A big problem with understanding "the fall of the Western Roman Empire" is that it never existed constitutionally any entity called like that. Neither "the Eastern Roman Empire". It was 1 and only 1 Empire with 2 emperors each one in charge of a different geographic zone of the one and only empire. That sound strange to us since we are used to "one man in charge" for "executive branch". But collegial rule for executive duties was actually a tradition in Roman civilization going back to the Republic, although for different reasons. When Odoacer did not declare as Emperor but only as king and, at least nominally, recognized the Emperor located in Constantinople, it really means a continuation of the empire now with just 1 Emperor. We got evidence that Odoacer said that "there is no need anymore for 2 emperors". Italy continued being part of the Empire. Even if Odoacer and later Theodoric(who was comissioned by Zeno to take power in Italy) were not 100% obedient and submissive to the Emperor in Constantinople, everything or mostly everything seems to had been a continuation to the empire.
Really good as always, maybe in the future you could make a video explaining the transition of the "roman" identity to the "polity" based identity we saw develop in Italy. Well done and keep em coming
My suspicion is that Romanization was not as sturdy as we imagine. Look at how MUCH the Greeks retained their identity as "Romans" and how LITTLE that happened for the Italians after the West fell. I think everyone resented Rome and submitted because of its cultural and military prestige. I think the collapse of the local Roman elite across the Mediterranean during the Third Century crisis absolutely ruined the idea of Roman Italy (in favor of the Balkan military elite) and that being "Roman" meant less and less because the imperial system was just that messed up.
@@geordiejones5618 Living in the Greek World. I'd make the following arguments, a lot of the traditions of the Modern Greeks are originated in post turkish conquests, a lot of their religious traditions are romans, and a massively large part of the population is not taught the continuity between ancient greeks, diadochi, roman conquests, life under the ottoman conquest. They are taught mainly about pre Diadochic Greece, bits and bobs about Rome , mainly Eastern Empire post Justinian, Revolution and then Modernity. Essentially the Greek society is not as connected or believe they are not as connected with their direct eastern roman empire, but base their identity around the antiquity and post revolution era. However, one thing that is bitter sweet i guess is that Turkey reffers to Greeks as the Rum (Romans) however reffers to Greece as Yunanistan so not recognizing the resurgence of "eastern rome".
This isn’t a story the average historian will tell. One day, Gibbon appeared with the fallacy gauntlet. He snapped his fingers causing the political system, infrastructure and societal norms to collapse within a few seconds. This event is known as the fall of the Roman Empire
Early in the video, he says Gibbon was relying on Eastern Roman historians who wanted to justify the Eastern Empire's invasion. Perhaps those were the only sources available to Gibbon 1200 years later.
Gibbons work was really legit, if you have a legitimate complaint about it yourselves you should say that instead of a scenario like the collapse was sudden Bc it’s pretty obvious from the comment y’all’ve never read his work.
@@yourfinalhiringagency3890 iirc Gibbon saw the Justinian reconquest as a disaster. I think Gibbon is being used as a hook on which to hang attitudes that go back to the age of Petrarch at least.
@@johnrohde5510 like all of us, he had a fascination with Rome and wanted to teach people about it, his views can only become more and more “outdated” to the Uber progressive blue haired lesbians, but how much could they really care for this empire of patriarchs when it’s everything they loath. He did a good job. I read the entire book. No complaints, I agree with him on most points. and learned a lot from him and his ol timer perspective
Yes, it must have declined. they lost a huge amount of income, and a lot of the rich survivors fled to what we now know as Venice, an area that saw great prosperity in the decades that followed
Maybe not at much as you think (although maintenance of old infrastructure may have gotten more difficult, so maybe thats why the barbarian successor states began to try to reduce war as this channel said). I recall that venice really began to prosper later after the lombards invaded and italy became divided between them and the byzantines, and well other parties that came in.
The Romans in the Italian Peninsula really lost their edge after Trajan, the Romans from the era of the Punic Wars would have never allowed the Ostrogoths to take control of them.
I’d take it a step further, and say that even after Julius Caesar Italy went soft. As early as Augustus the Italian Romans were dodging recruitment into the military and self mutilating themselves so that they didn’t have to serve. Recruiting directly from Rome and then shipping them to campaigns hundreds of miles away must’ve been a logistical nightmare. Recruiting locally from the provinces/ countryside was way easier.
Trajan, Hadrian, and marcus aurelius were all from the province of Hispania I believe. Funny thing I noticed is that when the italians lost their edge, the Spanish came up. Then the spanish slacked, and the Illyrians (Constantine, Aurelian, Diocletian, ETC.) took hold. Then, they started slacking and the next ones that were supposed to pick up the slack were the Germans. But, because of perception & the fact that, that one emperor (forgot who) had all Germanic sons, daughters, and wives killed... They sacked instead of taking up power how the Illyrians did. Maybe there's a universe out there where Germans were more accepted and that soft cultural power was given to them and in the year 2023 we're all Roman.
This video causes me to ask the question, "How did the common Romans across Western Empire, learn that their Empire was no more?" Did they go around and tell people? Or did it just stop? I mean how many, if any, generations of Romans lived their entire lives normally and didn't even know they were without an Empire? Or do we think they all know very quickly? I mean there had to be a weird hiatus period before the transition into the barbarian rule.....or was there?
@finnwarrior Hello there. This is why I love to ask myself this question, cause I'm not certain it did happen that way, or even in a very quick manner. A great example is with their languages. I don't now how familiar you are with the history and transition of the Latin language into the Romance languages; but this a wonderful example of how the people didn't know that things had really changed. Now we are talking about the Latin language and it's transition into the Romance languages...but if we were to travel back in time to the year 200 CE, then the majority of Rome will be speaking a relatively uniform form of Latin and say, 'We are speaking Latin, the language of Rome.' If we were to travel to the year 500 CE after the collapse of the west, then the majority of the former western empire will still be speaking a relatively uniform form of Latin and say, 'We are speaking Latin, the language of Rome.' By the year 800 CE if you were to ask the people of modern Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Romania, and all the other regions with other Romance languages....the people were still saying, 'We are speaking Latin, the language of Rome." But while they self-identified as Romans speaking Latin, and honestly thought they were speaking Latin...they were not speaking Latin at this point, nor were they Romans. By the 800s, the Romance languages were in full usage and growing stronger. It was obvious that these new Romance languages were both unique and separate from Latin. So much so, that in order to preserve Latin as the lingua franca for all things religion, political, science, medicine, and economic; they brought in a guy named Alcuin to create a standardization for the Latin language in both writing and speaking. This was the birth of the 'reconstructed' Latin we know and use today, but it was at this moment that the people of Europe said and/or were told, you are no longer Romans speaking Latin. And this was a massive culture shock to the people. Cause even as late as the 800s we know there were a lot of people across the former empire that honestly saw themselves still as Romans, doing what Romans do, and speaking as Romans speak. The question becomes....were these people outliers? Cause there were a lot of them, and it wasn't only the simple farmer/peasants that didn't know or see things this way. In fact, I would argue they had an easier time with accepting it. It was the elites and upper classes that struggled with this. And they were in the positions of power that were not granted to them via Rome... ;o)
@finnwarrior And this is exactly my point. There were still people in the former western empire who thought of themselves as Romans still speaking Latin until the 800s when the European kingdoms of the day finally started to put their foot down and basically say, "No, you are not speaking Latin, Rome is no more, and you are not Roman." It doesn't matter who we are talking about...whether it be the descendants in the Visigoth Kingdom of Spain, the Kingdom of Francia, or any of the Italian kingdoms....the story is the same. A majority of the children of Rome, still saw and identified themselves, as Romans under non-Roman rule for about 400 years (depending who we are talking about). And speaking of Italy, one would think that Italy of all regions would try to hold on to the Roman claim for as long as possible...but we see some the fastest kingdom based separations coming from the Italian peninsula instead of modern day France and Spain. That window of 500-800 really fascinates me cause these people were in a weird state of existence, being both Roman and not Roman at the same time. Were they aware of it? Did they experience the differences? Did they have some type of acceptance leading to some type of a dual existence? Like I said, I find the whole period and experience interesting. I would love to travel back in time and talk with these groups and see the world from their eyes.
My father was from Dalmatia. His village of Nevidane started out as a Roman settlement called Naevius. It was near the Roman city of Iadera. I have always wondered, since I was very young, what life was like for the Romans who lived in Dalmatia during the time of Theodoric’s rule.
If anyone is interested in these topics, Schwerpunkt has a huge Late Antique playlist with hours long videos explaining these change in thorough detail region by region
The climactic event of 536, the Justinian Plague and the Gothic War had far more of an impact than a change in management. Of course, things weren't so rosy in say, northern Gaul and Britain at the time.
What about in Spain? Ive heard that it was basically post-apocalyptic in Britain and northern Gaul as well as Pannonia and the frontier areas but what was the situation in Spain?
@@TerminaUltima I once read that the Vandals and Sueves were highly destructive in Spain; razing countless settlements. Then came the Visigoths and more responsible leadership.
Thank you again for these videos. I see the Third Century Crisis as particularly transformative compared to the late fifth. A lot of industrial scale quarries, mines and ceramic workshops, often run by the Army and Regional Fleets ceased at that time. There seems to have been a lot of reuse of material (although it's contended sometimes that this was about tying later Emperors with earlier seeming prodigies; the phase 'Felicior Augusto, melior Traiano' was oft used when inaugurating later Emperors). The Plague of Cyprian, an overall fall in temperature, civil war, invasions reduced the population considerably and its productivity yet made greater demands on it. Compared to the late 5th century when Generalissimo du jour Odoacer decided his puppet the little Augustus wasn't worth the bother, it certainly cannot have been as transformative in the near to medium term. Over time the definitive disappearance of the Roman state brought about severe economic simplification as piracy and continual localised warfare took its toll.
Hello Isaac, very well said. I agree that the crisis of the third century is, what would later cause the Roman Empire all its problems. One could even say that Rome never really overcame the crisis of the 3rd century. Superficially it seemed to have survived, but the cracks that were created in the 3rd century, ran deep, and continued growing. The fundamental problems such as succession system, prone-ness to civil wars, defense of the borders, monetary policy, were never solved.
@@Maiorianus_Sebastian One might say those system problems only ended with Constantine XI Palaeologos. 😞. The Fourth Crusaders came to Constantinople at the behest of a deposed pretender and his faction (and revolted when he couldn't pay them as he promised). The Ottomans took their first territory in Europe at the behest of the Emperor, who wanted/needed to use them against an usurper (who may well have had an equally good claim for all I know)
@@Maiorianus_Sebastian or one could say that the Roman empire definitively overcame the third century crisis and emerged a much stronger more centralized state
Of course one thing to remember with the reuse of building materials is that ordinary mortar and stone work has a lifespan. It is very long but it does mean that the buildings from the early burst of population and urbanization in the republic would have passed their useful lifespan by the late empire and that the most economically rational course would have been to reuse the building materials. Much of the late medieval building in Italy is facing this problem today.
I read the Consolation of Philosophy (sadly, not in the original language) and, in addition to moral philosophy, you caught glimpses of an incredible history that could have been written. You got a picture of palace intrigue and palace snakes much like you could find in authoritarian regimes today. Also, the book seemed to end abruptly after a discussion of free will. If only Boethius had had a couple more days.
If an empire "falls" it doesn't necessarily mean life and culture stops with it. A "fall" is usually spoken of in the context of a cessation of the hierarchical govermental structure. While the Ostragoths, allowed for previous systems to continue, the Ostrogoths called the shots. Why is there a reluctance to accept this? Do we characterize other areas/historical time periods in such a manner?
Ave, Frater Sebastianus! I've got a rather interesting question for you: What was the level of literacy of the total population of the Roman empire at around the time of Augustus? And how did that level of literacy change after the so-called "Fall of Rome" in 476 AD? I believe that this would make for an interesting topic for your next video, Frater, but that is a choice that you must make for yourself. Until next time, GRATIAS TIBIANUS, AMICI!
According to Chris Wickham, in his classic book Early Medieval Italy, literacy remained reasonably high. It didn’t change under the Ostrogoths, while under the Lombards, it remained quite high, as can be seen, he says, by the vast number of court cases which refer to leases and contracts. More of these survive from Lombard and Byzantine Italy than from the Empire, thanks to the Church, which kept massive archives.
Why write frater with an capital f? Not even in the church do they write frater as Frater. Nor is “tibianus” a word, most likely you misheard something as ‘tibi’ means ‘to you’ and ‘anus’ means ‘ring’ or ‘anus’ (biologically seen). Also, ‘amici’ is not correct in this case since you would say that when addressing multiple people you see as friends since ‘amici’ is plural of ‘amicus’ which means friend. The correct sentence would be: “Gratias tibi (ago), amice!” with ‘amice’ as vocative (form you use to adress someone with) of ‘amicus’. Don’t take it wrongly though, no hate implied in my comment. Just want to correct you and help you with your Latin.
@@ProGamerOne I meant it as a sign of respect & YES, I treat the creator of this channel with such utter respect that I regard him as Brother in the walk of Life. If my address of him offends him, then he will let me know & I will adjust accordingly but until such time as he informs me so, it has nothing to do with you. Do you read me?
@@Joanna-il2ur Yes, but what, at least, are the rough estimates for literacy rates amongst the total population? And what about amongst the different strata of the total population? And did this change significantly from the time of Augustus till after the so-called "Fall" of Rome? Did this vary from region to region or was it uniform all through out the whole Roman empire? These are the questions I'm hoping that Frater Sebastianus will kindly answer in his next video which would hopefully be on this subject, that is if he deigns to do so.
Some things I recall from a book I read about the years after the fall. I'll have to find the book to see what years it covered. The Roman's of one city sent their Bishop to their Goth overlord to beg him to allow them to trade with a neighboring city. Trade wasn't free. A rich Roman had a dispute with a Gothic prince who was encroaching on his property. The Gothic justice system fixed the dispute by taking the Roman's land and gave it to the prince. In disputes that involved blood money, Romans were worth 1/2 of a Goth. While Roman institutions were intact and rich Romans figured their knowledge would ensure they were secure. But after the Goths learned how to work those institutions, they got rid of the Roman elites. As we know from the Gothic wars, when Belisarius invaded Italy, Roman peasants had become serfs under the Germanic feudal system. Yes, under their Germanic masters things were relatively more peaceful, but we all know the saying about giving up liberty for security.
Be that all as it may, we also have to realize that after 500 all over Europe, construction halted, population sizes stalled, roads were no longer maintained, desperate people begged proto-nobility to become serfs in exchange for protection, knowledge of how to construct buildings disappeared, and literacy plummeted...
The Visigothic kingdom was handicapped by the Vandals and Sueves who were highly destructive; razing towns as they marauded across the Iberian penninsula.
Will you make a video about the hispanorroman revolts of Burdunelo and Petrus in the Tarraconense againgst the wisigoths to proclaim another Roman Empire?
Could you do a video about Judaism in the late empire? Ive heard that it nearly became the major religion of the empire before Christianity supplanted it. Particularly in the time of Augustine and the decrees of Honorius.
it is said that if you listen very carefully, you can hear maiorianus whispering "life was better in 500s than 400s for the average roman citizen" even millenias later.
It is estimated that the iberian peninsula didn't recover roman level population till the XIX century. Although this is not easy to quantify in my personal opinion.
I need to read Gibbons directly instead of the various extrapolated text I found in other books. In Italy the general idea, at the same time of Gibbons, was that the great decline of Italy happened because the Greco-Gothic war and was worsened by the arrival of the Lombards, both events that were depicted as cosmic-level tragedies in the works of Italian intellectuals of the XVIII and XIX Century. The view on the Theodoric reign was overall positive.
Did Odoacer have a palace? Or where did romans held court in Ravenna prior to Theodoric rule? I'm having difficulty finding info on Ravenna prior to 493AD
My guess is that average Roman people walked into all sorts of public works from ancient times that had "temporarily out of order" signs on them, and then no one fixed those things for centuries.
I love being German. I love being European. I love our history, our languages, our people, our culture... Europe is the shining city on the hill. At least. It was.
I just watched a video about the LOW amount of pottery in Europe after the fall of Rome. Life was not good for the average person, unless they came up with a new way of storing their possessions in a way archeologists cannot find?
It depends on where in Europe you were. South of the Danube, whole regions were depopulated. But in Italy not much changed - at first. Clovis also didn't plunder his own kingdom. After defeating Syragius, he just took over the land. Cologne was already under Frankish rule before the fall of the Western Roman empire. Other areas of course were devastated by the wars in the 5th century. Also, farmers and other oppressed people took revenge on any Roman civil servant they could get their hands on, especially tax collectors. So the upper class shrunk, and trade declined. A lot of people don't realize that most farmers and slaves didn't live much differently before and after the fall, since historians tend to focus on more interesting parts of the population.
Ironically I heard they discovered pottery in Britain up through the mid 6th century (around the time the Dark ages truly began with the Black Death). The Roman world surprisingly remained united through the roads, institutions, and trade. This quickly broke down of course but it surprised me to see the Roman world almost last a century longer than previously imagined and if the plague and Sassanid wars didn’t happen the West may very well have been recovered/reconquered.
@@LordWyatt the Black Death was in the 14th century with its worst effect in 1348/9. There were plagues in the sixth century, notably the Justinianic Plague, which we are now sure was Yersinia Pestis. It did affect Britain and Ireland; we have no figures but Irish records report a succession of human and animal diseases. In continental Europe Y Pestis mortality was about 50%. But the earlier Plague of Cyprian in the mid third century, believed to be Ebola, also killed half the population and the Empire didn’t collapse.
Like every event it hurts some people but helps others. The character of what it meant to be "Roman" changed from what it was in AD 100 to what it was in AD 476. Did life change that much for the average person living in rural Britain after 1066? Likely not. Ben Franklin considered himself an Englishman living in Philadelphia in 1740. By 1780 he considered himself an American.
I listened to a lecturer recently who said most Early Middle Age Historians and Classical Archeologists today believe the collapse of the empire resulted from depopulation. The depopulation began in the second century and continued into the eigth or so century. There is quite a bid of evidence for depopulation. The depopulation, in turn, was caused by epidemiology. Pathogens began arriving into the Mediterranean from the east with wars in Parthia. There were recorded epidemics at the time but once the pathogen was in the Mediterranean, it remained and continued to cause death. There was probably Malaria, Measles, Smallpox, and others. Romans lived in crowded cities, used public fountains, and public baths. The pathogens easily spread and devastated the population. Studies have shown that the city of Rome was a population sink. The German Tribes, on the other hand, lived in dispersed and detached dwellings, did not use public baths or fountains, and drank ale made with boiled water. Their populations slowly grew while Roman populations slowly declined and this trend continued for centuries. The Crisis of the Third Century was, in part, due to a shrinking tax base. There was also manpower shortages such that the Roman Army relied more on Germans in the third century onwards. After the Justinian plague devastated the populations 541-549 AD, Arab tribesmen were able to sweep into the eastern and southern empire. The population did not really return until the High Middle Ages due to a warming climate, smaller cities, a transformed culture, and some immunity development in the gene pool.
I wonder what kind of medieval kingdom would've grown out of Ostrogothic Italy if Belisarius did not destroy it, or at least decided to become the new king of the Ostrogoths. Julian tried to restore the empire, but ended up ruining Italy even more with his struggling war against the Goths.
It is very likely that the Ostrogoth would have "Latinized" as the Lombards eventually did in Otl, since both Ostrogoths and Lombards numbered around 100 000 individuals each, in a country inhabited by millions of Latins. However it is also very likely that a few elements of Gothic culture are integrated in the local culture, (such as art, architecture and technology) so this alternate kingdom of Italy would be still predominantly latin but would still be a bit different from the late western roman empire. It would also have been a much more stable and powerful kingdom than Otl kingdom of Lombardy (at least once the post-Theodorich dynastic dispute is solved) since the Lombards during most of their rule were brutal and xenophobic towards the local population unlike the much more tolerant and capable Ostrogoths.
@@francescosantambrogio6421 Longobards and Ostrogoths were culturally and linguistically relatively closely related, so culturally it didn't make much difference which Germanic tribe ruled Italy. Both have relatively fast Latinized themselves, leaving only some Germanic remnants in today's Italian. But genetically you can still see their heritage, especially in Northern Italy. There is a certain shade of blonde hair (a bit greyish), that you almost exclusively see in Northern Italy and Northern Spain.
9:50 , The majority Roman populace is the cause for extinction of visigoths, their laws were unpopular an roman aristocrats an garrison surrendered their cities to the caliphate.
How do you consider the wars of reconquest of Justinian? As I read them when a younger man I was caught up in the audacity of the emperors plans...with the brilliance of Belisaurius and the amazing victories he accomplished. But even before the end we see the dark hints that this will not turn out well. So now as an older, hopefully wiser guy I wonder if...maybe..the conquest of the Vandal kingdom could have been leveraged diplomatically vis a vis Italy to accomplish a Roman reoccupation that may have avoided the brutal destruction that befell Italy in our timeline. What do you think? Could Justinan have used his diplomatic corps to exact greater political concessions or compromises with the Ostrogothic elite to establish a more intensive Roman administration, without the combat? I'm interested in what others might think of this. This is the kind of thing I think about when I'm laying down to sleep. Lol.
Well, that depends on what we are comparing to. If to the times of the 5 Good Emperors, or even Diocletian, it was catastrophically worse. If we are comparing life in 470 AD vs 500 AD, then yes, there was little difference. 500 AD might even have been marginally better.
Very interesting topic and very well made video. I would however suggest to get your point across faster as this video should not have been over 20 minutes long. Subscribed
May I suggest two alternate history videos where one Theodora talks Justinan out of attacking the Ostrogoths and uses marriage instead of military force to rope them in? Second, maybe later a different Carolingian empire buys off the Umayyad Caliphate by offering them a piece of the action by bringing them into the Holy Roman Empire a Pompey solution on steroids.
I would imagine it being like what modern Americans must feel when witnessing the great things their forefathers had created, whilst being both ignorant and incapable of replicating them. To an extent, this is true for the west at large.
And yet trade trade routes did shrivel in Italy, western Europe, and Africa - this is well attested. And it was ultimately the loss of trade and learning that brought on what we used to call the Dark Age. So sure, Odoacer and his immediate successors might have treated the Romans well. But the world still suffered greatly for the loss of the western empire.
I enjoy how through more advanced technology and techniques, historians are learning more details about life from Roman and post-Western Roman world. Its revolutionary, compared to what I was taught 30 years ago.
But didn't you say it back then in one of your videos that after the Germanic tribes took over, some stuffs that are considered normal to the Roman civilians suddenly become privileges instead. You know, like the using of utensils and having the better hygiene.
It was more pronounced in Gaul and Hispania. In Italy, things were mostly business as usual (though life was declining, yes, but much more gradually, starting in the late 4th century), until the 540s.
So-called "Barbarians" were virtually undistinguishable from the Romans because they adopted the Rome customs quickly enough to taste the Roman creature comforts. They were at a whole other level of civilized society than modern immigrants from Africa and Latin America. If you lined up a Roman, a German, a Persian, an Arab, and a Chinese next to each other, then except for their dressing style, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference based on their cultural sophistication.
It's interesting we take the E. Roman perspective on this matter, when they clearly had an agenda. Rome as an EMPIRE [Under Emperors] may have ended, but Rome existed under different governmental forms, including Kings (Tarquins), Republic, etc., and if the government continued operating, including institutions, then it's probably fair to say Rome/the Roman state continued. And if we claim that it fell when Justinian took it...then...Rome fell and ceased to be Roman, because the Roman Empire (Eastern) took it over?
I feel like a lot of the focus here was on material improvement to lifestyle, but I would imagine that despite things being objectively better, for a lot of people it would have felt *worse*. The reason I say this is from looking at things like the industrial revolution in England; life became objectively better and safer for almost all peoples as they abandoned the farms and moved into the cities; the poorest in society were better fed than they had been 50 years ago, had access to certain goods that would have been unthinkable for their family mere decades before. Plus the workers were being introduced to ideas such as unions that on paper improved their bargaining position with employers which, again, they didn't have as farm hands. And yet despite that, you get Charles Dickens writing about how awful things are for the urban poor. An objective material improvement is not always going to make people feel happy. Better doesn't always equal "better". Heck, the same goes today. There's more anger and resentment towards the rich in places like America than ever before, even though the poorest in society are better protected than they have ever been there. The reason? Because anger comes from comparison to others, not from objective standards of living. The Roman people for sure were living a safer, likely healthier life during Gothic rule, but I would imagine that a very sizeable number of people had extraordinary resentment for their Gothic rulers. Every *small* change imposed on people, every small obstacle, every time you hear soldiers speaking Gothic instead of Latin, these all would cause feelings of anger and unhappiness, which would make the improvements feel irrelevant. Based on the sort of conversation I've had and heard in recent years about modern social issues, the following would have been a daily occurrence: Marcus: My friend, did you hear that? I'm sick of hearing Gothic spoken on the streets. It just isn't Roman. Cornelius: As am I, friend. You know, just 3 generations ago things were still Roman. My grandfather would be rolling in his grave. Marcus: Certainly. I thought on that, the other day when a Gothic soldier was intimidating Publius the merchant, there's no way our forefathers would have stood for that. Cornelius: And to top it off people keep saying things are better than they used to be, but how can that be true when most of the military commanders are Goths? You know, back in the old days the Roman politicians led armies? And they brought glories to Rome. And now, the highest Romans are as serfs under the Goths. Marcus: Yep. Well, what can we do, they have the support of the Emperor and we're just latrine cleaners. Catch you tomorrow.
The most empirical place to begin this Study is to bring up the *HARDLY IN THE LEAST* matter of Swamps South of Capital Rome ("Pontine Marshes"?) which were not wholly and totally drained for agricultural use for the Capital Rome until the 20th Century where they were somewhat infamously used as a "weapon" by retreating Germans who turned the Region back into a Swamp (filled with highly virulent malaria virus mosquito born "vector") so I don't think the question be "how did the Western Roman Empire fall?" but more accurately "how did the Capital of the Roman Empire Civitas Rome City fall?" The most easiest common explanation was a lack of food. Also I think the modern Port North of City Rome is quite new although the Port of Naples may in fact be very Ancient indeed predating even City Rome proper. As the Roman Empire grew so too did a great many Cities throughout the entire Empire..as far East as London and as far West as Jerusalem. All of these Cities were "vying" for there to be The Next Rome though indifferent to being "Roman" (Latin) or "Center for all of the Paperwork." In effect Ancient Rome collapsed partially as a loss to their Gods (Ancient Greek Gods replaced by Christianity) but also as to relates to one's belief in a Swamp as a Center for All the Things. Another loss may have been of any more trees to fell for the Roman system of trade...again to keep the Capital fed but of course well supplied with construction material there being no steel in that Ancient Times outside of Damascus anyways. Ancient Rome also was constantly "afflicted" with a lack of good "science"(no Doctors and only one Physician that i am aware of...Galen.) Again none of this is true of Modern Rome excepting the lack of large forests around near all of post Roman collapse. If one looks at Modern Marseilles or near all of Africa North near all of Levant near all of modern Greece the lack of any forests is quite striking. Also Rome never truly created any "industry" as well relying more instead on what Karl Marx famously called "bread and circuses" which i think there be much to say in that. The founding Myth of Romulus and Remus is of great interest tho imo. Ancient Rome had many interesting Gods of far greater depth and clarity than was true of "Greek Gods" which were all very condescending in as relates to the latter. Roman Gods were always about The Imperative which i think was and still is a uniquely Latin term ("Bounden Duty.")
and the fact that Odoacer and Theodoric were not barbarians, they just bave a German blood but they were a lot of emperors born in Gaul, and thus, Odoacer was born in Ravenna and he was a roman statesman, and he got a support of the senate on overthrowing Romulus Augustus. And their names were Flavius Odoacer Flavius Theodoricus
Is there any evidence to show the aqueducts were repaired? I read the Romans themselves destroyed the portions leading through the city walls, to prevent invaders from using them to enter Rome.
Yeah this whole thing of "the Roman Empire never fell" doesn't stand up to scrutiny. There was a political/social change. Roman territory was forcibly taken and conquered. We know from archeology that there was a steep decline in material culture for some parts of the empire. Different people were in charge, the culture was changing. Did people notice at first? Not really. Many of the same systems and instituions persisted for a long while but that doesn't mean a change didn't happen. One overly simplistic narrative of the "fall" has been replaced by another simplistic narrative that nothing had changed.
@maiorianus You make a persuasive case in videos that the collapse of ancient civilization in the west happened much later than is traditionally thought. I'd love to see you carry the story forward from 540 to the date that we can say civilization had definitely collapsed and the ancient workers most definitely gone. I'd love to see the traditional narrative of roman history changed to mark the fall of the Roman empire with the disbanding of the Senate in the gothic war.
I'm no expert, but it seems to me like it wouldn't be much after 540, since the Gothic War largely devastated life for most people on the Italian Peninsula for a long time afterward.
I think you think you were right there with a massive collapse of civil society devastation by war plague and famine. Certainly the actual city of Rome was very nearly abandoned. But the world of the ancient Mediterranean was not completely gone and I'm sure there was a much longer slower. Klein following that not unlike our traditional narrative set in the fifth century. I would imagine bringing our story of decline and fall inline with your standard textbook by 750 or so.
"I think you think you were right there with a massive collapse of civil society devastation by war plague and famine." Even though I literally started by saying that I'm not an expert and then simply gave my opinion? *sigh* OK then.
People want to blame Justinian for creating the idea of the fall, when he was abiding by the system they reference. Both Italy and North Africa had overthrown and killed rulers that were in service to Constantinopole. If the Germans were supposedly client kings of Constantinopole, then it was completely within Justinian's authority to revoke that territory from rebels who had defied the crown. So did this client king system exist or did it not?
Maybe we get the fall of the Western Roman Empire confused with the fall of Western Roman Civilization. Civilizations (at least vestages of civilizations) can survive the collapse of an empire - especially if it is conquered by a culture that wants to adopt its institutions, not wipe them out.
For the first fifty years upto AD 520-ish, more or less, rather more settled than the previous fifty after AD 420 - the Visigoths and Vandals had gone about their business and the Ostrogoths had settled in to play at finders keepers (the wealthier Romans having buzzed off to the honey pots of New Rome); so a sense of make do and mend replaced destruction and decay .. like Europe just after the Second World War. The next fifty years, AD 570-ish, saw the real disintegration of make-do mentality, and mending became a fool's errand; the Justinian reconquest was no Marshall Plan for Italy (or elsewhere) but a Soviet Style take-over bid, and one that that was fit only to fail - leaving what was left to the controlling hands of the Lombards .. and they were most definitely not the Romanising Ostrogoths. Only in the fifty-odd years thereafter, down to AD 620, did Rome - very briefly - settle into a period of relative 'get-on-with-things' way of life .. amid the Franks, English, Goths and Vandals .. And from this, the 'Italians' re-emerge into a pre-Rome Post-Roman existence (lasting down to AD 1870), with mostly city-states jealously eying their own 'land' and envying that of others. Only very occasionally joining together to beat off a common foe, and periodically swept up in waves of piracy, alien intrusion, foreign domination, Saracens, Arabs, Saxons, Normans, Austrians, French etc (much like parts of Europe after the collapse of the Soviet Union). And the Imperial Romans? Myeh! What did those Romans do for them .. apart from roads - all the easier to dominate them .. and public bathhouses - in water that was soiled by other peoples' filth .. and big megalomaniacal buildings - of real use to neither man nor beast .. or (You get the picture? Yes, we see! et al); impressive, for sure, but being a Leader of the Pack isn't all it's cracked up to be. ;o)
The life of the de facto ruler of the former empire also got better. In the roman empire 62% of Emperors died violently, thats like playing russian roulette with 4 bullets in the cylinder
Yeah. The life of a senator not being a very safe one wasn't anything new. Official execution was probably a gentle death compared to what happened to some Roman politicians in earlier centuries. Stonings and stuff like that.
I really do not like this narrative of " barbarians were actually good!". First off roman empire was a big place and not all places got off as easy as italy. Secondly things have changed rapidly once the barbarian honeymoon period ended as otherwise it would be very hard to reconcile deurbanization and breakdown public infrastsructure by thr ninth century. When we talk about effects of fall of roman empire, we have to take into account not just next 20 years but also next 500 and we need to compare it to eastern roman empire standards.
Do you think that the 7th century Rome may have been better for the remaining Romans in some ways. Less population. Agricultural. Less political turmoil. Would be invaders would be sacking a nearly empty city.
There’s a misconception that the Roman Empire was beneficial for the average citizen. The Empire was in fact a tyranny, akin to the military dictatorships of today. As Maiorianus rightly states, it mattered little to the average Roman whether they were ruled over by a king or an emperor.
Watching a lot of your videos, it seems to me that YOU have a little Eastern Roman bias...Like it or not for a 1000years more it was the only (European) beacon of civilization. And it fell for the same reasons the western part did. Infighting and negligence of its people and purpose. Classic Roman/Greek trait. (I am Greek, I know).
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A big problem with understanding "the fall of the Western Roman Empire" is that it never existed constitutionally any entity called like that. Neither "the Eastern Roman Empire". It was 1 and only 1 Empire with 2 emperors each one in charge of a different geographic zone of the one and only empire. That sound strange to us since we are used to "one man in charge" for "executive branch". But collegial rule for executive duties was actually a tradition in Roman civilization going back to the Republic, although for different reasons. When Odoacer did not declare as Emperor but only as king and, at least nominally, recognized the Emperor located in Constantinople, it really means a continuation of the empire now with just 1 Emperor. We got evidence that Odoacer said that "there is no need anymore for 2 emperors". Italy continued being part of the Empire. Even if Odoacer and later Theodoric(who was comissioned by Zeno to take power in Italy) were not 100% obedient and submissive to the Emperor in Constantinople, everything or mostly everything seems to had been a continuation to the empire.
Really good as always, maybe in the future you could make a video explaining the transition of the "roman" identity to the "polity" based identity we saw develop in Italy. Well done and keep em coming
My suspicion is that Romanization was not as sturdy as we imagine. Look at how MUCH the Greeks retained their identity as "Romans" and how LITTLE that happened for the Italians after the West fell. I think everyone resented Rome and submitted because of its cultural and military prestige. I think the collapse of the local Roman elite across the Mediterranean during the Third Century crisis absolutely ruined the idea of Roman Italy (in favor of the Balkan military elite) and that being "Roman" meant less and less because the imperial system was just that messed up.
@@geordiejones5618 Living in the Greek World. I'd make the following arguments, a lot of the traditions of the Modern Greeks are originated in post turkish conquests, a lot of their religious traditions are romans, and a massively large part of the population is not taught the continuity between ancient greeks, diadochi, roman conquests, life under the ottoman conquest. They are taught mainly about pre Diadochic Greece, bits and bobs about Rome , mainly Eastern Empire post Justinian, Revolution and then Modernity. Essentially the Greek society is not as connected or believe they are not as connected with their direct eastern roman empire, but base their identity around the antiquity and post revolution era. However, one thing that is bitter sweet i guess is that Turkey reffers to Greeks as the Rum (Romans) however reffers to Greece as Yunanistan so not recognizing the resurgence of "eastern rome".
Thanks!
Hi Jason, thank you for the kind donation, I really appreciate it a lot :)
This isn’t a story the average historian will tell. One day, Gibbon appeared with the fallacy gauntlet. He snapped his fingers causing the political system, infrastructure and societal norms to collapse within a few seconds. This event is known as the fall of the Roman Empire
Gibbon's work has done so much damage to the public perception, it's crazy.
Early in the video, he says Gibbon was relying on Eastern Roman historians who wanted to justify the Eastern Empire's invasion. Perhaps those were the only sources available to Gibbon 1200 years later.
Gibbons work was really legit, if you have a legitimate complaint about it yourselves you should say that instead of a scenario like the collapse was sudden Bc it’s pretty obvious from the comment y’all’ve never read his work.
@@yourfinalhiringagency3890 iirc Gibbon saw the Justinian reconquest as a disaster. I think Gibbon is being used as a hook on which to hang attitudes that go back to the age of Petrarch at least.
@@johnrohde5510 like all of us, he had a fascination with Rome and wanted to teach people about it, his views can only become more and more “outdated” to the Uber progressive blue haired lesbians, but how much could they really care for this empire of patriarchs when it’s everything they loath. He did a good job. I read the entire book. No complaints, I agree with him on most points. and learned a lot from him and his ol timer perspective
This is the good stuff. Ty another good episode
“When the Western Roman Empire fell in 476 AD, the average citizen could be forgiven for not _noticing.”_
A great vid as always!
Yes, it must have declined. they lost a huge amount of income, and a lot of the rich survivors fled to what we now know as Venice, an area that saw great prosperity in the decades that followed
Yeah
I see this like an absolute win.
Maybe not at much as you think (although maintenance of old infrastructure may have gotten more difficult, so maybe thats why the barbarian successor states began to try to reduce war as this channel said). I recall that venice really began to prosper later after the lombards invaded and italy became divided between them and the byzantines, and well other parties that came in.
@@abcdedfg8340was Venice safe? Did it suffer sackings like Rome?
Yeah,that Venice bastards plundered my land for centuries (Croatia)
Love this bouncy delivery style.
cassiodorus is the top G. His records basicly make this channel, he saved history
Let's not call good people that moronic term lmao
@@rolandfischer931 haha! yes its kinda disrespectful, this is our era sadly
@@rolandfischer931 dude it’s just slang, language changes
@@quadeevans6484 it's slang that currently is associated with an idiotic rapist, so it's kinda ruined for me, personally.
Dude was a OG
Thank you for the great content. Keep up the good work.
The Romans in the Italian Peninsula really lost their edge after Trajan, the Romans from the era of the Punic Wars would have never allowed the Ostrogoths to take control of them.
Good times created weak men.
I’d take it a step further, and say that even after Julius Caesar Italy went soft. As early as Augustus the Italian Romans were dodging recruitment into the military and self mutilating themselves so that they didn’t have to serve. Recruiting directly from Rome and then shipping them to campaigns hundreds of miles away must’ve been a logistical nightmare. Recruiting locally from the provinces/ countryside was way easier.
Trajan, Hadrian, and marcus aurelius were all from the province of Hispania I believe. Funny thing I noticed is that when the italians lost their edge, the Spanish came up. Then the spanish slacked, and the Illyrians (Constantine, Aurelian, Diocletian, ETC.) took hold. Then, they started slacking and the next ones that were supposed to pick up the slack were the Germans. But, because of perception & the fact that, that one emperor (forgot who) had all Germanic sons, daughters, and wives killed... They sacked instead of taking up power how the Illyrians did. Maybe there's a universe out there where Germans were more accepted and that soft cultural power was given to them and in the year 2023 we're all Roman.
This video causes me to ask the question, "How did the common Romans across Western Empire, learn that their Empire was no more?" Did they go around and tell people? Or did it just stop? I mean how many, if any, generations of Romans lived their entire lives normally and didn't even know they were without an Empire? Or do we think they all know very quickly? I mean there had to be a weird hiatus period before the transition into the barbarian rule.....or was there?
are u dumb? bruh they all new quickly someone had to take taxes and he told them or the merchants which were tralling through
@finnwarrior Hello there. This is why I love to ask myself this question, cause I'm not certain it did happen that way, or even in a very quick manner. A great example is with their languages. I don't now how familiar you are with the history and transition of the Latin language into the Romance languages; but this a wonderful example of how the people didn't know that things had really changed.
Now we are talking about the Latin language and it's transition into the Romance languages...but if we were to travel back in time to the year 200 CE, then the majority of Rome will be speaking a relatively uniform form of Latin and say, 'We are speaking Latin, the language of Rome.' If we were to travel to the year 500 CE after the collapse of the west, then the majority of the former western empire will still be speaking a relatively uniform form of Latin and say, 'We are speaking Latin, the language of Rome.' By the year 800 CE if you were to ask the people of modern Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Romania, and all the other regions with other Romance languages....the people were still saying, 'We are speaking Latin, the language of Rome." But while they self-identified as Romans speaking Latin, and honestly thought they were speaking Latin...they were not speaking Latin at this point, nor were they Romans.
By the 800s, the Romance languages were in full usage and growing stronger. It was obvious that these new Romance languages were both unique and separate from Latin. So much so, that in order to preserve Latin as the lingua franca for all things religion, political, science, medicine, and economic; they brought in a guy named Alcuin to create a standardization for the Latin language in both writing and speaking. This was the birth of the 'reconstructed' Latin we know and use today, but it was at this moment that the people of Europe said and/or were told, you are no longer Romans speaking Latin. And this was a massive culture shock to the people. Cause even as late as the 800s we know there were a lot of people across the former empire that honestly saw themselves still as Romans, doing what Romans do, and speaking as Romans speak.
The question becomes....were these people outliers? Cause there were a lot of them, and it wasn't only the simple farmer/peasants that didn't know or see things this way. In fact, I would argue they had an easier time with accepting it. It was the elites and upper classes that struggled with this. And they were in the positions of power that were not granted to them via Rome... ;o)
@finnwarrior And this is exactly my point. There were still people in the former western empire who thought of themselves as Romans still speaking Latin until the 800s when the European kingdoms of the day finally started to put their foot down and basically say, "No, you are not speaking Latin, Rome is no more, and you are not Roman." It doesn't matter who we are talking about...whether it be the descendants in the Visigoth Kingdom of Spain, the Kingdom of Francia, or any of the Italian kingdoms....the story is the same. A majority of the children of Rome, still saw and identified themselves, as Romans under non-Roman rule for about 400 years (depending who we are talking about). And speaking of Italy, one would think that Italy of all regions would try to hold on to the Roman claim for as long as possible...but we see some the fastest kingdom based separations coming from the Italian peninsula instead of modern day France and Spain.
That window of 500-800 really fascinates me cause these people were in a weird state of existence, being both Roman and not Roman at the same time. Were they aware of it? Did they experience the differences? Did they have some type of acceptance leading to some type of a dual existence? Like I said, I find the whole period and experience interesting. I would love to travel back in time and talk with these groups and see the world from their eyes.
My father was from Dalmatia. His village of Nevidane started out as a Roman settlement called Naevius. It was near the Roman city of Iadera.
I have always wondered, since I was very young, what life was like for the Romans who lived in Dalmatia during the time of Theodoric’s rule.
You mean Croatia you’re not Roman lol you’re Slav
If anyone is interested in these topics, Schwerpunkt has a huge Late Antique playlist with hours long videos explaining these change in thorough detail region by region
Your presentations are always very well sourced, detailed , insightful and entertaining.
Work much appreciated!!
The climactic event of 536, the Justinian Plague and the Gothic War had far more of an impact than a change in management. Of course, things weren't so rosy in say, northern Gaul and Britain at the time.
What about in Spain? Ive heard that it was basically post-apocalyptic in Britain and northern Gaul as well as Pannonia and the frontier areas but what was the situation in Spain?
@@TerminaUltima I once read that the Vandals and Sueves were highly destructive in Spain; razing countless settlements. Then came the Visigoths and more responsible leadership.
Thank you again for these videos. I see the Third Century Crisis as particularly transformative compared to the late fifth. A lot of industrial scale quarries, mines and ceramic workshops, often run by the Army and Regional Fleets ceased at that time. There seems to have been a lot of reuse of material (although it's contended sometimes that this was about tying later Emperors with earlier seeming prodigies; the phase 'Felicior Augusto, melior Traiano' was oft used when inaugurating later Emperors). The Plague of Cyprian, an overall fall in temperature, civil war, invasions reduced the population considerably and its productivity yet made greater demands on it. Compared to the late 5th century when Generalissimo du jour Odoacer decided his puppet the little Augustus wasn't worth the bother, it certainly cannot have been as transformative in the near to medium term. Over time the definitive disappearance of the Roman state brought about severe economic simplification as piracy and continual localised warfare took its toll.
Hello Isaac, very well said. I agree that the crisis of the third century is, what would later cause the Roman Empire all its problems. One could even say that Rome never really overcame the crisis of the 3rd century. Superficially it seemed to have survived, but the cracks that were created in the 3rd century, ran deep, and continued growing. The fundamental problems such as succession system, prone-ness to civil wars, defense of the borders, monetary policy, were never solved.
@@Maiorianus_Sebastian One might say those system problems only ended with Constantine XI Palaeologos. 😞. The Fourth Crusaders came to Constantinople at the behest of a deposed pretender and his faction (and revolted when he couldn't pay them as he promised). The Ottomans took their first territory in Europe at the behest of the Emperor, who wanted/needed to use them against an usurper (who may well have had an equally good claim for all I know)
@@Maiorianus_Sebastian or one could say that the Roman empire definitively overcame the third century crisis and emerged a much stronger more centralized state
Of course one thing to remember with the reuse of building materials is that ordinary mortar and stone work has a lifespan. It is very long but it does mean that the buildings from the early burst of population and urbanization in the republic would have passed their useful lifespan by the late empire and that the most economically rational course would have been to reuse the building materials. Much of the late medieval building in Italy is facing this problem today.
Never been in Italy. It is definitely on my bucket list. Meanwhile I enjoy it through your videos. You just got a new subscriber!!!
If You are a citizen of the world, Rome is a curiosity. If You are a European, then Rome is your bloodline.
Really enjoyed this with my morning coffee! Cheers
I read the Consolation of Philosophy (sadly, not in the original language) and, in addition to moral philosophy, you caught glimpses of an incredible history that could have been written. You got a picture of palace intrigue and palace snakes much like you could find in authoritarian regimes today. Also, the book seemed to end abruptly after a discussion of free will. If only Boethius had had a couple more days.
Omg, I love this channel
If an empire "falls" it doesn't necessarily mean life and culture stops with it. A "fall" is usually spoken of in the context of a cessation of the hierarchical govermental structure. While the Ostragoths, allowed for previous systems to continue, the Ostrogoths called the shots. Why is there a reluctance to accept this? Do we characterize other areas/historical time periods in such a manner?
Call it the end of the western emperorship, thats way more accurate.
Ave, Frater Sebastianus! I've got a rather interesting question for you: What was the level of literacy of the total population of the Roman empire at around the time of Augustus? And how did that level of literacy change after the so-called "Fall of Rome" in 476 AD? I believe that this would make for an interesting topic for your next video, Frater, but that is a choice that you must make for yourself. Until next time, GRATIAS TIBIANUS, AMICI!
According to Chris Wickham, in his classic book Early Medieval Italy, literacy remained reasonably high. It didn’t change under the Ostrogoths, while under the Lombards, it remained quite high, as can be seen, he says, by the vast number of court cases which refer to leases and contracts. More of these survive from Lombard and Byzantine Italy than from the Empire, thanks to the Church, which kept massive archives.
Why write frater with an capital f? Not even in the church do they write frater as Frater. Nor is “tibianus” a word, most likely you misheard something as ‘tibi’ means ‘to you’ and ‘anus’ means ‘ring’ or ‘anus’ (biologically seen). Also, ‘amici’ is not correct in this case since you would say that when addressing multiple people you see as friends since ‘amici’ is plural of ‘amicus’ which means friend. The correct sentence would be: “Gratias tibi (ago), amice!” with ‘amice’ as vocative (form you use to adress someone with) of ‘amicus’. Don’t take it wrongly though, no hate implied in my comment. Just want to correct you and help you with your Latin.
@@ProGamerOne wouldn’t it be amice, as you’re speaking to someone so it would be a vocative?
@@ProGamerOne I meant it as a sign of respect & YES, I treat the creator of this channel with such utter respect that I regard him as Brother in the walk of Life. If my address of him offends him, then he will let me know & I will adjust accordingly but until such time as he informs me so, it has nothing to do with you. Do you read me?
@@Joanna-il2ur Yes, but what, at least, are the rough estimates for literacy rates amongst the total population? And what about amongst the different strata of the total population? And did this change significantly from the time of Augustus till after the so-called "Fall" of Rome? Did this vary from region to region or was it uniform all through out the whole Roman empire? These are the questions I'm hoping that Frater Sebastianus will kindly answer in his next video which would hopefully be on this subject, that is if he deigns to do so.
Some things I recall from a book I read about the years after the fall. I'll have to find the book to see what years it covered. The Roman's of one city sent their Bishop to their Goth overlord to beg him to allow them to trade with a neighboring city. Trade wasn't free. A rich Roman had a dispute with a Gothic prince who was encroaching on his property. The Gothic justice system fixed the dispute by taking the Roman's land and gave it to the prince. In disputes that involved blood money, Romans were worth 1/2 of a Goth. While Roman institutions were intact and rich Romans figured their knowledge would ensure they were secure. But after the Goths learned how to work those institutions, they got rid of the Roman elites. As we know from the Gothic wars, when Belisarius invaded Italy, Roman peasants had become serfs under the Germanic feudal system. Yes, under their Germanic masters things were relatively more peaceful, but we all know the saying about giving up liberty for security.
Thank you for this very informative video on the subject. A subject rarely touched on and very interesting.
Be that all as it may, we also have to realize that after 500 all over Europe, construction halted, population sizes stalled, roads were no longer maintained, desperate people begged proto-nobility to become serfs in exchange for protection, knowledge of how to construct buildings disappeared, and literacy plummeted...
The Visigothic kingdom was handicapped by the Vandals and Sueves who were highly destructive; razing towns as they marauded across the Iberian penninsula.
Will you make a video about the hispanorroman revolts of Burdunelo and Petrus in the Tarraconense againgst the wisigoths to proclaim another Roman Empire?
Wasn’t he the one burned to death in a Bronze bull? If so, he was Burdunelus, little mule.
@@Joanna-il2ur yes! In spanish they are called Burdunelo and Pedro
Could you do a video about Judaism in the late empire? Ive heard that it nearly became the major religion of the empire before Christianity supplanted it. Particularly in the time of Augustine and the decrees of Honorius.
it is said that if you listen very carefully, you can hear maiorianus whispering "life was better in 500s than 400s for the average roman citizen" even millenias later.
It is estimated that the iberian peninsula didn't recover roman level population till the XIX century. Although this is not easy to quantify in my personal opinion.
I had to look up what “XIX” was lol
I need to read Gibbons directly instead of the various extrapolated text I found in other books.
In Italy the general idea, at the same time of Gibbons, was that the great decline of Italy happened because the Greco-Gothic war and was worsened by the arrival of the Lombards, both events that were depicted as cosmic-level tragedies in the works of Italian intellectuals of the XVIII and XIX Century. The view on the Theodoric reign was overall positive.
Can you do a video on the Gothic wars would love your take on it! Love your videos keep up thre great work!
Did Odoacer have a palace? Or where did romans held court in Ravenna prior to Theodoric rule? I'm having difficulty finding info on Ravenna prior to 493AD
I like this sponsor better than the Titles and Masterworks racket.
Great! This is surprising and a welcome correction.
My guess is that average Roman people walked into all sorts of public works from ancient times that had "temporarily out of order" signs on them, and then no one fixed those things for centuries.
I love being German. I love being European. I love our history, our languages, our people, our culture... Europe is the shining city on the hill. At least. It was.
I just watched a video about the LOW amount of pottery in Europe after the fall of Rome. Life was not good for the average person, unless they came up with a new way of storing their possessions in a way archeologists cannot find?
It depends on where in Europe you were. South of the Danube, whole regions were depopulated. But in Italy not much changed - at first.
Clovis also didn't plunder his own kingdom. After defeating Syragius, he just took over the land. Cologne was already under Frankish rule before the fall of the Western Roman empire.
Other areas of course were devastated by the wars in the 5th century.
Also, farmers and other oppressed people took revenge on any Roman civil servant they could get their hands on, especially tax collectors. So the upper class shrunk, and trade declined.
A lot of people don't realize that most farmers and slaves didn't live much differently before and after the fall, since historians tend to focus on more interesting parts of the population.
Ironically I heard they discovered pottery in Britain up through the mid 6th century (around the time the Dark ages truly began with the Black Death). The Roman world surprisingly remained united through the roads, institutions, and trade. This quickly broke down of course but it surprised me to see the Roman world almost last a century longer than previously imagined and if the plague and Sassanid wars didn’t happen the West may very well have been recovered/reconquered.
@@LordWyatt the Black Death was in the 14th century with its worst effect in 1348/9. There were plagues in the sixth century, notably the Justinianic Plague, which we are now sure was Yersinia Pestis. It did affect Britain and Ireland; we have no figures but Irish records report a succession of human and animal diseases. In continental Europe Y Pestis mortality was about 50%. But the earlier Plague of Cyprian in the mid third century, believed to be Ebola, also killed half the population and the Empire didn’t collapse.
Excellent Vídeo,Thanks.
Like every event it hurts some people but helps others. The character of what it meant to be "Roman" changed from what it was in AD 100 to what it was in AD 476. Did life change that much for the average person living in rural Britain after 1066? Likely not. Ben Franklin considered himself an Englishman living in Philadelphia in 1740. By 1780 he considered himself an American.
so interesting, a tale of comparative advantage
I listened to a lecturer recently who said most Early Middle Age Historians and Classical Archeologists today believe the collapse of the empire resulted from depopulation. The depopulation began in the second century and continued into the eigth or so century. There is quite a bid of evidence for depopulation. The depopulation, in turn, was caused by epidemiology. Pathogens began arriving into the Mediterranean from the east with wars in Parthia. There were recorded epidemics at the time but once the pathogen was in the Mediterranean, it remained and continued to cause death. There was probably Malaria, Measles, Smallpox, and others. Romans lived in crowded cities, used public fountains, and public baths. The pathogens easily spread and devastated the population. Studies have shown that the city of Rome was a population sink. The German Tribes, on the other hand, lived in dispersed and detached dwellings, did not use public baths or fountains, and drank ale made with boiled water. Their populations slowly grew while Roman populations slowly declined and this trend continued for centuries. The Crisis of the Third Century was, in part, due to a shrinking tax base. There was also manpower shortages such that the Roman Army relied more on Germans in the third century onwards. After the Justinian plague devastated the populations 541-549 AD, Arab tribesmen were able to sweep into the eastern and southern empire. The population did not really return until the High Middle Ages due to a warming climate, smaller cities, a transformed culture, and some immunity development in the gene pool.
where can i get a high quality digital version of this painting. its great
I wonder what kind of medieval kingdom would've grown out of Ostrogothic Italy if Belisarius did not destroy it, or at least decided to become the new king of the Ostrogoths.
Julian tried to restore the empire, but ended up ruining Italy even more with his struggling war against the Goths.
It is very likely that the Ostrogoth would have "Latinized" as the Lombards eventually did in Otl, since both Ostrogoths and Lombards numbered around 100 000 individuals each, in a country inhabited by millions of Latins. However it is also very likely that a few elements of Gothic culture are integrated in the local culture, (such as art, architecture and technology) so this alternate kingdom of Italy would be still predominantly latin but would still be a bit different from the late western roman empire. It would also have been a much more stable and powerful kingdom than Otl kingdom of Lombardy (at least once the post-Theodorich dynastic dispute is solved) since the Lombards during most of their rule were brutal and xenophobic towards the local population unlike the much more tolerant and capable Ostrogoths.
@@francescosantambrogio6421 Longobards and Ostrogoths were culturally and linguistically relatively closely related, so culturally it didn't make much difference which Germanic tribe ruled Italy. Both have relatively fast Latinized themselves, leaving only some Germanic remnants in today's Italian. But genetically you can still see their heritage, especially in Northern Italy. There is a certain shade of blonde hair (a bit greyish), that you almost exclusively see in Northern Italy and Northern Spain.
Good video!
How much do we know about the languages and laws of the Goths?
9:50 , The majority Roman populace is the cause for extinction of visigoths, their laws were unpopular an roman aristocrats an garrison surrendered their cities to the caliphate.
The endless civil wars too: the commoners and elite alike were happy to sellout to the Caliphate if it meant the end of it all
cool
How do you consider the wars of reconquest of Justinian? As I read them when a younger man I was caught up in the audacity of the emperors plans...with the brilliance of Belisaurius and the amazing victories he accomplished. But even before the end we see the dark hints that this will not turn out well. So now as an older, hopefully wiser guy I wonder if...maybe..the conquest of the Vandal kingdom could have been leveraged diplomatically vis a vis Italy to accomplish a Roman reoccupation that may have avoided the brutal destruction that befell Italy in our timeline. What do you think? Could Justinan have used his diplomatic corps to exact greater political concessions or compromises with the Ostrogothic elite to establish a more intensive Roman administration, without the combat? I'm interested in what others might think of this. This is the kind of thing I think about when I'm laying down to sleep. Lol.
no
@@nandocastiglione9742 my conclusion exactly.
Non Desistas, Non Exieris!
Well, that depends on what we are comparing to. If to the times of the 5 Good Emperors, or even Diocletian, it was catastrophically worse. If we are comparing life in 470 AD vs 500 AD, then yes, there was little difference. 500 AD might even have been marginally better.
Very interesting topic and very well made video. I would however suggest to get your point across faster as this video should not have been over 20 minutes long. Subscribed
May I suggest two alternate history videos where one Theodora talks Justinan out of attacking the Ostrogoths and uses marriage instead of military force to rope them in? Second, maybe later a different Carolingian empire buys off the Umayyad Caliphate by offering them a piece of the action by bringing them into the Holy Roman Empire a Pompey solution on steroids.
How was life for Romans in Constantinople after "The Fall" (1453)? Please!!!!!
I would imagine it being like what modern Americans must feel when witnessing the great things their forefathers had created, whilst being both ignorant and incapable of replicating them. To an extent, this is true for the west at large.
As we let the barbarians cross the Rio Grande.
@@ghostlyimageoffear6210 the barbarians speak a romance language tho
@@AK-hi7mg ...okay, fine. Let them in.
Americans are pretty good at replicating their imperialism
@@kafon6368 no. Trump 2024
I imagine it was a similar situation for the average Roman before and after the Fall of Constantinople in 1453.
It wasn’t. Constantinople was a shell of its former shell from 1204.
Maiorianus made a video on it:
ua-cam.com/users/shorts-OlqnQsVgI8?feature=share
@@LordWyattStill Constantinople recovered at some point and had large population till the plague in the mid of 14th century.
So would you still recommend reading Gibbons series about the Decline Of The Roman Empire?
Time to play CK3's Fallen Eagle and see how a proper Ostrogothic - Romano culture and state would perform.
Love the content. Cheers from Estonia
Which language the Romans and Goths communicated in? Did they have translators when communicating?
Nice video, but this bell noise is driving me insane.
And yet trade trade routes did shrivel in Italy, western Europe, and Africa - this is well attested. And it was ultimately the loss of trade and learning that brought on what we used to call the Dark Age. So sure, Odoacer and his immediate successors might have treated the Romans well. But the world still suffered greatly for the loss of the western empire.
Farmer looking up statues.
"They'd rather nice on my front porch."
Interesting times.
Then the Byzantines showed up to "liberate" Italy, and then the Lombards, and so everything went to hell.
Is there a video about Arian Christianity, which is closer to the real teachings in the Bible, without doctrines, and why it did not survive?
Have you noticed the URL!?????
It says etRuScY
omg what the hell ????
I enjoy how through more advanced technology and techniques, historians are learning more details about life from Roman and post-Western Roman world. Its revolutionary, compared to what I was taught 30 years ago.
What kind of technology and techniques?
But didn't you say it back then in one of your videos that after the Germanic tribes took over, some stuffs that are considered normal to the Roman civilians suddenly become privileges instead. You know, like the using of utensils and having the better hygiene.
It was more pronounced in Gaul and Hispania. In Italy, things were mostly business as usual (though life was declining, yes, but much more gradually, starting in the late 4th century), until the 540s.
@@aaronTGP_3756 Thanks for telling me! I guess this needed to be divided depending on the areas of the former Western Roman Empire too.
So-called "Barbarians" were virtually undistinguishable from the Romans because they adopted the Rome customs quickly enough to taste the Roman creature comforts. They were at a whole other level of civilized society than modern immigrants from Africa and Latin America.
If you lined up a Roman, a German, a Persian, an Arab, and a Chinese next to each other, then except for their dressing style, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference based on their cultural sophistication.
It's interesting we take the E. Roman perspective on this matter, when they clearly had an agenda.
Rome as an EMPIRE [Under Emperors] may have ended, but Rome existed under different governmental forms, including Kings (Tarquins), Republic, etc., and if the government continued operating, including institutions, then it's probably fair to say Rome/the Roman state continued.
And if we claim that it fell when Justinian took it...then...Rome fell and ceased to be Roman, because the Roman Empire (Eastern) took it over?
I feel like a lot of the focus here was on material improvement to lifestyle, but I would imagine that despite things being objectively better, for a lot of people it would have felt *worse*. The reason I say this is from looking at things like the industrial revolution in England; life became objectively better and safer for almost all peoples as they abandoned the farms and moved into the cities; the poorest in society were better fed than they had been 50 years ago, had access to certain goods that would have been unthinkable for their family mere decades before. Plus the workers were being introduced to ideas such as unions that on paper improved their bargaining position with employers which, again, they didn't have as farm hands.
And yet despite that, you get Charles Dickens writing about how awful things are for the urban poor.
An objective material improvement is not always going to make people feel happy. Better doesn't always equal "better".
Heck, the same goes today. There's more anger and resentment towards the rich in places like America than ever before, even though the poorest in society are better protected than they have ever been there. The reason? Because anger comes from comparison to others, not from objective standards of living.
The Roman people for sure were living a safer, likely healthier life during Gothic rule, but I would imagine that a very sizeable number of people had extraordinary resentment for their Gothic rulers. Every *small* change imposed on people, every small obstacle, every time you hear soldiers speaking Gothic instead of Latin, these all would cause feelings of anger and unhappiness, which would make the improvements feel irrelevant.
Based on the sort of conversation I've had and heard in recent years about modern social issues, the following would have been a daily occurrence:
Marcus: My friend, did you hear that? I'm sick of hearing Gothic spoken on the streets. It just isn't Roman.
Cornelius: As am I, friend. You know, just 3 generations ago things were still Roman. My grandfather would be rolling in his grave.
Marcus: Certainly. I thought on that, the other day when a Gothic soldier was intimidating Publius the merchant, there's no way our forefathers would have stood for that.
Cornelius: And to top it off people keep saying things are better than they used to be, but how can that be true when most of the military commanders are Goths? You know, back in the old days the Roman politicians led armies? And they brought glories to Rome. And now, the highest Romans are as serfs under the Goths.
Marcus: Yep. Well, what can we do, they have the support of the Emperor and we're just latrine cleaners. Catch you tomorrow.
I wonder who provided security inside Rome in 500 AD? Were centurions still employed?
So the dark ages weren’t so dark after all?
The “Dark Ages” are a myth invented by Renaissance artists to sell you more paintings.
The most empirical place to begin this Study is to bring up the *HARDLY IN THE LEAST* matter of Swamps South of Capital Rome ("Pontine Marshes"?) which were not wholly and totally drained for agricultural use for the Capital Rome until the 20th Century where they were somewhat infamously used as a "weapon" by retreating Germans who turned the Region back into a Swamp (filled with highly virulent malaria virus mosquito born "vector") so I don't think the question be "how did the Western Roman Empire fall?" but more accurately "how did the Capital of the Roman Empire Civitas Rome City fall?"
The most easiest common explanation was a lack of food. Also I think the modern Port North of City Rome is quite new although the Port of Naples may in fact be very Ancient indeed predating even City Rome proper.
As the Roman Empire grew so too did a great many Cities throughout the entire Empire..as far East as London and as far West as Jerusalem. All of these Cities were "vying" for there to be The Next Rome though indifferent to being "Roman" (Latin) or "Center for all of the Paperwork." In effect Ancient Rome collapsed partially as a loss to their Gods (Ancient Greek Gods replaced by Christianity) but also as to relates to one's belief in a Swamp as a Center for All the Things. Another loss may have been of any more trees to fell for the Roman system of trade...again to keep the Capital fed but of course well supplied with construction material there being no steel in that Ancient Times outside of Damascus anyways.
Ancient Rome also was constantly "afflicted" with a lack of good "science"(no Doctors and only one Physician that i am aware of...Galen.) Again none of this is true of Modern Rome excepting the lack of large forests around near all of post Roman collapse. If one looks at Modern Marseilles or near all of Africa North near all of Levant near all of modern Greece the lack of any forests is quite striking.
Also Rome never truly created any "industry" as well relying more instead on what Karl Marx famously called "bread and circuses" which i think there be much to say in that. The founding Myth of Romulus and Remus is of great interest tho imo. Ancient Rome had many interesting Gods of far greater depth and clarity than was true of "Greek Gods" which were all very condescending in as relates to the latter.
Roman Gods were always about The Imperative which i think was and still is a uniquely Latin term ("Bounden Duty.")
It's a bit obvious that life during the barbarian attacks was worse than life after the barbarians stopped attacking.
and the fact that Odoacer and Theodoric were not barbarians, they just bave a German blood but they were a lot of emperors born in Gaul, and thus, Odoacer was born in Ravenna and he was a roman statesman, and he got a support of the senate on overthrowing Romulus Augustus. And their names were
Flavius Odoacer
Flavius Theodoricus
think it would have survived more intact had not Justinian tried to take it.
Is there any evidence to show the aqueducts were repaired? I read the Romans themselves destroyed the portions leading through the city walls, to prevent invaders from using them to enter Rome.
Can you do an Episode about Roman Influence on The Islamic empire?
@@SanjayKumar-jd3bv Israel?
Ostrogoths were the saviors of Western Roman Empire...
Nothing changed! Next sentence: It got better and they had a better life. Which is it? It got better or didn't change?
Yeah this whole thing of "the Roman Empire never fell" doesn't stand up to scrutiny. There was a political/social change. Roman territory was forcibly taken and conquered. We know from archeology that there was a steep decline in material culture for some parts of the empire. Different people were in charge, the culture was changing. Did people notice at first? Not really. Many of the same systems and instituions persisted for a long while but that doesn't mean a change didn't happen. One overly simplistic narrative of the "fall" has been replaced by another simplistic narrative that nothing had changed.
@maiorianus You make a persuasive case in videos that the collapse of ancient civilization in the west happened much later than is traditionally thought. I'd love to see you carry the story forward from 540 to the date that we can say civilization had definitely collapsed and the ancient workers most definitely gone. I'd love to see the traditional narrative of roman history changed to mark the fall of the Roman empire with the disbanding of the Senate in the gothic war.
I'm no expert, but it seems to me like it wouldn't be much after 540, since the Gothic War largely devastated life for most people on the Italian Peninsula for a long time afterward.
I think you think you were right there with a massive collapse of civil society devastation by war plague and famine. Certainly the actual city of Rome was very nearly abandoned. But the world of the ancient Mediterranean was not completely gone and I'm sure there was a much longer slower. Klein following that not unlike our traditional narrative set in the fifth century. I would imagine bringing our story of decline and fall inline with your standard textbook by 750 or so.
"I think you think you were right there with a massive collapse of civil society devastation by war plague and famine."
Even though I literally started by saying that I'm not an expert and then simply gave my opinion? *sigh* OK then.
@@OhioDan sorry didn't mean for that comment to be directed at you
@@virgilxavier1 It's all right. No hard feelings.
People want to blame Justinian for creating the idea of the fall, when he was abiding by the system they reference. Both Italy and North Africa had overthrown and killed rulers that were in service to Constantinopole. If the Germans were supposedly client kings of Constantinopole, then it was completely within Justinian's authority to revoke that territory from rebels who had defied the crown. So did this client king system exist or did it not?
Maybe we get the fall of the Western Roman Empire confused with the fall of Western Roman Civilization. Civilizations (at least vestages of civilizations) can survive the collapse of an empire - especially if it is conquered by a culture that wants to adopt its institutions, not wipe them out.
So the Goth ruling Italy was like the Norse ruling Britain??
For the first fifty years upto AD 520-ish, more or less, rather more settled than the previous fifty after AD 420 - the Visigoths and Vandals had gone about their business and the Ostrogoths had settled in to play at finders keepers (the wealthier Romans having buzzed off to the honey pots of New Rome); so a sense of make do and mend replaced destruction and decay .. like Europe just after the Second World War. The next fifty years, AD 570-ish, saw the real disintegration of make-do mentality, and mending became a fool's errand; the Justinian reconquest was no Marshall Plan for Italy (or elsewhere) but a Soviet Style take-over bid, and one that that was fit only to fail - leaving what was left to the controlling hands of the Lombards .. and they were most definitely not the Romanising Ostrogoths. Only in the fifty-odd years thereafter, down to AD 620, did Rome - very briefly - settle into a period of relative 'get-on-with-things' way of life .. amid the Franks, English, Goths and Vandals ..
And from this, the 'Italians' re-emerge into a pre-Rome Post-Roman existence (lasting down to AD 1870), with mostly city-states jealously eying their own 'land' and envying that of others. Only very occasionally joining together to beat off a common foe, and periodically swept up in waves of piracy, alien intrusion, foreign domination, Saracens, Arabs, Saxons, Normans, Austrians, French etc (much like parts of Europe after the collapse of the Soviet Union).
And the Imperial Romans? Myeh! What did those Romans do for them .. apart from roads - all the easier to dominate them .. and public bathhouses - in water that was soiled by other peoples' filth .. and big megalomaniacal buildings - of real use to neither man nor beast .. or (You get the picture? Yes, we see! et al); impressive, for sure, but being a Leader of the Pack isn't all it's cracked up to be.
;o)
The life of the de facto ruler of the former empire also got better. In the roman empire 62% of Emperors died violently, thats like playing russian roulette with 4 bullets in the cylinder
Yeah. The life of a senator not being a very safe one wasn't anything new. Official execution was probably a gentle death compared to what happened to some Roman politicians in earlier centuries. Stonings and stuff like that.
I really do not like this narrative of " barbarians were actually good!". First off roman empire was a big place and not all places got off as easy as italy. Secondly things have changed rapidly once the barbarian honeymoon period ended as otherwise it would be very hard to reconcile deurbanization and breakdown public infrastsructure by thr ninth century. When we talk about effects of fall of roman empire, we have to take into account not just next 20 years but also next 500 and we need to compare it to eastern roman empire standards.
Do you think that the 7th century Rome may have been better for the remaining Romans in some ways. Less population. Agricultural. Less political turmoil. Would be invaders would be sacking a nearly empty city.
WTF, now I want my country to be defeated by a relentless storm of barbarians, too!
Nice barbarian propaganda you got there. Western Europe wasn’t totally unstable or lesser in quality compared to the Eastern Roman Empire in any way
"barbarischen propaganda" dafuq?! How degenerate you have to be, to have an emotional attachment to the idea of "leser barbarian folks"
Hail Caesar, morituri te salutant!
I know that in order to stand out you have to offer alternative info and debunk some myths... but this video is too much of an exaggeration.
There’s a misconception that the Roman Empire was beneficial for the average citizen. The Empire was in fact a tyranny, akin to the military dictatorships of today. As Maiorianus rightly states, it mattered little to the average Roman whether they were ruled over by a king or an emperor.
Watching a lot of your videos, it seems to me that YOU have a little Eastern Roman bias...Like it or not for a 1000years more it was the only (European) beacon of civilization. And it fell for the same reasons the western part did. Infighting and negligence of its people and purpose. Classic Roman/Greek trait. (I am Greek, I know).