8 Reasons
Why Rome Fell
Find out why one of history's most legendary empires finally
came crashing down.
- EVAN ANDREWS
- UPDATED:
JAN 29,
2019
ORIGINAL:
JAN 14,
2014
1.
Invasions by Barbarian tribes
The most straightforward theory for
Western Rome’s collapse pins the fall on a string of
military losses sustained against outside forces. Rome had tangled with
Germanic tribes for centuries, but by the 300s “barbarian” groups like the
Goths had encroached beyond the Empire’s borders. The Romans weathered a
Germanic uprising in the late fourth century, but in 410 the Visigoth King
Alaric successfully sacked the city of Rome. The Empire spent the next several
decades under constant threat before “the Eternal City” was raided again in
455, this time by the Vandals. Finally, in 476, the Germanic leader Odoacer staged
a revolt and deposed the Emperor Romulus Augustulus. From then on, no Roman
emperor would ever again rule from a post in Italy, leading many to cite 476 as
the year the Western Empire suffered its deathblow.
2. Economic troubles and overreliance on slave
labor
Even as Rome was under attack from outside
forces, it was also crumbling from within thanks to a severe financial crisis.
Constant wars and overspending had significantly lightened imperial coffers,
and oppressive taxation and inflation had widened the gap between rich and
poor. In the hope of avoiding the taxman, many members of the wealthy classes
had even fled to the countryside and set up independent fiefdoms. At the same
time, the empire was rocked by a labor deficit. Rome’s economy depended on
slaves to till its fields and work as craftsmen, and its military might had
traditionally provided a fresh influx of conquered peoples to put to work. But
when expansion ground to a halt in the second century, Rome’s supply of slaves
and other war treasures began to dry up. A further blow came in the fifth
century, when the Vandals claimed North Africa and began disrupting the
empire’s trade by prowling the Mediterranean as pirates. With its economy
faltering and its commercial and agricultural production in decline, the Empire
began to lose its grip on Europe.
3. The rise of the Eastern Empire
The fate of Western Rome was partially sealed
in the late third century, when the Emperor Diocletian divided the Empire into
two halves—the Western Empire seated in the city of Milan, and the Eastern
Empire in Byzantium, later known as Constantinople. The division made the
empire more easily governable in the short term, but over time the two halves
drifted apart. East and West failed to adequately work together to combat
outside threats, and the two often squabbled over resources and military aid.
As the gulf widened, the largely Greek-speaking Eastern Empire grew in wealth
while the Latin-speaking West descended into economic crisis. Most importantly,
the strength of the Eastern Empire served to divert Barbarian invasions to the
West. Emperors like Constantine ensured that the city of Constantinople was
fortified and well guarded, but Italy and the city of Rome—which only had
symbolic value for many in the East—were left vulnerable. The Western political
structure would finally disintegrate in the fifth century, but the Eastern
Empire endured in some form for another thousand years before being overwhelmed
by the Ottoman Empire in the 1400s.
4. Overexpansion and military overspending
At its height, the Roman Empire stretched from the Atlantic Ocean all the way to the
Euphrates River in the Middle East, but its grandeur may have also been its
downfall. With such a vast territory to govern, the empire faced an
administrative and logistical nightmare. Even with their excellent road systems,
the Romans were unable to communicate quickly or effectively enough to manage
their holdings. Rome struggled to marshal enough troops and resources to defend
its frontiers from local rebellions and outside attacks, and by the second
century the Emperor Hadrian was forced to build his famous wall in Britain just
to keep the enemy at bay. As more and more funds were funneled into the
military upkeep of the empire, technological advancement slowed and Rome’s
civil infrastructure fell into disrepair.
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5. Government corruption and political
instability
If Rome’s sheer size made it difficult to
govern, ineffective and inconsistent leadership only served to magnify the
problem. Being the Roman emperor had always been a particularly dangerous job,
but during the tumultuous second and third centuries it nearly became a death
sentence. Civil war thrust the empire into chaos, and more than 20 men took the
throne in the span of only 75 years, usually after the murder of their
predecessor. The Praetorian Guard—the emperor’s personal
bodyguards—assassinated and installed new sovereigns at will, and once even
auctioned the spot off to the highest bidder. The political rot also extended
to the Roman Senate, which failed to temper the excesses of the emperors due to
its own widespread corruption and incompetence. As the situation worsened,
civic pride waned and many Roman citizens lost trust in their leadership.
6. The arrival of the Huns and the migration
of the Barbarian tribes
The Barbarian attacks on Rome partially
stemmed from a mass migration caused by the Huns’ invasion of Europe in the
late fourth century. When these Eurasian warriors rampaged through northern
Europe, they drove many Germanic tribes to the borders of the Roman Empire. The
Romans grudgingly allowed members of the Visigoth tribe to cross south of the Danube and
into the safety of Roman territory, but they treated them with extreme cruelty.
According to the historian Ammianus Marcellinus, Roman officials even forced
the starving Goths to trade their children into slavery in exchange for dog
meat. In brutalizing the Goths, the Romans created a dangerous enemy within
their own borders. When the oppression became too much to bear, the Goths rose
up in revolt and eventually routed a Roman army and killed the Eastern Emperor
Valens during the Battle of Adrianople in A.D. 378. The shocked Romans
negotiated a flimsy peace with the barbarians, but the truce unraveled in 410,
when the Goth King Alaric moved west and sacked Rome. With the Western Empire
weakened, Germanic tribes like the Vandals and the Saxons were able to surge
across its borders and occupy Britain, Spain and North Africa.
7. Christianity and the loss of traditional
values
The decline of Rome dovetailed with the spread
of Christianity, and some have argued that the rise of a new faith helped
contribute to the empire’s fall. The Edict of Milan legalized Christianity in
313, and it later became the state religion in 380. These decrees ended
centuries of persecution, but they may have also eroded the traditional Roman
values system. Christianity displaced the polytheistic Roman religion, which
viewed the emperor as having a divine status, and also shifted focus away from
the glory of the state and onto a sole deity. Meanwhile, popes and other church
leaders took an increased role in political affairs, further complicating
governance. The 18th-century historian Edward Gibbon was the most famous
proponent of this theory, but his take has since been widely criticized. While
the spread of Christianity may have played a small role in curbing Roman civic
virtue, most scholars now argue that its influence paled in comparison to
military, economic and administrative factors.
8. Weakening of the Roman legions
For most of its history, Rome’s military was
the envy of the ancient world. But during the decline, the makeup of the once
mighty legions began to change. Unable to recruit enough soldiers from the
Roman citizenry, emperors like Diocletian and Constantine began hiring foreign
mercenaries to prop up their armies. The ranks of the legions eventually
swelled with Germanic Goths and other barbarians, so much so that Romans began
using the Latin word “barbarus” in place of “soldier.” While these Germanic
soldiers of fortune proved to be fierce warriors, they also had little or no
loyalty to the empire, and their power-hungry officers often turned against
their Roman employers. In fact, many of the barbarians who sacked the city of
Rome and brought down the Western Empire had earned their military stripes
while serving in the Roman legions.
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