ok buckle up, been on my mind for a while, but about to go full history nerd here. it has been noted that some dudes who fancy themselves intelligent and well-informed, Boris Johnson and Mark Zuckerberg, are REALLY into Augustus Caesar, the first Roman Emperor

Zuck even named his daughter after him! And that's fine, Augustus was certainly a great Emperor, being the first and all. But choosing him as your favorite Emperor, the one to study and revere over all others, is a mistake

It's like saying Man U is your favorite soccer team, sure they're good or w/e, but it's just a truly basic choice. Rome had ~450 years of emperors (more if you include the Byzantines, which you should!), picking Augustus betrays a superficiality of understanding

and so, without further adieu, let me make a point for the man we should ALL be as familiar with as Augustus, a man who leaders like Zuck and Boris should study! DIOCLETIAN!

Augustus was capable enough to cement an Empire where once a Republic (which his uncle destroyed) had stood, but Diocletian had the far more arduous task of RE-establishing an Empire that had practically fallen apart

From him, we can learn SO MUCH. Unlike Augustus, Diocletian was not born into the most powerful family in Rome; he was the son of an anonymous family in the Balkans, who through sheer intelligence and savvy rose through the ranks of the Roman army

At this time, the Empire was in shambles. A Roman-Gallic state was virtually independent in the West, and Palmyra controlled much of what used to the East. The armies rode roughshod over the entire bureaucracy and had been appointing Emperors at a whim for decades

This is known as the Crisis of the Third Century. Diocletian's reign ended this! I think it's much more impressive of a feat to reclaim an empire that many assumed was lost, and reinvent for a new century (the 4th), where Rome yet again prospered.

I won't get too much into the details of Diocletian's ascension to the throne (it involved a short but complicated civil war), but once there, he completely reinvented the office of Emperor and the imperial bureaucracy itself.

Throughout much of the century of crisis, Roman emperors had been soldiers, appointed by the armies they controlled due to their ability to pay them. It was a series of unscrupulous , unpolished military dictatorships, and the government of the empire suffered for it.

Diocletian, though a commoner with a military background, like many of the crisis emperors of the previous years, broke firmly with this trend of decay. Instead of a strongman military persona, he cloaked the imperial office in an aura of ancient mystery and enigmatic power

He understood to how project power by distancing himself. In his new palace, the emperor's throne was only accessible to visitors through a labyrinthine series of corridors and waiting areas, designed to impress and terrify the few visitors allowed to enter

This was in marked contrast to both his immediate predecessors, who were crude soldiers who ruled from mobile army camps, as well as Augustus, who very cannily ruled as a nominal "equal" (the "First Citizen") and only "suggested" policies to the Senate

This was a totally new type of Emperor - one who was truly almost divine and untouchable. And to maintain this aura, he could not debase this almighty presence through practical governing. To this end, he implemented the most striking change since the fall of the republic:

introducing, the TETRARCHY! Many people think Constantine was the first to divide the administration of the Empire into distinct geographical areas with separate Emperors, but this was actually an innovation brought about by our man Diocletian

Diocletian divided the Empire into 4 basically autonomous units, and promoted three men to serve as Caesar (emperor) of these areas, while he kept the most valuable region for himself and made himself somewhat of an 'emperor of emperors'

This was a massive administrative and bureaucratic innovation in terms of division of responsibility, all in order to resuscitate an Empire on the verge of collapse. And it succeeded! In order to save the Empire, Diocletian had to admit that one man could not rule it all.

The empire had to be divided in order to persist at all. These innovations brought Rome from the brink of collapse, to another 150 years of existence in Western Europe (and another 1200 in the East).

However, once split apart administratively in this way, there was no way to permanently revert these changes. Over time, the Eastern and Western halves of the empire continued to drift further and further apart.

Future Emperors reshuffled the administrative boundaries, and rethought the imperial office, but the concept of making radical changes to fundamental pillars of Roman political identity stems entirely from Diocletian.

He was an organizational, political, military, and public relations mastermind, at a time when Rome needed it most. While Augustus wretched Rome from republican civil war into stable Empire, Diocletian completely reinvented what an Empire was, and was it was to rule one.

Disregarding decaying tradition, favoring indirect rule over strongman tactics, drastic organizational reform - these are all lessons we can draw most potently from his reign, and no others.

With that, next time some rich powerful man talks about his admiration for Augustus, remember that Diocletian saved the decaying Augustan empire by almost completely starting over, instead of preserving an arbitrary "heritage". in summary, MAD PROPS TO THE GOAT, DIOCLETIAN