Isn't it ironic how the best Roman emperor was also the worst...

Isn't it ironic how the best Roman emperor was also the worst? He initiated the Pax Romana and made reforms that improved the state, but at the same time, not wanting to appear as a monarch, never made an official inheritance system for his powers, which led to countless civil wars, and ultimately the end of both the Eastern and the Western Empires.

He was doing his best to appoint a competent successor and establish a precedent in grooming individuals with potential to eventually become an emperor but his choices kept fucking dying. Marcellus, Agrippa, and Germanicus were all prospective heirs in Augustus' eyes and certainly would have made for a better ruler than Tiberius. However, they all ended up dying with the pop-history notion being that they (with the exception of Germanicus) were killed off by Livia.

Eh, I don't blame him for the incompetence of his successors.

I don't think the upper class would've accepted any kind of monarchy at that point in time though, Aurelian and Diocletian only managed to pull it off after decades of constant civil war and everyone getting tired of that bullshit enough to not just care anymore.

A Livia let-a them-a live-a!

Politically, he simply couldn't, the Romans, even when Augustus had attempted to give religious legitimacy to his shot at the Crown (whoever conquers Parthia shall be king), Romans didn't care, the best way Rome could've continued was with reforms being granted in order to break up the richer estates in Rome and policies to slowly fade out slavery in order to prevent them from rising again.

It's too easy to focus on the bad of the Roman empire because the civil wars and political fuckery stands out the most.

But in reality he created an institution that lasted almost 500 years after him and laid the foundations of not just western civilisation but the entire modern world.

For all his power, number of cronies and wealth, had he attempted to change the Roman law and established a monarchy, he would have met Caesars fate.

Daily reminder that the Roman empire entered a terminal decline only about a century into its existence.

It all started to end in the teutobourg forest.

K den. So the recovery from the crisis of the third century and golden age which followed didn't happen.
Early historians assumed Rome was a corrupt trash heap from the third century onwards. Unfortunately only recently has this not been taken as gospel. The success of men like Aurelian, Diocletian, Constantine and of course the Byzantine Empire are clear denials of this assumption

>failed to make an official inheritance
I don't see how Augustus can be specifically faulted for this. No Empire/Kingdom would do this. The Persians, the Macedonians and all the 'barbarians' did not have an official/effective inheritance law and the death of a ruler would frequently lead to a break up of the domains or at the very least a major power struggle. The development of an effective inheritance would not come for over a thousand years and even then succession wars would be common.

You contradict yourself by not calling later Rome a corrupt trash heap before praising the success of Diocletian and Constantine. Both were instrumental in the development of proto- feudalism and the strengthening of class strata to a level never seen before whilst also bureaucratizing all levels of civil administration to near autistic levels. This climate helped foster further economic stagnation, exploitation of resources and manpower, and a disregard for Rome/Roman ideals for personal political/fiscal gain. The splitting of the Empire also fostered even more civil strife and Rome would continue to cannibalize itself, especially with the vipers Constantine sired.

>Best Roman Emperor

That would be Trajan.

Absolute best system was the impérial adoption: every Emperor adopted the best general as the next Emperor -> no retarted emperors like Commodus.

Marcus Aurelius should have had Commodus strangled before, then.

I think the empire could have had a "Senators, Popular Assemblies and military all get a vote from selected inheritors by the emperor" system.

1000 years...

>Absolute best system was the impérial adoption
That wasn't a "system", it was a series of fortuitous events that Rome found itself in for nearly 100 years. Those emperors adopted because they had no other choice but to adopt.

Also, the only one who put thought into it was Hadrian.

You tend to forget that following Pax Romana (or rather what caused it to end) was the fact that Rome was hit by a series of plagues, the first being the great Anontine plague, which greatly reduced Rome's population by at least a third. The crippled resources and manpower forced later Emperors (like Diocletian and Constantine to impose class stratafication and strong economic control).

These more than anything stopped Rome's re-expansion of Italy, North Africa and Spain. And it more than anything stopped Rome's ability to launch an effective counter-attack against the Caliphate in the 7th century.

The lack of manpower and resources in the face of the rising tide of Islam definitely also has to do with the fact that the Byzantines and Sassanids had just wrapped up the most devastating war ever fought between West and East.

Correct, the initial defeats were due to the war, but when they started to mount a counter attack, the last great plague devastated the Romans again. People tend to focus history solely on human actions, but neglect the environmental changes that can affect societies

Bullshit. From Augustus all the way to Alexander Severus - a period of exactly 262 years - Rome only suffered two civil wars, both of which were very brief. Yes, there were assassinations like with Nero and Commodus, from the Imperial succession was remarkably stable over that amount of time compared to many medieval kingdoms and contemporary empires, considering they didn't even have an official system for it.

It was in the third century, and only in the third century, that your argument makes sense, and two centuries of Pax Romana pretty much negates any criticism you can throw Augustus' way.