Another interesting interpretation of the Roman Empire collapse is based on a biological model. According to this model, all nations are biologically like human beings. They are born, grow into maturity, diminish in strength, and finally die.
Nothing can remain in the same state, and everything has to go through this natural progression. According to this theory, decay and decline are inevitable by-products of growth and prosperity. Gibbon has expressed it in this way:. Prosperity ripened the principle of decay; the causes of destruction multiplied with the extent of conquest; and, as soon as time or accident had removed the artificial supports, the stupendous fabric yielded to the pressure of its own weight.
The story of its ruin is simple and obvious. Recently, environmental factors have also been attributed to the decline of the Roman Empire. This theory attributes both the rise and fall of Rome to ecological factors. The growth of the Roman Empire coincided with the environmental prosperity of the Mediterranean basin from the 3rd century BC until the middle of the 2nd century AD.
His armies campaigned successfully in modern Croatia, Serbia and France. He made much of Spain into a protectorate for a time. Large scale repairs were made to churches and public buildings throughout Italy. Either Theoderic or Odoacer undertook renovations to the Colosseum following which senators proudly inscribed their names and offices on their seats.
Rather than imagining that Roman rule had ended in , Italians in the late 5th and early 6th centuries spoke about its recovery. The answer lies not in Italy but in Constantinople. It is at this moment of East-West tension that we can return to Marcellinus Comes. Odoacer was not a Goth. Theoderic, however, was a Gothic king and he had taken power from Odoacer.
As the Gothic-led Western Roman state found itself in increasing tension with Constantinople, the fall of Rome emerged as a way to justify an Eastern Roman invasion that would restore Italy to Eastern Roman control. Marcellinus did not invent this idea in a vacuum. He served in Constantinople as an aide to the future Eastern Roman emperor Justinian , who was at the time the imperial heir apparent.
This propaganda worked well. In , Eastern Roman armies attacked Italy. The Italian war did not conclude until and the fighting devastated both the city of Rome and much of Italy.
The victories that extended Rome's reach and prompted such grand processionals as the one depicted here in the Roman Forum also brought increased tensions among conquered populations along its borders.
It reached its zenith under Trajan r. Linking its provinces were more than , miles of roads, 50, of which were paved. Roman engineers founded or improved more than 1, cities and towns, transforming the rural European landscape into a marvel of urbanization.
In the third century the Roman army could field , infantry and cavalry and 45, sailors and marines. By the time Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Turks in , the Roman army—the oldest continually existing social institution in the Western world—had been on the march for two millennia. Rome itself was a magnificent example of cultural, technological and social superiority in its time.
In the city had 28 libraries, 10 basilicas, 11 public baths, two amphitheaters, three theaters, two circuses the Circus Maximus could seat , people; the Colosseum, 50, , 19 aqueducts, 11 public squares, 1, fountains and 46, apartment buildings.
Regardless, it is possible to identify some of the primary forces that rendered the imperial government incapable of dealing with the lethal challenges that beset it. The Romans called the area beyond the western imperial border along the Rhine and Danube rivers the land of the barbarians. Its mostly Germanic-speaking inhabitants were relatively few in number and lived in small villages, their populations limited by their primitive agricultural technology. Employing only the wooden scratch plow, German farmers could not turn the earth sufficiently to maintain its fertility.
The small populations and nomadism of the German tribes retarded development of their political structures. Governments were local, comprising mostly clan chiefs whose ruling power was limited by councils of advisers drawn from among other influential clan members. An individual chieftain did not have the wealth or manpower to form a warrior group loyal to him alone. Instead, clan warriors came together as circumstances required.
These groups were usually small and capable only of conducting limited raids. In a few instances the tribes provided warriors to serve in limited military capacities in the Roman army itself.
The Romans used subsidies, trade, military honors and punitive expeditions to ensure the loyalty of the tribes, often playing them off against one another. The German tribes along the western border did not pose a threat to Roman garrisons, and the limited size of the tribal populations meant there was no mass migration. Indeed, the Romans occasionally settled small groups as farmers on the imperial side of the border. But by the third century circumstances in this region had changed.
The presence of Roman garrisons and merchants spurred the economic and sociopolitical development of the border tribes. The garrisons provided lucrative markets for local agricultural products, metals, slaves and military recruits.
These larger tribes required more complex political and organizational structures. Among the more significant developments was the ability of now-wealthy tribal chiefs to support a large warrior class. By the end of the second century the populations of the tribes along the western imperial borders had grown considerably. When the chiefs of the tribes arranged themselves in confederation under the temporary authority of elected leaders, these confederations could easily field 10,man armies.
At the same time the discovery of large metal ore deposits beyond the imperial border created a local armaments industry. They preferred to live as natives, even if this meant poverty, which, in turn, meant they turned to those who could help—Germans, brigands, Christians, and Vandals.
Some scholars have suggested that the Romans suffered from lead poisoning. The lead was also used in cosmetics, even though it was also known in Roman times as a deadly poison and used in contraception. Economic factors are also often cited as a major cause of the fall of Rome. Other lesser economic issues included the wholesale hoarding of bullion by Roman citizens, the widespread looting of the Roman treasury by barbarians, and a massive trade deficit with the eastern regions of the empire.
Together these issues combined to escalate financial stress during the empire's last days. Gibbon, Edward. History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Ott, Justin. Iowa State University, Damen, Mark. Utah State University. Delile, Hugo, et al. Actively scan device characteristics for identification. Use precise geolocation data. Select personalised content. Create a personalised content profile.
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