Trajan abandoned the policy of not extending the Roman frontiers established by Augustus.

Pliny implied as much when he wrote that, although an emperor could not be coerced into doing something, if this were the way in which Trajan was raised to power, then it was worth it. He added Dacia, Arabia, Armenia, and Mesopotamia to the empire, waging war against Decebalus and the Parthians.

[28] Sura is also described as telling Hadrian in 108 about his selection as imperial heir.

32 f. and 73 f.[288], In the 18th-century King Charles III of Spain commissioned Anton Raphael Mengs to paint The Triumph of Trajan on the ceiling of the banquet hall of the Royal Palace of Madrid – considered among the best works of this artist. Among medieval Christian theologians, Trajan was considered a virtuous pagan. Wasson, D. L. (2013, May 25).

[195][196] In the absence of conclusive evidence, trade between Rome and India might have been far more balanced, in terms of quantities of precious metals exchanged: one of our sources for the notion of the Roman gold drain – Pliny's the Younger's uncle Pliny the Elder – had earlier described the Gangetic Plains as one of the gold sources for the Roman Empire. [124] Trajan also reformed the infrastructure of the Iron Gates region of the Danube. They constitute a most important source for Roman provincial administration. What is certain is that there was an increased Roman military presence in Judea at the time.

[4], As far as ancient literary sources are concerned, an extant continuous account of Trajan's reign does not exist. [92] A revealing case-history, told by Pliny, tells of Dio of Prusa placing a statue of Trajan in a building complex where Dio's wife and son were buried - therefore incurring a charge of treason for placing the Emperor's statue near a grave. "Trajano fundador. The war began when the Parthians placed one of their own on the throne of Armenia, a Roman buffer state.

[243], Trajan sent two armies towards Northern Mesopotamia: the first, under Lusius Quietus, recovered Nisibis and Edessa from the rebels, probably having King Abgarus deposed and killed in the process,[243] with Quietus probably earning the right to receive the honors of a senator of praetorian rank (adlectus inter praetorios).

[198] As far as territorial conquest involved tax-collecting,[199] especially of the 25% tax levied on all goods entering the Roman Empire, the tetarte, one can say that Trajan's Parthian War had an "economic" motive. [267] However, Hadrian, who was eventually entrusted with the governorship of Syria at the time of Trajan's death, was Trajan's cousin and was married to Trajan's grandniece,[268] which all made him as good as heir designate. [81] "It's well established that [the cities' finances] are in a state of disorder", Pliny once wrote to Trajan, plans for unnecessary works made in collusion with local contractors being identified as one of the main problems. He had pursued a senatorial career without particular distinction and had not been officially adopted by Trajan (although he received from him decorations and other marks of distinction that made him hope for the succession).

Luckily, Trajan’s usefulness was recognized by Domitian (81-96 CE), and he was able to avoid the paranoid emperor’s reign of terror. Trajan clearly enjoyed the favour of Domitian, who in 91 allowed him to hold one of the two consulships, which, even under the empire, remained most prestigious offices. In a fierce campaign which seems to have consisted mostly of static warfare, the Dacians, devoid of maneuvering room, kept to their network of fortresses, which the Romans sought systematically to storm[128] (see also Second Dacian War).

Some Rights Reserved (2009-2020) under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license unless otherwise noted. [217] While Trajan moved from west to east, Lusius Quietus moved with his army from the Caspian Sea towards the west, both armies performing a successful pincer movement,[218] whose apparent result was to establish a Roman presence into the Parthian Empire proper, with Trajan taking the northern Mesopotamian cities of Nisibis and Batnae and organizing a province of Mesopotamia, including the Kingdom of Osrhoene – where King Abgaros VII submitted to Trajan publicly[219] – as a Roman protectorate. Lendon, "Three Emperors and the Roman Imperial Regime". Italics indicates a junior co-emperor, while underlining indicates a usurper.

[66], Competition among Greek cities and their ruling oligarchies was mainly for marks of preeminence, especially for titles bestowed by the Roman emperor.

[86], Trajan ingratiated himself with the Greek intellectual elite by recalling to Rome many (including Dio) who had been exiled by Domitian,[87] and by returning (in a process begun by Nerva) a great deal of private property that Domitian had confiscated.

Trajan, however, dropped the charge.

T. Olajos, "Le monument du triomphe de Trajan en Parthie. Decebalus fled, but, when cornered by Roman cavalry, committed suicide.

[236][231] It is possible that it was this "streamlining" of the administration of the newly conquered lands according to the standard pattern of Roman provincial administration in tax collecting, requisitions and the handling of local potentates' prerogatives, that triggered later resistance against Trajan.

When Domitian had been assassinated by a palace conspiracy on September 18, 96, the conspirators had put forward as emperor, and the Senate had welcomed, the elderly and innocuous Nerva . [202] There could also be Trajan's idea to use an ambitious blueprint of conquests as a way to emphasize quasi-divine status, such as with his cultivated association, in coins and monuments, to Hercules.

He came from a family with a very impressive military reputation.

Pope Professor Emeritus of Latin Language and Literature; former Professor of Roman History, Harvard University. There are cartouches of Domitian and Trajan on the column shafts of the Temple of Knum at Esna, and on the exterior a frieze text mentions Domitian, Trajan, and Hadrian", Eric M. Thienes, "Remembering Trajan in Fourth-Century Rome: Memory and Identity in Spatial, Artistic, and Textual Narratives".

Trajan's birthplace of Italica was founded as a Roman military colony of Italic settlers in 206 BC, though it is unknown when the Ulpii arrived there.

As all four consulars were senators of the highest standing and as such generally regarded as able to take imperial power (capaces imperii), Hadrian seems to have decided on a preemptive strike against these prospective rivals.

For the emperor's father, see. Ancient History Encyclopedia. [90] When the city of Apamea complained of an audit of its accounts by Pliny, alleging its "free" status as a Roman colony, Trajan replied by writing that it was by his own wish that such inspections had been ordered. It seems that the mortgage scheme was simply a way of making local notables participate, albeit in a lesser role, in imperial benevolence. Fronto concluded that "neglect of serious matters can cause greater damage, but neglect of amusements greater discontent". David H. Higgins in his notes to Purgatorio X l. 75 says: "Pope Gregory the Great (d. 604) was held to have swayed the justice of God by prayer ('his great victory'), releasing Trajan's soul from Hell, who, resuscitated, was converted to Christianity. When he returned to Rome in 99, he behaved with respect and affability toward the Senate. How did Roman leader trajan Die? Dio, as a Greek notable and intellectual with friends in high places, and possibly an official friend to the emperor (amicus caesaris), saw Trajan as a defender of the status quo. [98] Other prominent Eastern senators included Gaius Julius Alexander Berenicianus, a descendant of Herod the Great, suffect consul in 116.

[112] Trajan's troops were mauled in the encounter, and he put off further campaigning for the year in order to regroup and reinforce his army.

Dikla Rivlin Katz, Noah Hacham, Geoffrey Herman, Lilach Sagiv, Z. Yavetz, "The Urban Plebs in the Days of the Flavians, Nerva and Trajan".

[207], The campaign was carefully planned in advance: ten legions were concentrated in the Eastern theater; since 111, the correspondence of Pliny the Younger witnesses to the fact that provincial authorities in Bithynia had to organize supplies for passing troops, and local city councils and their individual members had to shoulder part of the increased expenses by supplying troops themselves.

[138], Not all of Dacia was permanently occupied. [26][27] These baths were later expanded by the third century emperor Decius as a means of stressing his link to Trajan. [29] According to a modern historian, Sura's role as kingmaker and éminence grise was deeply resented by some senators, especially the historian Tacitus, who acknowledged Sura's military and oratory virtues but at the same time resented his rapacity and devious ways, similar to those of Vespasian's éminence grise Licinius Mucianus. The population of Rome at the time of Trajan and Nerva had grown to its greatest height, close to one million, and it needed (and people felt they deserved) a new forum, not only a marketplace and shopping center but also a center for politics, commerce, and religion.

Unfortunately for the architect, Hadrian would have him exiled and later executed. 1–35. [255], Quietus was promised a consulate[256] in the following year (118) for his victories, but he was killed before this could occur, during the bloody purge that opened Hadrian's reign, in which Quietus and three other former consuls were sentenced to death after being tried on a vague charge of conspiracy by the (secret) court of the Praetorian Prefect Attianus. [126], These costly projects completed,[127] in 105 Trajan again took to the field. [18] Hadrian was then retained on the Rhine frontier by Trajan as a military tribune, becoming privy to the circle of friends and relations with which Trajan surrounded himself – among them the then governor of Germania Inferior, the Spaniard Lucius Licinius Sura, who became Trajan's chief personal adviser and official friend. [181] That meant that Charax on the Persian Gulf was the sole remaining western terminus of the Indian trade route outside direct Roman control,[182] and such control was important in order to lower import prices and to limit the supposed drain of precious metals created by the deficit in Roman trade with the Far East. By trying to develop an anti-Roman bloc, Decebalus eventually left Trajan without the alternative of treating Dacia as a protectorate, rather than an outright conquest. [188], In his Dacian conquests, Trajan had already resorted to Syrian auxiliary units, whose veterans, along with Syrian traders, had an important role in the subsequent colonization of Dacia. Dio is described by Philostratus as Trajan's close friend, and Trajan as supposedly engaging publicly in conversations with Dio.

The furthest south the Romans occupied (or, better, garrisoned, adopting a policy of having garrisons at key points in the desert)[148] was Hegra, over 300 kilometres (190 mi) south-west of Petra.

By Fighting over politics

Rebellion among the Jewish population broke out in Cyrenaica, spreading to both Egypt and Cyprus; however, when trouble broke out on the northern frontier, Trajan left his army in Syria and retreated to Rome.

Although his ancestors, whether or not original settlers, were undoubtedly Roman, or at least Italian, they may well have intermarried with natives.