Trajan
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Marcus Ulpius Nerva Traianus (September 18, 53 – August 9, 117), Roman Emperor (98-117), commonly called Trajan, was the second of the Five Good Emperors of the Roman Empire. Under his rule, the Empire reached its greatest territorial extent.
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Biography
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Early life and rise to power
Trajan was the son of Marcus Ulpius Traianus, a prominent senator and general from the famous gens Ulpia. The family had settled in the province of Hispania Baetica in what is now Andalusia, a province that was as utterly Romanized as southern Hispania. Trajan himself was just one of many well-known Ulpii in a line that continued long after his own death.
He was born on September 18 53, in the city of Italica. As a young man, he rose through the ranks of the Roman army, serving in some of the most contentious parts of the Empire's frontier. In 76 – 77, Trajan's father was Governor of Syria (Legatus pro praetore Syriae), where Trajan himself remained as Tribunus legionis. When Trajan was nominated as Consul and brought Apollodorus of Damascus with him to Rome around 91. Along the Rhine River, he took part in the Emperor Domitian's wars against the Germanic tribes, and was known as one of the foremost military commanders of the Empire when Domitian was killed in 96.
His renown served him well under Domitian's successor, Nerva, who was unpopular with the army and needed to do something to gain their support. He accomplished this by naming Trajan as his adoptive son and successor in the summer of 97. It was the future Emperor Hadrian who brought word to Trajan of his adoption, and thus had Trajan's favour for the rest of his life. When Nerva died on January 27 98, the highly respected Trajan succeeded without incident, making him the first non-Italian Roman to become Emperor. Image:SPQR COIN Roman.jpg
The new emperor was greeted by the people of Rome with great enthusiasm, which he justified by governing well and without the bloodiness that had marked Domitian's reign. He freed many people who had been unjustly imprisoned by Domitian and returned a great deal of private property that Domitian had confiscated; a process begun by Nerva before his death. His popularity was such that the Roman Senate eventually bestowed upon Trajan the honorific of optimus, meaning "the best".
Dio Cassius reports that Trajan drank heavily and was a pederast, but in his relations with boys he harmed no one. "I know, of course, that he was devoted to boys and to wine, but if he had ever committed or endured any base or wicked deed as the result of this, he would have incurred censure; as it was, however, he drank all the wine he wanted, yet remained sober, and in his relation with boys he harmed no one." (Dio Cassius, Epitome of Book LXVIII; 6.4) This sensibility was one that influenced even his governing, leading him to favor the king of Edessa out of appreciation for his handsome son: "On this occasion, however, [Abgarus,] induced partly by the persuasions of his son Arbandes, who was handsome and in the pride of youth and therefore in favour with Trajan, and partly by his fear of the latter's presence, he met him on the road, made his apologies and obtained pardon, for he had a powerful intercessor in the boy." (ibid. 21.2-3)
Dacian Wars
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But it was as a military commander that Trajan is best known to history. In 101, he launched a punitive expedition into the kingdom of Dacia, on the northern bank of the Danube River, defeating the Dacian army near Tapae. During the following winter Decebalus launched a counter-attack across the Danube further downstream, but this was repulsed. Trajan's army advanced further into Dacian territory and forced King Decebalus to submit to him a year later, after Trajan took the Dacian capital of Sarmizegetusa. Domitian had campaigned against Dacia from 85 to 89 AD without securing a decisive outcome, and Decebalus had brazenly flouted the the terms of the peace which had been agreed on conclusion of this campaign. Trajan then returned to Rome in triumph and was granted the title Dacicus Maximus.
Decebalus though, after being left to his own devices, in 105 AD undertook an invasion against Roman territory by attempting to stir up some of the tribes north of the river against her. Trajan took to the field again and after building with the design of Apollodorus of Damascus his massive bridge over the Danube, he conquered Dacia completely in 106. Sarmizegetusa was destroyed, Decebalus committed suicide, and his severed head was exhibited in Rome on the steps leading up to the Capitol. Trajan built a new city, "Colonia Ulpia Traiana Augusta Dacica Sarmizegetusa", on another site than the previous Dacian Capital, although bearing the same name, Sarmizegetusa. He resettled Dacia with Romans and annexed it as a province of the Roman Empire. Trajan's Dacian campaigns benefited the Empire's finances through the conquest of Dacia's gold mines.
Expansion in the East
At about the same time, one of Rome's client kings, the last king of Nabatea, Rabbel II Soter, died. This might have prompted Trajan's annexation of Nabatea, although the reasons for annexation are not known, nor is the exact manner of annexation. Some epigraphic evidence suggests a military operation, with forces from Syria and Aegyptus. What is clear, however, is that by 107, Roman legions were stationed in the area around Petra and Bostra, as is shown by a papyri found in Egypt. The Empire gained what became the province of Arabia Petraea (modern southern Jordan and north west Saudi Arabia).
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Period of peace
For the next seven years, Trajan ruled as a civilian emperor, to the same acclaim as before. It was during this time that he corresponded with Pliny the Younger on the subject of how to deal with the Christians of Pontus, basically telling Pliny to leave them alone unless they were openly practicing the religion. He built several new buildings, monuments and roads in Italia and his native Hispania. His magnificent complex in Rome raised to commemorate his victories in Dacia (and largely financed from that campaign's loot) - consisting of a forum, Trajan's Column, and a shopping centre - still stands in Rome today. He was also a prolific builder of triumphal arches, many of which survive, and rebuilder of roads (Via Traiana and Via Traiana Nova).
Maximum extent of the Empire
In 113, he embarked on his last campaign, provoked by Parthia's decision to put an unacceptable king on the throne of Armenia, a kingdom over which the two great empires had shared hegemony since the time of Nero some fifty years earlier. Trajan marched first on Armenia, deposed the king and annexed it to the Roman Empire. Then he turned south into Parthia itself, taking the cities of Babylon, Seleucia and finally the capital of Ctesiphon in 116. He continued southward to the Persian Gulf, whence he declared Mesopotamia a new province of the Empire and lamented that he was too old to follow in the steps of Alexander the Great.
But he did not stop there. Later in 116, he captured the great city of Susa. He deposed the Parthian king Osroes I and put his own puppet ruler Parthamaspates on the throne. Never again would the Roman Empire advance so far to the east.
It was at this point that the fortunes of war — and his own health — betrayed Trajan. The fortress city of Hatra, on the Tigris in his rear, continued to hold out against repeated Roman assaults. He was personally present at the siege and it is possible that he suffered a heat stroke while in the blazing heat. The Jews inside the Roman Empire rose up in rebellion once more, as did the people of Mesopotamia. Trajan was forced to withdraw his army in order to put down the revolts. Trajan saw it as simply a temporary setback, but he was destined never to command an army in the field again.
Late in 116, Trajan grew ill and set out to sail back to Italy. His health declined throughout the spring and summer of 117, and by the time he had reached Selinus in Cilicia which was afterwards called Trajanopolis, he suddenly died from edema on August 9. Some say that he had adopted Hadrian as his successor, but others that it was his wife Pompeia Plotina who hired someone to impersonate him after he had died. Hadrian, upon becoming ruler, returned Mesopotamia to Parthian rule. However, all the other territories conquered by Trajan were retained.
Trajan's legacy
Image:Traiani iustitia.jpg For the remainder of the history of the Roman Empire and well into the era of the Byzantine Empire, every new emperor after Trajan was honored by the Senate with the prayer felicior Augusto, melior Traiano, meaning "may he be luckier than Augustus and better than Trajan".
Unlike many lauded rulers in history, Trajan's reputation has survived undiminished for nearly nineteen centuries. The Christianization of Rome resulted in further embellishment of his legend: it was commonly said in medieval times that Pope Gregory I, through divine intercession, resurrected Trajan from the dead and baptized him into the Christian faith. In the Divine Comedy, Dante, following this legend, sees the spirit of Trajan in the Heaven of Jupiter with other historical and mythological persons noted for their justice.
See also
References
- J.F.C. Fuller. A Military History of the Western World. Three Volumes. New York: Da Capo Press, Inc., 1987 and 1988.
- v. 1. From the earliest times to the Battle of Lepanto; ISBN 0306803046: 255, 266, 269, 270, 273 (Trajan, Roman Emperor).
- Ancell, R. Manning. "Soldiers." Military Heritage. December 2001. Volume 3, No. 3: 12, 14, 16, 20 (Trajan, Emperor of Rome).
- Bennett, J., Trajan: Optimus Princeps, 2nd Edition, Routledge 2001
- Bowersock, G.W., Roman Arabia, Harvard University Press, 1983
- Isaac, B., The Limits of Empire, The Roman Army in the East, Revised Edition, Oxford University Press, 1990
- Kennedy, D., The Roman Army in Jordan, Revised Edition, Council for British Research in the Levant, 2004
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