The Roman Empire’s Collapse in the 5th century

18 Mar, 2004 930 History of the Ancient World

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the causes of the fall of the Roman Empire. Edward Gibbon wrote of its decline, “While that great body was invaded by open violence, or undermined by slow decay, a pure and humble religion gently insinuated itself into the minds of men, grew up in silence and obscurity, derived new vigour from opposition, and finally erected the triumphant banner of the cross on the ruins of the Capitol.”But how far is the growth of Christianity implicated in the destruction of the great culture of Rome? How critical were the bawdy incursions of the Ostrogoths, the Visigoths and the Vandals to the fall of the Roman Empire? Should we even be talking in terms of blame and decline at all?St Augustine wrote about the fall of the Roman Empire in the fifth century AD, Edward Gibbon famously tackled it in the eighteenth and it is a question that preoccupies us today.

→ Play on BBC Sounds website

Guests

  • Charlotte Roueche 2 episodes
    Historian of late antiquity at Kings College London
  • David Womersley 2 episodes
    Fellow and Tutor at Jesus College, Oxford and editor of Edward Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
  • Richard Alston No other episodes
    Lecturer in Classics at Royal Holloway, University of London

Related episodes

Programme ID: p00547ds

Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00547ds

Auto-category: 937 (Roman Empire)

Hello (First sentence from this episode) Hello, Edward Gibbon wrote of the decline of the Roman Empire.