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Etruscans ruled Rome until 509 BC, when the Romans revolted and threw out the last king, tyrant.
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When invaders threatened One in 494 BC, the plebeians seceded, or withdrew.
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450 BC, the Plebeians forced the Patricians to have all laws written down.
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300s BC Romans also began to elect magistrates called praetors.
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265 BC, the Romans had defeated the Etruscans and the Greek cities in Southern Italy.
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Violence broke out between Rome and Carthage in 264 BC, the beginning of the First Punic War.
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In 218 BC the Carthaginian general Hannibal led a well-trained army and a force of war elephants across they Pyrenees and the Alps to invade Italy.
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In. 202 BC Scipio routed Hannibal's forces on the plain of Zama outside Carthage and took the city, ending the Second Punic War.
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Finally, in 149 BC Rome decided to destroy its old enemy once and for all and declared war for the third time.
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In 133 MC the tribune Tiberius Gracchus noted the treatment of soldier-farmers, who were being reduced to poverty.
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In 107 BC the social unrest reached a new level when a talented military leader named Gaius Marius was elected consul.
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In 91 BC conflict broke out. The conflict was known as the Social War, from socius, the Latin word for ally.
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The Social War revealed the talent of one general in particular, the ambitious Lucius Cornelius Sulla, who became consul in the 88 BC.
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In 60 BC the three men took over the Roman Republic as the First Triumvirate, or rule of three men.
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Recognizing Caesar's power, the Senate declared him dictator for life in 44 BC.
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In 43 BC the Second Triumvirate, composed of Caesar's adopted son and heir, Octavian; a loyal officer named Marc Anthony; and the high priest Lepidus, took power.
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When civil war between the two eventually broke out, Octavian defeated Antony and his ally, Queen Cleopatra, at the naval battle of Actium in 31 BC.
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In 27 BC the Senate gave Octavian a title of honor -- Augustus, "the revered one."
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The period from the beginning of Augustus's reign in 27 BC until the death of the last of the Good Emperors in AD 180 is often called the Pax Romana -- the Roman Peace.
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Augustus died in AD 14. For 54 years, the relatives of Julius Caesar, called the Julio-Claudian Emperors, ruled the empire.
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Nero, the last of the Julio-Claudians, commuted suicide in AD 68. After his death, civil wars in Rome, and four military leaders claimed the throne in turn.
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In AD 96 a new line of emperors established itself on the Roman throne. Called the Good Emperors, these five rulers governed Rome for almost a century.
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By the AD 100s the supreme position of the emperor had been well established.
