Widely considered one of the strongest of the ancient empires to grace Earth, the Roman Empire stood for over one thousand years. Through its humble beginnings along the Tiber river, Rome expanded through near-perpetual aggression to become the dominant force throughout the Mediterranean, Europe, Northern Africa, and the Near East for almost a millennia. As the empire aged, thought, so too did it’s center of focus change. Once rich and prosperous, the Western Roman Empire, and the city of Rome itself, eventually became useful only as a namesake, their wealth and prestige long gone, and with them, the power of the Western Empire. Meanwhile, Rome, as a whole, shifted it’s focus to the prosperous east, which had continued to flourish despite the continued economic struggles of the Empire. At this time, Constantine I creating a new capital at Byzantium, renaming the city to Constantinople. Once Constantinople was established as the center of the empire, the west was mostly forgotten, both by the people and the emperor. The majority of Rome’s Citizens and wealth now hailed from the east, so the western empire was soon treated as an aside by the Eastern Empire and slowly fell into further decline. Many Historians would name a specific event or chain of events that spelled the end for the western half of the Roman empire, but I would argue that the Western Roman Empire did not suddenly collapse because of any one event, rather, it slowly fell over the course of several decades as a result of a multitude of failures. No one body was entirely responsible for Rome’s collapse, instead a combination of a decaying political structure, infighting, a continuously weakened economy, and consistent assaults by germanic tribes eventually caused the ...
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...hyperinflation after the unfortunate period between the Severan Dynasty and the Crisis of the 3rd Century. On top of this, the West desperately needed a standing army at all times to defend against enemies on virtually all sides, enemies that would happily see the Empire crumble. To pay for it’s already volatile standing army, Western Rome was forced to increase taxes on an already tax-burdened population that simply did not have the money for. In unison with the perpetual siege by the germanic tribes, the Western Roman Empire’s sever lacking of stable and strong leaders caused not only losses against the germanic tribes, but civil wars to break out on a regular basis. Combining all of these factors together, you can clearly see that Western Rome had entered a spiral, a spiral that it could not escape from, a spiral that slowly whittled Western Rome out of existence.
The year is 476 A.D. and the Roman Empire has collapsed after being overthrown by barbarians. Looking back, the causes of Rome’s decline can be separated into four categories, social, economic, military, and political. The social aspects of Rome’s fall are the rise of christianity and civil wars. The rise of christianity displaced Rome’s polytheistic roots which viewed the emperor as having a godly status. Pope and church leaders took an increased role in political affairs which further complicated governance. Civil wars also deteriorated the empire. More than 20 men took the throne in only 75 years and the empire was thrust into chaos. The economic aspects of Rome’s fall were high taxes from the government and labor deficit. The roman empire
The economics of the Roman Empire soon hit rock bottom due to the high taxation to support the army. Gold was also eroding since Rome was no longer bringing new resources through the expansion. Emperors then tried to mint coins out of silver and copper instead and the end result was inflation and dramatic rises in Noochintra 2 prices on goods. There were many things that brought Rome to its downfall, but the biggest one was the violence and the ruthless ambition of men such as Marius, Sulla, and of course Julius Caesar. That ultimately destroyed the Roman republic.
There are many reasons for the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the fifth century. A major reason was the political corruption and the instabilities of the government. The last ruling emperor of a united Roman Empire was Theodosius I. At his death in 395, he divided the empire leaving the east to his son Arcadius and the west to his other son Honorius. Constantinople and the Eastern Roman empire remained strong while...
Rome was once one of the world's greatest empire until around 200 BCE when Rome started to crumble. The Fall of Rome did not happen suddenly, it took about 1100 years to take place. The first two centuries as an empire were named the "Pax Romana", which meant the time of Roman peace. The Romans were living the life, without a worry in the world. So how and why did Rome start to collapse, if the empire was was doing so grand and magnificent? To answer that question, the primary reasons that Rome started to decline were that the Romans had difficulty with their government which caused social problems/decay, their military was falling behind on their duties and became indolent, and natural disasters.
The Romans were on one of the greatest people of all. They had power, wealth, and even a half of the world. They built one of the strongest and vast empire that world has ever seen. They came from nothing to something awesome. It started of as a city and ended up being one of the greatest empire of all. This essay is going to focus on the Roman Empire from the rise to the fall and the government, architecture, mythology, Family Structure, and Food of the Romans.
What could the Western Roman Empire have done differently to delay or prevent its collapse? (1800-2000 words)
One of the main reasons of the collapse of the Roman Empire was the over expenditure on the military to constantly fund wars abroad. In order for the Romans to invade and conquer other provinces they had to spend heavily on their legions. The Roman armies and supply lines became over-stretched resulting in thousands of soldiers being recruited and deployed from Rome into other territories as invaders or defenders. They also depended on soldiers to defend the borders of the lands they had conquered from barbarian attacks which resulted in the increased manufacturing of weapons and more money being spent on soldiers. High military spending left the Romans with very limited resources for other essential government projects such as the building of more public houses and the development of roads and aqueducts as well as leading to inflation. The over-expenditure on the military led th...
For a long period of time, Rome seemed like an unstoppable empire. It conquered the majority of the land surrounding it, including Greece, Turkey, Iraq, and many of its other neighboring countries. It seemed as though Rome would conquer the entire world, as it was the center of it, until it began to decline in 476 C.E. The very aspects that made it so successful were the ones that caused its collapse. Various political, religious, and economic reasons caused its downfall. The fact that the entire economy of Rome collapsed and money became worthless was a major reason for the empire’s collapse. In addition, the loss of a common religion and lack of efficient ruling in relation to its vast territory affected the empire. The Roman Empire did not become so successful in a short period of time, and so its decline did not just happen overnight. Over several years all of these different aspects together caused the fall of the Roman Empire.
The Fall Of The Roman Empire Rome was one of the biggest, most powerful empires in recorded history. Such an empire could not fall due to one factor alone in a short period of time. It was a slow process of decay. Many factors would influence the toppling of this Empire, such as social gaps, religion, economical troubles, and corruption in politics. Among all of these factors, one of the most obvious and major causes was the crumbling of one most powerful military forces in history, The Roman army.
The Roman Empire was incredibly large and successful. In the prime of the empire population reached up to 56.8 million people. The land they conquered amasses to an outrageous 1 million square miles. Their influence is so great that even now people can see their imprint in architecture, law, and even helping spread Christianity, the world’s most populous religion. These amazing facts also begs a question. How did one of the world’s greatest civilization fall? Well, the fall of Roman Empire in 476 ACE was aided by ineffective rulers, the crumbling economy, and the invasion of the Germanic Tribes.
The fall of the Western Roman Empire was due to four major reasons, one of which was political. The emperors of Rome became so through inheritance or adoption, the vast majority of said emperors were terribly unfit to rule. This caused the empire to be very unstable as assassination and people revolting were commonplace, trust was hard to come by and long term or vaguely competent emperors were even more scarce. Inheriting or gaining the throne was incredibly dangerous as the Praetorian guards were often corrupt and would be paid to assassinate the emperor for more political and financial power, despite this short lasting terms there was no system put in place to substitute or exchange a dead emperor. Because of this instability, civil wars were thriving within the Western Roman Empire, due to their terrible living conditions, inflated taxes, and overall flimsiness of the government.
The decline and fall of the Roman Empire is a scholarly article written by Justin Ott about the Roman Empire and the events leading up to its fall. The article mostly focuses on the military and economy of Rome in the third century A.D. It lists in the beginning a few of the different theories people have of how Rome fell, including led poisoning and the spread of Christianity. The article seems to want to disprove these theories, showing how they are not the main causes for the collapse of Rome. “Gibbon’s arguments in these sections can be accurately summarized as “the insensible penetration of Christianity in the empire fatally undermined the genius of a great people.” The problem with this conclusion is two-fold. First of all, this explanation is too narrow as it is difficult to believe one single factor brought down the empire. More importantly, it is clear that the Eastern Roman Empire was by far more Christian than the West, therefore if Christianity was behind the fall, the East should have fallen first.” The article’s audience appears to be historians, or those who are interested in history, or just the Roman Empire. It
Rome's vast empire lasted for an amazing one thousand-year reign. Half of it referred to as the republic, and the other as the empire. However, after its fall in 5oo-a.d. Rome has still remained in existence through its strong culture, architecture, literature, and even religion (Spielvogel 175). Even after its disappearance as a nation Rome left behind a legacy that will never be forgotten. Its ideals and traditions have been immolated, and adopted for over two thousand years. Whether, it is through its language of Latin, its influence of religion, or its amazing architectural ability Rome has influenced almost every culture following its demise. The heritage of Rome has been passed down through three different channels; one is through the eastern Roman Empire; through the Roman Catholic Church, and consciously by any and every one who has been in touch with Roman Culture (Hadas 157).
One of the most common causes of the decline of an empire results from having weak military power and martial spirit. In order for an empire to be successful, that empire must present a strong will to fight or sacrifice property and life in order to defend its state. If an empire does not possess this characteristic, it often will quickly diminish. For example, the Roman Empire became successful because of the willingness of the males to defend the state. Shortly after, the males lost their willingness to defend and the empire had to recruit unreliable mercenaries to fight in war. Unlike the successful army of the past, these mercenaries did not have true loyalty to Rome. Because of constant warfare, the Romans had heavy military spending. The Roman Empire had become too large to control effortlessly. Families and soldiers in parts of the Roman Empire adopted local customs. The Roman Empire was made up not only of natives from the Italian peninsula, but it was also made up of barbarians from the conquered lands. The barbarians were very knowledgeable when it came to Roman warfare and military tactics. Corruption became widespread throughout the Em...
As the Roman Empire shifted its center of power to the East, Rome lost much of the prestige and protection it had previously enjoyed. With Constantinople as the new seat of the empire, the West was left to stand alone, often defenseless.4 Barbarians attacked Rome in AD 410, and Rome found little help from Constantinople. With the Western Empire essentially abandoned, disease, poverty and instability were rampant. Many structures had fallen into disrepair, and famine ravaged the land. Most government officials had left Rome, leaving the churc...