Roman discussion for ancient civilization.

In the late 2nd century or early 3rd century, I for get which one, Rome was being transformed from a small agrarian city-state to the center of a successful empire. However, its political structure had not quite evolved to deal with these major changes, therefore leading to many political, economic, social and military problems. These problems lead partly to the fall of the republic and its replacement by a military regime. Because of the expansion of the Roman Empire, Rome was fighting more enemies than it had ever had to face, fighting further away from Rome and for longer periods. In this situation the traditional system of army recruitment was not enough to deal with the new demands that were being put on it.

One of the major problems in the Roman Empire was that military and civilian commands were not separate; they were invested in the same men.

The territorial development of the Roman Empire (n...

Facade du panthéon à Rome

The Roman empire in the time of Hadrian (ruled 117...

This created problems with the growth of Empire, since political leaders at Rome were also in control of large armies which could be fighting for months, sometimes years, before returning to Rome. After a long and successful campaign the army and especially its leader would be received into Rome as heroes and a general could use this popularity combined with the loyalty of his men to dominate the government in Rome. This was a problem because it changes the character of the Roman system of government, which for so long had provided a relatively stable government as an Oligarchy.