Vespasian (9 – 79 AD / ruled 69 – 79 AD) worked hard to restore law, order and self-respect to Rome after the civil war. He established the new, Flavian dynasty. Born to a Roman knight and tax ...

After bloody fighting in Rome itself, Vespasian was declared emperor. An army general who had been suppressing the rebellion in Judea, he wasted no time in establishing his own dynasty.

But blink and you may get your epics confused. It is Rome, in the year 79AD, and Anthony Hopkins portrays the elderly Emperor Vespasian, who rose to power following the civil war that followed the ...