MAPPING THE WEST The Roman World at the End of the Republic, 44 B.C.E.

By the time of Julius Caesar’s assassination in 44 B.C.E., the territory that would be the Roman Empire was almost complete. Caesar’s young relative Octavian (the future Augustus) would conquer and add Egypt in 30 B.C.E. Geography, distance, and formidable enemies were the primary factors inhibiting further expansion—which Romans never stopped wanting, even when lack of money and political discord rendered it purely theoretical. The deserts of Africa and the once again powerful Persian kingdom in the Near East worked against expansion southward or eastward, while trackless forests and fierce resistance from local inhabitants made expansion into central Europe and the British Isles impossible to maintain.