Titus Flavius Josephus, a contemporary historian, sometime high-ranking officer in the Roman army, and commander of the rebels in the Jewish revolt describes the Roman people as if they were "born readily armed." At the time of the two historians, Roman society had already evolved an effective military and had used it to defend itself against the Etruscans, the Italics, the Greeks, the Gauls, the maritime empire of Carthage, and the Macedonian kingdoms. In each war, it acquired more territory until, when the civil war ended the Roman Republic, nothing was left for the first emperor, Augustus, to do except declare it an empire and defend it.