Speech+-+Written

** Well the answer is 7, and they were: England and Wales (then known as Britannia), Gaul (now known as France), Spain, Greece, the Middle East and the coast of North Africa. But in total including all countries there were 54 conquered by the Romans. ** ** My name is Dan and as you might have guessed I am going to talk to you about the Roman Empire. ** ** Today I will inform you about three points of the Romans, firstly I will talk about the Roman armies’ formations, secondly about their most powerful siege weapon, and last of all who was responsible for its fall. ** ** The ** **Roman army had a main formation that they used against their enemies. They would place their commanders at the back of their army so as they would be out of danger and still be able to issue orders to the rest of their men, in front of them were the infantry reserves and on either side of them were the cavalry units. In front of the reserves was the main infantry which consisted of legionnaires and standard bares, on either side of them was the auxiliaries mainly archers and slingers in loose formation so as the cavalry could charge through them without fear of killing their own men. The Romans were at an advantage when facing barbarian hordes such as the Gaul tribes who were often attacking the Romans in large numbers but in a loose formation** ** The Romans had many forms of siege weapons most powerful of them was the trebuchet. The trebuchet had the ability to fire the weight of an average car a kilometer with enough power to destroy a wall the width of ten men which was 6 meters high. The source of its power was its firing method which consisted of a large counter weight that was dropped to pull the firing beam and sling in a wide arc sending the missile very high, very far and with a lot of force. ** ** The fall of the Roman Empire was invertible because of immense size and its far off borders were becoming increasingly harder to defend against barbarian attacks and raids. Inside the empire itself was dangerous as many of the royal families were seeking power from the emperor and were consistently trying to overthrow him for the great power that was Rome. The reason that the Empire fell was that there was many invasions by rebels and bandits envious of their power and authority but most of all its riches and great buildings that still stand today such as the coliseum. ** ** In conclusion I think that the Roman Empire had the most powerful military might and massive buildings of its time and was only overthrown by numbers of barbarians and other minor forces jealous of the power that Rome had. **
 * Do you know how many capital countries the Romans ruled over in the height of their power? **