Download Chapter 7 Rome Study Guide Wars First Punic War: began when

Chapter 7 Rome Study Guide
Wars
 First Punic War: began when Rome resisted Carthage’s attempt to seize the
Strait of Messina
 After the deaths of the Gracchus brothers, Rome experienced a series of civil
wars.
 Germanic peoples invaded the Roman Empire because they were afraid of
the Huns
 Hannibal: a Carthaginian general that led a force of 50,000 soldiers and 60
elephants across the Alps to invade Italy.
 Alaric: The Visigoth chief that captured and sacked Rome in A.D. 410, for
the first time in 800 years
Government
 After the Roman’s drove the Etruscan monarchs out of power, they
established a republic
 Republic: a government in which the power rests with the citizens who
have the rights to elect their leaders.
 The first emperor of the Roman Empire was Augustus Caesar.
 Roman Law
 Law was the greatest contribution of ancient Rome
 Gave us the following ideas
 A person is innocent until proven guilty
 All citizens have a right to a trial by jury
 All citizens have the right to equal protection under the law
 The Roman legal system contributed to the unity and stability of the
Roman Empire
 The Senate: held the most power in the Roman government
 Tribunes: represented the rights of plebeians
 Consuls: chief executives of the government
 Caesar – elected dictator for life (marks the end of the Republic)
 In 49 B.C. , Caesar began a civil war by leading his troops across the
Rubicon River
 Caesar’s government decreased the power of the Senate
 He was assassinated on Ides of March, March 15, 44 BC in the senate
by a group of conspirators
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Chapter 7 Rome Study Guide
Religion
 The Roman’s tolerated religious differences.
 Judaism
 The Roman’s tolerated the Jew’s religion
 After a second rebellion in AD 132, the Roman emperor Hadrian forbad
Jews to live in Jerusalem
 Jewish Diaspora: refers to the Jews banishment from Jerusalem and
forced to disperse. “Scattering of Jews”
 Christianity
 The Roman’s put Jesus to death because they thought him to be a political
rebel and feared an uprising.
 Christianity was adoped as the official religion of the Roman Empire by
Theodosius
 Paul: was the apostle that is credited with the spread of Christianity
 Constantine: first emperor of Rome to convert to Christianity.
 Christianity gained acceptance when Emperor Constantine legalized it.
Edict of Milan
 Christianity spread through the Roman Empire because
 It embraced all people: men and women, rich and poor
 Rome’s excellent roads encouraged the exchange of ideas
 Jesus promised eternal life
Fall of the Empire
 Diocletian tried to stabilize the large empire by dividing the empire and
appointing a co-emperor
 Rome helped keep the large empire together by building a network of roads
 Contributing factors
 Germanic invasions
 Corruption and instability
 Heavy taxes
 Reasons for the Fall
 Inflation and the huge amount of money spent on defense
 The invasions of Germanic tribes and the Huns
 Disruption of trade
 Western Empire
 Damaged by barbarian invaders from the north
 Rise of Christianity
 Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions
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Chapter 7 Rome Study Guide
 The government could not handle the size of the empire
Miscellaneous
 Roman Engineers used
 Concrete
 The arch
 The dome
 Aqueducts
 Constantine made Constantinople the center of power for the Eastern Roman
Empire
 Early Rome was divided into two main social classes:
 Plebeians
 Patricians
 Landless farmers migrated to Rome due to growing success of provincial and
mainland latifundia
 Charioteers raced at the Circus Maximus
 Romance Languages
 Italian
 French
 Romanian
 Spanish
 Portuguese
 Etruscans:
 gave Romans their alphabet (got from Greeks, got from Phoenicians)
 knowledge of architecture,
 the arch
 Virgil: a poet that wrote the great Roman epic: the Aeneid
 Pax Romana: Period of peace and prosperity in the Roman Empire (200
years)
 The early Roman Republic had major power struggles between the
aristocracy and the common citizens.
 Rome and Carthage: had a conflict of interest over the control of the
Mediterranean Sea – Punic Wars
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