In 52 BC, after six years of war against the Gallic tribes, Julius Caesar had tamed another enemy of the Roman Republic. Almost one million Gauls were taken as slaves, while their land became just another Roman province. Soon tonnes of grain along with lucrative taxes were flowing towards the imperial capital, whose inhabitants enjoyed all the luxuries of the provinces. Everything had changed since outlaws had founded Rome almost 500 years earlier. The small city on the seven hills had grown powerful through irresistible military might and political ingenuity, and the Roman Republic came to rule an expanse of territory that stretched around the Mediterranean and beyond. A few years later, Julius Caesar was brutally assassinated, and the republic was replaced by an empire that mad tyrants and power-hungry generals would ultimately destroy from within

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