3/8: Alaskan volcano 43 BC led to weak crop harvests in Egypt and obliged Cleopatra to choose a protector: she chose the wrong Roman: 3/8: The War That Made the Roman Empire: Antony, Cleopatra, and Octavian at Actium by Barry Strauss
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🗓️ 15 May 2023
⏱️ 15 minutes
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3/8: Alaskan volcano 43 BC led to weak crop harvests in Egypt and obliged Cleopatra to choose a protector: she chose the wrong Roman: 3/8: The War That Made the Roman Empire: Antony, Cleopatra, and Octavian at Actium by Barry Strauss
The Battle of Actium had great consequences for the empire. Had Antony and Cleopatra won, the empire’s capital might have moved from Rome to Alexandria, Cleopatra’s capital, and Latin might have become the empire’s second language after Greek, which was spoken throughout the eastern Mediterranean, including Egypt.
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| 0:00.0 | This is CBS, I Am the World. I'm John Bash with Professor Barry Strouse. His new book is |
| 0:10.2 | The War that made the Roman Empire, Antony Cleopatra and Octavian at Actium. We have the |
| 0:16.5 | free players, Octavian, who is adopted by Julius Caesar before his death and is the |
| 0:22.6 | heir apparent, except Antony, who is Caesar's right-hand man, Lieutenant Ambition and the |
| 0:31.1 | Triumvirate with Leopoldus and Octavian and Antony. Antony has the richest portion of |
| 0:36.6 | the Empire. The Treasuries pour in not only all of the Treasuries of what is now Syria, |
| 0:43.7 | what is now Israel, what is now Iraq, Iran, Turkey, all of that pouring in Armenia, pouring |
| 0:50.0 | into Antony's possession, if he puts in the right rulers, he has to conquer pieces of it. |
| 0:55.4 | Remember, Caesar was on his way to conquer Parthia upon the time of his death. However, he also |
| 1:01.4 | has Cleopatra's treasury. And we now enter into a period that is very dynamic because Octavian's plans |
| 1:11.3 | include the fact that he's got to have better information. Antony's out of his reach. So we |
| 1:16.5 | introduce another heroin into this who will triumph quite secretly for all these centuries. Her name |
| 1:25.3 | is Octavia. What do we need to know about her, Barry? Okay, so Octavia is the older sister of Octavian. |
| 1:32.8 | They have the same parents and they always were close to these two kids. She had been married to |
| 1:40.5 | a Roman politician named Marcellus. He started out as an opponent of Julius Caesar, a dog and a |
| 1:46.4 | opponent of Julius Caesar. And then somehow mysteriously he switched allegiances to Caesar's side. |
| 1:52.2 | Perhaps his wife Octavia had something to do with it. Anyhow, he died. She was a widow. |
| 2:00.8 | Around the same time, Antony was widowed. His Roman wife, Fulvia, also died. Never mind his |
| 2:07.3 | mistress, Cleopatra. And Antony and Octavian almost come to blows in the year 40. But they make a |
| 2:15.0 | piece treaty to make an agreement. And to seal the deal, they agree that Octavia should marry |
| 2:20.9 | Mark Antony. All of Rome is thrilled at this result. And it looks like Civil War has been reverted. |
| 2:27.8 | And this glorious marriage celebrated in Rome is going to seal the peace. Octavia goes eastward |
... |
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