Clifford Ando | The Long Defeat: The Fall of the Roman Empire

Clifford Ando, David B. and Clara E. Stern Professor; Professor of Classics, University of Chicago speaks at third lecture in our four-part series: Why Did Civilizations Collapse: Internal Decay or External Forces? The Long Defeat: The Fall of the Roman Empire in East and West.
The Roman Empire remains one of the world's longest lived polities. Its collapse has therefore endured as a great historical puzzle. Was it barbarians or internal decay? Or was Christianity to blame? The lecture will explore a range of theories and consider in detail why the two famous theories, those of St. Augustine and Edward Gibbon, have found so little favor.
Free and open to public thanks to the generous support of the Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures Members and Archaeological Institute of America.
Our lectures are free and available to the public thanks to the generous support of our members. To become a member, please visit: bit.ly/2AWGgF7

[@conniepayne4425]

This is a talk on the historiography of the writings on the fall of the Roman Empire, not a history of the Roman Empire. If you're looking for the latter, pass this talk up.

[@wicksinn]

It was a pretty good overview of the literature but it did not answer any burning questions that people have about it.

[@SolaceEasy]

Just pass it up. Unengaging speaker.

[@acrylique3111]

Very interesting ideas I never came across until now. Its as if my brain were missing them, thanks so much !

[@johnrohde5510]

Excellent lecture . Thank you very much.

[@Johnnycdrums]

I loved, "The Fall Of The Roman Empire" when I first saw it as a kid. Recently watched it again, and it still holds up very, very, nicely.

[@DidivsIvlianvs]

Me too.

[@steveswitzer4353]

@@DidivsIvlianvs Those silly shields with the holes in them i can never get past them and james mason as a christian v unconvincing and the silly chariot chase but whatever there are worse movies

[@admirall.ackbar]

This is a okay lecture. Not as bad as some comments have posted. The first half hour is on the historiography of the fall. A review of literature about it. In the second half he provides evidence why the 5th century is the appropriate place to say that Rome fell. He then argues the reason it fell in the 5th and not the 3rd is that neighboring tribes and states had by the 5th learned Roman culture and military tactics, in effect become Romanized, and thus were able to fight Rome on an equal footing.I wouldn't say it's the best lecture I ever heard, but it's not bad, and learned a few new things and ideas.

[@annascott3542]

Dear OI, it would would be terrific if you’d start including QA segments in your programming. Thank you, grateful subscriber

[@ISAC_UChicago]

Dear Anna, Thanks for asking! We have started to include them in all of our 2019 lectures (unless the speaker asked us not to). While it can be tricky at times (often people are so excited that they don't want to wait for the microphone before asking their question), going forward we try to film as many Q&As as possible. (kb)

[@annascott3542]

That’s so true... but despite that it’s still usually enjoyable. Awesome, thanks!

[@retsehcmaharg]

I walked out on that movie 50+ years ago after the first 5 minutes. Had I stayed I might be on the staff of the OI today!

[@savannajane3705]

Brilliant, simply..

[@NDRonin1401]

Sweet intro, I would watch whatever that dude talks about.

[@SolaceEasy]

Hard act for the speaker to follow.

[@terriok1]

Did you catch his name?

[@yaceya]

@@terriok1 Do you mean Matthew W. Stolper?

[@Marmocet]

Perhaps when looking for reasons for the fall of the Western Roman Empire, it's more productive to ask: what held the Roman Empire together? Why should the Roman Empire _not_ have fallen?

[@TEverettReynolds]

> it's more productive to ask: what held the Roman Empire together? I agree with that question. The decline and fall is understandable, and maybe even predictable, but how it survived so long after losing the Republic is probably a better way to get a grip on what actually happened.

[@davidrapalyea7727]

Re: reasons for decline. Esp. population. One reason seems to be the weather got colder. Rome was at its highest during the Roman Warm Era that was not reached again until about the year 1000 that itself lasted about 300 years. Contemporaries commented on it in about 200AD I believe. I read Britain had a wine industry that made the French nervous, and Dutch wines still do no match the ones Caesar brought. I once found an entire article on Dutch wines that stated "it must have been much warmer..." in those times.

[@TEverettReynolds]

@@davidrapalyea7727 I do believe weather could have contributed to the success and fall of the Roman Empire. A few centuries of good weather conducive to crops would allow populations to thrive in areas that, in the opposite scenario, would be hard pressed to feed everyone. Famines are very hard to find in the archaeological record, but can still be devastating to a population in just a single generation. Just look at how quick the 1932-33 Holodomor Famine event in the former USSR eliminated millions of people. Its a shame we just don't have good reliable population statistics from the Roman era.

[@DeathsOnTheYAxis]

I thought this was pretty good. He gets to his point at the end: static border with barbarians over hundreds of years causes them to become advanced and eventually kill the Romans. I like this theory because there is no propaganda angle, which makes it much less likely to be an exaggeration of the evidence.

[@gullybull5568]

He makes his point - decline from ISLAM raiders. How come Islam wants to destroy Muslims ?

[@candyapples5296]

Thank You! And that took me all of 5 seconds to get :)

[@jesiahquincy8384]

I realize it is quite randomly asking but does anybody know a good website to stream new series online ?

[@gs7828]

It's a bit too simplistic. The real question is "who were the Romans" that are discussed? Which societies existed? Wha was the connection between people and civic authorities? Were military means part of public life? To which extent political maps can be studied from today's perspective on a nation state, and to which extent they are useless in studying the fall of centralised Roman control?

[@DeathsOnTheYAxis]

@@gs7828 You've phrased this as a question but I hear an assertion. The Roman government failed to extend national identity and was enforcing an unnatural military-political boundary. That the Romans "lost" in these regions long before they "lost" them, if they ever had it. To be honest I don't think that's an interesting point at all. No one thinks that the Roman Empire was a nation state. It was en empire. It had a government and an army, and it did extracted tax revenue and conscripted from the people residing in certain territories. These territories can be drawn on a map and that is why we have political maps of the empire.

[@XalphYT]

Are there similar maps and lectures for the Persian Empire held in Iran?

[@jamesmccabe4050]

Excellent.

[@bugajification]

In a way you may look at a fall of Roman Empire as a diffusion of civilization. Were once border marked exact difference between civilization and barbarity, both started to intermix and exchange. One might wonder what would happen if Roman Empire would develop marches similar to medieval Holy Roman Empire marches that would protect their borders,or what if they wouldn't conquer all of the civilised states in sight. It's hard to.imagine several different states falling at once (like they did in bronze age) maybe that kind of a buffer zone would help empire to manage the pressure and help facilitate socio-political innovation. Where one of the states would develop more advanced way of handling the crisis and rest would learn from it. But then again I feel like im just describing post modern europe

[@allmendoubt4784]

Excellent thanks, I studied a long module on Late Antiquity back in the day and had forgotten the overall themes. My current quest is to understand the formation of early medieval Europe for it seemed largely legend. Hmm living in China = no literature and a wavy reality. However, when comparing cultures in my classes I tend towards the theme that Rome as an entity has not fallen yet, it is perhaps even more coherent now in distinction from the Han, than it was in the 3rd century, any academic of Romantic and Germanic heritages cannot survive without recourse to the body of cultural knowledge that has survived in our use of ideas based around a common lexis.

[@larryconcepts]

"heritages cannot survive without recourse to the body of cultural knowledge that has survived in our use of ideas based around a common lexis." Yes, but Roman culture had the same (or even more profound) debt to Greek and Etruscan cultures, they in turn leaned on Mycenean, Minoan, and Egyptian culture, and even our time units and geometric units are Sumerian. To claim thereby that these entities have also still not fallen, would be similarly valid, and lead to a pointless tautology. Having "recourse to their body of cultural knowledge" is not sufficient grounds for claims survival of anything BUT the said cultural knowledge. It won't however get your a ticket to the chariot races.

[@Alberad08]

Interesting lecture - thans for sharing!

[@davemojarra2666]

First dude was Prof Hubris.

[@12from121]

Aurelian and the Army still being largely intact was why Rome didn't fall 200 years earlier. The western army was wiped out at the end of the 4th century and never rebuilt.

[@steveswitzer4353]

The frigidus culled the western army and not enough taxes once the barbarians were inside and the regulars replaced by foederati who came ready armed and probably trained in the roman army anyway

[@gs7828]

The Western armies you talk about were the ones pulling a coup in Italy. Yes, the Latins didn't raise armies for quite a bit, but the idea of Rome becoming a cultural space rather than a state is the point. Rome didn't fall: it ceased to be a state in the West.

[@12from121]

@@gs7828 don't disagree with you. Fall is a very modern idea

[@kinngrimm]

39:00 i agree with Immerwahr on his thesis of the pointalist empire that the US is, having (had?) over 1000 military bases around the world which many the military was surprised about and asking for Immerwahrs list. Recently from another source i heared something about 800 military bases.

[@dovydenaspdx]

Interesting lecture. I think we are also seeing some of the same things happening now, success leads to stupidity. An odd and counterintuitive thing.

[@MasisReubenPanos]

54.08 "by the Roman Empire on the Sasanians in the 190's". The Sasanian dynasty took power in 224 CE. 190 CE the Arsacid dynasty still ruled.

[@tomgilesmarvoloryley]

This is great but i really wish he'd had time to extend that conclusion for like another half hour. Peter Heather's book says a similar kind of thing at the end - the evolution of Rome's neighbours modelled on a Roman structure led to Rome's downfall - and also skimps on the details. Are they talking about just the Sassanians, or the Goths, or the Vandals, or all of them? And when exactly? When the last emperor abdicates or in the 370s? Or the 3rd century? The goths that crossed the Danube were very different to the Goths in the time of Theoderic. Maybe I'll just have to read this guy's books.

[@johnrohde5510]

Doesn't Heather also lay stress on the disruption of Imperial tax structures due to migration?

[@Achill101]

I understood his presentation that all of the neighbors who were in long-term contact with the Roman empire became more like it. The Sassanians were already an empire and didn't need to learn so much, but the Goths and Vandals learned a lot from Rome, military arts in Roman service, metallurgy through trade and cultural diffusion, etc.

[@steveswitzer4353]

@@Achill101 Heather blames the huns to a great extent as far as i can remember

[@Achill101]

@@steveswitzer4353 - but the Huns were the people shortest in contact with Rome?

[@steveswitzer4353]

@@Achill101 but they drove the goths west causing the defeat at adrianople

[@cauemorenokersuldecastroca2917]

Their point at the end is interesting. I see it gaining traction lately. Nevertheless I ask myself if he is not falling in the trap he accused the late antiquity scholars. The main geopolitical shift of our times is the rise o China as a superpower. This process was to a large extent aided and incentivised by the USA with the restablishment of ties at the Nixon presidency, and the push for China admision in the WTO at the Clinton administration.

[@charityava1098]

Welp, I've finally done it. It took the bulk of my dignity, profound existential agony, and frantically alternating between stemming the tide of brain matter that threatened to spill out of my head, and compulsively peering into the growing cavity in my skull, but finally, I've fallen back out of the @ss end of KZbin.

[@chukmok]

I'LL SAVE YOU SOME TIME: PEOPLE JUST STOP CARING

[@clydecessna737]

One of the best explanations for the decline and fall is this: The Closing of the Western Mind by Charles Freeman en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Closing_of_the_Western_Mind

[@Numischannel]

"Late Antiquity" is a term created by State-funded scholars to organize workshops were everyone from every area can read a paper on their respective subjects, from "Silkroadology" to "Jewsih Mesianic Movements in the 2nd. Century AD" to "Early Quran Studies", so that they can fill their production quotas. There is nothing in common between the world of Marcus Aurelius and the world of Charlemagne, beyond the fact that both received the title of "Augusti of the Roman Empire." If that's relevant, then Emperor Francis II from Austria until 1806 had the same claim.

[@Numischannel]

In other words, I agree 100% with Ando, and I think this is one of the best lectures ever uploaded in youtube.

[@DidivsIvlianvs]

They always chop off Egypt. In fact, Rome had outposts on the Arabian peninsula in the 2nd Century.

[@desmondcampbell9358]

Starts at 4:10

[@kevinbyrne4538]

I think that the Roman Empire fell in large part because the Roman generals learned that they could use their armies to conquer Rome and become emperor. Consequently, the Roman armies exhausted themselves (and the empire) in civil war, leaving the barbarians -- some of whom had served in a Roman army and therefore knew its strategies and tactics -- increasingly free to invade the empire.

[@larryconcepts]

Though that's somewhat valid as far as it goes, Roman civil wars predate the fall by centuries, dating back to the Republic (- Marius and Sulla, - Pompey and Caesar, - Octavian and Antony, - even the Gladiator Revolt could be seen as a civil war in some sense, - the four Emperors struggle after Nero's death broke the succession, many etcetera's.) Internal strife was not sufficient condition for the ultimate regime change. Each had profound effects on the development of the state, yet it rumbled ever onward. Nor can the loss of any particular separated partition be considered the end of the Institution of the Empire. At the Western end it could have been called the Ravenna Empire, Rome being ditched for safer harbors by then. Byzantines called themselves 'Romans' for 1100 years. The term and citizenship had been detached from the Eternal City from at least the Social Wars, if not before. The West's subordination to the east alternated with puppet Emperors of the occupying Germanic kings for 7 or 8 decades. As late as 465-6 the Eastern Emperor Leo I took direct formal rule of the West as well, also appointed Western Emperor candidates to take it off his hands. It has the appearance of a large Empire losing grip of one of its dominions, rather than the collapse of some wholly distinct entity. Our narrative of the "collapse of the west" wasn't seen as such at the time, or for a long time after. The alien Greek-ness of the east taints Western retro-perspectives.

[@alessandrogini5283]

I think that a big what if come with succession of hadrian and the emperor alexander severus

[@gs7828]

Everything functioned very differently compared to modern nation states. It's important not to apply today's expectations of what a society should do.

[@TEverettReynolds]

So.. Roman success in making its self a model empire to its Barbarian neighbors, allowed those neighbors to become more and more like Rome, eventually allowing them to defeat Rome. I support this idea. I will add, that all the trade, resources, and gold sent into those Barbarian areas on the Frontiers, over three centuries, only helped them build up and get smarter, stronger, and more able to now afford the better weapons and learn the better strategies needed to defeat Rome. Rome really should have figured out a way to get the Barbarians on the border into the Empire, instead of shunning them and abusing them. Had Rome been able to organize and embrace the local Barbarians, they probably could have continued expanding and would have had a chance to defeat the Huns.

[@emsnewssupkis6453]

The Huns didn't move into the Roman Empire to be civilized. Just for example.

[@larryconcepts]

@@emsnewssupkis6453 correct

[@dargay386]

How to visit this amazing museum ?

[@nilesbutler8638]

Man, he is an unorganized, jumpish speaker. I think he dropped nearly every third sentence mid-thought, to go off on a tangent or a different direction of though. Really hard to listen to, even if he has a nice voice and well-written script. Why is it that so many academics are so bad at public speaking?

[@jensallis2]

Totally agree

[@Ghostshadows306]

Agree

[@g-rexsaurus794]

Highest populatil Europe would have for another 11 hundred years? Well that's an understatement, high medieval Europe had more than double the population of Roman Europe, yes we are including far more land but I'm not sure why the professor here is so sure that it has to be "at least", it might very well be that former-Roman Europe in 1000 AD was already at Roman levels in general.

[@konfunable]

526 Byzantine empire was drawn extremely inaccurately.

[@theroadupward]

All empires fall-100%.

[@PAPITO_49]

At 21:40 you have not mentioned the decline may be do to #1-devaluation of money, #2 government intervention in private business ie rules & regulations and #3 depopulation, population moving to other parts of the known world to be free from to much government. Same as in today's world 2023 P.S. The fall of the Economy starting around the 3 century.

[@nuttawutnumpet3393]

Civis Romanus Sum

[@LoneWolf2k1_minis]

Romanes eunt domus!

[@billdavis4329]

The best explanation on this topic comes from a little (25-page) essay, published by Sir John Glubb, entitled "The Fate of Empire and the Search for Survival." www.rexresearch.com/glubb/glubb-empire.pdf The central thesis is that all empires ultimately fall, usually due to internal failures, and at rough intervals of some 250 years or so.

[@OnlyMyPOV]

It moved to the USA and is ruled by the Khazars (which is Caesars).

[@histguy101]

It's not. "Khazar" in Latin is "Gazari" and in Greek "Hazaroi." The Khazars were contempories and next door neighbors with the Roman empire(who still used the title Caesar) for centuries and had many interactions with them, but they were still a nomadic steppe people with their own name.

[@Awakeninghumanzombies247]

🌎🦅

[@senegalcom]

Skip to the last three minutes to hear his theory. The first 56 minutes is the longest intro ever, combined with maps he's only briefly reviewed before the lecture.

[@adamtippett4702]

That is because it is a historiography on the fall of Rome and not a history

[@larryconcepts]

Why watch something you're not interested in then criticise it for being boring? How does Academia and the world at large owe you entertainment? He rather moved too quickly and skipped a lot of material to fit in a limited time enough background material to reference for his very modest theory. His maps referential gestures, if you want details get an historical atlas. This is a lecture at a symposium, not American Idol. "You've got 2 minutes to wow Howie !"

[@larryconcepts]

Why watch something you're not interested in then criticise it for being boring? How does Academia and the world at large owe you entertainment? He rather moved too quickly and skipped a lot of material to fit in a limited time enough background material to reference for his very modest theory. His maps referential gestures, if you want details get an historical atlas. This is a lecture at a symposium, not American Idol. "You've got 2 minutes to wow Howie !"

[@georget5874]

look up a lecture on you tube by the oxford professoer bryan ward perkins, he's one of the guys this speaker implies is obsessed with immigration. In the lectures I watched Ward Perkins doesnt mention migration at all, so where he gets that from I dunno. He does talk alot about archaeological evidence covering the decline of the western roman empire and its very interesting, far more so than this speaker, whose main concerns seem to be the worrying lack of enthusiasm for Bulgarian immigration into Britain and the Republican parties tax policy. Very interesting subjects no doubt and the speaker is undoubtedly a very saintly guy but... not what I was looking for personally.

[@histguy101]

You referenced two "quips" from the video, then said "he seems more interested in talking about that." They were jokes, and he didn't talk about them.

[@gleeart]

Before the wmd era you almost always lost due to numbers, if there were alot more of them than you you were bound to lose sooner or later. Plus the cumbersome beaurocacy involved in authorising a bloke to swing a sword for you compared to a guy across the frontier doing it to you was bound to imbalance it all eventually.

[@samhouston1979]

with American hegemony on decline….i think this is quite relevant again

[@Hakirokone]

Amazing. How can a man have so little to actually say and talk for so long?

[@unseenstalkr]

+H Kone haha have you ever watched/listened to anything from richard hoagland? Another Classic Ramblin' Man.

[@cwdor]

cause he is english.......adg

[@corettaha7855]

H Kone be polite. He has a speech impediment.

[@adamtippett4702]

Again, this is a historiography of the fall of the Roman Empire. Secondly, he has a speech impediment. Thirdly, it is considered scholarly to reference other scholars on the issue followed shortly thereafter you rebuttal. The conclusion includes repeating your thesis statement which makes sense he offers his theory because it was a historiography rather than a theory on the Fall of Rome itself.

[@massiveferguson9466]

Speech impediment?

[@khurmiful]

Good for a bedtime lecture when you are trying to sleep, other than that you won’t learn much from this, if you are into your Roman History

[@adamtippett4702]

it is a historiography of the Fall of Rome and not a history itself

Excellent

[@mango2005]

I think the Western army was largely destroyed at the Frigidus in 394 and Stillicho as an Easterner had no interest in rebuilding it.

[@larryconcepts]

Stilicho was a Vandal in origin, rose to Roman general, married to the emperors cousin. In 394 Eastern Emperor Theodosius defeated the Franks and killed the puppet emperor Eugenius. Then young Honorious was set up with Stilicho as manager, with whom the Easterners were on strained terms. Desperately trying to restrain the Goths he pulled armies (filled with foreign barbarian recruits) back to Italy from the Rhine, opening the frontier to the refugee nations, fleeing devastation from the Huns. In all this you imagine he had no interest in building an army.

[@sharonhoerr6523]

Don't forget that up to 40% of the population was enslaved. The Romans practice of crucifying rebels did not endear them to other cultures.

[@brandongordin9774]

horrid use of time and WAY too much time on the lituature nods. get to the argument.He runs out o time and you are left trying to figure out the value of this hour long waste of time.

[@Ramsez]

I always saw "All roads lead[ing] to Rome" as one of the main causes for the fall of Rome. Once people started migrating, they would always end up near Rome, in a great position to attack.

[@massiveferguson9466]

R VW I have some notion that migrating tribal groupings,such as Goths with their chattels and wheeled baggage trains, did make extensive use of Roman roads.

[@larryconcepts]

Odd though, that the roads were a massive military advantage to the Empire when things were functioning properly. The lectures main point, which some commenters here snoozed through, was how clearly we carry our own paradigms back to co-opt the Roman saga for contemporary moral rationalizations. From Adrianople in 378 to the dismissal of Romulus Augustus in 476 a century of Roman political and military and administrative incompetence, empty promises, opportunistic truces and betrayals led to the inevitable. Hardly a bunch of immigrants on a road trip. The Goths (Visi and Ostro) were a concentration of refugees from Hun invasions, entire displaced nations left to starve or be enslaved in refugee camps either side of the Danube. Food and safety was the refugees motivation. Romes failure to deal with the refugee situation led to desperate measures against a divided, inept and treacherous Roman elite. Roman armies used the same roads to swiftly move legions around. Also, a road is fairly easy to disrupt if it hundreds of thousands need to pass. Not sure if you're proposing that the Romans should have demolished the roads and bridges as in WW I and II. What else? Build a wall and make the Huns pay the costs for it. Seems a strange anachronistic concept.

[@larryconcepts]

Odd though, that the roads were a massive military advantage to the Empire when things were functioning properly. The lectures main point, which some commenters here snoozed through, was how clearly we carry our own paradigms back to co-opt the Roman saga for contemporary moral rationalizations. From Adrianople in 378 to the dismissal of Romulus Augustus in 476 a century of Roman political and military and administrative incompetence, empty promises, opportunistic truces and betrayals led to the inevitable. Hardly a bunch of immigrants on a road trip. The Goths (Visi and Ostro) were a concentration of refugees from Hun invasions, entire displaced nations left to starve or be enslaved in refugee camps either side of the Danube. Food and safety was the refugees motivation. Romes failure to deal with the refugee situation led to desperate measures against a divided, inept and treacherous Roman elite. Roman armies used the same roads to swiftly move legions around. Also, a road is fairly easy to disrupt if it hundreds of thousands need to pass. Not sure if you're proposing that the Romans should have demolished the roads and bridges as in WW I and II. What else? Build a wall and make the Huns pay the costs for it. Seems a strange anachronistic concept.

[@igorvuk4454]

an absolvte vnit of a man!

[@DidivsIvlianvs]

He seems to have forgotten that the city of Rome was sacked by the Gauls in 390 BC. The Romans never forgot and Caesar's conquest of Gaul was delayed payback.

[@joereynaga]

Rome fell because of its Moral plan and simple .

[@arlieferguson3990]

Didn't seem prepared for the lecture and uses the "a sort of," phrase an awful lot

[@holyroodguydean]

o

[@davidrapalyea7727]

The empire fell because the Roman climate optimum ended and barbarians moved South for the Winter. See chart the response post.

[@davidrapalyea7727]

Chart www.google.com/search?q=weather+chart+10+thousand+years&num=20&newwindow=1&client=ms-opera-mobile&channel=new&espv=1&tbm=isch&source=iu&ictx=1&fir=noacR15TtNHpQM%253A%252CtxINWJdtd4pbrM%252C_&usg=AI4_-kRrLMrwADsPkFNJ3qIpc9WtBo7o_w&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiQ357nuqDgAhUGneAKHTdHBAcQ9QEwAnoECAAQCA&biw=1100&bih=576#imgrc=noacR15TtNHpQM:

[@emsnewssupkis6453]

@@davidrapalyea7727 Correct. My own ancesters were Vikings who moved into France and became 'Normans' and then decamped to England and take over, there.

[@larryconcepts]

And the Hun massacres didn't matter, they fled from needing to put on a sweater? Simplicity is lobotomy.

[@petrapetrakoliou8979]

If you think that the Germans invading Roman territory in the 3rd century were wearing leather cloths, you are deeply mislead by popular films like Fritz Lang's The Nibelungs, which are not of any documentary value, I must stress....

[@cyclingnerddelux698]

Nothing new about the fall of the Roman Empire.

[@dumdebadaba]

Too long. Did he get paid by the minute?

[@Defender2516]

I didn't really like this video, even though I have a huge interest in the decline of the Roman Empire. Mainly because the speaker could of summed up his entire message in the last 5 minutes. If you want to see this persons point, just watch the last 5 and that will sum up the entire video. His lack of content made him constantly refer to others people work on the decline of the Empire, simply because all he had was a mere few points of his own. I listened to this for a hour and really did not take anything out from it overall.

[@emsnewssupkis6453]

And the decline of the systems set up during the Roman WARM Period was due to climate gettting much colder. The Dark Age was the Cold and Dark Age. We can see clues about this, for example, the last Roman villas in England were built with infloor heating systems due to the colder winters. During the warm cycle, Roman homes even in Britain were open via the central courtyard due to the need to ventillate, not heat.

[@annascott3542]

Le sigh. Because he’s presenting an historiography of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire.

[@fonce9965]

If Clifford did all of the research he would know that Roman Legions suffered from hypothermia which helped the Visigoths, Vandals & the Alans to DEFEAT them & stop their northeast progression into Greater Scythia just above the Crimean peninsula! This region sits above the Black Sea & below the Arctic Sea! The Romans accustomed to the comfort of Mediterranean warmth & luxury did not have a chance!

[@fonce9965]

The real problem here is that the TRUE history of Planet Earth was taken from libraries & Civic centers along with the wealth of every nation sacked by Roman Legions & hidden away forever locked up in the Vatican Archives not even available to Scholars! In a way, the Pope is the antichrist & still rules over the Roman Empire!

[@fonce9965]

Except for recently, it has been discovered that the Cosa Nostra Aka. the Sicilian Mafia has secretly embezzled over 3 billion dollars from Vatican City & the Pope! So who really rules the world? The Mob or Multinational Corporations? Certainly NOT the US Government!

[@vitalic_drms]

this is what counts for scholarship in 2013? laughable and sad

[@Bridget1415]

Um, um, um, ah, um, um...

[@harryaarrestad583]

20 minutes in , waffle , nothing about Vespasian … not hanging around .

[@ehsfb20011]

You couldn't make the Sophia Loren jokes today.

[@Gwegory22]

dont often check comments sections of lecture videos (i watch a great deal) Glad to see im not the only one who thinks this guys is a pretty poor speaker. perhaps a good historian/writer but good lord he needs a class on public speaking.

[@Ghostshadows306]

No it’s worse than that. I don’t even know what he’s taking about it.

[@johnk.lindgren5940]

Second listening. I realized, this dude is a clown. I am referring to the dude before 4:33. The presenter. 1453 was the of the Roman Empire.

[@vekazanov]

+John K. Lindgren You probably mean "the end of"? :-) Yes, I was always wondering about the way average history books just, em, chew up the fact that nothing ended with the fall of the western half of the empire, and eastern part survived - and thrived at times! - for one more thousand years.

[@Marmocet]

Surely _something_ ended with the fall of the Western Roman Empire. _Something_ happened that merits an explanation.

[@cwdor]

you are a lying sack of shit.........a

[@NDRonin1401]

You can't form a coherent sentence, even after editing, but he is the clown. Got it.

[@leyentieclb8099]

terrible.Just read jones the first 300 pages?

[@martynfenton4862]

This guy doesn't talk about the subject!

[@martynfenton4862]

@Georgi Georgiev I'm no expert at all. Only pick up what I read. I'm just commenting that the subject matter doesn't seem to match the title

[@cacambo589]

I think it's all one sentence - the whole hour! No structure, no clarity, no memorable facts, no colorful illustrations just word after word after mind-numbing word....

[@johneyon5257]

make sure to enjoy the very funny 4 minute introduction by Matthew Stolper of the speaker - clifford ando's lecture is less informative than the intro - and his awkward way with words is distracting

[@entropytango5348]

A long and drawn out fall of a lecture, nothing new, nothing to wake us up

[@SolaceEasy]

Below average presenter.

[@mikeschatz9153]

Nothing said. Really a waste of time. To use his own words, “ blah blah blah”.

[@davidfrisken1617]

A lot of talking, without actually saying anything. Why do I feel like I have just heard a talk by a christian apologist?

[@roymerritt6992]

In other words the Romans sowed an appreciation for competence. The Barbarians recognized that the Romans were successful because they turned whatever they were trying to achieve into a discipline for success. The Barbarians merely emulated the Romans approach to the task at hand. Wasn't it Roman policy to acquire whatever successful technology they might divine from cultures they had conquered? The Romans allowed their hubris to lead to their decline much in the same manner we are. We are striven by divisiveness and and the rhetoric often has violent connotations. The other day at CPAC Wayne Lapierre accused the left of wanting to commit violence on the right wing. This is inciting for blood shed. The right wing in this country has virtually turned into the enemy within. These Trump supporters were literally waving Russian flags at the CPAC conference the other day and no doubt because Trump's name was emblazoned on it. CPAC rounded them up but not before someone took some screen shots of it. This former Red Baiting Party of Cold Warriors has now thrown in its lot with a former KGB Colonel who once said that the fall of the Soviet Union was the greatest tragedy of the Twentieth Century. Statements like that haven't convinced me that Vladimir Putin isn't still an iron willed Stalinist Bolshevik at heart. Whether this is true or he's simply a more modern version of Fascism it does not matter his use of Trump as a useful idiot is highly problematic for our democratic republic. Both philosophies Marxism and Fascism are two sides of the same totalitarian coin. Its apparent to me the GOP would adapt either's policy which suited their ascendancy and that is because just like Nazis and Communists they are at heart complete authoritarians and on the surface rabid white supremacist.

[@nicholasturner1439]

What a convoluted mess of stupidity.

[@larryconcepts]

Your clear depiction of the TrumPutinist Axis of Oiligarchs, demagogues and brown-shirt thuggery is pretty good. But using "moral of the story" tone referring to the decline of Rome simplifies it to a fable. Not useful in fighting the disinformation Blitzes of the Trumputin agit-prop war-rooms. To control a democracy, get the electorate evenly divided, into strictly us/them bunkers, and utilize a maniac fanatic brown-shirt fringe to tilt the balance. 20th century dictatorships have their own dynamics. 2 millenia of Roman history doesn't fit into the TrumPutin tea spoon, significant as it is.

[@kinngrimm]

hypothermia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_winter_of_536