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All of Modern History is just 4 Empires Long
Travel back 2055 years with me, to the year 30 B.C.E.
The hottest news of the day is that Cleopatra just died. Crazy bummer.
Her death comes just 14 years after Julius Caesar died. Or, was murdered by Senators for passing a bunch of social reforms and redistributing wealth in Roman society. His death sparked a civil war, which was still raging at the time that Cleopatra died.
Octavian, the son of Julius, eventually won the Roman Civil War and renamed himself Augustus Caesar. He ruled Rome for 41 years, from 27 B.C.E. to 14 C.E.
It’s strange to think about someone ruling through “Year 1” — taking Rome from the Before times into the Common Era. But the Romans didn’t think of years this way. They measured years based on the founding of Rome (which was 753 B.C.E.). So our “Year 1” was their “Year 753”.
But let’s not make things too complicated. We’re talking about modern history, the common era, Years 1 through 2025, showing that it’s an incredibly short period of time that can be accounted for with just 4 Empires. (And the British don’t even make the list!)
Julius was the last leader of the Roman Republic. And Augustus was the first leader of the Roman Empire, which lasted until 476 C.E.
