Andrew's Western Civ Blogs

Today we are taking notes on the slides 43-52 in Chi Cago's Rome slideshow. Right after the death of Caesar, a second triumvirate took over with an 18 year old Octavian, Mark Antony, and Lepidus. Then Octavius turns them into enemies by forcing Lepidus to retire. This causes Mark Antony to run off to join forces with Egypt, but they are soon defeated at the Battle of Actium. Now as the sole leader of Rome, Octavian is given rank of Augustus and Imperator, and he is now considered an emperor. This makes Rome an empire now, and Octavius spends about 40 years as the emperor. He even made a time of Roman peace called Pax Romana, which lasted for an astonishing 207 years. He spread Rome into Africa, and started the construction of some basic but impressive services all around Rome. After his death however, a few other emperors took over. The first of which was Tiberius, who was reluctant, but also a great general. The second was Caligula, who only ruled for about 4 years, and was consid...

On June 2nd, and at 8:00 to 8:50, our section will be taking the test on Ancient Rome. When Julius Caesar gained power, he was very successful, and had the whole army on his side due to soldiers loyalty to leaders, not to Rome. He also made everyone in Rome happy, and created the first Triumvirate with himself, Pompey, and Crassus. Due to his military power, he completely took over Gaul and even crossed the Rubicon, called the point of no return. After that victory, Pompey is jealous because Caesar appoints himself as the new governor of Gaul. Then in 44 BC, he is given the role as a dictator, which eventually gave him power for life. He actually made some decent reforms like giving jobs to the poor and giving citizenship to provinces. He was assassinated however, as seen the Shakespeare play, by senators who saw Caesar as a threat to Rome's republic.

For my essay on Rome, I am going to do option A, which is to  compare and contrast the government of ancient Rome with the government of the modern-day United States.

Today we are taking notes on the new section about Rome, The Roman Empire. First, the main idea of this section is that the Roman Empire changed the entire way Roman culture, government, and society functioned. This matters now because the Empire has become a model of organization and control. Some of the important terms and people are Civil War, which is a fight between people of their own country. Julius Caesar, who was the famous military leader who became a consul of Rome. A triumvirate, which is a group of three leaders. Augustus, the name of an emperor which means "exalted one." And finally, Pax Romana, which was the time of "Roman peace," including peace and prosperity.

Today we are writing all about the Punic Wars between Rome and Carthage. First though, we need to see what the Romans used as their main fighting force. The Roman Legions were big groups made up of 5,000 men, and they each had things like shields, swords, spears, and armor. This war was actually made up of three different wars, and took place from 264-146 BCE. The first one was mainly fought at sea, and they fought for control over the island of Sicily. In the second one, the general Hannibal took charge of his forces and invaded Rome. They got pretty far, but they never made it all the way to Rome. The last battle is when Rome decided to get rid of Carthage once and for all. When they attacked, they overwhelmed them so much the whole city was burned and over 50,000 were put into slavery. After that, there was a lot of unemployment and slavery all around Rome, but most of them couldn't find a good place to get money.

  Today we are talking about how the leader Tarquin took control, and forced Rome to change its views on tyranny. Tarquin took control when a women named Tullia killed her own husband and sister so she could marry Tarquin. Then Tullia told Tarquin to kill her father, and when he kicks him from the throne, she runs his father over with her chariot. Later Tarquin tried to cover up a scandal involving his son, Sextus, and a matron. The people of Rome got so upset that they decided to kick him out, and promised to not go back to tyranny. Today, we also have to compare some of the aspects of Roman and US Government. The plebs, or what we might consider regular citizens, didn't have any rights, and made up about 98% of the population. Also, like our form of government there are three branches that were put in place. Instead of one president, there were two consuls who only had a one year term. In the legislative branch, there are two different sets of people; a senate, which had a fixed ...

Today, we took notes on the first eight slides of the Rome slideshow. A few different groups settled on Rome, and one of them was Etruscans. They came from the north-central part of the peninsula, and were metalworkers, artists, and architects. Next came the Greeks, who had colonies around the Mediterranean Sea. The Romans also borrowed some ideas from the Greeks, such as their religion and their alphabet. The ones who actually came first however were the Latins, who created Rome on the banks of Tiber. On that shore, Rome was built on 7 hills, including Palatine. Lastly, Lucius Tarquinias Superbus was the last king of Rome, and was a true tyrannt with his power.

   Today we are writing all about what we think of the hit song called Rome by rapper Chi Cago. You can definitely tell a lot of time was put into this song, and it actually doesn't sound that bad. It's a lot better than if I made one, so I'm not gonna complain about it. It also has a good rhythm to it as well, and the lyrics were pretty creative for what you had to sing about. I never really found garageband that easy to use, so it's neat how you got it to sound as good as it is. Overall, not bad at all, and pretty creative too.

    In Rome, the plebeians didn't have the respect that they deserved in government, and were being undermined by patricians. They kept taking laws that were created, and changing them so they were better for their personal gain. As a protest, many of the plebeians went on strike across Rome, resulting in the creation of the Tribune of the Plebs. These ten officials began to write down each and every law, so they can't be changed later. Laws were carved into 12 tablets, and were shown to everyone in the city. This led to the thought of all free citizens being given protection of the law.

A roman aqueduct was a piece of architecture in ancient Rome that not only looks pretty impressive, but it also served a very practical purpose. These series of tunnels, bridges, and ridges were used to transport clean water for everyday use in Rome. They were powered by gravity to carry water from bodies of water to inside cites, and even had enough momentum to travel uphill sometimes. There's even one that's still operational today, called the Aqua Virgo, which was around back in the days of the Roman Empire.