Trajan spouse Pompeia Plotina
Early life
Marcus Ulpius Trajanus was born on 18 September 53 AD in the Roman province of Hispania Baetica (in what is now Andalusia in modern Spain), in the municipium of Italica (now in the municipal area of Santiponce, in the outskirts of Seville), a Roman colony established in 206 BC by Scipio Africanus. At the time of Trajan's birth, it was a small town, without baths, theatre and amphitheatre, and with a very narrow territory under its direct administration. His year of birth is not reliably attested and may have been 56 AD.Greek author Cassius Dio claimed that Trajan was the first emperor of non-Italic origins, referring to him as "an Iberian, and neither an Italian nor even an Italiote", but this assertion is rejected by scholars. Trajan was, according to the academic consensus, Hispaniensis by birthplace and Italic by lineage. In fact, as asserted by Appian and inferred from the name of the city, Trajan's hometown of Italica in Hispania Baetica was an Italic settlement: in particular, according to Sextus Aurelius Victor's description of Trajan as "Ulpius Traianus ex urbe Tudertina", his family, the Ulpi Traianii, derived from the town of Tuder (Todi) in the Umbria region of Italia. This is confirmed by archeological attestations, with epigraphic evidence of the Ulpii and the Traii in Umbria at large and Tuder specifically, and by linguistic studies on the family names Ulpius and Traius, both Osco-Umbrian in origin. Intermarriage  between the Ulpii and the Traii resulted in the Ulpii Traiani; it's unknown if they were co-founders of Italica or later Italic migrants that arrived in the town at an unknown time.It is possible that Trajan's ancestors married non-citizen locals and lost their citizenship at some point, but they would have certainly recovered their status when the city became a municipium with Latin citizenship in the mid-1st century BC. One author has argued that the Traii ancestors of Trajan were a family of indigenous Iberian Turdetani rather than Italic settlers, but this view departs from the prevailing view in academia.Trajan's father was Marcus Ulpius Trajanus, a prominent senator and general, and his mother was Marcia, a Roman noblewoman of the gens  Marcia and a  and sister-in-law of the second Flavian Emperor Titus. Marcus Ulpius Trajanus the elder served Vespasian in the First Jewish-Roman War, commanding the Legio X Fretensis.Trajan himself was just one of many well-known Ulpii in a line that continued long after his own death. His elder sister was Ulpia Marciana, and his niece was Salonia Matidia. Very little is known about Trajan's early formative years, but it is thought likely that he spent his first months or years in Italica before moving to Rome and then, perhaps at around eight or nine years of age, he almost certainly would have returned temporarily to Italica with his father during Trajanus’ governorship of Baetica (ca. 64–65). The lack of a strong local power base caused by the size of the town from which they came, made it necessary for the Ulpii (and for the Aelii, the other important senatorial family of Italica with whom they were allied) to weave local alliances, in the Baetica (with the Annii, the Ucubi and perhaps the Dasumii from Corduba), the Tarraconense and the Narbonense, here above all through Pompeia Plotina, Trajan's wife. Many of these alliances were made not in Spain, but in Rome.
The family home in Rome, the Domus Traiana, was on the Aventine Hill, and excavation findings under a car park in the Piazza del Tempio di Diana are thought to be the family's large suburban villa with exquisitely decorated rooms.Death and succession
Early in 117, Trajan grew ill and set sail for Italy. His health declined throughout the spring and summer of 117, possibly acknowledged to the public by the display of a bronze portrait-bust at the public baths of Ancyra, showing an aged and emaciated man, though the identification with Trajan is disputed. He reached Selinus, where he suddenly died, probably on 11 August and apparently from edema. Trajan in person could have lawfully nominated Hadrian as his successor, but Dio claims that Trajan's wife, Pompeia Plotina, assured Hadrian's succession by keeping Trajan's death a secret, long enough for her to produce and sign a document attesting to Hadrian's adoption as son and successor. Dio, who tells this narrative, offers his father – the governor of Cilicia Apronianus – as a source, so his narrative may be based on contemporary rumour. It may also reflect male Roman displeasure that an empress – let alone any woman –  could presume to meddle in Rome's political affairs.Hadrian held an ambiguous position during Trajan's reign. After commanding Legio I Minervia during the Dacian Wars, he had been relieved from front-line duties at the decisive stage of the Second Dacian War, being sent to govern the newly created province of Pannonia Inferior. He had pursued a senatorial career without particular distinction and had not been officially adopted by Trajan although he received from him decorations and other marks of distinction that made him hope for the succession. He received no post after his 108 consulate and no further honours other than being made Archon eponymos for Athens in 111/112. He probably did not take part in the Parthian War. Literary sources relate that Trajan had considered others, such as the jurist Lucius Neratius Priscus, as heir. Hadrian, who was eventually entrusted with the governorship of Syria at the time of Trajan's death, was Trajan's cousin and was married to Trajan's grandniece, which all made him as good as heir designate. Hadrian seems to have been well connected to the powerful and influential coterie of Spanish senators at Trajan's court, through his ties to Plotina and the Prefect Attianus. His refusal to sustain Trajan's senatorial and expansionist policy during his own reign may account for the "crass hostility" shown him by literary sources.Hadrian's first major act as emperor was to abandon Mesopotamia as too costly and distant to defend, and to restore Armenia and Osrhoene to  Parthian hegemony, under Rome's suzerainty. The Parthian campaign had been an enormous setback to Trajan's policy, proof that Rome had overstretched its capacity to sustain an ambitious program of conquest. According to the Historia Augusta, Hadrian claimed to follow the precedent set by Cato the Elder towards the Macedonians, who "were to be set free because they could not be protected" – something Birley sees as an unconvincing precedent.  Other territories conquered by Trajan were retained. According to a well-established historical tradition, Trajan's ashes were placed within the small cella that still survives at the base of Trajan's column. In some modern scholarship, his ashes were more likely interred near his column, in a mausoleum, temple or tomb built for his cult as a divus of the Roman state.
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