Persian Gulf? Or the Caspian Sea?
I’m surprised to not see Julius in these list
All these emperors, excluding Marcus Aurelius, faced good economic times. But even with a troubling economy Marcus did great.
His founded distrust in men led to unstable times for the empire.
I sometimes find very intriguing calling Marcus Aurelius good when it was his poor planning which led to Comoddus to ascend to power, which was an overall negative, and simultaneously to discount Domitia as a good emperor, as one could argue he helped set the basis for the next 5. Just an observation, I still like Marcus Aurelius as much as the next guy.
Commodus, Vespasian, Domitian, Claudius, Octavius
I wouldn’t look at Hadrian executing senators as being a necessarily bad thing, why did he execute them?
I always thought Trajan looked like Peter Tork from The Monkees.
How did Caligula potentially cost the "health of the Empire", apart from later seeming like like lunatic for not trusting his peers?
Same with Nero.
Because old men in robes who's wealth was handed to them on a silver platter didn't like them.
It’s not rocket science. Being stupid and doing nothing will not be good for the empire, not to mention a good ruler is suppose to unite the people and the senate.
you should really interview mike duncan of the history of rome podcast
Sententious, that's a 2eth word right there.
I always thought if there were a good time to live in Rome it would be during this time, but let's see if that would be true
4:15 is that an historical term? Never heard someone call the mid 4th century "golden autumn"
I’ve never seen why Nerva is considered the first “good” emperor compared to the other four that preceded him. To me, his best accomplishment was setting up Trajan after looking at who would likely win in a civil war and picking the strongman. His reputation must come in large part to the Senate given he was their pick. Does he really deserve the title “good”? Overrated in my option but I’m sure others will disagree. One of the best parts of history is hearing other peoples interpretations! This is just mine.
Title reminds of when you did “the short answer” haha
If we're going to deal in facts then an important point is that in the U.S. the wealthiest 1% pay 45% of the income taxes. In fact, the top 50% of taxpayers paid 97.7% of the taxes while only the bottom half paid only 2.3%. The prescription has never been taxation for the purpose of redistribution alone. Policies that encourage innovation, create economic mobility, incentivize giving, create stable family situations, and lower barriers to marketplace entry create economic equality.
Can someone tell me what the music in the first 6 seconds is? Is it an entire piece or just a 6 second sample?
Wait why isn’t Augustus a part of the five greats?
It is more a reference to a period in Roman history where it was thought they had five consecutive good emperors, rather than a top five list.
@@ahorsewithnoname773 Aha I see
Hi the painting around 7:39 is from where?
The painting at 9:21. Can anyone tell me who's work that is?
Personally, I believe enperor Aurelian (not Aurelius) should be one of the five, if not one of the six good emperors. He restored the empire during his reign, only to be assasinated