Romans in sub-Saharan Africa
The eastern Sahara expedition was promoted by the emperor Nero, to discover the sources of the Nile River. Seneca wrote that around 62 CE, Nero sent legionaries to the city of Meroe in Nubia in order to explore all the Nile southward from that capital. Another expedition was recorded by Plinius the Elder in 68 CE. This expedition resulted in the first Europeans to reach the interior of equatorial Africa. It probably lasted several months, bypassed the Sudanese swamps and possibly reached the northern portion of present-day Uganda.