THE RISE OF ROME The Story of Mankind | ||
24. THE RISE OF ROME
HOW ROME HAPPENED
THE Roman Empire was an accident. No one planned it. It "happened.'' No famous general or statesman or cut-throat ever got up and said "Friends, Romans, Citizens, we must found an Empire. Follow me and together we shall conquer all the land from the Gates of Hercules to Mount Taurus.''
Rome produced famous generals and equally
distinguished
statesmen and cut-throats, and Roman armies fought all over
the world. But the Roman empire-making was done without
HOW ROME HAPPENED
[Description: Map of Mediterranean with written explanation as to how Rome
happened.]
In the year 203 B.C. Scipio had crossed the African Sea and had carried the war into Africa. Carthage had called Hannibal back. Badly supported by his mercenaries, Hannibal had been defeated near Zama. The Romans had asked for his surrender and Hannibal had fled to get aid from the kings of Macedonia and Syria, as I told you in my last chapter.
The rulers of these two countries (remnants of the Empire of Alexander the Great) just then were contemplating an expedition against Egypt. They hoped to divide the rich Nile valley between themselves. The king of Egypt had heard of this and he had asked Rome to come to his support. The stage was set for a number of highly interesting plots and counter-plots. But the Romans, with their lack of imagination, rang the curtain down before the play had been fairly started. Their legions completely defeated the heavy Greek phalanx which was still used by the Macedonians as their battle formation. That happened in the year 197 B.C. at the battle in the plains of Cynoscephalæ, or "Dogs' Heads,'' in central Thessaly.
The Romans then marched southward to Attica and informed the Greeks that they had come to "deliver the Hellenes
CIVILIZATION GOES WESTWARD
[Description: The successive centers of influence from 4000 B.C. to 400 A.D., moving from Egypt to Rome.]Meanwhile right across the Hellespont lay the Kingdom of Syria, and Antiochus III, who ruled that vast land, had shown great eagerness when his distinguished guest, General Hannibal,
Lucius Scipio, a brother of Scipio the African fighter who had defeated Hannibal and his Carthaginians at Zama, was sent to Asia Minor. He destroyed the armies of the Syrian king near Magnesia (in the year 190 B.C.) Shortly afterwards, Antiochus was lynched by his own people. Asia Minor became a Roman protectorate and the small City-Republic of Rome was mistress of most of the lands which bordered upon the Mediterranean.
THE RISE OF ROME The Story of Mankind | ||