(2) BEST: TRAJAN –

NERVA-ANTONINE DYNASTY / FIVE GOOD EMPERORS

(98 -117 AD: 19 YEARS 6 MONTHS 10/14 DAYS)

 

The Optimus Prime of Roman emperors. No, really, as in the Senate gave him the title of Optimus or Optimus Princeps, “the best” or “the best emperor”, one of the two benchmarks or gold standards invoked by the Senate for every new emperor thereafter, wishing them to be better than Trajan…but none were (with the possible exception of Aurelian). A little like Jedi wishing may the Force be with you.

Everybody loved Trajan. The army, with whom he was popular as he had distinguished himself in military campaigns against the Germanic tribes. The Praetorian Guard, whose revolt had forced his predecessor Nerva to adopt him as heir and successor. The people. The Senate, who deified him after his death, and as I said, invoked him thereafter for new emperors.

“As an emperor, Trajan’s reputation has endured – he is one of the few rulers whose reputation has survived 19 centuries.”

“Even Christian historians saw him as a virtuous pagan, among other things for not persecuting them too hard during his reign (Catholic tradition holds that Pope Gregory I briefly raised Trajan from the dead in order to convert him). He is immortalized in Heaven in The Divine Comedy”.

He was a successful soldier-emperor, who took the Roman Empire to its greatest territorial extent by the time of his death – a greater area is argued on occasion for Septimus Severus, although that is not clear and just extended worthlessly further into the Saharan desert at most.

Famously, he extended the empire by the conquest of Dacia in his wars against it, and by his annexation of Mesopotamia, Armenia and Assyria as Roman provinces in his war against the Parthian Empire. Less famously, he seems to have quickly and quietly annexed the Arabian client kingdom of Nabataea, possibly because they were just signed up from his pure awesomeness because little else is recorded of it.

And his general Quietus suppressed a widespread revolt by the Jews in the eastern provinces that henceforth bore an adaptation of the name Quietus – the Kitos War, yet another of those recurring revolts by the Jews against the empire before Hadrian wiped Judaea and Jerusalem from the map.

It wasn’t just all conquest or war – he was also a philanthropic ruler, albeit at some cost in debasing the currency. He oversaw prolific building projects and social welfare policies.

May Trojan’s force be with you, indeed.

RATING: 5 STARS*****

S-TIER (GOD TIER)

EMPIRE-MAKER

MAXIMUS:

Germanicus, Dacicus, Parthicus – and of course, Optimus or best

DEIFIED:

By the gods and divine Trajan, yes!

SPECTRUM RANKING COMPARISON: Exactly the same, in second place – just as it was for Daily Roman Updates, and the Roman Senate for that matter.