The Roman Empire

It’s often referred to as the epitome of empire. It’s still considered a reference as far as innovation, infrastructure, and ingenuity are concerned. The remnants of their controversial conquests can be contemplated in every corner of the globe, from Corsica to Constantinople and beyond. Hail, Cesar! Charge! We’ll seize the day and roam around what remains of The Roman Empire on this week’s episode of FYI!

Transcript

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it's often referred to as the epitome of Empire it's still considered a reference as far as Innovation infrastructure and Ingenuity are concerned the remnants of their controversial conquests can be contemplated in every corner of the globe from Corsica to Constantinople and Beyond hail Caesar we'll seize the seize the day and roam around what remains of the Roman Empire on this week's episode of f why I welcome to for your info English you got it foreign hello hello hello and welcome to another exciting edition of your favorite topic beige show where you can learn about a fascinating topic as you learn English and I'm sure you've figured it out already from the intro but today we're going to be taking a look at the Holy Roman Empire and we could do a whole series on the Roman Empire in fact if you want to take a look at this a little bit further on your own you can go really in depth with a documentary series called Rome the power and Glory I remember seeing it on Netflix I believe but you'll have to look it up and see where you can find it and that goes into amazing detail today we're just gonna scratch the surface we're going to talk about some Emperors we're going to talk about gladiators and we're going to talk about why this Empire was so influential because it wasn't the biggest ever many Chinese empires have dwarfed the Roman Empire as far as the amount of people living under that Empire just to give you an idea of the numbers they say or it's estimated that around 70 million people were living under the rule of the Roman Empire now I want you to think about the population in China see what I'm getting at but there is no doubt that this is perhaps the most influential Empire to have ever ruled the Earth let's take a look at the intro because as always I like to put a lot of good vocab in there for you I started off by saying it's often referred to as the epitome of Empire now if you don't know the word epitome I could tell you another word that's a synonym personification the epitome the personification of Empire then I say said it's still considered a reference as far as in cuanto a good structure to know Innovation infrastructure and Ingenuity and Ingenuity is in Spanish and then I said the remnants it's another way of saying the remains of their controversial conquests and yes some would say that any Conquest is controversial by Nature I mean you're conquering a land or a town or who knows even a population but as I said the Roman ones can be contemplated in every corner of the globe from Corsica to Constantinople and Beyond and then I said hail Caesar now to hail is to try and get a cab but also hail I think you say is Abe Ave and we don't pronounce it if you noticed it's c like the salad Caesar salad and then you heard that battle Call of Duty and after that I said charge and then I don't know if you got it but there was a little play on words I said we'll Seize the Day Caesar seized the day okay it wasn't that good but if you got it good ear and then there was another pun as well I said we are gonna roam around what remains of the Roman Empire and to roam around us the ambular let's start off with a little history as always Rome was founded in 753 BC by its first king Romulus and I'm sure you're all familiar with the story of Romulus and Remus you know fratricide it's commonplace you'll see in today's episode and commonplace means and it eventually grew into a very rich and Powerful City during the next few hundred years and eventually as we're here to talk about today an Empire so we're going to look at a lot of dates here you might want to write down some dates so we can see the timeline so 753 BC Rome was founded with its first king Romulus and by A.D now a d is 117 117 A.D the Roman Empire included the whole of Italy all the lands around the Mediterranean and much of Europe including England Wales and parts of Scotland and it all started with this little city on the banks of the Tiber River the city of the Seven Hills as it's called but we've got to go back even before for that because we couldn't talk about the history of Rome or the Romans without talking about the Etruscans the Etruscans occupied the land known as Italy so much of what we got from the Romans was adopted from the Etruscans so we could never underestimate the value of the Etruscans on the Romans when we think about the value of the Romans and their contributions on modern day society and the Roman Empire almost didn't happen yeah well there was a sacking unsakao we say the same of Rome in 390 BC the good news is Rome survived as a city and bounced back even stronger but imagine that if they had gotten their way the city would have been burned to the ground and we wouldn't even be talking about the Roman Empire and it wasn't easy at first I imagine ruling the world is not an easy task and they had to deal with the carthaginian Empire now this is in modern day Tunisia and they were considered a major Naval power in the Mediterranean so if the Romans wanted to make any progress whatsoever they had to deal with the people from Carthage the carthaginian Empire and what did they do well they found one of their warships and they reverse engineered it what they supposedly do with UFOs and they figured out their technology and they used it against them so it started out with the Romans being resourceful Relentless and even sneaky and this led to a period known as the Punic Wars there were three Punic Wars in the first ones the Romans prevailed and they were able to get Sicily Sardinia and then Corsica in the Second Punic War you'll probably remember the name Hannibal the carthaginian general Hannibal who in 218 BC went through southern Spain into France over the Alps and into Italy with his elephants and by the way there's an FYI episode on elephants if you haven't listened to it it's fascinating and I think most of you know how this story ended Hannibal was very successful he reached the gates of Rome but eventually he was forced out and this would be the beginning of the end for Carthage and their empire and then in the third Punic War this was in 149 BC Rome kicked but this was a two-year Siege where the Romans destroyed everything in their path Carthage was wiped off the map and anybody who wasn't killed was taken as a slave this is when the rest of the world knew that the Roman Empire the Romans they meant business and one of the outcomes of these Punic Wars was the Roman Empire owned the Mediterranean Iranian that was their territory baby and that's where they started to grow and consolidate their power and become what everybody knew as this amazing Empire but it wasn't so simple as we know there were a lot of Emperors some of them are admired in retrospect and some of them are laughed at and we're gonna take a look at these Emperors and be careful with these words so the Empire is the land and the emperor is the ruler and I'm gonna ask you guys to take a guess how many Emperors do you think there were in the reign of the Roman Empire did you say 20 did you say 40 what if I told you 70 different Emperors ruled the Roman Empire in the first century 12 Emperors in the second century nine and in the third Century this is how you knew that things were aren't going well 29 so that was one of those indications of instability so here's another trivia question who was the first emperor of Rome did you say Julius Caesar well technically he wasn't the emperor he was a general who in fact was told that he had to relinquish control of his army no no he wasn't told he was ordered but Julius Caesar was stubborn and he said no way Jose it's not gonna happen and we all know the rest that led to a Civil War and eventually he got his way in 44 BC Julius Caesar was made dictator for life so it's kind of a trick question he was a dictator more than an emperor but this signaled the end of the Republic and Julius Caesar was murdered just a year later and of course any time an emperor kicks the bucket La Palma there are power grabs there's backstabbing there's even suicide I'm not even gonna get into the story of Mark Anthony and Cleopatra but the other day I read up on Cleopatra and Mark Anthony and locator okay no not Marc Anthony Mark Anthony sinachi and to answer the first question technically the first emperor of Rome was Augustus Caesar who in 27 BC took power and this was the official birth of the Roman Empire the Holy Roman Empire and they would enter a period called Pax Romana and nowadays if we use the word Pax in English we're talking about people they use it a lot in the restaurant industry but here they meant peace Roman peace oh and by the way in the bonus episode we're going to take a look at a lot of Latin Expressions that are still used in everyday English we're also going to take a look at some of the Innovations I should say many of the innovations that we owe Rome so much for we'll also take a look at some of the most important Roman remains in Spain we'll take a look at Gladiators fun facts and of course we'll see what led to the downfall of the Roman Empire all that and much more in the bonus episode of FYI and just a quick reminder guys every week you can get two episodes on each topic and my patrons they are in the know in terrados they know about it and they've been not only getting bonus episodes but if you're a patron you can join me in weekly classes monthly private classes obviously it depends on what level you join us at but take a look at it because there are tons and tons of benefits of joining my Curious community and I think the most important benefit is I'm your teacher that's right aside from teaching you every Friday here on the podcast and also teaching you in the bonus episode if you're in my Interstellar level you guys have a private class with me take a look at it it's patreon.com Alberto Alonso and you can let me know if you have any questions and speaking of patrons I'd like to send a shout out to all my patrons especially my super duper students Javier Paco Roberto David Jose Maria Mila Alex and Patricio and don't forget about my Interstellar students these are the ones that have a monthly private class with me where we can measure their progress a huge shout out to Carmen Lena Issa Paco and Edgar remember if you guys want to find out how you can get exclusive content classes with me and so much more go to patreon.com Alberto Alonso where were we oh right we were talking about Pax Romana where the Romans enjoyed a period of stability now when I say the Romans I mean the ones living near Rome the rest of the Empire wasn't as stable because well they were always expanding and this was a time period from 27 BC to 180 A.D it was a 200 year period which saw unprecedented peace economic prosperity and as I said probably a little bit more are in the heart of it in Rome than in the rest of the Empire but in general it was a peaceful time and just remember they had land all over the world from England to the north of Morocco to Iraq let's take a look at some of the most unpopular Emperors in the Roman Empire Tiberius he was just incompetent they said his political inability poor judgment and jealousy LED Rome to a very dark age where there were purges there was murder and Terror you know those aren't exactly the words you want people to use when they talk about your Reign Caligula there's another one that when you think of that name Madness comes to mind well this was a man who made his horse a console that's right you heard correctly his horse foreign he imposed A Reign of Terror just like Tiberius oh and he promoted all kinds of depravity and the cherry on top he believed he was a living God and we couldn't talk about unpopular Emperors without talking about Nero no I'm not talking about the CD burning software but as you can see there are tons of remnants of the Roman Empire and I'm not just talking about ruins here Nero it's a CD burning software Caesar salad and we'll look at a lot more we'll look at a lot more language that comes from the Roman Empire in the second part and Nero's name is synonymous with evil they've accused him of killing his stepbrothermanastro his wife and his mother ah why not while you're at it he also persecuted Christians and he instigated the devastating Great Fire of Rome really nice guy and I guess we should look at the other side of the coin too there were the five good Emperors as well and they were Emperors who ruled from 96 to 180. their names being nerva trajan Hadrian Antonius Pius and the famous Marcus Aurelius Marcus Aurelius probably one of the most hallowed respected of all the Emperors he was a philosopher and he didn't have it easy he had a tough period during his Reign there were Wars plagues even instability throughout the Empire Hadrian was another one who people usually talk positively about he cared for his people supposedly he spent Rome's money well and he strengthened the Empire fortale and we can't talk about Emperors without talking about Constantine Constantine the Great but an interesting fact about him is he wasn't a Christian at first but he was known for enacting numerous reforms that strengthened the Empire he also restructured the government he tried to come combat inflation maybe he could give some notes to our politicians these days he introduced a new gold coin that became the standard for the Byzantine and European currencies for more than a thousand years so another one whose Legacy is still felt he also organized the Roman armies and we're going to talk about that too about how they were able to conquer so much land well obviously they had to have a good army and that Army had to flex their muscles the Roman army was famous for being some of the best fighters in the world and they often fought against and defeated armies that were much bigger than their own and I know what you're thinking what was their secret how did they do it people said that they were strong because they were well organized they ran like a well-oiled machine as we would say they were also very well trained so they proud practiced and they rehearsed all the different scenarios that could happen on the battlefield and they were not lazy by any means here I'll ask you another trivia question and this is either you know it or you don't how many kilometers do you think they marched in a typical day did you say 10 did you say 20 what if I told you double that they marched an average of 40 kilometers a day and obviously without that strong Army Rome would have never grown as big as it grew but as with everything in life it's fleeting fugath nothing lasts forever and like all other Empires before it Rome fell as well in the bonus part we're going to talk about the downfall of Rome it wasn't something that happened overnight and there were many factors that caused the downfall of perhaps one of the greatest or at least most influential Empires the world has ever seen ancient Rome was a hub of Commerce and a hub is I think what you would call in Spanish people would trade all kinds of things there animals food jewelry spices is I mean they had a trading Network that was over 88 000 kilometers of roads and the Romans are famous for their roads among many other things that we'll look at in the bonus part but the same way the Empire wasn't built overnight as the expression goes Rome wasn't built in a day it didn't fall overnight either it was a long process and that's exactly what I tell my students with English don't get impatient I know sometimes we get impatient all of us do but be patient work hard train like the Roman troops and just remember Rome wasn't built in a day we'll look at that and many more expressions in the bonus episode of today's F why laughs