On January 25, 98 AD, Roman Emperor Trajan took the Imperial throne upon the death of his predecessor, Emperor Nerva. Trajan would come to be known by the Romans as a kind and philanthropic ruler. However, several years into his reign he began a written correspondence with Pliny, a governor from the eastern reaches of the Empire. In his letters, Pliny asked Trajan for advice on how to discipline Christians. Pliny had been executing Christians for charges including atheism, incest, and cannibalism (common Roman misunderstandings of Christian teachings on monotheism, love, and communion, respectively), but acknowledged to Trajan that he actually found the Christians to be quite harmless. Trajan encouraged Pliny to continue the executions regardless. Their correspondence marks the first evidence that the Roman government considered Christianity to be a religion distinct from Judaism, and set the precedent for the following centuries of Roman persecution of Christians. (Image: marble bust of Emperor Trajan)
