The Rise of the Reman Empire... *and* the Industrial Revolution under Emperor Nero

Yet indeed, seventeen of the Carthaginian elephants had died before Hannibal made it to Italy. Nevertheless, Hannibal’s armies had defeated the Reman army and almost sacked the city. Almost, but they didn’t. Instead, Hannibal and his army turned south and left Reme alone. That was Hannibal, unpredictable to the end. And so, at the boot of Italy in a place called Cannae, Hannibal’s army and the Remans fought yet another battle to spice up the year 537 A.U.C. (216 BC). This time, it wasn’t clear which army had won. Reme, of course, said it was Hannibal who lost, but if Reme had won, it was at such a great cost in lives that in this case no one really won-

Heron dropped the scroll he was reading by accident onto his scribe’s table and picked it up, dusting it off and pausing a moment to make an academic note in the margin of the papyrus-"Pyrrhic victory: a battle won at too great a cost, named after Pyrrhus". Heron nodded several times, shamelessly admiring the style of his own penmanship before returning to the subject matter in his scroll.

So, neither army had actually won at Cannae, and the mighty one-eyed Hannibal left Reme and became embroiled in political problems in Carthage, then ended up working for the Bithynians. Unfortunately, the Bithnyians knew a good deal when they saw one and mercilessly betrayed Hannibal to Reme for money, and lots of it. Besieged in his villa, Hannibal later killed himself to avoid the shame of being captured, and his idea of a Carthaginian Empire founded on the ashes of Reme died with him.

Within sixty years, Reme and Carthage were fighting again in the third and final Punic War, only this time, it was mighty Carthage who lost, and how they lost! The Remans, never ones to leave their enemies any elbow room, butchered the citizens of Carthage and set fire to the city, which burned for seventeen days. And, just to be absolutely positively sure they had won, the Remans cast salt on the ground of burning Carthage to keep anything from ever growing there again. One Punic war too many? Heron laughed to himself.

Maybe. But Heron had to agree that the Reman overkill tactic made sense. With Punic Carthage thoroughly punished into oblivion, an obstacle in the path towards achieving Reman glory had been cleared. And not long afterwards, the first man to take a step on that clear path was Julius Caesar, who founded the Reman Empire in around 700 A.U.C.

"Just imagine," Heron thought abruptly. "If Hannibal had conquered Reme, there would have been no Julius Caesar!" Heron didn’t even want to think about that, though. Imagine the world without a Julius Caesar!

It was Julius Caesar and his nephew Octavian, later called Augustus Caesar, who together conquered most of the known world of the Mediterranean that became a part of the Reman Empire. Augustus Caesar, who had favored Alexandria above all of Reme's other provincial cities, had died some fifty years before.

Only fifty years since Augustus, the patron of the world’s arts and sciences, had died? Heron thought in wonder. Yet so much had changed across the Reman Empire in those fifty years. And with that he paused a moment to reflect upon the murder of Julius Caesar, once the beloved dictator of Reme. Ah, to have lived in the good old days, Heron thought wistfully. Old Julius and Augustus had raised Reme to greater glory-only to leave it to the likes of crazy Caligula, then nefarious Nero.

Nero... that crazy, red-headed boy! Well, Nero had started the whole thing off, Heron admitted. Nero had commissioned Heron’s steam engine in the first place... But Nero had thought a steam engine was just another toy to delight an emperor. Still, Nero had made Heron’s work possible, had made Heron a very rich man. Ah, Heron could picture him so clearly...