The Roman Empire: Reasons for the Decline

David G. Terrell
October 26, 2009

The decline of the Roman Empire has intrigued scholars for centuries—with some trying to

understand the events while others attempted to eke out lessons for their contemporaries‟ edification.

Regardless of intent or interpretation, in the mid-third century AD the Roman Empire in the west

disappeared and, in the east, became a Greek kingdom that continued for another thousand years. The

dominant interpretations of the events, arising over the past 200 years, are varied and thoughtful. Gibbon,

in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1781), attributed the events to a „triumph of Barbarism and

Religion‟. Spengler resorted to a biological analogy to suggest that the decline was a natural, foreseeable

process. Toynbee asserted that the Roman Empire was the inheritor and successor of a Hellenic Society

that began declining due to the Peloponnesian War. Others refused to acknowledge a decline at all and

assert that a natural evolutionary process transformed the Roman Empire into the European medieval

world.1

Nevertheless, the key features of civilization—population; sufficiency in food, housing, and

clothing; the availability of technology (especially energy and metallurgy); functioning multifaceted

economic systems; and, effective urban-rural infrastructures—declined in and about Rome and her

western provinces. 2 While it has proven difficult to objectively quantify the causes, 3 the historical

consensus is to examine the years after 250 for physical, social and political causal factors.4 This essay

1
M Cary, and H H Scullard, A History of Rome Down to the Reign of Constantine (3rd Edition. New York:
Palgrave, 1975), 551-2.
Chris Wickham, The Inheritance of Rome: A History of Europe from 400 to 1000 (New Yory: Penguin Group
(USA), 2009), 8-12.
2
Fernand Braudel, The Structures of Everyday Life: The Limits of the Possible (New York: Harper & Row, 1981),
23-26.
Wickham, 22-49.
3
Charles Freeman, Egypt, Greece and Rome: Civilizations of the Ancient Mediterranean (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1996), 552.
4
Cary, 552.
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David G Terrell

will briefly examine the various factors, as expressed by historians under consideration in the current

class—and this author‟s assessment of them.

Cary rejects many of the physical causes advocated by other historians, such as the physical

exhaustion of natural resources and arable land; plagues and disease; physical vices; the dilution of racial

purity; and, population reduced by warfare, sterility, or the deliberate avoidance of childbearing. This

author agrees with Cary in asserting that while these events did occur, there are few indications that their

effects correlated with major characteristics of decline.5

Significant social factors affected the Roman Empire in the centuries before its decline.

Prominent among them were the limited educational opportunities for all but scions of wealthy families.

Overwhelming ignorance prevented many Romans from helping advance their civilization. Also, the

Empire‟s expansion and dominance were rendered possible through the efforts of its practical, aggressive

leaders. In later centuries, the characteristics that distinguished these leaders fell out of style; being

subsumed by Christianity‟s doctrines of patience. The religion successfully enlisted the best minds away

from military and civil service, though Boren disagrees. Rome had to rely on foreign troops to meet its

military needs.6 Finally, Rome‟s economy was stagnant through reliance upon slave-labor that stifled

technological advancement and through concentrated wealth that lead to under-consumption by the

common people. In spite of the negative effects of these factors, it does not seem possible that they, of
7
themselves, caused the decline of Rome.

The political evolution of the Roman Empire in the third and second centuries BC was the most

significant force causing its decline. Over time, political power became concentrated in the hands of a

few—who did not use their power to maintain order nor control the army—thus spawning chaos and

5
Cary, 552-4.
6
Freeman, 608.
7
Cary, 554.
Henry C Boren, Roman Society: A social, Economic and Cultural History (Lexington, Massachusetts: D.C. Heath
and Company, 1977), 296.
Wickham, 36.
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David G Terrell

creating an environment favoring the rise of the dictator.8 The over-concentration of authority created a

proletariat that was economically dependent on the ruling class. The people, unable to satisfy their basic

needs through their own exertions, suffered in discontent and lost their habits of self-sufficiency and

resourcefulness against adversity. The Emperors tended to be military leaders who, ruling from the field

with military discipline, had neither time nor patience for the inherent inefficiencies of senatorial

consultation.9

The attitude of self-aggrandizement extended to those serving in the government‟s administrative

organizations and the rampant misgovernment carried out by an uncontrolled bureaucracy squandered

resources and caused further discontent. This lack of adherence to constitutional mores led to disputed

successions to leadership posts, arbitrary taxation without representation, a general debasement of money,

and government policies that were often driven more by the whims of leaders and the demands of foreign

policy than the welfare of the people of Rome. The politico-military leadership, bound up in gaining

esteem through victory in the field, may have overextended the Empire by expanding east beyond Greece,

towards the Jews, and other oriental areas but Goldsworthy asserts the major threats of the Persians and

the Huns did not, in themselves, pose such a threat. The leadership demonstrated a strategic ineptness in

the face of a steadily changing political situation and this overextension made for porous frontiers.

Communities along the borders were continuously disrupted over the course of two centuries. 10

The discontent of Roman military-aged males affected the number of recruits for the Army and

they had to be replaced by provincial men who lacked versatility, discipline and loyalty to Rome. By

depending exclusively on a professional force, Rome placed itself in a position of yielding to them—or at

8
Boren, 279.
9
Boren, 280.
10
Adrian Goldsworthy, How Rome Fell: Death of a Superpower (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009), 405-6.
Wickham 46-48.
Freeman, 553, 609-10.
Boren, 279.
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David G Terrell

least to the generals who did demand their loyalty. Having a monopoly on the means of violence, the

army‟s participation in emperor-making was the chief proximate cause for the decline.11

Lamentably, the political disruptions and disdain of constitutional institutions by emperors, intent

of protecting themselves and their power, meant that during the last 200 years of the empire, civil wars

were never absent for more than a decade. Their commonality—every adult emperor from Septimius

Severus on experienced at least one—drained the Empire economically and militarily. The late Roman

Empire devolved until its sole purpose was to keep an emperor in office and to benefit the administrators

of power.12

These political currents damaged the people‟s faith in Rome‟s institutions, but hope was slow to

die. Rome‟s decline was therefore a long process. While the political factors dominated, no single factor

led to the end of the Western Roman Empire. Unfortunately, we lack much of the basic information to

confirm or deny the various theories. There is almost no discrete data about the population, demographics,

economic infrastructure, trade balances, taxation and climate change. All must be reconstructed from

wisps of information woven into tenuous wisps of intelligence. The information we do have focuses on

government, culture, religion, international relations and foreign wars; and leads us to create broad,

chronological histories focusing on the continuity of governance rather than the lives of people. “In the

end, it may have well been „murdered‟ by barbarian invaders, but these struck at a body made vulnerable

by prolonged decay.” 13

David G Terrell
Herndon, Virginia

11
Cary, 556.
12
Goldsworthy, 406-415.
13
Cary, 555-6.
Boren, 281-289.
Wickham, 35.
Freeman, 552.
Goldsworthy, 415.
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David G Terrell

Bibliography

Boren, Henry C. Roman Society: A social, Economic and Cultural History. Lexington, Massachusetts:
D.C. Heath and Company, 1977.

Braudel, Fernand. The Structures of Everyday Life: The Limits of the Possible. New York: Harper &
Row, 1981.

Cary, M, and H H Scullard. A History of Rome Down to the Reign of Constantine. 3rd Edition. New
York: Palgrave, 1975.

Freeman, Charles. Egypt, Greece and Rome: Civilizations of the Ancient Mediterranean. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1996.

Goldsworthy, Adrian. How Rome Fell: Death of a Superpower. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009.

Wickham, Chris. The Inheritance of Rome: A History of Europe from 400 to 1000. New Yory: Penguin
Group (USA), 2009.

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