The Romans establish the port colony of Narbo Martius (modern Narbonne), eight miles (thirteenkilometers) from the Mediterranean Sea, as the capital of Gallia Narbonensis in 118.

Located on the Via Domitia, the first Roman road in Gaul, built at the time of the foundation of the colony, and connecting Italy to Spain, Narbonne is therefore located at a very important crossroads because it is situated where the Via Domitia connects to the Via Aquitania, which leads toward the Atlantic through Toulouse and Bordeaux.

In addition, it is crossed by the Aude River.

Gaius Julius Caesar ends his consulship in Rome in 58 BCE.

Due to the costs of consulship, Caesar is still deeply in debt, and there is money to be made as a governor, whether by extortion or by military adventurism.

Having secured the governorship of both Cisalpine Gaul and Transalpine Gaul, Caesar initially has four veteran legions under his direct command: Legio VII, Legio VIII, Legio IX Hispana, and Legio X.

As he had been governor of Hispania Ulterior in 61 BCE and had campaigned successfully with them against the Lusitanians, Caesar knows personally most (perhaps even all) of these legions.

Caesar also has the legal authority to levy additional legions and auxiliary units as he sees fit.

His ambition is to conquer and plunder some territories to get himself out of debt, and it is likely Gaul was not his initial target, but that he was instead planning a campaign against the kingdom of Dacia located in the Balkans.

The nations of Gaul are civilized and wealthy.

Most have contact with Roman merchants and some, particularly those that are governed by Republics such as the Aedui and Helvetii, have enjoyed stable political alliances with Rome in the past.

Two of Caesar’s provinces border on unconquered territory, and parts of Gaul are known to be unstable.

Some of Rome's Gallic allies have been defeated by their rivals, with the help of a contingent of Germanic tribes.

The Romans fear these tribes are preparing to migrate south, closer to Italy, and that they have warlike intent.

The threat of invasion by the Helvetii, a German-Celtic tribe from the area that is now Switzerland, gives Caesar a pretext to advance his career through war.

His personal ambitions extending far beyond his proconsulship of Cisalpine and Transalpine Gaul, Caesar goes to war in Gaul, ostensibly to protect the Roman republic's Mediterranean holdings.

Narbo (modern Narbonne) had been established in Gaul in 118 BCE, as Colonia Narbo Martius.

Located on the Via Domitia, the first Roman road in Gaul, built at the time of the foundation of the colony, and connecting Italy to Spain, Narbonne is therefore located at a very important crossroads because it is situated where the Via Domitia connects to the Via Aquitania, which leads toward the Atlantic across Toulouse and Bordeaux.

In addition, it is crossed by the Aude River.

Politically, Narbonne has gained importance as a competitor to Marseille.

Julius Caesar settles veterans from his Tenth Legion there (while those of the Thirteenth are given somewhat better lands in Italia itself) and attempts to develop its port while Marseille was revolting against Roman control.

Later, the provincia of southern Gaul would be named "Gallia Narbonensis", after the city, and Narbonne would become its capital.

Seat of a powerful administration, the city will enjoy economic and architectural expansion and become a prosperous port (though it is today located about fifteen kilometers from the shores of the Mediterranean Sea).

Six of the eight volumes of the encyclopedia on medicine known as De Medicina describe various diseases and discuss therapy using diet, drugs, and manipulation.

Authored by Aulus Cornelius Celsus, a Roman of patrician lineage who flourishes from 10 to 37, the remaining two books deal with surgical topics, including operations for bladder stone, goiter, and hernia, as well as describing tonsillectomy and the removal of eye cataracts.

Celsus also recommends the use of splints and starch-stiffened bandages to treat fractures.

Nothing is known about the life of Celsus.

Even his praenomen is uncertain; he has been called both Aurelius and Aulus, with the latter being more plausible.

Some incidental expressions in his De Medicina suggest that he lived under the reigns of Augustus and Tiberius; which is confirmed by his reference to the eminent physician Themison of Laodicea as being recently in his old age.

It is not known with any certainty where he lived.

He has been identified as the possible dedicator of a gravestone in Rome, but it has also been supposed that he lived in Narbonese Gaul, because he refers to a species of vine (marcum) which, according to Pliny, is native to that region.

It is doubtful whether he practiced medicine himself, and although Celsus seems to describe and recommend his own medical observations sanctioned by experience, Quintilian says that his volumes included all sorts of literary matters, and even agriculture and military tactics.

The Visigoths move into the south of Gaul, led by king Ataulf, who establishes his residence at Narbonne and makes an alliance with emperor Honorius against the usurper Jovinus.

…the flourishing port of Narbonne.

Honorius's general Constantius, evidently an admirer of Galla Placidia, had bargained with Ataulf for the return of the princess.

Due to the rebellion of Heraclianus, however, the Romans were unable to fulfill their part of the bargain, the supply of corn to Ataulf’s troops.

After the heads of Sebastianus and Jovinus arrived at Honorius' court in Ravenna in late August, relations between Ataulf and Honorius improved sufficiently for Ataulf to cement them by marrying his royal hostage, apparently with her willing consent, perhaps at Narbo in early 414, but Jordanes says he married her in Italy, at Forlì (Forum Livii).

The nuptials are celebrated with high Roman festivities and magnificent gifts from the Gothic booty.

Priscus Attalus gives the wedding speech, a classical epithalamium.

Constantius, having eliminated several usurpers in Gaul, confined the Goths in Aquitania, and reorganized the administration (the Gallic assembly of 418), is unable to expel the Franks, the Alemanni, and the Burgundians, who have occupied the northern part of the country, nor to eliminate the brigandage of the Bagaudae (gangs of fugitive peasants).

Avitus, the future Western Roman Emperor, was born in Clermont, to a family of the Galllo-Roman nobility.

His father was possibly Flavius Julius Agricola, consul in 421.

Avitus had followed a course of study typical for a young man of his rank, including law.

Before 421, he had been sent to the powerful patricius Flavius Constantius (briefly Emperor in 421), to ask for a tax reduction for his own country.

This embassy was successful.

A relative of his, Theodorus, had been hostage at the court of the King of Visigoths, Theodoric I: in 425/426 Avitus had gone and met him, thus meeting the King, who had let Avitus enter his own court.

Avitus had then started a military career, serving under the magister militum Flavius Aetius in his campaign against the Juthungi and the Norics (430–431) and also against the Burgundians (436).

Because the Romans had had to fight against the Franks, who had plundered Cologne and Trier in 435, and because of other events, Theodoric I, King of the Visigoths, sees the chance to conquer Narbo Martius (in 436) to obtain access to the Mediterranean Sea and the roads to the Pyrenees.

Through Litorius, Avitus obliges Theodoric to lift the siege of Narbonne.