My professor once asked .....
"What happened when 'Rome' fell in AD476 ?"
His answer was that nothing much happened.
Everything was exactly the same. The statues of an 'Emperor' (Zeno) still stood. The Senate still debated. The Garbage still got collected. People still got married and had birthday parties and ........ the money looked pretty much the same !
As a measure of economy it was simply determined that everyone would be much better off with an Emperor who lived far away. He could ask you nicely to pay your taxes but he had no ability to collect anything.
From The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire;
"The unfortunate Augustulus was made the instrument of his own disgrace; he signified his resignation to the senate; and that assembly, in their last act of obedience to a Roman prince, still affected the spirit of freedom and the forms of the constitution. An epistle was addressed, by their unanimous decree, to the emperor Zeno, the son-in-law and successor of Leo, who had lately been restored, after a short rebellion, to the Byzantine throne.
They solemnly
"disclaim the necessity, or even the wish, of continuing any longer the Imperial succession in Italy; since, in their opinion, the majesty of a sole monarch is sufficient to pervade and protect, at the same time, both the East and the West. In their own name, and in the name of the people, they consent that the seat of universal empire shall be transferred from Rome to Constantinople; and they basely renounce the right of choosing their master, the only vestige that yet remained of the authority which had given laws to the world. The republic (they repeat that name without a blush) might safely confide in the civil and military virtues of Odoacer; and they humbly request that the emperor would invest him with the title of Patrician, and the administration of the diocese of Italy." ...................................................................................................
"The son or Orestes assumed and disgraced the names of Romulus Augustus; but the first was corrupted into Momyllus by the Greeks, and the second has been changed by the Latins into the contemptible diminutive Augustulus. The life of this inoffensive youth was spared by the generous clemency of Odoacer; who dismissed him, with his whole family, from the Imperial palace, fixed his annual allowance at six thousand pieces of gold, and assigned the castle of Lucullus, in Campania, for the place of his exile or retirement."
The Empire of the West ended with a sigh ....... It was a long time before anyone noticed that it had ended.
Posted 07/27/2013 12:29 pm
