- In 509 BCE Romans over threw Tarquinius Superbus, the last of Rome's Etruscan kings.
- New Roman Republic power in senate (council of elders - senior citizens) and 2 elected consuls.
- Originally leaders from wealthy landowners or patricians, later from the plebeian class of small farmers, merchants and freed slaves
Conquered their neighbors one by one
75-50 BC. This piece of art contains verism, which is hyperrealisim. You can see every detail in the mans face. The figure is frontal without any hint of dynamism or emotion.
Early Empire--27 BCE-193 CE
- Began with the rule of Agustus
Consists of a complex system of concrete barrel vaults. It held 50000 spectators and is the world's largest amphitheater. The exterior has Tuscan Doric at the lower level, Ionic, and Corinthian columns at the top.
High Empire-- 96 BCE- 192 CE
- The Roman Empire reached its greatest extent under Trajan
- The emperor's new forum and markets transformed the civic center of Rome.
- Haddrian was the first emperor to wear a beard. He built the Pantheon, a triumph of concrete technology.
Trajan built Rome's largest forum with the spoils from two wars in Dacia. Featured: triumphal gateway, statutes of Dacian captives, an equestrian statute of the emperor and a basilica with clerestory light.
Late Empire-- 197-337 BCE
- 193-235, the Late Antique style arose. Artists represented the emperor as a central frontal figure disengaged from the action around him.
- • Constantine restored one-man rule, ended persecution of the Christians, and transferred the capital of the Empire from Rome to Constantinople 330. The abstract formality of Constantine art paved the way for the ionic art of the Middles Ages.
Chaotic scene of battle between the Romans and barbarians decorates the front of this large sarcophagus. The emotive figures are pilled up in an emphatic rejection of classical perspective.