ABSTRACT
Caesar’s conquest of Gaul, effectively completed by 51 BC, saw the establishment of the Roman frontier along the Rhine. In the succeeding decades the western Alps were gradually assimilated, and in central Europe the first moves were made into the Hungarian Plain. In 15 BC the king of Noricum died, bequeathing his kingdom to the Roman people, and opening up the rest of Pannonia and southern Germany for conquest. By 14 BC the Rhine-Danube frontier had been established, and, despite subsequent attempts by Drusus and then Germanicus to extend to the Elbe, this was to remain the boundary, excepting the addition of Britain under Claudius in the west, and of Dacia under Trajan in the east. Before we evaluate the immediate effect that incorporation into the Roman Empire had on the areas we have been considering, we must first discuss those areas which were not, or only later, conquered-Britain and Germany.
