Dr Simon Elliott

Because suddenly, if you were able to capture a fairly small kingdom in Anatolia, then you're going to be a multi-trillionaire and anybody associated with you.

So your troops are unbelievably loyal to you.

No one's going to argue when you get back home unless they are also a multi-trillionaire as well.

So the whole nature of the top of Roman society has been bent and changed by this wealth.

And then your loyal legions fight their loyal legions.

They do, they do.

And often what you find is that when the legions are defeated and usually the leader, Pompey as an example, are killed,

A lot of the legionaries will move over to fight for the new guy because he's got all the money.

And it's an issue, to be honest, because if you think about when Octavian becomes the last man standing after the Battle of Actium, he inherits 60 legions.

And that's 6,000 men legions.

which even with the amount of wealth the Romans have got now, they can't afford.

He inherits hundreds and hundreds of polyrene galleys in the Mediterranean, and they've got no opponent anymore, so they're useless.

So this is why one of the great things Augustus does, he sees the next great reformer of the Roman military after Marius because of that.

As you cascade, you go past Caesar being assassinated in 44.

You then end up with another round of civil wars.

And finally, the last man standing is Octavian.

It's also, more importantly, control of the Ptolemaic Empire in Egypt.

Right.

So it's the last vaguely independent Hellenistic kingdom, which is fabulously, fabulously, fabulously wealthy.

And it's where all the bread for Rome comes from.