Notes on Rome

Aeneas- the last surviving soldier of Troy brings his people to Africa and then to Rome. In Africa, the go to Carthage and Aeneas falls in love with the queen there Dido. The Gods tell Aeneas that this is not his destiny and he goes to Rome. Dido is so upset at losing him that she kills herself. When they get to Italy they find people there, the Latins. They have a great war and the Trojans win. The Trojans set up a town called Alba Longa. Alba Longa was the capitol city of the Trojans new country. They were not yet called the Romans yet. The start of Rome is told as there were two twin boys, Romulus and Remus. It is said they were abandoned at birth and a she wolf kept them alive. They had a siblings rivalry to the point where they went to war with each other. Romulus wins and Remus is killed. He founds a city called Rome. It was originally just a village that gradually progressed. There was a civilization just north of Rome. This was the Etruscan civilization. The Etruscan Kings ruled Rome for a period of time. There was an Etruscan king named Tarquin the proud whose son Tarquin the Sixth rapes the wife of a woman of Rome named Lucrtia. There was then a revolt of the Roman people led by Lucius Junius Brutus. He is the man the established the Roman Republic in 509 B.C.E. They divisions of the Roman Republic were the patricians(rich, landowning people that make laws) and the plebeians(commoners). They hated each other to the point where they almost went to civil war. The plebeians and patricians try to find a compromise to prevent war. The compromise is they give the plebeians one seat in the senate. They call this seat the tribune of the plebs. The one plebeian has a lot of power, he is the one senator that has the right to veto a law or bill. That power was put into affect in Rome and is still used today. This opens the era of Roman expansion. Rome would meet you on the battlefield, beat you, then set up a governor, a battalion, and a tax collector then they would leave you alone. They would collect men to be in the army and if they served then they would give them land after 30 years of service. There was a country called Epirus. Their king was Pyrrus. They conquer much of Rome and defeats Rome in almost every battle but he cant win the war. Pyrrus losses so many men that he cant win the war and decides to turn around and go back to Eprius because of his great losses. This then leads to go from a nobody to a somebody. This then leads to the Punic Wars. These wars were between Rome and Carthage. In 264 B.C.E. Roman allies complain about the people of Carthage trying to take power from them. Rome assists and then get into a war with Carthage. They now have much control over the Mediterranean. This then leads into the next Punic War. This was the war with Hannibal.

Herodotus is considered the father of history. He was the first man to go out to people and write history based on observation. He wrote about the Persian Wars. Thucydides was a historian who wrote about the Peloponesian Wars. Unlike Herodotus, he was more of a scholar and really tried to get the story right. Another historian was Livy. He was a Roman historian and he wrote all about the history of Rome. Book 21 of his writings told the story of Hannibal. Hannibal was a general from Carthage. His father fought the Romans and when he was young he made Hannibal swear to hate the Romans. Hannibal took his army through the Pyrenees mountains and takes his army and war elephants across the Alps. He fights his way to Rome and Rome sends its best generals and soldiers to fight him at Cannae. Hannibal had a brilliant battle plan to surround the Romans. 60,000 Romans died. It is to this day one of the greatest victories ever, and the single worst loss ever to Rome. Hannibal gets to about 50 miles away from Rome but he doesn't have the supplies to attack Rome itself. If Rome was seiged at that point History could have been totally different. Hannibal fought the Romans at Zama. This time Hannibal used the war elephants but the Romans let the elephants come and then blew horns ans scared the elephants and turned around back to the Carthaginian army. Scipio defeats Hannibal at the last battle of the second Punic War at Zama. Hannibal fled from Zama but was never able to muster an army to fight Rome again. This brings up the 3rd Punic War. The ROmans are led by Scipio Africanis's son, Scipio Aemilianus. The Romans seige Carthage and completely destroy the city. They destroyed the city, killed everyone in it, and even spread salt all over the land so nothing will ever grow there again.