By the time of the Emperor Trajan’s death in 117 CE, the Roman Empire had reached the height of its power. Spanning from the Atlantic Ocean to the fabled Tigris and Euphrates rivers of Mesopotamia in the east and from the lowlands of Scotland to the Great Pyramids of Giza in the south, the Romans built something that would stand for over a millennium. As all things, Rome perished, the final blow being delivered by the Ostrogoths, and thus Europe was plunged into what would later be coined “the Dark Ages”.
This map, drawn freehand with pen and ink on vellum drawing board and later tea stained, represents the Roman Empire at the time of its territorial maximum. The province names have here been listed in Latin as the Romans would have referred to them. In the bottom left-hand corner, the key reads in Latin:
Senatus Populusque Romanus
Dominium Romanorum Ab Urbe Condita DCCCLXX Sub Regno Caesaris Divi Nervae Filius Nerva Traianus Optimus Augustus
The above text would translate as:
The Senate and the People of Rome
The Dominion of the Romans from the founding of the city 870 years ago, under the reign of the divine Caesar, son of Nerva, Trajan, the greatest and revered one
In addition, included on the reverse, an excerpt from Virgil’s Aeneid (Book 6.788-800) in Latin.