Fall of the Roman Emperor

Collapse of the Western Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was on the whole, a peaceful and a well-organized empire, during the years of 27B.C through 180A.D. By 190 A.D the Roman Empire came crashing down, the economy began to stagnate. Too much money was being used to simply maintain the border and the unity of the emperor. The cities began to deteriorate and by the 3rd century, the emperor was being attacked from every direction both internally and externally. If The Roman Empire was such a powerful empire, then what led to the decline of the Roman Empire? The fall of the Western Roman Empire was caused by three of the many reasons: politics, economy and the military. Political problems
Internally, the senate became extremely corrupt and political instability came into existence. Consuls and officials would offer positions in office for the people that could pay the money, therefor; some ineffective people got elected and the Plebeians suffered as a result. There was a lack of orderly succession in Rome. In fact, more than twenty men claimed the office of emperor during the period. The emperor Constantine divided the empire into two halves, he declared Constantinople the new capital of Roman society, and claimed to rule over all Eastern provinces. The Western Roman Empire lost its power over towns in the East, causing a great reduction in profits from the treasury and weakening them dramatically in warfare now their strength had been dwindled. [D4] “Part of the money went into the maintenance of the army and the vast bureaucracy required by a centralized Government. The expense led to taxation.” All this means that since the government was going down and the money was being wasted on the army, the plebeians were getting taxed, therefore; caused many economic problems. Economic problems
Rome depended on its empire for funds; (farming practices and mining) it became very poor and had trouble coping economically. Rome had nothing to trade, and couldn't rebuild itself. During certain Imperators regimes, they debased the currency. This meant that a coin didn't have a default value. Instead, it was represented by the amount of silver it contained. As a result, severe inflation occurred. [D3] “The abundance of slaves likewise kept wages low.” There were a lot of slaves so they didn’t really have jobs to be done by the people, which made the wages low. Rome increased piracy on the Mediterranean Sea, which caused destruction of the economic infrastructure/long-distance trade as it was no longer safe. The government lacked revenue because of limited trade and precious metal, but still continued to spend money. This caused the government to raise taxes on all areas of Roman life. Also Rome had agricultural problems, this happened of the overworked soil which resulted in the loss of fertile land throughout Italy and Western Europe, therefore; Romans could not grow a surplus of food to trade. Due to trade distribution the food that they could grow was being traded locally, this became more self-sufficient and less concerned with Roman authority. Rome also lacked trained and loyal soldiers which led to military problems. Military problems
By 300 AD the majority of the Roman army was comprised of barbarian trained soldiers- much less effective than the superior infantry that Rome had in previous centuries. This made the battles against enemies very difficult; Rome no longer had a firm grip or control over military situations. [D5] “Rome, like all great empires, was not overthrown by external enemies, but undermined by internal decay.” This is saying that Rome really did not have any foreign enemies, but Rome had frequent civil wars, which really means Rome vs. Rome and it caused Rome to “decay”. Roman military lacked solders, and the Roman citizens who were expected to enlist in the legions refused and sneakily signed their slaves in their position, which made the military very sluggish. [D5] “The Roman army was composed entirely of Germans”. Eventually Rome had to hire Germanic mercenaries, but those solders were less disciplined and less loyal for the security of Rome. The Germans turned their backs on Rome and took over some land, which means less land, people, and resources. The fall of such a great and successful empire as the Roman Empire shows how political missteps, military weaknesses and economical lapses can bring down an empire. It makes me wonder, what would happen if Rome never fell. Probably if Rome stayed strong as it was in the second century, the Mediterranean area and western/southern Europe would've remained a single state, with Latin and Greek the predominant languages. Germanic influences and Islamic ones would've been pre-empted. It is likely that the age of exploration would've taken longer since even at the height of their power the Romans didn't seem enthusiastic about venturing far into the Atlantic.