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--- timelines:saeculum_novum [2019/03/29 15:14] – external edit 127.0.0.1
+++ timelines:saeculum_novum [2019/10/01 16:27] (current) – janus_antoninus
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 ====== Sæculum Novum ======
+A [[pods:roman_empire|Roman Empire]] TL created and written by [[offtopic:Janus_Antoninus|Janus Antoninus]] ([[http://althistory.fandom.com/wiki/User:Red_VS_Blue|Red VS Blue]] on the Althistory Wiki). Starting from the reign of Marcus Aurelius, this TL divergences by contriving a replacement for Commodus, one that continues the until then successful line of adoptions that had sustained the imperial succession going back to Trajan.
-A [[pods:roman_empire|Roman Empire]] TL created and written by [[offtopic:Janus_Antoninus|Janus Antoninus]], starting with the death of Commodus after his father had adopted an orphan boy. Written over the course of six years on another wiki as [[http://althistory.wikia.com/wiki/Superpowers|Superpowers]].
+In tackling such a common alternate history topic, I have striven only to write as good an example of that idea as I can manage. Like any alternate history, especially one with such an ancient PoD, I have treated this TL as more of an exploration than a hypothetical prediction: Rome could not have continued to prosper into its //Sæculum Novum// without being heavily transformed in both the short-run and the long-run, so I have found it fruitful to explore these possibilities and to develop one of them into a TL that at least feels realistic. I leave whether I have succeeded in these efforts up to the reader.
-In tackling the common task of making Rome retain its dominion over Europe, the core idea of this TL is to explore the history of the kind of Rome that could survive into its //Sæculum Novum//. The Roman Empire could not have survived as it had been during the Nerva-Antonine period and beyond; an empire that survives long past its historical decline must have reforms of its political structures and rules in a different direction than IOTL. There are perhaps a number of ways this could occur but this TL develops one such possibility.
 ==== PoD ====
-AD: Birth of Gaius Correlus Sulla to Roman colonists in the city of Athens.
+CE: Commodus dies of illness on an imperial tour of the eastern provinces
+  and Marcus Aurelius ends up adopting an orphan boy during his visit to Athens.
-Orphaned by the Antonine plague, Gaius develops the skills to survive on his own for several years. On a tour of Greece, Marcus Aurelius is approached by this boy after speaking to an audience at the Stoa Poikile, where Gaius had listened keenly to this man who was being shown great respect by the entire crowd. Bearing a resemblance to the late Annius Verus, Sulla further drew the attention of the emperor with a demonstration of his keen memory for the speeches made by philosophers throughout Athens. For private rather than public reasons, Marcus Aurelius adopts this curious youth and begins to spend time with him as he never could with the son he had lost nor with the son he was responsibly grooming in Rome for the succession.
+Following the pointless rebellion of Avidius Cassius, Marcus Aurelius and his family went on a tour of the eastern provinces that had, however briefly, supported the would-be usurper. Here Marcus faced tragedy after tragedy: first the death of his wife, Faustina, while in Cappadocia then the death of his last son, Commodus, over the Winter. Allowing himself little time to grieve, he continued onward with one of his daughters to Tarsos then, eventually, Alexandria, where he is said to have "conducted himself like a private citizen and a philosopher at all the schools and temples". On his return to Rome, by way of Antioch then Athens, where he began by speaking at the Stoa Poikile on remaining steadfast in the face of death.
-Growing closer to his adopted son, Marcus Aurelius decides that he would make a worthy emperor alongside Commodus - as Lucius Verus had been next to Marcus in a bygone era. When Commodus dies, seemingly from the plague, shortly thereafter, Sulla is left as the sole successor. On the untimely death of Marcus Aurelius, the boy of humble birth is recognized by the Senate as //Caesar Gaivs Aurelivs Antoninvs Svlla// Augustus and takes up the burden of his adoptive father. The rest, as they say, is history.
-==== Timeline ====
+After speaking at the Stoa, Marcus Aurelius was approached by an orphan boy, not much younger than Commodus had been when he died. What passed between Marcus and the young [[Serenus]], as he called himself, is not known but, whatever it was, Marcus did not leave Athens alone. Back in Rome, Marcus addressed the people, bemoaning his eight year absence, and offered them a //congiarium// and //triumphus// to celebrate his victories along the Danube. Before the celebrations, he spoke before the Senate of the death of Commodus and his adoption of Serenus, who he portrayed as a kindness offered to him by the gods during these dark times. That this blond boy bore an uncanny resemblance to a younger Commodus did not go unremarked by the //literati// of the time.
-**[[Sæculum Novum 1|Reign of Sulla]]**
+While Serenus was not granted //imperium// or other imperials powers in time for the triumphal celebrations, he was appointed //Caesar// after the address to the Senate and would not be far from Marcus for his entire stay in Rome. When news came that the situation on the Danube was deteriorating, Marcus set out to the frontier with his son in tow to finally bring this war to an end.