Lepidus, having founded several cities and inaugurated…

Emperor Wen of Han quickly shows an aptitude to govern the empire with diligence, and appears to be genuinely concerned for the people's welfare.

Heavily influenced by his Taoist wife, Emperor Wen governs the country with the general policies of noninterference with the people and relaxes laws.

His personal life is marked by thriftiness and general willingness to forgive.

He is initially very deferential to Zhou Bo, Chen Ping, and Guan Ying, who had been instrumental in his accession, and they are to serve as successive prime ministers.

In 179 BCE, he abolishes the law that permitted the arrest and imprisonment of parents, wives, and siblings of criminals, with the exception for the crime of treason.

He also creates a governmental assistance program for those in need.

Loans or tax exemptions are offered to widowers, widows, orphans, and seniors without children.

He further orders that monthly stipends of rice, wine, and meat be given to seniors over eighty years in age, and that additional stipends of cloth and cotton be given to seniors over ninety years in age.

Moreover, he makes peace with Nanyue, consisting of parts of the modern Chinese provinces of Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan and much of modern northern Vietnam, whose king, the Han Chinese general Zhao Tuo, Empress Dowager Lü had offended by an economic embargo and which has therefore engaged in raids against the Principality of Changsha (modern Hunan) and the prefecture of Nan (modern Hubei).

Emperor Wen accomplishes this by writing humble yet assertive letters to Zhao offering peace with dignity and by caring for Zhao's relatives remaining in his native town of Zhending (in modern Shijiazhuang, Hebei).

Finally, after some hesitation (during which he, apparently influenced by the theory of chanrang, thought that maybe it would be more proper for him to find the wisest person in the empire and offer the throne to him, or that he should consider offering the throne to his uncle Liu Jiao, the Prince of Chu; his cousin Liu Pi, the Prince of Wu; or his younger brother Liu Chang, the Prince of Huainan), he creates his oldest son Liu Qi the Crown Prince and Prince Qi's mother, Consort Dou, Empress.

The war between Pontus and the allied Pergamenes, Bithynians, and Cappadocians has continued, apparently with various interruptions, until the summer of 179 BCE, when Pharnaces, finding himself unable to cope with the combined forces of Eumenes and Ariarathes, is compelled to purchase peace by the cession of all his conquests in Galatia and Paphlagonia, with the exception of Sinope.

The Bastarnae, a large Germanic tribe, has settled in Europe east of the Carpathian Mountains from the upper valley of the Dniester River to the Danube River delta.

Philip V of Macedon, in pursuit of a scheme for directing the Bastarnae against the Dardani, dies at Amphipolis in 179, remorseful at having put his younger son Demetrius to death at the instigation of his older son Perseus, who succeeds him peacefully to the Macedonian throne.

Tiberius Gracchus Major, or Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, after serving in the Roman army, had been elected tribune of the plebs circa 187 BCE, in which capacity he is recorded as having saved Scipio Africanus Major from prosecution by interposing his veto.

Tiberius had been no friend nor political ally to Scipio, but felt that the general's services to Rome merited his release from the threat of trial like any common criminal.

Supposedly, in gratitude for this action, either Scipio or his son Publius Cornelius Scipio had betrothed Scipio's youngest daughter to him.

However, accounts of this are mixed with similar accounts about the betrothal of the younger Tiberius Gracchus to his wife Claudia, so the actual facts are not certain.

In both versions, the father hastens to make a betrothal to a Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, without consulting the mother (his wife), to which the wife protests until she is informed that the bridegroom is Gracchus.

Since Scipio had died in 184 BCE or 183 BCE and retired into the country well before then, and his youngest daughter Cornelia Africana was only 6 or 7 at his death, it is more likely that the betrothal took place after Scipio's death, or that Tiberius had been betrothed circa 186 BCE to an older daughter who died before the marriage could take place.

Plutarch's Life of Scipio has been lost, along with Scipio's own memoirs, and no contemporary histories or biographies of Scipio or Tiberius exist.

Tiberius is elected praetor for 179 BCE, in which year he would have been about 38 if born in 217 BCE.

During his praetorship, he successfully puts down uprisings in Spain (the Roman Hispania) and conciliates various tribes.

The Romans had favored Demetrius, and Perseus' role in killing Demetrius has not endeared him to Rome.

As king, Perseus campaigns, as his father had done, to extend Macedonian power to the northeast and south, extending his influence in Thrace and Illyria.

One of his first acts on becoming king had been to renew the treaty with Rome.

However, he solicits alliances with the Achaean League and other Greek states, which some of the leaders hostile to Rome would like to accept, and makes special efforts to win over the Greek world.

To this end, …

Perseus resumes control of the Delphic Amphictyony, …

…establishes excellent relations with Rhodes, and …

…encourages revolution in Aetolia and …

…Thessaly.

Rome’s real work in Hispania is done by Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus from 179 to 178, during which years he has conquered thirty cities and villages.

He has taken some by sheer force and others by exploiting rivalries between the Celtiberians and the Vascones to the north.

His alliances with the Vascones would facilitate the Roman domination of Celtiberia.

By this time, some of the Basque cities and villages may have already been subject to Rome, but at any rate a significant number of Basque holdings come into the Roman Empire voluntarily through alliance.

Tiberius Sempronius Graccus founds a new city named Gracurris on top of the existing city of Ilurcís (probably the modern-day Alfaro in La Rioja or Corella in Navarre).

Built of standard Roman construction, it appears to have housed several disorganized Celtiberian groups.

The city would have been founded in roughly 179 BCE according to references in later writings.

The foundation of this city marks the end of the Celtiberian civilization and the consolidation of Roman influence in the area.

Graccuris will prove to be situated in the middle of a region, roughly corresponding to the modern Ebro River Valley, that will be hotly contested between the Celtiberians and Vascones.

Tiberius Sempronius Graccus is probably responsible for the majority of the treaties signed with the two groups.

The treaties generally establish a tribute from the surrounding cities to be paid in silver or other products of the earth.

Each city has to supply a predetermined amount of men for the army, and only a select few cities have the right to issue currency.

Yet the inhabitants of cities subdued by force are almost never tribute-paying subjects: when they offer resistance to the Romans and are defeated, they are sold as slaves.

Those who surrender before an outright conquest are recognized as citizens of their respective cities but are denied Roman citizenship.

When cities subjugate themselves freely, the inhabitants become citizens, and the cities retain their municipal autonomy and, at times, are exempt from taxes.