Essay On The Barbarians

The decline of the Western Roman Empire began in roughly 180A.D with the end of Pax Romana, consisted of a domino effect of factors such as: plagues, social stratification, the barbarization of the army, failures of the Roman leaders and government, and the barbarian invasions slowly causing the Fall of the already weakening empire. The Barbarians caused the fall of Rome to a moderate extent because while on one hand social stratification had affected Rome with heavy taxation of the lower class leading to the allowance of the barbarian invasions which coincided with the fall of Rome, on the other hand, the barbarian attacks on Rome occurred only after the empire was left weak because of the plagues the loss of population that came from it which coincided with the start of the decline of the Western Roman Empire.

Social stratification led to the fall of Rome because it brought about the heavy taxation of the lower class causing lowered Plebian support and pride for the Roman Empire. While Rome was still suffering from their decreased population Diocletian and Constantine drained Rome’s public funds to enlarge the army and civil service. They had to rebound from this at the expense of the Roman people. Spielvogel states, “Although more revenues were needed to pay for the army
From this it is shown that in order to maintain a civilization it has to be both socially and economically stable in order to thrive and remain which the Roman empire wasn't after the occurrence of the