Scientists determine 75% of Rome's emperors died from violent deaths on ...

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More than 75 percent of the 69 men who ruled the Roman Empire from 63BC to 395AD died from violent deaths - either on the battlefield or they were brutally murdered by conspirators looking to remove them form the throne, scientists have determined.   

The rest, which accounts to just one in four, died of natural causes like sickness or old age. 

Data scientists University of São Paulo's Institute of Mathematical and Computer Sciences (ICMC-USP) in São Carlos determined the 80/20 rule is associated with the deaths of the Roman rulers, as they were more likely to die of unnatural causes.

Analyzing the deaths further, researchers found an emperor was more likely to perish from unnatural causes shortly after taking the thrown and the threat did not decline for 13 years after. 

One such famous death was that endured by Julius Caesar, who reigned from 46BC to 44BC.

Caesar died at age 55 when he was violently stabbed 23 times, in a plot among 40 conspirators on the Ides of March. 

However, other well-known emperors like Augustus (Caesar's adopted son) at age 75 of natural causes and Marcus Aurelius died at 55 years years old from a hemorrhage.

The researches set out to see if the death data was associated with any mathematical patterns, leading them to the 80/20 rule - the probability that a common occurrence happens 80 percent of the time and a rare event is about 20 percent. 

In the case of Roman emperors, the rare event was them dying of natural causes.   

'When we analyzed time to death for each emperor, we found that the risk was high when the emperor took the throne,' data scientist Francisco Rodrigues, a professor at

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