Download Chapter 15

Chapter 15
The Roman Empire
Section 1: The Rule of Augustus (p. 233-234)
Lesson Essential Question 1: How did Augustus
rule the Roman Empire?
A. What did Octavian do in 27 B. C.?
1. Octavian told the Senate that he had returned
the republic and he offered to resign as the one
and only ruler of Rome.
2. The Senate turned down the offer and gave
him several titles.
3. In the end, Octavian took the title of Augustus,
or “revered one.”
B. What did Octavian become?
1. In practice, Octavian
became the first
Roman emperor.
2. Define emperor: An
emperor is an absolute
ruler of an empire.
C. What offices did Augustus hold?
Augustus held the offices of consul, tribune, high
priest, and senator all at the same time.
D. Why did Augustus refuse to be
crowned emperor?
Augustus knew that most Romans would not
accept one-person ruling unless it took the
form of a republic.
E. How did Augustus try to make the
Roman Empire like a republic?
1. Augustus kept the assemblies and
government officials of the republic.
2. He made sure that senators felt honored.
3. Augustus also talked about tradition and
the need to bring back “old Roman
virtues”.
F. What did Augustus do to strengthen his own
power and what effect did each way have?
1. He had soldiers swear allegiance to him
personally.
2. Effect - This gave Augustus control over the
armies.
3. Augustus built up his imperial household to take
charge of the daily business of government.
4. He chose people based on talent rather than their
birth.
5. Effect - This gave slaves and freedmen, former
slaves, a chance to be part of the government.
G. What did Augustus do with the
boundaries of the Roman Empire?
Augustus wanted the boundaries of the empire to
be defendable, so he rounded out the empire to
natural boundaries.
G. What did Augustus do with the
boundaries of the Roman Empire?
• North – The Rhine River and the Danube
River
• West – The Atlantic Ocean
• South – The Sahara Desert
H. What other improvements did Augustus make to the
Roman Empire? What were the results of each
improvement?
Change
Result
1. He gave provincial governors
longer terms of office.
1. By having longer terms, governors
could gain experience in their jobs.
2. He paid provincial governors high
salaries.
2. Large salaries would make sure
that governors did not feel the need to
overtax the people or keep public
money for themselves.
3. Augustus ordered a census, or
population count, to be taken from
time to time.
3. Augustus did this to make sure
people were not paying too much or
too little taxes.
I. How did Augustus make Rome
more beautiful?
1. Augustus wrote strict laws to govern the way
people behaved in public.
2. He protected the city by setting up a fire
brigade and a police force.
3. He supported learning by building Rome’s
first library.
J. How could one summarize the rule
of Augustus?
1. He ruled for 41 years.
2. Augustus brought peace to Rome.
3. He gave Romans a sense of pride and
patriotism.
4. He made Roman citizenship available to
people in the provinces.
5. Augustus reorganized the government so that
it ran well for more than 200 years.
Section 2: Pax Romana (p. 234-236)
Lesson Essential Question 2: What happened
during Pax Romana?
K. What was Pax Romana?
It was the 200 years of Roman peace brought by
Augustus. While there were some revolts
and problems, for the most part, Rome and
its people prospered.
L. What happened to trade during Pax
Romana?
1. Trade increased.
2. The same coins were used throughout the
empire.
3. There were no tariffs placed on goods brought
into the country.
4. Define tariff: Tariffs are taxes placed on
goods coming in to a country.
5. Goods and money moved freely along the
trade routes.
L. What happened to trade during Pax
Romana?
6. The Mediterranean was cleared of pirates,
making it safe for trade and travel.
7. Shipping became big business.
8. Luxury items passed over Roman roads.
9. Increased trade meant more business for
Romans.
10. Shopkeepers grew rich.
M. What changes came to the area of
Roman law during Pax Romana?
1. During Pax Romana, Roman law went
through major changes.
2. The laws in the Twelve Tables were changed.
3. Roman judges wrote new laws that would be
as fair to non-Romans as to Romans.
4. They created laws that were reasonable.
5. Everyone was considered equal before the
law.
6. A person was innocent until proven guilty.
N. What is meant by saying Roman law
was “standardized”? How did it help?
1. All legal procedures were the same in all
parts of the empire.
2. This helped Rome govern a large area
successfully.
Section 3: Daily Life (p. 236-239)
Lesson Essential Question 3 – What was daily
life like for the Romans?
O. During the early years of the empire, how
many people lived in Rome?
During the early years, about 1 million people
lived in Rome.
P. What were the problems facing the
city of Rome?
1. One problem was too
little housing.
2. The air was polluted.
3. There was crime in
the streets.
4. The cost of living was
high.
5. Many Romans could
not find jobs.
6. They had to pay taxes
on almost everything.
Q. Describe the homes of the rich.
1.
2.
3.
Rich people lived in a
domus.
A domus was a house
with marble walls,
colored stone floors, and
windows made of glass.
The rooms in the house
had furnaces that heated
them and pipes brought
water even to the upper
floors.
R. Describe the homes of the poor.
1. Most Romans lived in
apartment houses
called islands.
2. Islands were six or
seven stories high and
took up an entire city
block.
3. The higher the floor,
the cheaper the rent.
S. Describe the Roman family.
1. The Father
a. The father was head of the household.
b. His word was law.
c. The father arranged the children’s marriages to
improve social position or to increase wealth.
S. Describe the Roman family.
2. Cousins were expected to help one another
politically.
S. Describe the Roman family.
3. Boys
a.
Most Roman boys and girls went to school together until
age 12.
b. Sons of the poor went to work at age 12.
c. At age 12, sons of the rich began their formal education.
d. Sons of the rich studied reading, grammar, writing,
music, etc.
e. When they were 15, boys entered a school of rhetoric, or
speech and writing, to prepare for a political career.
f. Some boys went to Athens or Alexandria to study
philosophy or medicine.
S. Describe the Roman family.
4. Girls/Women
a. Girls received a different kind of education.
b. When they were 12, their formal education stopped.
c. Instead of school, daughters of the wealthy were given
private lessons at home.
d. As a result, many Roman women were just as educated,
if not more educated, than Roman men.
e. Some women worked in or owned small shops.
f. Wealthy women had slaves to do housework.
g. Having enslaved people allowed rich women free to
study the arts, literature, and fashions, or to ride chariots
in the country.
T. What activity did Roman’s
participate in at home?
The Romans gambled with dice at home.
U. What were bathhouses like?
1. The Romans would meet friends at public bathhouses,
where they could take warm, cold, or steam baths.
2. The bathhouses of Rome provided more than baths.
3. Some bathhouses had gymnasiums, sports stadiums,
and libraries.
4. There, the Romans could watch or play games.
5. They also could listen to lectures, see musicals,
exercise, or just sit and talk.
U. What were bathhouses like?
V. How did public games differ
between the republic and the empire?
1. During the republic, the games had been
staged by the politicians looking for votes.
2. During the empire, the games were staged by
the government.
W. What types of games were held?
The games included circuses, chariot races, and
gladiatorial games.
X. What was the Circus Maximus?
The Circus Maximus was an oval arena where
chariot races were held. It could seat more
than 200,000 people.
Y. Describe gladiators.
1. Define gladiators: Gladiators were people who
fought animals or one another in arenas.
2. Most gladiators were enslaved people, prisoners of
war, criminals, or poor people.
3. Gladiators were trained by managers who hired them
out.
4. A few gladiators were upper-class Romans who
wanted excitement and public attention.
5. The night before a fight, gladiators would appear at a
feast.
Y. Describe gladiators.
6. There, they could be looked over by fans and
gamblers who wanted to bet on the outcome of a
match.
7. When gladiators would enter the arena, they would
walk past the emperors’ box and say, “Hail Emperor,
those who are about to die salute you.”
8. Many gladiators did die.
9. Those whose fighting pleased the crowd became idols
of the people.
10. All kinds of animals were used in the public games.
Section 4: Fall of the Empire
(p. 240-241, 243-244)
Lesson Essential Question 4: Why did the
Roman Empire decline?
Z. What happened to the Roman
Empire?
1.
2.
3.
4.
Pax Romana ended after about 200 years.
From then on, the Roman Empire grew worse.
By 476 A. D., there was no empire left.
Instead, much of western Europe was a patchwork of
Germanic kingdoms.
5. The eastern part of the empire, however, lasted
another 1,000 years as part of the Byzantine Empire.
AA. What were the reasons the
Roman Empire fell?
1. The first was political.
a. The emperors had no written rule over who
inherited the throne.
b. Sometimes, the throne was inherited by a son.
c. Sometimes, an emperor adopted an heir to the
throne.
d. Between 96 A. D. and 180 A. D., all emperors
were adopted.
e. The system worked well until then.
AA. What were the reasons the
Roman Empire fell?
2. The second reason for Rome’s downfall was economic.
a. To stay in office, an emperor had to keep the soldiers who
supported him happy.
b. He did this by giving the soldiers high wages.
c. This meant more and more money was needed to pay for the
army.
d. Romans had to pay higher taxes.
e. In addition to taxes, the Romans began to suffer from inflation.
f. Define inflation: Inflation is a period of ever-increasing prices.
g. Since there were no new conquests, there was no gold coming in
to Rome, but there was gold going out.
h. People began to barter for goods.
i. Define barter: Bartering is when goods are exchanged without
using money.
AA. What were the reasons the
Roman Empire fell?
3. The third major reason Rome fell centered on
foreign enemies.
a. Roman borders were open for attack.
b. Germanic hunters and herders began to raid
Greece and Gaul.
c. Trade and farming in Greece and Gaul declined.
d. Cities again began to surround themselves with
walls to protect themselves.
Diocletian and Constantine I
(p. 241, 243)
Lesson Essential Question 5 – What efforts
were made to save the Roman Empire?
BB. What two emperors tried to save
the Roman Empire?
1. Diocletian
2. Constantine I
Diocletian
Constantine I
CC. Who was Diocletian?
Diocletian was the son of a freedman.
DD. What changes did Diocletian
make as emperor?
1. He fortified the frontiers to stop invasion.
2. Diocletian reorganized different governments to make
them work better.
3. To keep prices from rising, he set maximum prices for
wages and goods.
4. To make sure goods were produced, he ordered
workers to stay in the same jobs until they died.
5. Diocletian made city officials personally responsible
for the taxes their communities had to pay.
EE. What was one of the most
important changes Diocletian made?
Diocletian made the policy rule by divine right
for the emperor.
FF. Define rule by divine right:
A policy in which an emperors’ powers and the
right to rule did not come from the people
but from the gods.
GG. What did Diocletian do to the
empire?
1. Diocletian divided the empire into two parts
because he realized the empire was too big
for one person to rule.
2. Diocletian ruled the richer eastern portion,
while someone else ruled the western
portion.
GG. What did Diocletian do to the
empire?
HH. What did Constantine do to prevent people from
leaving their jobs when things got bad?
1. The sons of workers had to follow their
fathers’ trade.
2. The sons of farmers had to stay and
work the land their fathers worked.
3. The sons of ex-soldiers had to serve in
the army.
II. What did wealthy Romans do to avoid
Constantine’s control and pressure?
1. Wealthy landowners moved to their villas, or
country estates.
2. Most villas were like small, independent
cities.
3. Each villa produced enough food and goods to
meet the needs of everyone who lived in the
villa.
JJ. What move did Constantine make
in 330 A. D.? Why?
Constantine moved the capital from a dying
Rome east to a new city called
Constantinople in present-day Turkey.
Constantinople was wealthier than Rome.
End of the Empire (p. 243-244)
KK. Why were the Germans able to
defeat the Romans?
One reason the Germans were able to defeat the
Romans was because an invention the
Germans borrowed from the Huns, the iron
stirrup.
LL. What happened in 406 A. D.?
1. The Rhine River froze.
2. Groups of Germans crossed the frozen river and
entered Gaul.
3. The Romans were not able to force them back across
the border.
MM. What happened in 410 A. D.?
1. The Germanic chief Alaric and his soldiers
invaded Rome.
2. They burned records and looted the treasury.
3. The Roman Senate told the people, “You can
no longer rely on Rome for finance or
direction. You are on your own.”
MM. What happened in 410 A. D.?