Why The Roman Empire Fell... When will our great civilization fall?

[princeofvegas 0]

I did my thesis on the collapse and fall of the ancient roman empire. I am going to summarize it here because I think it is something that will eventually happen to us and there are already signs of it.

 

It is inevitable that any great civilization must one day come to an end. There is widespread speculation and many theories as to why the Roman Empire faded away into history. Rome was a great Empire that in its time, expanded across the far reaches of Europe. However, like the great civilizations before it, it came to a sudden end. Some of the more mainstream theories include a loss of civic virtue to a shortage of running water. Other theories are a bit more complicated and involve the governmental operations of the Empire and invading Barbarians. Perhaps it was not one factor that caused the fall, but many factors that led to the inevitable end of Roman civilization. We must not forget the downfall of the Roman Empire because history will repeat itself if we do not learn from our mistakes.

 

Many historians believe that the beginning of the collapse of the Roman Empire was attributable to the loss of civic virtue. For instance, Roman citizens began outsourcing their jobs, defending the Empire, to Barbarian mercenaries. In the Roman Times, you were considered a man once you served in the legions of Rome. With Roman citizens hiring mercenaries to perform their civil duty, there was an eventual decline of the civic virtue for which the Empire was built on. When the Roman Empire began, men had the idea that everything they did was for Rome, similar to the old British military slogan, ?For King and Country.? As time went on and more Roman jobs were outsourced, citizens became more interested in the welfare of themselves than that of their country. There was also another factor that contributed to the loss of civic virtue. The spread of Christianity in the Roman culture made the citizens less interested in the ?here and now? and more willing to wait for the rewards of heaven. This made them less concerned about the protection of their family and cities and left the Roman Empire wide open to many problems that would plague its downfall.

 

A few notable historians contend that the way the Roman Empire was operated, was in itself the seed of its own destruction. First and foremost, the Empire had no budgetary system as it relied upon the treasures from conquered territories. The Empire was open to trade with very few countries and survived its entire time on the spoils of war. There eventually came a time when the Roman military had no more new territories to conquer because it had conquered them all. Slowly, the wealth of the Roman Empire began to trickle away as it did not have any other means of income. Secondly, the cost to operate the military increased with every new territory because they had to pay the soldiers who occupied the new territory. With every territory that was taken over by the Romans, soldiers had to remain to keep the peace and maintain the empire of Rome. Once the money began to run low soldiers stopped getting paid on a regular basis. For all they had done for their country, they did not want to be treated this way so many began to abandon the military in order to make a living. The Roman Empire's pattern of tax collection by taxing the lower class people heavily when money was needed caused the rich to get richer and the poor to get poorer. The government did not have annual taxes or wage taxes, they had what are now known today as necessity taxes. Whenever the Empire was in need of money, they started to tax the peasants and hard workers in the society and the rich never had to give up a single cent. This led to an eventual uprise from the peasants and their refusal to work which helped to contribute to the destruction of the Roman Empire. Without anyone to farm or herd livestock, everyone had to fend for themselves.

 

One of the more mainstream theories as to why the Roman Empire fell is the fact that their supply of running water ran dry. Some of the underground springs and even above ground lakes eventually dried up due to the amount of water that was in demand across the Roman Empire. Unlike we have today, the Romans did not have a way to purify salt water into drinking water. With each new territory they conquered, the citizens that lived there demanded to have running water if they were to be Roman citizens. The Romans got their supply of running water from underground springs and lakes. With millions of people using these sources of water day in and day out, the water sources began to run dry. Dry lakes however, were not the only reason that the Romans ran out of running water. Towards the end of the Empire, their great aqueducts came under attack from the invading barbarians. Barbarian attacks on the great aqueducts caused a permanent disruption in their flow of water which also caused a permanent disruption in Roman life. All they had to do was demolish a section of the aqueducts and the running water that it was supplying would trickle to a quick stop. This was never an issue in the glorious days of the empire because they could easily send a team of engineers out an have it operational in a matter of weeks. As the Roman Empire was falling there was not enough money to repair the aqueducts and their once beautiful cities began to decay with filth. Eventually Roman citizens left the cities to find a source of water to live near and most of their cities were left abandoned.

 

Most believe that the ultimate fall of the Roman Empire can be attributed to the Barbarian invasions in the 7^th century A.D. This is not mere speculation, but absolute fact that can be verified from many different historic references. Around the 6^th century A.D, the Barbarians began attacking Rome in greater and greater numbers and with all of the civil wars and emperor displacements the city was defenseless. It eventually happened where the mercenaries that Rome was paying to protect the cities realized that Rome had a great weakness in its military adeptness. They seized this opportunity and began to descend upon the city. Rome was able to defend itself for almost 60 years. There is one turn of events that Rome was not prepared for. In the 7^th century AD, the Arabs were conquering the middle eastern world and parts of Europe. Hearing of Romes weakness, they immediately sent thousands of soldiers to Rome and the city fell in a matter of weeks. Under normal circumstances, Rome would have been able to defend itself from attacks like this, but because of all of the other underlying factors, the Empire came to a halt.

 

There is no one that knows for sure what led to the eventual end of the Roman Empire, there are however many accepted theories as to how and when it happened. The problem with each of these theories is that the theorists stand by their reason in singularity. I feel that each of these theories contributed as a whole to the fall of the Roman Empire having one thing lead to another. With problem after problem like this piling up, the Roman citizens could not do anything to alleviate the inevitable decline. The loss of Rome can probably be considered one of the greatest losses to the world as a whole. Rome made so many technological achievements in its time not only in engineering, but in medicine. When the Roman Empire fell, it was followed by a the Middle Ages, which was a time of no great technological advancements. Many believe that if the Roman Empire lasted until today, we would be at least 500 years more advanced technologically than we are now. If every great civilization since the beginning of time has come to an end, when will our time come?

[networker 0]

This is a really good post.It's definitely true that the Roman's outstretched themselves territorially.Then they had no choice but to outsource manpower in order to run things better. What's interesting is that many ant-free trade people these days, blame outsourcingfor the economic problems we have now.Just like the Romans, outsourcing in many ways means that people lose their sense of loyalty, butalso we lose control of our economies as well. This to me seems as rudimentary as 1+1=2, yet governments can't see this, and why?Perhaps just like the Romans, our governments have become corrupted. Just following the clicheabsolute power corrupts absolutely.Once you become corrupted,loyalty doesn't mean anything anymore, and being practical doesn't mean anything either.

Edited December 12, 2009 by networker (see edit history)

[buxgoddess 1]

This is being pessimistic. With every uphill journey there will be a downward descend. It was not only for Rome but for all great civilizations. The difference is the speed at which the descend took place. I think that the descend is directly related with the technology at hand and how much the technology is dreadful or nice.Take for the example of supersonic planes, they are a boost to the commerce and aviation and has greatly enhanced the mobility, but if utilized as destroyer carrier will bring the end of the world in few minutes after an unmanned nuclear bombing. Though the speed at which the development that can be done is improved by the supersonic planes so is its capability to help destruction.The nuclear bombs also help create electrical energy and are a lifeline to the modern world but if left loose and exposed can wipe out the entire living kingdom on earth.These technology was not there during Roman times so they descended slowly with riots, commotion, corruption and betrayal as the cause in general.The cause that the large territory was difficult to handle and the tax collection was necessity based and poor funding of the conquered territory lead to the downfall. The same thing happens in the case of the current world and there are cases of Russia dividing and countries unable to control states and mis control going on. States unable to generate enough fund for self sustainence and look to the central government to help.Also the ethics and culture of the people in most countries are deteriorating fast.It is unpredictable how fast the civilization of today will descent but it will happen pretty fast of course.

[nolan 0]

A few key differences between modern times and Roman times that make the two hard to compare in terms of susceptibility to failure:1. In Roman times, the logistics of managing a large body of people were substantially more difficult than they are at present. Modern systems of transportation and communication make what was impossible for the Romans not only possible for us, but effortless. For example, in Roman times if you wanted to get the latest scoop on what was going on along the empire's western fronts, you couldn't just pick up a telephone, send out an e-mail, view satellite imagery, or deploy a jet plane, as you can these days.2. Global initiatives and manageable, comprehensive political alliances did not exist in Roman times. Yes, so-and-so could say they weren't going to attack you and could give you their word or even sign something saying they'd play nice, but you were still trusting their word. In modern times, there are political organizations whose sole purposes are to keep everybody else in check and to form a collaborative framework for differing political bodies (e.g., the U.N. or the World Bank). Additionally, various oceanographic and airspace treaties allow nations to monitor activities not only for their own protection, but for the protection of others, as well. (If country A wants to send a naval fleet to country D, more often than not B and C will know about it. In some circumstances, interceptions and authorizations are even allowed, as was the recent case with North Korea [as endorsed by the UN].)3. Lastly, the infrastructure for transporting necessities such as food and water has immensely improved. Even around the time of Napoleon you had to worry long and hard about access to such resources and how they would be allotted and dispersed (e.g., when the "largest army ever assembled" made its march into Russia -- needless to say, it didn't go well). Today, cargo ships and aircrafts can ferry these necessities with little difficulty and supply routes are managed much more efficiently.(Disclaimer: These points reflect upon the status of developed nations only.)

[networker 0]

A few key differences between modern times and Roman times that make the two hard to compare in terms of susceptibility to failure:
in Roman times if you wanted to get the latest scoop on what was going on along the empire's western fronts, you couldn't just pick up a telephone, send out an e-mail, view satellite imagery, or deploy a jet plane, as you can these days.

You know what's interesting?. As far as this goes, the Roman's would of had a primitive but ingenious method
of getting messages quickly over a long distance :
http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

I just discovered this today. Who knows what other methods of doing things they had in those times.
They say necessity is the mother of invention.