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In the 3rd century BCE Rome is a young, aggressive republic run by a powerful group of ambitious families intent on growing an empire. This aristocracy has conquered the rest of Italy, but real power lays in waging war against Carthage; the richest state in the western Mediterranean. Decades of battle against Carthaginian general Hannibal shape the fledgling Roman Empire and by 146 BCE, Rome is the undisputed master of southern Europe.
Under Emperor Trajan and then Marcus Aurelius, the Roman Empire grows to the largest, and most powerful it has ever been. But in the 160s CE, disaster strikes: Germanic invasions, the plague and a new leader; Emperor Commodus, plunges Rome into chaos.
