<Article>The Establishment of the Politics of the Five Good Emperors

Minamikawa Takashi

doi:10.14989/shirin_69_153

Under the rule of the Five Good Emperors, the Roman world enjoyed a period of unexampled prosperity and peace, and the political situation in the Empire was pretty stable. How could the Roman Empire achieve this political stability? In this article, we try to examine this question and reconsider the significance of the beginning of the Age of the Five Good Emperors in the political and social history of the Roman Principate. In 96 A. D. Roman Emperor Domitian was assassinated and M. Cocceius Nerva was proclaimed emperor. Domitian is generally depicted as a tyrant, but on the other hand Nerva is regarded as a good emperor who was in harmony with the Senate and inaugurated a new system of succession (Adoptivkaisertum). But our detailed study can show that under the short reign of Nerva there was the antagonism of the Domitianic party against the anti-Domitianic, and that the political situation didn't become stable yet. And our another study has already shown that Trajan's adoption by Nerva in 98 was not the inauguration of a new system of succession but a result of political strife. So, what is difference of the politics of Nerva and Trajan from that of Domitian? Our arguments are as follows. In the first century, the new aristocracy from the Italian and provincial cities gradually engaged in the central government. Domitian positively opened the imperial offices to them with no regard to the traditional group in the Senate. He was an eminent administrator, but in concert with his strong desire for fame this positive policy provoked antipathy of the traditional and conservative group. As for Nerva, he formed a kind of the gerontocracy which can be regarded as a reaction to Domitian's policy. The politics which could achieve the political stability was at length formed in the early years of Trajan's reign; having a high regard for the political and social tradition, Emperor Trajan employed the new power to the imperial administration properly. In sum, the Politics of the Five Good Emperors, which was really established in the reign of Trajan, can be characterized by the formation of the system under which the distinguished in the whole Empire could participate in the imperial government.

<Article>The Establishment of the Politics of the Five Good Emperors

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