The Roman Empire was one of the largest empires in the world and spanned over fifty-four countries. How did an empire so big and powerful fall apart after all of the work and planning that was put into it? The once powerful Roman Empire fell apart for various reasons, such as the over expansion of land and military overspending which led to inadequate man power to cover all of the frontiers and insufficient funds. Also, the corrupt government system of the empire and the instability of its politics for an empire so large, the government was not fit to control
Invasion of Barbarians, Economic troubles and over reliance on slave labor, the rise of the eastern empire, overexpansion and military overspending, Government corruption and political instability, The arrival of the Huns and the migration of the Barbarian tribes, Christianity and the loss of traditional values. Weakening of the Roman legions, and lead poisoning which is what I think happened because there has been so much proof they had lead pipes which funneled their water, they had lead cups which, and with that much lead they got very sick and had mental diseases and that is one of the reasons it fell but I believe there was one other factor that helped make the Roman empire collapse and that is government corruption because their was so many corrupt king one of them liked to dine with his favorite horse in fancy restaurants, and liked watching mass murders in the colosseum and he later was killed, one of them was greedy and that was the reason the economy fell and it later destroyed itself and those were in my opinion why the Roman empire
One of the reasons for the fall of the Western Roman Empire is political problems within the government. A few reasons the political problems became a big issue is because the Emperors were not fit. They were greedy and cruel. Approximately five fit emperors. To become emperor you needed to inherit it, the emperor could be part of your family or they could adopt you. The emperor was usually assassinated by their own praetorian guard. There was no way of replacing the emperors after this happened. This is one reason the civil war broke out and that legions were fighting legions which ultimately resulted in poor living conditions and high taxes.
The fall of the Western Roman Empire, in the Middle Ages by 476 CE, was also due to geography. According to Document 7.8, the Romans consumed too much amounts of lead and soon had lead poisoning. “They claim the leaders of Rome were killed off by consuming excessive amounts of lead. They argue that since only the wealthy could afford to have lead pipes bring water into their homes and to cook with lead utensils, their death rate was increased considerably” (Doc 7.8). One death cause of the Romans was lead poisoning. Many Romans died from this, which led to the fall of the Western Roman Empire. According to Document 6, nearby barbarians, the Huns, the Visigoths, the Franks, the Anglo-Saxons, the Vandals, and the Northmen,
There were many different causes for the fall of the Roman empire, not just one. The Roman Empire was very strong, but eventually broke down over time for a multitude of reasons. Most of those reasons had to do with changes in Rome’s identity. Some of these changes in Rome’s identity led to the fall of Rome because they were so sudden; only portions of the Roman population were prepared for the change. Other times, citizens got into arguments because they were, in a way, too prepared. For example, some groups had disagreements because they knew things that they should not have known.
In Document A you can clearly see that majority of the Emperors were assassinated. This relates back to the idea of head Romans being corrupt. The Patricians were very greedy for power.This was a poor decision. Instead of improving the people’s lives, they chose to waste their time assassinating emperor after emperor. With a new emperor coming into power frequently, the government was not stable and it was definitely not productive.This could have affected the bad military decisions, and the issues with enforcing drafts. In addition, with assassinations occurring all the time, it would have been easier for other civilizations to invade Rome. Even though Romans looked down on others as uncivilized, by the fall of Western Rome,I feel that they were just as
The Roman Empire, by far, was one of the most influential commonwealth in history. It became a magnet for wonderful culture and bountiful trade; even today we trace back to the Romans when it comes to basic academics and philosophy. Nevertheless with all the glory that the Roman Empire brought, there was bound to be downfall sooner or later. With all of the foreign invasions and migrating of other civilizations into the Empire, there was mass hysteria and struggle when it came to protecting the Romans. Additionally there were extreme issues in finding more military support, and not supporting the other parts of the Empire equally. Finally, the decline of Roman morale and ethics encouraged the behaviour of a normal Roman to go from civil to
In order for Rome to flourish as an Empire there had to be changes made regarding the style of ruling. Pompeius Magnus, Licinius Crassus and Julius Caesar, combined their knowledge to seize power in Rome. Pompey defeated enemies of the oligarchy, including a rebellion in Spain. Crassus was the wealthiest man in Rome by profiting from outlawing Roman citizens and putting prices on their dead or alive heads. He used his wealth to to influence the Senate throughout the urban population. Caesar was a young aristocrat that excelled and offered his political abilities to help Pompey and Crassus. He basically worked as a tool for his two more powerful partners. Crassus was killed while fighting the Parthians in Mesopotamia. Pompey made sure he stayed away from Caesar. Pompey was killed in
During this time as well, Rome was struggling and falling because of severe financial crisis. This event happened because of constant wars,overspending,oppresive taxation and Inflation between rich and poor. From reading, one could also infer that Rome wasn’t at all the powerful country it was projected as. Rome’s economy, depended heavily on slaves. With the halt in the second century, Rome’s supply of slaves along with other war treasures began to dry up.I’d say Rome wasn’t ready for such an economic downfall to happen. Further exposure came in the 5th century, when vandals took full control of North Africa and began disrupting the empire’s trade by sailing the Mediterranean Sea as pirates. At this point with its economy faltering and its local and commercial production in decline, the empire began to lose its grip on
There are many different ideas to be said the main reasons for the fall of Rome. But in the end, there were many things that contributed to Rome’s collapse. Disasters and diseases, Rome’s emperors, and the Roman military were the primary reasons for the fall of Rome.
Rome has an amazing history. Its empire lasted for hundreds of years, and its emperors are still famous to this day. But Rome had a bad side to it. The insane and cruel emperors, slavery, and bloody games made Rome a terrible society.
The most significant internal stress on the Western Roman Empire was that for many years, the Emperor of Rome had been incompetent. Romans had been so unsatisfied with the emperors that the 75 years leading up to the collapse of the empire had been ruled by 20 different emperors (Andrews 1). Many of the emperors in this time period were murdered by the Praetorian Guard, which was founded as the personal bodyguards of the emperor. The main problem that these emperors had was to be too self-indulgent. They spent the wealth of the empire on parties and clothes instead of dispersing it throughout the empire. They also hoarded wealth which contributed to financial crisis (Gill 1). This financial crisis was one of the leading contributors to the fall of Rome because it simply was no longer economically viable. The last major internal factor of the fall of Rome was the collapse of Roman values. The Edict of Milan ceased the persecution of Christians in the Roman empire which greatly increased the number of roman Christians (Andrews 1). The long history of roman militarism was also in decline. Long periods of peace lead to the cessation of strict military practices and the downsizing of the army (Gill 2). The cumulative effect of these stresses was to change the Roman Empire from a vast empire to a shell of what it had been. This was a
There are several dates that are said to be the time when the collapse of Rome occurred. These dates include 565 A.D., 410 A.D., and 330 A.D. Some say that Justinian and his death marked the time when Rome actually collapsed. Some of the downfalls that will be mentioned in this paper were, high taxes and bankruptcy of the empire. After these economic problems the Western Empire will never recover to what it was.
There is no shortage of explanations for the fall of the Roman Empire: Christianity and the loss of traditional values, the rise of the Eastern Empire, government corruption and political instability as well as overexpansion and military overspending have been identified as the chief cause of Rome’s destruction. The Roman military was the glue which held the empire together. The Romans could never have created their vast empire without a strong army. From the middle of the third century and onward this essential component to the success and stability of the empire slowly withered away. The declining quality of the military paired with the poor imperial strategy left the empire vulnerable to increasing barbarian attacks. However, the crumbling economic structure which was in financial peril was the chief factor in the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Furthermore, the exact date the Empire’s fall cannot be identified since Rome
The fall of Rome is question that needs to be answered by everyone or what really caused the fall of Rome. There are many reasons as to why Rome fell but everyone owns their own opinion as to why Rome fell. Today we were given three authors that investigated their own view on how Rome. Walter Goffart believes that more of a transformation of Rome happened because even though wars happened, it didn’t affect the economy, people just moved on. Parsons believes it was the people of Rome that caused the fall to Rome. Ward-Perkins seems to think that the lack of participation of the Roman citizens caused the failure. Rome fell due to the lack of people but some of the people could have taken a leadership role and stepped up to help save Rome.