Suppose the emperor Trajan had actually managed to conquer India and the Romans had held on to the country for several centuries. In what ways do you think India might be different today?
Trajan is remembered as a successful soldier-emperor who presided over the greatest military expansion in Roman history, leading the empire to attain its maximum territorial extent by the time of his death. He is also known for his philanthropic rule, overseeing extensive public building programmes and implementing social welfare policies, which earned him his enduring reputation as the second of the Five Good Emperors who presided over an era of peace and prosperity in the Mediterranean world.
As per the above passage, we can conclude if India had been conquered by Trajan, he would have been the greatest ruler and extended philanthropic rule all over India. There must be absence of democratic ideas and democratic rights in India. The division of society will be on the basis of Roman society.
Suggested Q&A
History · Class 11- HistoryClass 11Go through the chapter carefully and pick out some basic features of Roman society and economy which you think make it look quite modem.
- HistoryClass 11Why do you think the Roman government stopped coining in silver? And which metal did it begin to use for the production of coinage?
- HistoryClass 11Imagine that you are a Roman housewife preparing a shopping list for household requirements. What would be on the list?
- HistoryClass 11Compile a list of some of the towns, cities, rivers, seas and provinces mentioned in this chapter, and then try and find them on the maps. Can you say something about any three of the items in the list you have compiled?
- HistoryClass 11If you had lived in the Roman Empire, where would you rather have lived—in the towns or in the countryside? Explain why?
- HistoryClass 11How does the following account enlarge upon the character of the Pax Mongolica created by the Mongols by the middle of the thirteenth century? The Franciscan monk, William of Rubruck, was sent by Louis IX of France on an embassy to the great Khan Mongke’s court. He reached Karakorum, the capital of Mongke, in 1254 and came upon a woman from Lorraine (in France) called Paquette, who had been brought from Hungary and was in the service of one of the prince’s wives who was a Nestorian Christian. At the court he came across a Parisian goldsmith named Guillaume Boucher, ‘whose brother dwelt on the Grand Pont in Paris’. This man was first employed by the Queen Sorghaqtani and then by Mongke’s younger brother. Rubruck found that at the great court festivals the Nestorian priests were admitted first, with their regalia, to bless the Grand Khan’s cup, and were followed by the Muslim clergy and Buddhist and Taoist monks.