Year of the Six Emperors
E399580
The Year of the Six Emperors was a tumultuous period in 238 AD when rapid successions and overlapping claims to the Roman imperial throne led to extreme political instability in the empire.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Year of the Six Emperors canonical | 4 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T3932287 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Year of the Six Emperors Context triple: [Gordian III, cameToPowerDuring, Year of the Six Emperors]
-
A.
Year of the Five Emperors
The Year of the Five Emperors was a tumultuous period of civil war and rapid imperial succession in 193 AD that ultimately paved the way for the rise of the Severan dynasty in the Roman Empire.
-
B.
Year of the Four Emperors
The Year of the Four Emperors was a tumultuous period of civil war in 69 AD during which four different men successively claimed the Roman imperial throne before stability was restored under Vespasian.
-
C.
Crisis of the Third Century
The Crisis of the Third Century was a period of severe political instability, military upheaval, economic collapse, and external invasion that nearly caused the disintegration of the Roman Empire between roughly 235 and 284 CE.
-
D.
Constantinian civil war
The Constantinian civil war was a series of early 4th-century conflicts within the Roman Empire that culminated in Constantine the Great’s victory over rival emperors and the consolidation of his sole rule.
-
E.
Rise and fall of Elagabalus
The rise and fall of Elagabalus refers to the brief, tumultuous reign and dramatic downfall of the teenage Roman emperor Elagabalus, whose controversial religious reforms and eccentric behavior destabilized the Severan dynasty.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Year of the Six Emperors Target entity description: The Year of the Six Emperors was a tumultuous period in 238 AD when rapid successions and overlapping claims to the Roman imperial throne led to extreme political instability in the empire.
-
A.
Year of the Five Emperors
The Year of the Five Emperors was a tumultuous period of civil war and rapid imperial succession in 193 AD that ultimately paved the way for the rise of the Severan dynasty in the Roman Empire.
-
B.
Year of the Four Emperors
The Year of the Four Emperors was a tumultuous period of civil war in 69 AD during which four different men successively claimed the Roman imperial throne before stability was restored under Vespasian.
-
C.
Crisis of the Third Century
The Crisis of the Third Century was a period of severe political instability, military upheaval, economic collapse, and external invasion that nearly caused the disintegration of the Roman Empire between roughly 235 and 284 CE.
-
D.
Constantinian civil war
The Constantinian civil war was a series of early 4th-century conflicts within the Roman Empire that culminated in Constantine the Great’s victory over rival emperors and the consolidation of his sole rule.
-
E.
Rise and fall of Elagabalus
The rise and fall of Elagabalus refers to the brief, tumultuous reign and dramatic downfall of the teenage Roman emperor Elagabalus, whose controversial religious reforms and eccentric behavior destabilized the Severan dynasty.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (49)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
historical period
ⓘ
political crisis ⓘ |
| alsoKnownAs | annus sex imperatorum ⓘ |
| cause |
military unrest
ⓘ
provincial revolts ⓘ senatorial opposition to Maximinus Thrax ⓘ |
| characterizedBy |
conflict between Senate and army
ⓘ
extreme political instability ⓘ overlapping imperial claims ⓘ rapid succession of emperors ⓘ |
| country | Roman Empire ⓘ |
| endTime | 238-12-31 ⓘ |
| followedBy | reign of Gordian III ⓘ |
| follows |
Crisis of the Third Century
ⓘ
surface form:
Crisis of 235–238
reign of Severus Alexander ⓘ |
| hasConsequence |
further destabilization of the Roman Empire
ⓘ
increased influence of the Praetorian Guard ⓘ weakening of central imperial authority ⓘ |
| hasEmperor |
Balbinus
ⓘ
Gordian I ⓘ Gordian II ⓘ Emperor Gordian III ⓘ
surface form:
Gordian III
Maximinus Thrax ⓘ Pupienus ⓘ |
| hasPart |
reign of Balbinus
ⓘ
Gordian I ⓘ
surface form:
reign of Gordian I
reign of Gordian II ⓘ reign of Gordian III ⓘ reign of Maximinus Thrax ⓘ reign of Pupienus ⓘ |
| languageOfName | Latin ⓘ |
| location |
Africa Proconsularis
ⓘ
Capitolium ⓘ
surface form:
Capitol in Rome
Germania ⓘ Rome ⓘ |
| numberOfEmperors | 6 ⓘ |
| partOf | Crisis of the Third Century ⓘ |
| pointInTime | 238 ⓘ |
| significantEvent |
assassination of Maximinus Thrax by his own troops
ⓘ
defeat and death of Gordian II at Carthage ⓘ election of Pupienus and Balbinus by the Senate ⓘ elevation of Gordian III as sole emperor ⓘ lynching of Pupienus and Balbinus by the Praetorian Guard ⓘ proclamation of Gordian I and Gordian II as co-emperors ⓘ revolt in Africa against Maximinus Thrax ⓘ siege of Aquileia by Maximinus Thrax ⓘ suicide of Gordian I ⓘ |
| startTime | 238-01-01 ⓘ |
| temporalLocation | 3rd century ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Year of the Six Emperors Description of subject: The Year of the Six Emperors was a tumultuous period in 238 AD when rapid successions and overlapping claims to the Roman imperial throne led to extreme political instability in the empire.
Referenced by (4)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
subject surface form:
Gordian III