>>17749769>>17750736>>17752086Being Roman wasn’t about blood, it was about law, loyalty, and integration. In the Roman world citizenship was not something inherited solely by birth or reserved for a specific ethnic group. It was a legal status, a political identity that could be granted to people from across the empire, regardless of their origin. You didn’t have to be born in Rome or even be ethnically Roman to become Roman. Through service, allegiance, and assimilation, individuals and entire communities could gain Roman citizenship. Soldiers from the provinces, allied leaders, and even former enemies could all become Romans in the eyes of the law. Over time Roman identity expanded to include people from Gaul, Spain, North Africa, the Levant, and beyond.