Culture of ancient Rome
The Roman Empire, at its height (c. 117 CE), was the most extensive political and social structure in western civilization. By 285 CE the empire had grown too vast to be ruled from the central government at Rome and so was divided by Emperor Diocletian into a Western and an Eastern Empire. The Roman Empire began when Augustus Caesar became the first emperor of Rome (31 BCE) and ended, in the west, when the last Roman emperor, Romulus Augustulus, was deposed by the Germanic King Odoacer (476 CE). In the east, it continued as the Byzantine Empire until the death of Constantine XI and the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks in 1453 CE. The influence of the Roman Empire on western civilization was profound in its lasting contributions to virtually every aspect of western culture.
History of Italy
In 27 BC, Augustus established the Roman Empire and inaugurated the Pax Romana, two centuries of stability and relative peace in which Italy flourished as the leading political and economic centre of the "known world". The death of the last of the "good emperors", Marcus Aurelius, and the crisis of the third century marked the beginning of the decline of Rome. The Empire went through major changes in the following centuries, including a division between West and East in 286 under Diocletian and the end of the persecutions of Christians with the Edict of Milan of 313 under Constantine. The Bishop of Rome was granted religious primacy with the Edict of Thessalonica in 380 and the West collapsed amid barbarian invasions in 476, when Odoacer deposed Romulus Augustus.