The Roman World

Catalog description

In this course we will explore the growth of Rome from a village in the Italian peninsula to a global empire stretching from Spain to Syria and Britain to the sands of the Sahara. We will focus on the development of political, social, and cultural institutions in the construction of the Roman Republic and the enormous military conquests of that period. We then examine the transformation of the Republic into an empire, governed by an emperor. Finally, we analyze the rise of Christianity in the Roman world and the Roman empire’s decline in the 5th century C.E. Attention is paid to the everyday life of ancient Romans not just power politics.