Are they and welcome to Emperor of Rome, a podcast about the rulers of the ancient Roman Empire.

I'm your host Matt Smith and with me as always is Dr.

I'm Eannan Evans, a senior lecturer in ancient Mediterranean studies at Latrobe

University. This is episode L-X-I-V, iron and rust.

With the passing of Marcus Aurelius, his son Commodus is made emperor.

The 19-year-old youth had been raised knowing that the empire would be his to rule, and he spent

his time doing what he pleased.

The next 12 years under the reign of Commodus would be bloody and chaotic, and many historians believe it to mark the beginning of the

end for the Roman Empire.

Here's Rianna Evans.

Commodus is the last emperor of a dynasty.

He comes in as a very young emperor he is represented

as universally awful by our very hostile sources and his reign is sometimes

seen as the beginning of the end.

In fact, a lot of historians have seen it as the long fall of the Roman Empire.

Edward Gibbon starts with him, starts with really the death of Marcus Aurelius and in the decline and fall of the Roman

Empire.

Why is it seen as that point then because Rome does consistently degrade as an empire.

Its glory days are very much behind it.

Well, it's all, as we always see with the benefit of hindsight,

in that the third century is going to be a succession of wars and short-lived emperors.

So we're getting towards the end of the second century.

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