The Thessalonians receive the first of Paul's epistles - the earliest text in the New Testament, written in Greek

A working week of seven days is adopted in Rome, based on the seven known planets (whose names provide the days)

Tribes speaking Finno-Ugric languages are by now settled around the northeast of the Baltic, in modern Estonia and Finland

The 16-year-old Nero is proclaimed emperor by the praetorian guards after the death of Claudius, supposedly poisoned by toadstools

St Peter, believed to have come to Rome as leader of the Christian community, is subsequently considered the first pope

St Paul arrives in Rome a prisoner, but then spends two years freely preaching Christianity

Boudicca launches a devastating attack on Roman soldiers and settlers, destroying their headquarters at Colchester

A great fire in Rome is popularly believed to have been started by Nero, whom legend also accuses of fiddling while the city burns

Early Christian tradition states that both Peter and Paul meet death in Rome as martyrs, possibly as a result of the fire of AD 64

Nero comes to Athens to give some of his officially celebrated performances at the Greek games

A rebellion in Spain prompts such chaos that Rome has four emperors within a year, after the suicide of Nero in 68

Vespasian, proclaimed emperor by his troops in Alexandria, is the survivor among this year's four emperors

Agricola, appointed Roman governor of Britain in AD 77, establishes Chester as a stronghold from which to control the Welsh tribes

Titus becomes emperor on the death of his father, Vespasian, and begins a brief two-year reign of lavish public generosity

A sudden eruption of Vesuvius buries the town of Pompeii in volcanic ash, in places twelve feet deep

The Colosseum is inaugurated by the emperor Titus with games lasting 100 days, in which some 9000 large animals are killed

Dying after a reign of only two years, Titus is succeeded on the imperial throne by his brother, Domitian

Agricola defeats the tribes of Scotland at an unidentified place called Mons Graupius, probably almost as far north as Aberdeen

Tacitus begins his career with two specialized but influential works of history, one on Britain and the other on Germany

Trajan, succeeding to the imperial throne in AD 98, is sufficiently confident to spend a year in Germany before returning to Rome

A cult develops in Rome of the Egyptian goddess Isis, credited with restoring to life her hushand, Osiris, after he has been hacked to pieces

Sculptors in the Roman empire develop the most brutally realistic convention in the history of portraiture

A bridge is built over the river Tagus at Alcántara and stands today as a fine example of Roman technology

After two campaigns by Trajan the rich region of Dacia (today's Romania) is brought under Rome's control

Hadrian, governing Syria when he is declared emperor, is confident enough to delay almost a year before returning to Rome