Roman Empire

When Diocletian became the emperor of Rome in 284 AD, the Roman Empire was beset with enormous military and social problems and was on the verge of collapse. Complete anarchy prevailed in the Roman army which was no longer controllable under a single command and it was common practice for a succession of generals to declare themselves as emperor. In the fifty years before Diocletian came to power, a similar number of emperors and pretenders to the throne had come and gone, only one of them dying of natural causes. As a result, civil wars and unrest erupted throughout the empire. Roving armies seized whatever goods and food supplies they could find in the countryside and cities while the imperial tax collectors made increasingly harsh demands on the farmers to generate funds for the large armies and a bloated bureaucracy. When the farmers could no longer afford to...
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