Eric merz

Merz, Eric
Per. 3
9/22/13
World History
The fall of Rome
All civilizations eventually come crashing to an end. “Rome lasted for 503 years and this empire was located in Italy. Rome was about 6,500,000 square miles.” (Frequently asked questions, the Roman Empire). What was the main reasons for the fall of the Roman Empire? When we ask this question the word fall refers to extinction or demise. The three main reasons of the fall of the Roman Empire was because of military weakness, political corruption and economic decline. Rome was affected negatively by the poor military strategy’s during its time in need. “Roman soldiers at the time did not wear breastplates and head armor, these soldiers often got shot down by archers” (doc B). I think the soldiers were lazy. They did not want to carry around all this heavy armor in the heat. Archers would always shoot down and defeat the Roman army. “The Huns exceeded any definition of savagery. They have compact sturdy limbs and think necks […]” (doc D). The Huns where the Romans enemy. They were savages and lived anywhere eating anything. The Romans stood no chance against this military brilliance. The Huns were ready to endure anything at the time, and the Roman soldiers were too lazy to wear armor. The Roman Empire took a big hit from their corrupted political empire. “Over a 50 year period Rome had 19 rulers, and 13 got assassinated. None of Rome’s rulers dies naturally or ‘old age’” (doc A). What I can infer about this is the Roman citizens were angry with their rulers and their government was not trusted very much. This would corrupt Rome because of so much change of power. “Rome was invaded a lot by its enemies. When Rome did invade they would end up running back home” (doc C). This means to me that Rome was hated politically because so many different civilizations invaded them. Being hated politically would lead to a demise of a civilization. Finally Rome also had a bad economic decline. “The condition of Roman subjects in time of peace is worse than war… the taxes are severe […]” (doc E). This means that even during time of peace Rome was in trouble with money. Rome needed do raise its economy by putting loads of taxes on the citizens. These people could not afford these raised taxes and forces poverty throughout Rome. “The Roman world was shaken by a violent earthquake. [..] 50,000 people lost their lives in the flood alone and harvest lands were ruined” (doc F). This earthquake helped only to destroy Rome and their economy. With 50,000 people dead and their farmland destroyed Rome lost a lot of workers and valuable land to produce crops. This is one less item to sell in this was bringing down Rome. In a nutshell, the Roman people once had a thriving and powerful civilization. The Roman Empire is perhaps the most studied and revered of any government that has ever existed. There are many theories that attempt to explain the decline and fall of the great empire. Through each of these various explanations there are proving documents that Rome fell because of their Military weaknesses, Political corruption and Economic decline. The Romans were forces out of their natural habitat and there way of life and civilization was lost forever.