Augustus dominates Rome's first century, and this episode traces how an unremarkable teenager became the empire's first emperor. Adopted by his great-uncle Julius Caesar, he inherits both a name and a target after Caesar's assassination, then allies with Mark Antony to hunt down their enemies and split the empire between them. The partnership collapses when Antony takes up with Cleopatra in Egypt; Augustus strikes first, destroys the Egyptian fleet, and watches both die by suicide. Back in Rome he consolidates power through popular acclaim rather than open tyranny, expanding the empire abroad while managing politics carefully at home. The film lingers on his contradictions: a public moral conservative who banishes his own daughter Julia for her affairs and exiles the poet Ovid for indecent verse, while his private household tells a messier story. He rules more than forty years, survives plots and mutinies, and is declared a god at death, setting the template every later emperor is measured against.