Download An Age of Empires: Rome and Han China, 753 B.C.E. – 330 C.E.

An Age of Empires: Rome and Han
China,
753 B.C.E. – 330 C.E.
Rome’s Creation of a Mediterranean Empire,
753 B.C.E. – 330 C.E.
A. A Republic of Farmers
1. Italy was a crossroads for the
Mediterranean, and the city of Rome was a
crossroads for Italy.
2. The Apennine mountain range runs along
the length of Italy.
3. The mild climate affords a long growing
season which are suitable for a wide variety
of crops.
I.
Ancient Rome
4. Rome was founded in 753 B.C.E. by
Romulus, according to popular myth.
5. Archaeological evidence suggests
that the earliest occupation may go back
as early as 1000 B.C.E.
6. What we refer to as Ancient Rome
consists of the Tiber River and seven hills.
The oldest settled hill is called the Palatine
Hill.
Seven Hills of Rome
7. Agriculture was the essential economic
activity in the early Roman state and land was
the basis of wealth.
8. The vast majority of early Romans held a
small plot of land while a few wealthy families
acquired large tracts of land.
9. These wealthy families were members of
the Senate, or “Council of Elders”, that played a
dominant role in politics.
10. Between 753 B.C.E. to 507 B.C.E., there
were seven kings of Rome starting with Romulus
and ending with Tarquinius Superbus.
11. In 507 B.C.E. members of the senatorial
class led by Brutus “the liberator” deposed of
Tarquinius and instituted a res publica, a “public
possession,” or republic.
12. The Roman republic, which lasted from
506 to 31 B.C.E., had many assemblies that
male citizens were allowed to attend.
13. The real center of power resided in
the Roman Senate.
14. The basic unit of Roman life was
the family, which the oldest male was the
unquestionable leader.
15. This was called the paterfamilias,
or the oldest living male.
16. Roman society was very hierarchical with
complex ties of obligation called the
patron/client relationship.
17. The patron was a man of wealth and
influence, while a client was a man who sought a
patron’s help and protection.
18. Roman women were less constrained
than their Greek counterparts.
19. The Romans were polytheistic and
adopted the Greek’s view of spirituality.
B. Expansion in Italy and the Mediterranean
1. When Rome became a republic in 507
B.C.E., it was a relatively insignificant city-state.
2. Within several centuries, Rome was the
center of a huge empire encompassing virtually
all the lands surrounding the Mediterranean
Sea.
3. Rome’s conquest of Italy began due to the
ongoing friction between pastoralists in the
mountains and agriculturalist of the coastal
plains.
4. Rome formed a league of central cities
organized for defense against the hill tribes.
5. By 290 B.C.E., Rome had won three wars
with the tribes of Samnium extending their
“protection” over nearly the entire peninsula.
6. One key element of Roman success was
their willingness to open Roman citizenship to all
their conquered peoples.
Incremental Map
7. Between 264 and 202 B.C.E., Rome fought two
bloody wars against Carthage. This allowed Rome to
emerge as the unchallenged master of the western
Mediterranean.
8. Between 200 and 146 B.C.E., a series of wars
pitted Rome against the Hellenistic kingdoms of the
eastern Mediterranean. Now Rome’s territorial
acquisitions included the entire Mediterranean.
9. The conquests of the Celtic peoples of Gaul by
general Gaius Julius Caesar between 59 and 51 B.C.E.
extended the empire into the European heartland.
C. The Failure of the Republic
1. Two factors eventually bring down the Roman
Republic: (1) Italian peasants were gone for extended
periods of time due to constant warfare, and (2) most of
the wealth that was generated from the conquests ended
up in the hands of the elites.
2. These elites took the wealth and funneled it into
purchasing more Italian land usually by taking it from the
lands of the peasant who were away fighting wars.
3. Small farms were now replaced by latifundia or
“broad estates”.
4. Originally, in order to be part of the Roman legion
(units of 6,000 soldiers) you had to own property.
5. With the elites buying up all the property, this
posed a problem.
6. Some generals solved this problem by allowing
anyone into the army. This generally included poor and
property less men. This poses a problem!
7. A series of ambitious individuals – Sulla, Pompey,
Julius Caesar, Mark Antony, and Octavian – commanded
armies who primary loyalty was to their generals and not
to the state.
8. Julius Caesar’s grandnephew Octavian
eliminated all his rivals by 31 B.C.E. and
refashions the Roman system of government.
9. Octavian was later renamed Augustus by
the Senate and we sometimes refer to him as
the first Roman Emperor.
10. Augustus rules for 45 years and adds the
territories of Egypt, parts of the Middle East, and
Central Europe into his empire.
Augustus
11. Augustus was so popular that four
members of his family succeeded him as
emperor.
12. They are sometimes referred to as
the bad-emperors: Tiberius, Caligula,
Claudius, and Nero.
13. They were followed by the so-called
good-emperors because they were mature
men of proven ability.
D. An Urban Empire
1. The Roman Empire of the first three
centuries C.E. was an “urban” empire.
2. The Roman upper class lived in
elegant townhouses on one of the seven
hills.
3. The Roman lower classes lived in
crowded slums in the lower parts of the
city.
4. Some attractive elements of Roman urban
life included a forum (an open plaza that served
as a civic center), government buildings,
temples, gardens, baths, theaters,
amphitheaters, and centers for public
entertainments.
5. One source of prosperity for some urban
dwellers was manufacture and trade.
6. Commerce was enhanced by the pax
romana or “Roman peace”.
7. One of the most enduring consequences
of the Roman empire was Romanization, the
spread of the Latin language and Roman way of
life.
8. The phenomenon was confined primarily
to the western half of the empire.
9. The evolution of modern Portuguese,
Spanish, French, Italian, and Romanian proves
that not only did the elites take in the language
of Rome but so did the common man.
The Origins of Imperial China, 221 B.C.E. –
220 C.E.
A. Resources and Population
1. Due to the geographical position of China,
the Chinese had a more difficult time
controlling the area within its region.
2. The Chinese did not have the
Mediterranean Sea to help facilitate travel
over large distances.
II.
Han China
3. Agricultural production was the primary
source of wealth and taxes.
4. The next fundamental asset of the
Chinese was its human labor force.
5. Between seasonal intervals, China
required every able-bodied man to donate one
month of labor a year to public works projects.
6. The vast majority of its population live in
the eastern part of the empire with a population
of about 60 million people by about 140 C.E.
B. Hierarchy, Obedience, and Belief
1. Like the Romans, the basic unit of
Chinese society was the family.
2. The Chinese family unit not only
included the living generations but also
their ancestors.
3. The fundamental sources of values
during the Han dynasty was the doctrine of
Confucius.
4. Women in ancient China are hard to
speculate on because not much was written
about them.
5. What we do know is that women had their
marriages arranged by their parents.
6. Chinese women could have a considerable
amount of influence if they had the ability, the
personality, and provided sons to her husband.
7. Many accounts write of the tensions
between wives, mother-in-law, and sister-in-law
competing for the influence of husbands, sons,
and brothers.
C. The First Chinese Empire
1. Towards the end of the Zhou period, China
deteriorated to a region of “Warring States” that
competed for power.
2. By 221 B.C.E. Shi Huangdi – meaning
“first emperor” – took the Qin state to Empire
status by taking over those warring states one
by one.
3. The Qin homeland was located in the Wei
valley.
Qin Empire
4. Shi Huangdi created a totalitarian
state based on the needs of the state.
5. They rid the state of Confucianism
because they regarded it as too nonviolent
in regards to the actions of the ruler.
6. Instead, they adopted the Legalism
approach which justified Huangdi’s
absolute hold on power.
D. The Long Reign of the Han
1. The Qin dynasty was so oppressive that a
series of rebellions broke out all over China.
2. When it was all over, a man named Liu
Bang establishes a new dynasty he names the
Han.
3. The Han rejects the excesses of the Qin
dynasty and replaces the Legalist code with a
revised version of Confucianism emphasizing
the benevolence of the state.
4. The Han empire endured for more than
400 years from 202 B.C.E. to 220 C.E.
5. This time is generally split into two time
periods: (1) Western Han with its capital at
Chang’an, and (2) Eastern Han with its capital in
Luoyang
6. The Han also held in the idea of the
Mandate of Heaven allowing the people to see
the emperor as a divine figure unlike the
Romans.
7. A significant aspect of Chinese society
during this time was the rise of the gentry class.
8. The gentry class in China was the class of
individuals right below the aristocracy and they
served as the chief bureaucrats within the state.
9. It was the intention of the Qin and Han
dynasties to weaken the aristocratic class.
10. The rise of Daoism among the
commoners was also quite characteristic of this
time period.