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Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius was Emperor from 161-180. A Stoic philosopher by temperament, he spent most of his time fighting Barbarian invasions in the West and Parthian incursions in the east. A great plague occurred during his rule.
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Avidius Cassius
Roman general under Marcus Aurelius, he was sent to the East to counter the Parthian threat from 162-165. He defeated the Parthians, and was made by Aurelius the head of all military east of Egypt. He eventually led a revolt against Rome but was defeated.
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Vespasian
Roman Emperor 69-70 CE. Great general, strong leader. With him began a progression of successful emperors and the resulting peaceful Roman world that lasted up to the 140s CE.
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Commodius
Successor as Emperor to Marcus Aurelius, 180-192. A failure as leader, interested only in enjoyment. Eventually murdered by Palace guards.
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Laetus
Head, or Prefect, of the Praetorian Guard, he was responsible for the murder of Commodius in 392. He then set up Pertinax as Emperor, whom he also killed when the latter began reforms threatening the Praetorians' prerogatives (193).
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Helvius Pertinax
Close adviser to Marcus Aurelius, he was tapped as Emperor by the Praetorian Guard upon Commodius' murder. In his three months as Emperor before he also was murdered, Pertinax tried to reform state finances, administration, and terms of military service.
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Septimius Severus
First of the Severi emperors, he came to power after the 193-194 civil war. Hailing himself as Pertinax's avenger, he took Rome, ousted the Praetorian Guard, undertook successful campaigns against the Parthians, and further eroded the power of the Senate.
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Caracalla
Septimius Severus' son, he ruled 211-17, disregarding senatorial prerogatives and equalizing citizenship status of all free men in Roman lands. Continued Parthian campaigns. Curried favor with troops, beginning the process imbuing armies with king-making powers. He was murdered.
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Severi
Dynasty of Roman Emperors descending from Septimius Severus, beginning in 193 and lasting to 235. Increasingly ineffective with the passing of years, they relied on the army for support, making it the decisive force in emperor- creation.
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Gallienus
Military emperor facing terrible territorial challenges. During his reign, Alamanni invaded on the Rhine frontier and pushed as far as Italy, Franks moved into Gaul, and the new Sassanids pushed westwards through Armenia into Roman lands. At the same time, Gallienus had to deal with several breakaway provinces in the West under rival claimants to the Roman throne.
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Claudius II Gothicus
Barracks-room emperor, he faced major Gothic incursions into the Balkans and even Asia Minor in 269-70. He defeated them decisively, however, removing any Gothic threat to Rome for the next one-hundred years.
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Probus
A late military-camp emperor, Probus (r. 275-282) took on and defeated Alamanni and Franks in Gaul, restoring the Rhine and Upper Danube frontier. Also defeated Vandals, and came to a treaty with the Sassanids. Was assassinated when his army, whom he had been driving hard, heard of another claimant.
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Diocletian
Last of the military-camp emperors, this Balkan general ruled from 285-306. Reformed the empire administratively, splitting it into East and West, militarily, fiscally, and in terms of court procedure. Under his hand, a far more absolutist state emerged. He undertook the last Roman persecution of Christians before Constantine took power and embraced Christianity.
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Maximian
Diocletian's colleague, or co-emperor in the West. They both retired in 306.
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Maxentius
One of Maximian's junior colleagues, or Caesars, he became an imperial claimant after their retirement. Constantine defeated him at the Battle of Milvian Bridge.
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Constantine the Great
Ruled 312-37. Continued Diocletian's reforms, founded Constantinople, and began the Christianizing of the Empire. Tried to solve doctrinal disputes in the Empire. Truly the first medieval ruler.
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Licinius
Constantine's western co-emperor until Constantine defeated him in battle and temporarily reunited the Empire.
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Arius
A priest in Alexandria in the 320s, he believed that Christ was less divine than God, being his son and corporeal. Not accepted as orthodox creed, his ideas became the Arian Heresy, a form of Christianity to which the Goths were converted.
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Ulfillias
The son of Cappadocian slaves captured by Goths, he became an Arian priest, and converted Goths to Arian Christianity in the 350s, when Arianism was embraced as the official creed of the East. Makes Goths heretical to westerners.
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Julian the Apostate
Roman Emperor, 361-65. Opposed to Christianity, he tried to cleanse Empire of it in favor of a pantheistic, pagan creed. Ideas did not outlast him.
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Valentin
In the 370s, Alamanni raided Gaul, but were stopped by the western Emperor Valentin. In 375, Valentin died while pushing the Sarmatians back over the Danube. He was succeeded by Gratian in the West and Valens in the East
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Gratian
Emperor in the West at time of the Battle of Adrianopole, where his Eastern colleague Valens was killed while fighting Visigoths. He tried to bring reinforcements, but Valens did not await his arrival.
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Valens
Emperor in the East from 364-378. Allowed Visigoths to cross the Danube and settle in Roman territory. Roman authorities did not supply them well with food and let them starve; revolting, they met Valens in battle near Adrianopole in 378. Not waiting for reinforcements led by Gratian, the Emperor of the West, Valens attacked, and was routed when Ostrogothic cavalry intervened. Valens died at the scene.
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Fritigern
Elected Visigothic king in 370s because he agreed not to stay and fight the Huns.
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Theodosius
Eastern Emperor who ruled from Valens' death in 378 to 395. He patriated the Visigoths as foederati within Roman lands, attempting to guarantee them food supplies. He also made Christianity the state religion.
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Alaric
Visigothic King from 395. Led Visigoths on multiple forays into Gaul, then into Italy, where, failing in negotiations with the Emperor and Senate, he sacked Rome slightly. Then, he took his people south to try to obtain passage to North Africa across the Mediterranean. After ships were destroyed, he died in 412.
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Rhadagaesius
Vandal king, he led his tribe and others in plundering Gaul, 395-406.
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Stilicho
Roman-Barbarian Master of Soldiers in West, 406-12. Fought holding actions against Vandals, Burgundians, and Visigoths. Would not consent to Visigothic incorporation into Roman forces as foederati. Was strangled by Honorius after Visigothic departure form Italy.
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Honorius
Roman Emperor in West, 395-423. Would not negotiate with Visigoths, instead choosing to barricade himself in Ravenna. Held the throne during first sack of Rome in 410.
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Athaulf
Visigothic king, 412-16, succeeding Alaric. Took Visigoths out of Gaul after failed attempt to cross to North Africa. Fought for Honorius against other claimants, but was unable to secure food for his people. Died while negotiating for food and normalized status within the Empire.
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Theodosius II
Eastern Emperor, 408-450. Sent army west after death of Honorius in 423, was able to install the child Valentinian III as Western Emperor in Rome.
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Valentinian III
Child-emperor established in West by Theodosius II in 425. Operated under the influence of his mother as well as his Master of Soldiers, Aetius.
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Aetius
Roman-Barbarian Master of Soldiers, 430s-451. Had lived as a Hunnic hostage, knew them well, and was able to recruit them in armies to fight Germanics. Had to do reverse when Huns invaded 450s. After their defeat, he was murdered by the West Roman Emperor, Valentinian.
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Theodoric the Visigoth
Visigothic King from 440 to 451. His forces were instrumental in Aetius' defeat of Attila the Hun. Theodoric died in the battle.
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Gaiseric
Vandal ruler able to transport his tribe to North Africa in 429. His forces took Carthage in 435, began pirate raiding of Mediterranean cities, and were able to sack Rome in 455 by sailing up the Tiber.
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Augustine
Bishop of Hyppo in North Africa, died witnessing Vandal siege of city. Emphasized a more Christian, otherworldly approach to life. Wrote the famous philosophical text, City of God. His main idea was that Christianity did not ensure Rome's fall, but rather, that there was something better out there.
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Rouia (Rugilla)
King of recently unified Huns in 440s. He raided the Balkans extensively and was able to extort increasing tribute from the Byzantine Empire.
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Attila
Hun leader, 450-454. After extorting increasing tribute from Constantinople, he went West, ravaging Roman lands, ambiguously invited by Honoria. He was defeated by a joint Roman-Germanic army at Battle of Catalaunian Plains, 451.
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Marcian
Eastern Roman Emperor in 450, he refused to pay the higher tribute that Attila was demanding.
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Honoria
Valentinian III's daughter, Honoria rejected her father's candidate for her husband, and in 450 wrote to Attila asking for his protection. He took this as a marriage proposal and came west, asking for half of the Empire as a dowry.
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Pope Leo I
The Christian Pope in 451, when Attila's forces penetrated into Italy. According to reports, he and a party of Senators convinced the Huns to spare Rome a sacking.
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Ricimer
Barbarian general acting for Rome, he defeated Vandals in a sea battle in 456. Set up Marjorian as a puppet Emperor, but could not carry offensive to North Africa. Tiring of Marjorian and wanting some arrangement with the Vandals, he disposed of the Roman and installed a distant relative of the Vandal king as Emperor. Both Ricimer and his Emperor were dead by 472.
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Marjorian
Western emperor set up in 460 by Ricimer. He could not carry the anti- Vandal offensive further, as the Roman fleet was destroyed in storm. Ricimer soon replaced him with a different puppet.
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Orestes
Barbarian Master of Soldiers in the West, he made his son Romulus Augustulus Emperor in 475. He was killed shortly thereafter.
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Romulus Augustulus
Made emperor by his Barbarian father Orestes in 475, he lasted less than a year, being deposed by Odovacar, another Barbarian general. Romulus became a bishop.
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Odovacar
Barbarian warlord who in 476 deposed Romulus Augustulus, the final western Emperor. Sending notification to Zeno that there was no need to appoint a further western Emperor, Odovacar claimed that he would rule in the west in Zeno's name. Zeno seemed to acquiesce, then sent Theodoric the Ostrogoth west in 488, both to eliminate Odovacar, and to get the Gothic menace out of Byzantine lands.
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Zeno
Eastern Roman Emperor from 474-91. Wanting both to remove the Ostrogoth threat from the East and to unseat Odovacar, who had deposed Romulus Augustulus, Zeno sent Theodoric the Ostrogoth into Western Rome with the mission of defeating Odovacar. Theodoric succeeded, and Zeno thus had some responsibility in the founding of the Ostrogothic Kingdom of Italy.
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Theodoric the Ostrogoth
In 488, he was sent west by Eastern Emperor Zeno to subdue Odovacar. He succeeded by 493, and set up his own Ostrogothic Kingdom. Respectful of Roman custom, Gothic Arianism prevented him from bridging the cultural chasm.
