page_title: Augustus
section_title: War and expansion
hierarchical_section_title: Augustus / War and expansion
caption_attribution_description: Muziris in the Tabula Peutingeriana (the temple of Augustus is also visible in muziris)
context_page_description: Augustus was the first Roman emperor, reigning from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He was the first ruler of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. His status as the founder of the Roman Principate has consolidated an enduring legacy as one of the most effective and controversial leaders in human history. The reign of Augustus initiated an era of relative peace known as the Pax Romana. The Roman world was largely free from large-scale conflict for more than two centuries, despite continuous wars of imperial expansion on the Empire's frontiers and the year-long civil war known as the "Year of the Four Emperors" over the imperial succession.
  Augustus was born Gaius Octavius into an old and wealthy equestrian branch of the plebeian gens Octavia. His maternal great-uncle Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC, and Octavius was named in Caesar's will as his adopted son and heir. Afterwards, Octavius took the name Gaius Julius Caesar and was called Octavian. Along with Mark Antony and Marcus Lepidus, he formed the Second Triumvirate to defeat the assassins of Caesar.
context_section_description: Augustus chose Imperator ("victorious commander") to be his first name, since he wanted to make an emphatically clear connection between himself and the notion of victory, and consequently became known as Imperator Caesar Divi Filius Augustus. By the year 13, Augustus boasted 21 occasions where his troops proclaimed "imperator" as his title after a successful battle. Almost the entire fourth chapter in his publicly released memoirs of achievements known as the Res Gestae was devoted to his military victories and honors.
  Augustus also promoted the ideal of a superior Roman civilization with a task of ruling the world (to the extent to which the Romans knew it), a sentiment embodied in words that the contemporary poet Virgil attributes to a legendary ancestor of Augustus: tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento—"Roman, remember by your strength to rule the Earth's peoples!" The impulse for expansionism was apparently prominent among all classes at Rome, and it is accorded divine sanction by Virgil's Jupiter in Book 1 of the Aeneid, where Jupiter promises Rome imperium sine fine, "sovereignty without end".
  By the end of his reign, the armies of Augustus had conquered northern Hispania (modern Spain and Portugal) and the Alpine regions of Raetia and Noricum (modern Switzerland, Bavaria, Austria, Slovenia), Illyricum and Pannonia (modern Albania, Croatia, Hungary, Serbia, etc.), and had extended the borders of the Africa Province to the east and south. Judea was added to the province of Syria when Augustus deposed Herod Archelaus, successor to client king Herod the Great (73–4 BC). Syria (like Egypt after Antony) was governed by a high prefect of the equestrian class rather than by a proconsul or legate of Augustus.
  Again, no military effort was needed in 25 BC when Galatia (modern Turkey) was converted to a Roman province shortly after Amyntas of Galatia was killed by an avenging widow of a slain prince from Homonada. The rebellious tribes of Asturias and  Cantabria in modern-day Spain were finally quelled in 19 BC, and the territory fell under the provinces of Hispania and Lusitania. This region proved to be a major asset in funding Augustus's future military campaigns, as it was rich in mineral deposits that could be fostered in Roman mining projects, especially the very rich gold deposits at Las Medulas.
  Conquering the peoples of the Alps in 16 BC was another important victory for Rome, since it provided a large territorial buffer between the Roman citizens of Italy and Rome's enemies in Germania to the north. Horace dedicated an ode to the victory, while the monumental Trophy of Augustus near Monaco was built to honor the occasion. The capture of the Alpine region also served the next offensive in 12 BC, when Tiberius began the offensive against the Pannonian tribes of Illyricum, and his brother Nero Claudius Drusus moved against the Germanic tribes of the eastern Rhineland. Both campaigns were successful, as Drusus's forces reached the Elbe River by 9 BC—though he died shortly after by falling off his horse. It was recorded that the pious Tiberius walked in front of his brother's body all the way back to Rome.
  To protect Rome's eastern territories from the Parthian Empire, Augustus relied on the client states of the east to act as territorial buffers and areas that could raise their own troops for defense. To ensure security of the Empire's eastern flank, Augustus stationed a Roman army in Syria, while his skilled stepson Tiberius negotiated with the Parthians as Rome's diplomat to the East. Tiberius was responsible for restoring Tigranes V to the throne of the Kingdom of Armenia.
  Yet arguably his greatest diplomatic achievement was negotiating with Phraates IV of Parthia (37–2 BC) in 20 BC for the return of the battle standards lost by Crassus in the Battle of Carrhae, a symbolic victory and great boost of morale for Rome. Werner Eck claims that this was a great disappointment for Romans seeking to avenge Crassus's defeat by military means. However, Maria Brosius explains that Augustus used the return of the standar
caption: Muziris in the Chera Kingdom of Southern India, as shown in the Tabula Peutingeriana, with depiction of a "Temple of Augustus" ("Templum Augusti"), an illustration of Indo-Roman relations in the period
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