Miss Salcedo 7 th Grade History

Marcus Aurelius died in A.D. 180 and his son,

Commodus took over.

Commodus was cruel leader and wasted money. By A.D. 192, his bodyguard killed him.

 After Commodus, there was a time of chaos.

The emperors that took over after Commodus were

known as Severans.
They were concerned with protecting the empires

boarders and paying the army well. But they ignored the empire.
Can that cause a major problem?

 Because they ignored the empire, crime and poverty

increased.
Crime

and

Poverty

 The last Severan ruler died in A.D. 235. After that,

Rome was very unstable.

For 50 years, army leaders fought for power. Within the

50 years, there were 22 rulers.

Because of poor leadership, Romans no longer

honored old ideals. Officials took bribes, talented people did not want to serve in government, pay taxes, or attend school and more people were enslaved.
It was cheaper to have slaves and get work done.

 By A.D. 200, Rome was in economic trouble.

Aside from the government weakening, roads and

bridges were destroyed, Roman invaders seized and destroyed crops, and roads became unsafe.
With crops being destroyed, people were not able to eat, and

with roads being unsafe, trade suffered and the army was not able to organize and get invaders out.

 Inflation also occurred.

Inflation is when money loses its value.

A bad economy meant that people were not paying

taxes. In order for the government to function, they put less gold in the coins in order to make more coins. Once people knew of the less gold in the coins, they knew it was not worth as much as before so prices went up in order to make up for the loss of value of the coins

 Because of the low value of the coins

Roman

citizens resorted to bartering. Barter or bartering is the exchange of a good or service without using money.

 During the economic troubles, the military also

suffered. Germanic tribes invaded Roman towns and raided farms and Persia, from the east came into the Roman territory. The Roman government could no longer pay Romans to enlist in the army and started to use Germanic warriors, the only thing was that they were not loyal to Rome.

 Diocletian came to power in A.D. 284.

In order to help the empire, he introduced reforms or

political changes to help the empire.

 Diocletian tried to help the economy.

He set prices of goods and of wages.
Diocletian also wanted to produce goods so he made

sure workers stayed at the same job until they dies.

Unfortunately, people did not agree and they ignored him.

 By A.D. 305, Diocletian retired and a general by the

name of Constantine took over in A.D. 312 Constantine came into the empire and tried to help the economy.
1st, sons had to follow their fathers trade. 2nd, sons of soldiers had to join the army.

 Constantine was about expanding.

He moved the capital of the Empire from Rome in the

west to the Greek city of Byzantium.

 There, he built a forum, amphitheater called

Hippodrome and many palaces. The city became known as Constantinople, but today it is called Istanbul and in present day Turkey.