WHAT HAPPENED IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE 3. CENTURY
Find out what all happened in the first half of the 3. century

The Romans, led by Gaius Flaminius, are ambushed and defeated by Hannibal at the Battle of Lake Trasimene. (21. June 217. BC)

Battle of Raphia: Ptolemy IV Philopator of Egypt defeats Antiochus III the Great of the Seleucid kingdom. (22. June 217. BC)

Roman Emperor Elagabalus adopts his cousin Alexander Severus as his heir and receives the title of Caesar. (26. June 221)

Cao Pi dies after an illness; his son Cao Rui succeeds him as emperor of the Kingdom of Wei. (29. June 226)

Pope Pontian succeeds Urban I as the eighteenth pope. (21. July 230)

The Praetorian Guard storm the palace and capture Pupienus and Balbinus. They are dragged through the streets of Rome and executed. On the same day, Gordian III, age 13, is proclaimed emperor. (29. July 238)

Second Punic War: Battle of Cannae – The Carthaginian army led by Hannibal defeats a numerically superior Roman army under command of consuls Lucius Aemilius Paullus and Gaius Terentius Varro. (2. August 216. BC)

Pope Pontian resigns. He and Hippolytus, church leader of Rome, are exiled to the mines of Sardinia. (28. September 235)

Pope Callixtus I is killed by a mob in Rome's Trastevere after a 5-year reign in which he had stabilized the Saturday fast three times per year, with no food, oil, or wine to be consumed on those days. Callixtus is succeeded by cardinal Urban I. (14. October 222)

Second Punic War: At the Battle of Zama, Roman legions under Scipio Africanus defeat Hannibal Barca, leader of the army defending Carthage. (19. October 202. BC)

Pope Anterus succeeds Pontian as the nineteenth pope. During the persecutions of emperor Maximinus Thrax he is martyred. (21. November 235)

Cao Pi forces Emperor Xian of Han to abdicate the Han Dynasty throne. The Cao Wei empire is established. The Three Kingdoms period begins. (11. December 220)

Second Punic War: Battle of the Trebia – Hannibal's Carthaginian forces defeat those of the Roman Republic. (18. December 218. BC)

Publius Septimius Geta, co-emperor of Rome, is lured to come without his bodyguards to meet his brother Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (Caracalla), to discuss a possible reconciliation. When he arrives, the Praetorian Guard murders him and he dies in the arms of his mother, Julia Domna. (19. December 211)

The papacy of Zephyrinus ends. Callixtus I is elected as the sixteenth pope, but is opposed by the theologian Hippolytus who accuses him of laxity and of being a Modalist, one who denies any distinction between the three persons of the Trinity. (20. December 217)