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Marcus Ulpius Nerva Traianus (September 18
53-August 9 117), Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor
(98-117), commonly called Trajan, was the second
of the so-called "Five Good Emperors" of the Roman
Empire. Under his rule, the Empire reached its
greatest territorial extent.
 
Trajan was the son of M. Ulpius Traianus, a
prominent senator and general from Ulpius|a famous
Roman family. The family had settled in the
province of Hispania Baetica in what is now
Andalusia, a province that was as utterly
Romanized as southern Gaul. Trajan himself was
just one of many well-known Ulpii in a line that
continued long after his own death.

He was born on September 18 53, in the city of
Italica. As a young man, he rose through the ranks
of the Roman army, serving in some of the most
contentious parts of the Empire's frontier, along
the Rhine River. He took part in the Emperor
Domitian's wars against the Germanic tribes, and
was known as one of the foremost military
commanders of the Empire when Domitian was killed
in 96.

His renown served him well under Domitian's
successor, Nerva, who was unpopular with the army
and needed to do something to gain their support.
He accomplished this by naming Trajan as his
adoptive son and successor in the summer of 97. It
was the future Emperor Hadrian who brought word to
Trajan of his adoption, and thus had Trajan's
favor for the rest of his life. When Nerva died on
January 27 98, the highly respected Trajan
succeeded without incident, making him the first
non-Italy|Italian Roman to become Emperor.

The new emperor was greeted by the people of Rome
with great enthusiasm, which he justified by
governing well and without the bloodiness that had
marked Domitian's reign. He freed many people who
had been unjustly imprisoned by Domitian and
returned a great deal of private property which
Domitian had confiscated; a process begun by Nerva
before his death. His popularity was such that the
Roman Senate eventually bestowed upon Trajan the
honorific of optimus, meaning "the best".

But it was as a soldier that Trajan is best known
to history. In 101, he launched a punitive
expedition into the kingdom of Dacia, on the
northern bank of the Danube River, and forced King
Decebalus to submit to him a year later, after
Trajan took the Dacian capital of Sarmizegetusa.
Trajan then returned to Rome in triumph and was
granted the title Dacicus Maximus.



However, Decebalus soon began stirring up trouble
on the frontier again, trying to get the
neighboring kingdoms of the north bank of the
Danube to join him. Trajan again took the field,
with his engineers building a Trajan's
bridge|massive bridge over the Danube, and
conquered Dacia completely in 106. Sarmizegetusa
was destroyed, Decebalus committed suicide, and on
the site of the former capital, Trajan built a new
city, "Colonia Ulpia Traiana Augusta Dacica
Sarmizegetusa". He resettled Dacia with Romans and
annexed it as a province of the Roman Empire.

At about the same time, the kingdom of Nabatea
expired upon the death of its final king, Rabbel
Soter. He willed the realm to Trajan, so at the
same time that Dacia was being conquered, the
Empire gained what became the province of Arabia
Petraea (modern southern Jordan and a small part
of Saudi Arabia).



For the next seven years, Trajan ruled as a
civilian emperor, to the same acclaim as before.
It was during this time that he corresponded with
Pliny the Younger on the subject of how to deal
with the Christianity|Christians of Pontus,
basically telling Pliny to leave them alone unless
they were openly practicing the religion. He built
several new buildings, monuments and roads in
Italy and his native Iberia. His magnificent
Trajan's Forum|forum, including Trajan's Column,
raised to commemorate his victories in Dacia,
still stands in Rome today, as does a triumphal
arch in Mérida, Spain|Mérida, which in Trajan's
time was the major city of Lusitania.



In 113, he embarked on his last campaign, provoked
by Parthia's decision to put an unacceptable king
on the throne of Armenia, a kingdom over which the
two great empires had shared hegemony since the
time of Nero some fifty years earlier. Trajan
marched first on Armenia, deposed the king and
annexed it to the Roman Empire. Then he turned
south into Parthia itself, taking the cities of
Babylon, Seleucia and finally the capital of
Ctesiphon in 116. He continued southward to the
Persian Gulf, whence he declared Mesopotamia a new
province of the Empire and lamented that he was
too old to follow in the steps of Alexander the
Great.



But he did not stop there. Later in 116, he
captured the great city of Susa. He deposed the
Parthian king Osroes I of Parthia|Osroes I and put
his own puppet ruler Parthamaspates on the throne.
Never again would the Roman Empire advance so far
to the east.

It was at this point that the fortunes of
war—and his own health—betrayed
Trajan. The fortress city of Hatra, on the Tigris
in his rear, continued to hold out against
repeated Roman assaults. He was personally present
at the siege and it is possible that he suffered a
heat stroke while in the blazing heat. The Jews
inside the Roman Empire rose up in rebellion once
more, as did the people of Mesopotamia. Trajan was
forced to withdraw his army in order to put down
the revolts. Trajan saw it as simply a temporary
setback, but he was destined never to command an
army in the field again.

Late in 116, while resting in the province of
Cilicia and planning another war against Parthia,
Trajan grew ill. His health declined throughout
the spring and summer of 117, until he finally
died from edema on August 9. On his deathbed, he
named Hadrian as his successor. Hadrian, upon
becoming ruler, returned Mesopotamia to Parthian
rule. However, all the other territories conquered
by Trajan were retained.

For the remainder of the history of the Roman
Empire and well into the era of the Byzantine
Empire, every new emperor after Trajan was honored
by the Senate with the prayer felicior Augusto,
melior Traiano, meaning "may he be luckier than
Augustus and better than Trajan". 

Unlike many lauded rulers in history, Trajan's
reputation has survived undiminished for nearly
1,900 years. The Christianization of Rome resulted
in further embellishment of his legend: it was
commonly said in medieval times that Pope Gregory
I, through divine intercession, resurrected Trajan
from the dead and baptized him into the Christian
faith. In the Divine Comedy, Dante, following this
legend, sees the spirit of Trajan in the Heaven of
Jupiter with other historical and mythological
persons noted for their justice.  

== See also ==
* Trophaeum Traiani
* Trajan's Column
* Trajan's bridge

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succession box|title=List of Roman Emperors|Roman
Emperor|before=Nerva|after=Hadrian|years=98–
117
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