The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Edward Gibbon finished his first volume of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire in 1776. Although historians of ancient Rome have in the centuries since moved on from Gibbon’s arguments, The Decline and Fall is still a celebrated work of history, both for being a landmark work of historical scholarship and for Gibbon’s engaging, witty writing style. The work does show Gibbon’s biases as an upper-class British man, like his anti-Catholicism, negative views of powerful women in history, and uncritical repeating of stereotypes about “Eastern” cultures. Gibbon scandalized both his contemporaries and future generations by suggesting Christianity had a role to play in the downfall of the Roman Empire.

However, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire was also a work that helped set standards of historical scholarship still observed today. These include critically considering primary sources and seeking to explain historical trends rather than just attributing historical change to the actions of certain great individuals.

This guide uses the 2013 Cambridge College Library edition.

Content Warning: The source material deals extensively with political and social violence, including numerous incidents of death by suicide.

Summary

Before he begins describing Rome’s fall, Gibbon argues why Rome was great. As Gibbon famously writes, “In the second Century of the Christian Era, the empire of Rome comprehended the fairest part of the earth, and the most civilized portion of mankind” (1). The Roman Empire’s success rested on the strength and discipline of its military, a wealthy urban society, and a religiously-tolerant and open-minded culture. However, Gibbon also argues that Rome was being corrupted from within by its own wealth.

In Gibbon’s account, the Roman Empire was at its height in the second century CE under the reigns of emperors Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius. The decline began when Marcus Aurelius was succeeded by his son, Commodus, who became a corrupt tyrant interested more in performing in gladiator games than ruling. After Commodus was assassinated, the Praetorian Guard, a special troop of soldiers assigned to protect the emperor and Rome, began to install and get rid of emperors at will.

At the same time, there was a series of civil wars, after which the general Septimius Severus became emperor. While previous emperors had ruled like the chief magistrates of a republic, Septimius Severus managed the empire more like a military dictator, increasing the size of the army and granting them more money. So empowered, the army as a whole began to make their own officers emperors.

By the start of the third century, there was a quick but long succession of emperors who found themselves killed in battle, murdered, or driven to death by suicide. At the same time, the German groups—especially the tribes known as the Goths—became more organized and dangerous to the empire. As Gibbon puts it, “[N]o emperor could think himself safe upon the throne, and every barbarian peasant of the frontier might aspire to that august but dangerous Station” (168).

The long series of assassinated emperors and “barbarian” invasions finally came to an end toward the end of the third century with the reign of Emperor Diocletian. He defeated the threats to the empire at the border and reformed the government to give it much-needed stability, while also subjecting the empire to harsher taxation. Among Diocletian’s changes was setting up a system of four emperors—the senior emperors, the Augusti, and the Caesars, the junior emperors—who would rule over different parts of the empire. However, as soon as Diocletian abdicated, the system broke down and the Roman Empire collapsed back into civil war. Gibbon’s narrative for Volume 1 ends with Emperor Constantine rising to power and again unifying the empire under the rule of a sole emperor.