ABSTRACT
Rome had, in its earliest days, been ruled by kings, but after a ‘revolution’ in about 509 Bc, the state was ruled by annually elected magistrates, of which the most senior were the consuls. This system of government lasted nearly five centuries. However, the series of civil wars in the first century Bc, which culminated in the victory of Octavian over Antony and Cleopatra in 31 Bc, ushered in a long era during which control was exercised by a single man. He was called not ‘king’ but princeps – the ‘leading citizen’ of the state. In 27 Bc Octavian took the title Augustus (the revered one) by which he was afterwards known. Rule by emperors, who succeeded mostly by virtue of family relationships, though also by adoption or military coup, lasted until the fall of the Roman Empire in the west in Ad 476. Although the emperor had supplanted the consuls as the leading power in the state, they and other magistrates continued to be elected annually by the Senate, and aided the emperor in the running of state affairs.
