Pax Romana

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For other uses, see Pax Romana (disambiguation).

The Pax Romana (

Five Good Emperors".[1]

During this period of about two centuries,[2] the Roman Empire achieved its greatest territorial extent in AD 117 (Emperor Trajan), and its population reached a maximum of up to 70 million people, which was around 33% of the world's population.[3] According to Cassius Dio, the dictatorial reign of Commodus, later followed by the Year of the Five Emperors and the Crisis of the Third Century, marked the descent "from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust".[4]

Overview

Extent of the Roman Empire under Augustus. Yellow represents the extent of the Republic in 31 BC, while green represents gradually conquered territories under the reign of Augustus, and pink areas represent client states.

The Pax Romana, spanning from 27 BC to 180 AD, stands as one of the most enduring periods of peace in the annals of civilization. However, Walter Goffart wrote: "The volume of the Cambridge Ancient History for the years AD 70–192 is called 'The Imperial Peace', but peace is not what one finds in its pages".[5] Arthur M. Eckstein writes that the period must be seen in contrast to the much more frequent warfare in the Roman Republic in the 4th and 3rd centuries BC. Eckstein also notes that the incipient Pax Romana appeared during the Republic, and that its temporal span varied with geographical region as well: "Although the standard textbook dates for the Pax Romana, the famous 'Roman Peace' in the Mediterranean, are 31 BC to AD 250, the fact is that the Roman Peace was emerging in large regions of the Mediterranean at a much earlier date: Sicily after 210 [BC], the Italian Peninsula after 200 [BC]; the Po Valley after 190 [BC]; most of the Iberian Peninsula after 133 [BC]; North Africa after 100 [BC]; and for ever longer stretches of time in the Greek East."[6]

The first known record of the term Pax Romana appears in a writing by Seneca the Younger in AD 55.[7] The concept was highly influential, and the subject of theories and attempts to copy it in subsequent ages. Arnaldo Momigliano noted that "Pax Romana is a simple formula for propaganda, but a difficult subject for research."[8]

The Pax Romana began when Octavian (Augustus) defeated

Ludi Saeculares in 17 BC the Concept of Peace was publicized, and in 13 BC was proclaimed when Augustus and Agrippa jointly returned from pacifying the provinces. The order to construct the Ara Pacis was no doubt part of this announcement.[citation needed
]

AR Antoninianus of Gordian III, struck at Antioch 243–244 AD with Pax Augusta on the reverse

Augustus faced a problem making peace an acceptable mode of life for the Romans, who had been at war with one power or another continuously for 200 years.[12][page needed] Romans regarded peace not as an absence of war, but as a rare situation which existed when all opponents had been beaten down and lost the ability to resist.[8] Augustus' challenge was to persuade Romans that the prosperity they could achieve in the absence of warfare was better for the Empire than the potential wealth and honor acquired when fighting a risky war. Augustus succeeded by means of skillful propaganda. Subsequent emperors followed his lead, sometimes producing lavish ceremonies to close the Gates of Janus, issuing coins with Pax on the reverse, and patronizing literature extolling the benefits of the Pax Romana.[12]

After Augustus' death in AD 14, most of his successors as Roman emperors continued his politics. The last five emperors of the Pax Romana are known as the "

Five Good Emperors".[3]

Influence on trade

Roman trade in the Mediterranean increased during the Pax Romana. Romans sailed East to acquire silks, gems, onyx and spices. Romans benefited from large profits and incomes in the Roman empire were raised due to trade in the Mediterranean.[14][15]

As the Pax Romana of the western world by Rome was largely contemporaneous to the Pax Sinica of the eastern world by Han China,[16][17] long-distance travel and trade in Eurasian history was significantly stimulated during these eras.[17]

Pax imperia: analogous peaces

"Pax imperia" redirects here. For the video game, see Pax Imperia.
See also: List of periods of regional peace and Regional hegemony

The prominence of the concept of the Pax Romana led to historians coining variants of the term to describe other systems of relative peace that have been established, attempted, or argued to have existed. Some variants include:[1]

More generically, the concept has been referred to as pax imperia

city states maintained their political identity. Aron notes that during the Pax Romana, the First Jewish–Roman War was a reminder that the overlapping of the imperial institutions over the local ones did not erase them and the overlap was a source of tension and flare-ups. Aron summarizes that, "In other words, imperial peace becomes civil peace insofar as the memory of the previously independent political units are effaced, insofar as individuals within a pacified zone feel themselves less united to the traditional or local community and more to the conquering state."[21]

The concept of Pax Romana was highly influential, and there were attempts to imitate it in the

Dante Aligheri. Dante's works on the topic were analyzed at the beginning of the 20th century by William Mitchell Ramsay in the book The Imperial Peace: An Ideal in European History (1913).[24][25]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c "Pax Romana". Britannica Online Encyclopedia. 23 February 2024.
  2. ISBN 978-1-5072-0454-2
    .
  3. ^ a b c "The Pax Romana". www.ushistory.org. Retrieved 2017-02-10.
  4. ^ Dio Cassius 72.36.4, Loeb edition translated E. Cary
  5. ISBN 978-1-85285-001-2
    .
  6. ISBN 978-1-4443-5720-2
    .
  7. ISBN 978-1-134-00704-2
    .
  8. ^
    S2CID 195009430
    .
  9. ISBN 978-1-5760-7075-8
    .
  10. Gates of Janus
    ).
  11. JSTOR 4238621
    .
  12. ^
    ISBN 978-0-549-83411-3.[permanent dead link
    ]
  13. ^ Sir Ronald Syme had suggested a later date (but Rome was then at war).
  14. OCLC 784708336
    .
  15. OCLC 941874968
    .
  16. ISBN 9788120804562
    .
  17. ^
    ISBN 978-0-415-93735-1
    .
  18. ISBN 978-9956-616-12-1
    .
  19. ISBN 978-0-8232-5501-6
    .
  20. ISBN 978-0-8262-1518-5
    .
  21. ^
    ISBN 978-0-7658-0504-1
    .
  22. ^
    ISBN 978-0-8179-8093-1
    .
  23. ISBN 978-1-134-00704-2
    .
  24. ISBN 978-1-58477-178-4
    .
  25. ^ The imperial peace: an ideal in European history. Oxford, The Clarendon Press. 1913 – via Internet Archive.

Further reading

Library resources about
Pax Romana

External links

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