The Affect Of Hadrian's Influence On Rome

During the rest of his reign Hadrian often traveled the empire working towards his goals of peace; overall he traveled twelve of the twenty years he ruled. He even builds a ship in order to travel faster and more efficiently. Instead of continuing to conquer like Trajan had, he pulls back from some of their lands such as Armenia and Parthia and makes it his goal to defend the lands rather than gain more. His legacy is of great importance to him and he wants to make sure Rome prospers under his rule. This is why he begins to focus on infrastructure in cities; he writes to Marcus that the construction in the cities connects him to the past and future which he loves. In addition to repairing old buildings and constructing new ones Hadrian also had statues erected all over Rome in his honor and some even in the likeness of his wife Sabina and his lover Antinous. He is able to begin to impart his love of architecture and the arts into Roman culture through this constant construction. The building of the infrastructure will ultimately influence Hadrian to continue to build and renovate Rome helping make it one of the cultural beacons of the world. …show more content…
He also begins to works towards preserving Roman history by having it written down by scholars such as Phlegon. In his continuation of building and renovations he opens up the Olympieion in Athens for the first games, expands his mausoleum on Tiber and worked to improve towns all across Italy that had been left in shambles. Towards the end of his reign he begins to take on a more practical viewpoint on matters instead of his more idealistic that he held in the beginning. He expresses his views though that Rome is the actualization of Greek ideals and culture; while they created better art, philosophy and government ultimately it was the Romans that implemented