DÜNYA MEDENİYETLERİNE GİRİŞ

Eastern Rome came into being in 395 CE and stood till 1453, when Turks conquered Istanbul. Eastern Roman Empire stood for 1008 years.

Rome defeated Carthage and added Spain and Northern Africa to its lands. The defeat of the old enemy Carthage brought Spain and northern Africa under Roman control.

In 380 CE, Christianity became the sole authorized official religion of Rome and its empire. Roughly a decade after that, in 391 CE, Emperor eodosius forbade the practice of all religions except Christianity.

The importance of the Senate for Roman history cannot be emphasized enough; look around Roman monuments that still survive and one will see stamped on them SPQR – Senatus Populusque Romanus (the Roman Senate and People).

Who were the people of Rome, in addition to the leadership class of patricians? In the early years, roughly 80 % of the citizens were not patricians but rather plebeians, the lower classes.

The Punic Wars together amounted to a long-lasting con ict between Rome and Carthage, a powerful rival city- state and society to the south, founded originally by the Phoenicians, that arose in what is now Tunisia, on the southern coast of the Mediterranean.

The battle was joined and Hannibal was confronted by a young man later considered to be one of the greatest military geniuses of all time: Publius Cornelius Scipio. e Romans pressed their might under Scipio’s leadership, and they defeated Hannibal at the battle of Zama, not far from his home city of Carthage, in 202 BCE. ere was a brief truce, and negotiations commenced, but they failed.

Emperor Marcus Aurelius was a Stoic who believed in private virtue and continuous public service. He wrote that men must always do their duty. Our role is to live each day as if it were our last, “without agitation, without torpor, without pretense.”

Senate, with its many jealous and competing factions, feared his public popularity, so it called him back to face artificial charges relating to his time as consul. He returned in 49 BCE, but accompanied by his army. As Caesar went back into Italy, he crossed the Rubicon River, as depicted below, declaring “let the die be cast!” and marching to Rome.

The next year, 47 BCE, Julius Caesar had further victories in the east. In response to one of them, he famously proclaimed: veni, vidi, vici – I came, I saw, I conquered.

Their main legend of origin was recorded in the great work The Aeneid, written by Virgil (70 - 19 BCE).

Rome taught mankind throughout the Western world how to establish the rule of law, advance engineering and science, and create a powerful military force, thus generating practical details, which enabled the rise of Western civilization.

Some also ascribe a part of Roman origin to the more ancient and distant influence of Indo European forbears. This, they claim, is seen in the Roman language, Latin, which has clear ties to the languages the Indo-Europeans spoke.

Humanity in civilization has invented a formal knowledge system, with individuals able to speak and exchange ideas, constituting an enclosed group, a single cultural organism, a community. According to the French philosopher Émile Durkheim, men started off with “mechanical solidarity.” This meant that each could substitute in work for the other. Gradually, he theorized, humanity moved to a new form of organization, “organic solidarity,” with individuals specializing in what they do: fishermen, farmers, administrators, medicine men, and soldiers.

Among the prominent gods of the later Republic years were six male gods: Jupiter, the all important sky god, resembled the Zeus of Greece. Other male gods included Neptune (Poseidon to the Greeks), Mars (Ares to the Greeks), Apollo (he had the same name in both cultures), Vulcan (Hephaistos to the Greeks), and Mercury (Hermes to the Greeks).

There were also six female gods, starting with Juno, who, based on the Etruscan belief, was a moon goddess and originally stood as a representation of women but evolved to become more like the Greek Hera, wife of Zeus. Joining her were Minerva (Athena to the Greeks), Venus (Aphrodite to the Greeks), Diana (Artemis), Vesta (Hestia to the Greeks), and Ceres (Demeter to the Greeks).

The next year, 47 BCE, Caesar had further victories in the east. In response to one of them, he famously proclaimed: veni, vidi, vici – I came, I saw, I conquered. A year later, he arrived back in Rome with even more conquests and military triumphs.

Livy was the last Roman to write a full history from the origins of the Roman Republic through 9 BCE in Latin.

Originally a market town dominated by the Etruscans, migrants who most likely were originally from Anatolia, the city state in 509 BCE overthrew the last of the ruling Etruscan kings and created the Roman Republic as a replacement

The Roman Innovations in Architecture and Sculpture include one that is found throughout the world – the round arch.