In 27 AD, Octavian accepted the title of Augustus (meaning divine greatness), head of state, and supreme commander of the Roman Senate. This year, Rome completely buried the old republican system and adopted the system of God.
Octavian's control of power, over the entire empire, was so absolute that he was allowed to appoint his own heir, and on August 19, 14 AD, Octavian died of illness. Tiberius was unanimously agreed by the Senate to legally inherit all the rights of Octavian - let Tiberius succeed the emperor of Rome.
The early succession of the Roman Empire can almost be summed up as adoptive succession. Adoptive inheritance was popular among the Romans, and in ancient Rome, an adopted child did not have to sever ties with his original family. Adoption is a way to strengthen ties and political alliances between families. Adopted children often enjoy the benefits of both the original family and the current family. Each emperor is not necessarily directly related by blood. For example, Octavian and his successor Tiberius are not related by blood, but because of affinity and adoption, they form the same family, so they are identified as the same dynasty.
After Octavian died, he succeeded his adopted son Tiberius. After Tiberius died, his adopted son Caligula was succeeded. In 41 AD, Caligula was assassinated by the Guards, and Caligula's uncle, Claudius I, ascended the throne. In AD 54, Claudius was poisoned and his stepson and adopted son Nero ascended the throne. Nero was a famous tyrant in Roman history, ignoring state affairs, brutal and bloodthirsty. In 68 AD, Galba, the governor of the Spanish province, revolted and proclaimed himself emperor. The Senate immediately recognized Galba as emperor and declared Nero the enemy of the motherland. Anyone could hunt down or kill Nero. With nowhere to run, Nero finally committed suicide by stabbing a dagger in his throat, ending the Giulia-Claudian dynasty and the beginning of the four emperors' struggle for the throne.
Nero
After Galba became emperor, he was unable to control the situation, and the generals from all over the country supported their troops. In January 69 AD, Viterius, the governor of Lower Germany, proclaimed himself emperor, while Galba was killed by his subordinate Osso, and Osso established himself as emperor. In March, Vitelius sent troops to compete with Osho for the throne, and Osho committed suicide. In July, Wei Paxian, the general who quelled the Jewish rebellion, proclaimed himself emperor. In October, Vespasian defeated Vitelius, ending the battle for the throne and creating the Flavian Dynasty.
After Weipaxiang died in 79 AD, his son Titus ascended the throne. In 81 AD, Titus died and his younger brother Domitian came to the throne. In 96 AD, Domitian died in a palace coup, ending the Flavian dynasty.
After Domitian's death, the Senate elected Nerva, a former consul who participated in the coup, as emperor. The Anthony dynasty begins. In 98 AD, after Nerva's death, his adopted son Trajan ascended the throne. Trajan died in AD 117 and was succeeded by his adopted son Hadrian. Hadrian transitioned the Führer system to an absolute monarchy.
In 138 AD, Hadrian died and his adopted son Anthony came to the throne. In 161 AD, after Antony's death, the throne was succeeded by two adopted sons, Verus and Marcus Aurelius, which was the first time in Roman history that two emperors ruled together. In AD 169, Verus died and the empire was restored to the status of an emperor. In 180 AD, Marcus Aurelius died. After the death of Marcus Aurelius, his son Commodus succeeded him. On December 30, 192 AD, the Guards launched a coup, and Commodus was killed in the gladiator's barracks, ending the Antonine dynasty.
After Commodus died, the guards put the city governor Petinax on the throne. Petinax was just a puppet. When he was disobedient, he was immediately killed by the guards. After Petinax died, the Guards actually announced that the throne would be auctioned off, and whoever paid the most could become the emperor. In the end Julianus bought the throne at a price that the guards were happy with. But Julianus had no followers, he was just a puppet, and the federal armies were even more dismissive of him. Nigel, the governor of Syria, was the first to proclaim himself emperor. Then Severus, the governor of Pannonia, rebelled and invaded Rome, and the Senate instead declared Severus emperor and executed Julianus.
Since then, the succession of the Roman Empire has been cyclical between the succession of sons and the coup d'etat of the Guards.
In 284 AD, Diocletian, the commander of the Guard, rebelled and became the ruler of the empire. After Diocletian proclaimed himself emperor, he officially changed the system of heads of state to a monarchy.
Diocletian practiced the co-governance of four emperors, and there were two emperors in the east and west, one was the principal, called Augustus, and the other was the deputy, called Caesar, and stipulated that the deputy was the adopted son and son-in-law of the principal, and the principal was in office for 20 years. , to make way for a deputy. Eastern Augustus Diocletian, Caesar Galerius. Western Augustus Maximian, Caesar Constantius I.
In 323 AD, Constantine, son of Constantius I, conquered the east and became the sole ruler of the empire. After Constantine defeated his opponent and became the emperor, it was not uncommon for the emperor to designate his own son as the heir, and sometimes even a foreign relative could become the emperor by marrying a woman from the emperor's family. In the succession of the Roman Empire, it was not uncommon for relatives to inherit, for subordinates to defect, and for blood vendettas within the family.
In 394 AD, Theodosius I again became the sole ruler of the empire, the last unification of the Roman Empire. When Theodosius died in AD 395, he split the empire in two, giving the eastern part to the eldest son Arcadius and the western part to the younger son Honorius, and the Eastern and Western Roman Empires were divided.
Most of the emperors of Western Rome were puppets, and the real power rested with the barbarian military chiefs. In 476 AD, Odoac deposed the Western Roman Emperor Romulus Augustus, declared allegiance to the Eastern Roman Emperor Zeno, transferred the national emblem of the Western Roman Empire to the Eastern Roman Empire, and the Western Roman Empire perished.
The east was known as the Byzantine Empire because of its capital Byzantium (Istanbul). The main method of succession to the Byzantine throne was blood. In the event that the emperor has no sons, the emperor's brothers, nephews, sisters, daughters, parents, grandsons and spouses are entitled to inherit the throne. The main factor that threatened the throne of the Eastern Roman Emperor was the coup d'état.
After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, a number of barbarian states were successively established on the ruins. In 962 AD, Otto I of the Otto dynasty, king of the East Franks, was crowned emperor by Pope John XII in Rome. In 1157 AD, the empire received the title of "Holy Empire". In 1254, the Empire began to use the title "Holy Roman Empire" for the first time. Strictly speaking, the Holy Roman Empire has no legal direct relationship with the Roman Empire, on the contrary, it appeared on the stage of history as one of the invaders of the Roman Empire. But the Vatican in Rome has recognized the Holy Roman Empire as the legitimate successor of the Western Roman Empire, and later the Byzantine Empire in Constantinople.
The empire created by Otto I, the emperor needed to gain legitimacy as "Roman Emperor" by conquering Italy. Therefore, the German monarch can only obtain it if he marches into Italy and accepts the coronation of the Pope. At first, the throne of the Holy Roman Empire was not elected by election, but the Holy Roman Empire lacked a recognized royal succession law, so once the emperor died, it often caused disputes between the princes to succeed the emperor, thus leading to civil war and anarchy in the empire. In order to solve the problem of inheritance, in 1356, Charles IV issued the "Edict of the Golden Seal", which stipulated that the right to elect the emperor belonged to seven princes: the Archbishop of Cologne, the Archbishop of Mainz, the Archbishop of Trier, the Duke of Saxony, and Brandenburg. Marquis, King of Bohemia, Count Palatine of the Rhine, this is the electoral system of the Empire.
Later, after the Habsburg family monopolized the throne, the actual role of the elector almost disappeared, and the emperor no longer needed the pope to be crowned. The Holy Roman Empire was banned by Napoleon.
