0:00:00.042,0:00:03.088
Hi there, my name’s John Green, this is[br]crash course: world history, and today we’re

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going to talk about the fall of Rome.

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Mr. Green, Mr. Green, Mr. Green![br]Who’s that pretty lady?

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That lady, me-from-the-past, is Emperor Justinian.[br]We’ll get to him in a minute.

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[music intro]

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[music intro]

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[music intro]

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[music intro]

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[music intro]

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[music intro]

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How and when Rome fell remains the subject[br]of considerable historical debate—

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but today I’m going to argue that the Rome[br]didn’t really fully fall until the middle

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of the 15th century.

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But first, let me introduce you to The Traditional[br]View:

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Barbarians at the Gates.[br]My, don’t you look traditional?

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If you want to be really technical about it,[br]the city of Rome was

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conquered by bar bar bar barbarians in 476[br]CE.

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There was a last Roman Emperor Romulus Augustus,[br]who ruled the empire for less than a year

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before being deposed and sent into exile by[br]Odoacer,

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who was some kind of barbarian- we don’t[br]know for sure.

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Ostrogoth, Hun, Visigoth, Vandals;[br]they all looked the same to the Romans.

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Rome had been sacked by barbarians before,[br]most notably by Alaric the Visigoth in 410-

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Is it Uh-lar-ick or Uh-lair-ick?[br]The dictionary says Uh-lair-ick but

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The Vampire Diaries say Uh-lar-ick so[br]I’m going to go with Uh-lar-ick.

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But anyway, after 476, there was never again[br]a “Roman” emperor in Rome.

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Then there’s the hipper anti-imperialistic[br]argument—

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that’s nice, but if you really want to go[br]full hipster

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you should probably deny that you’re being[br]hipst—

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right, exactly—which goes like this:

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Rome was doomed to fall as soon as it spread[br]outside of Italy

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because the further the territory is from[br]the capital,

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the harder it is to govern.

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Thus imperialism itself sowed the seeds of[br]destruction in Rome.

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This was the argument put forth by the Roman[br]historian Tacitus,

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although he put it in the mouth of a British[br]chieftain.

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That sounded dirty, but it’s not,[br]it’s all about context here on Crash Course:

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"To robbery, slaughter, plunder, they give[br]the lying name of empire; they make a desert

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and call it peace.”

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There are two ways to overcome this governance[br]problem:

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First, you rule with the proverbial topaz[br]fist—

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that’s not the proverb? Really, Stan?[br]It’s an iron fist? But topaz is much harder

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than iron.[br]Don’t these people know their Mohs scale

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of mineral hardness?..

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Regardless,[br]the Romans couldn’t do this because their

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whole identity was wrapped up in an idea[br]of justice that precluded indiscriminate violence.

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The other strategy is to try to incorporate[br]conquered people into the empire more fully:

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In Rome’s case,[br]to make them Romans.

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This worked really well in the early days[br]of the Republic

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and even at the beginning of the Empire.[br]But it eventually led to

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Barbarians inside the Gates.

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The decline of the legions started long before[br]Rome started getting sacked.

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It really began with the extremely bad decision[br]to incorporate Germanic warriors into the

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Roman Army.

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Rome had a long history of absorbing people[br]from the empire’s fringes into the polity

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first by making them allies and then[br]eventually by granting them full citizenship

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rights.

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But usually these “foreign” citizens had[br]developed ties to Rome itself;

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they learned Latin, they bought into the whole[br]idea of the aristocratic republic.

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But by the 3rd and 4th centuries CE, though,[br]the empire had been forced to

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allow the kind of riffraff into their army[br]who didn’t really care about the idea of

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Rome itself.[br]They were only loyal to their commanders.

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—And as you no doubt remember from the historical[br]examples of

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Caesar, Pompey, Marius, contemporary Afghanistan—[br]this is not a recipe for domestic bliss.

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So here is Rome,[br]stuck with a bunch of expensive and bloody

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wars against Germanic peoples who were really[br]good at fighting

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and then they had a great idea:[br]Why not fight with these guys?

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So they essentially hired them[br]and soon the Roman Legions were teeming with

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these mercenaries[br]who were loyal mostly to gold,

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secondarily to their commanders,[br]and not at all to Rome

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which is a place that very few of them ever[br]even saw.

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I mean, why would they give a crap about the[br]health and well-being of the empire?

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Am I allowed to say crap, Stan?[br]Nice.

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This was of course a recipe for civil war,[br]and that’s exactly what happened with general

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after general after general[br]declaring himself Emperor of Rome.

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So there was very little stability in the[br]West.

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For instance, between 235 and 284 CE, 41 different[br]people were either emperor or claimed to be

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emperor.

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And after the year 200,[br]many of the generals who were powerful enough

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to proclaim themselves emperors weren’t[br]even Roman.

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In fact, a lot of them didn’t speak much[br]Latin.

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Oddly enough, one of the best symbols of the[br]new face of the Roman Empire was sartorial.

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Instead of the traditional tunic and toga[br]of the glory days of the Senate,

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most of the new general-emperors adopted that[br]most practical and most barbaric of garments:

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pants.

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Oh, which reminds me,[br]it’s time for the Open Letter.

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An Open Letter to Pants:

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Dear Pants,

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Although you eventually became a symbol of[br]patriarchal oppression,

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in your early days you were worn by both men[br]and women.

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And in the days of the Roman Republic, they[br]hated you.

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They thought you barbarous.[br]They thought that people wearing you was

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the definition of people lacking civilization.

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They ventured north and the wind blew up through[br]their togas

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and lo and behold, they adopted pants.

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And there’s a history lesson in that, pants,[br]which is that when people have to choose between

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civilization and warm genitals,[br]they choose warm genitals.

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Best Wishes,[br]John Green

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And now a note from our sponsor:[br]Today’s episode of crash course is brought

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o you by[br]the all-new Oldsmobile Byzantium,

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mixing power and luxury in a way-[br]Really? Oldsmobile isn’t a company anymore?

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And Byzantium is a place?[br]Are you sure?

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So remember when I said the Roman Empire survived[br]til the 15th century?

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Well that was the Eastern Roman Empire, commonly[br]known as the Byzantine Empire

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(although not by the people who lived in it[br]who identified themselves as Romans).

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So while the Western empire descended into[br]chaos,

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the eastern half of the Empire had its capital[br]in Byzantium,

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a city on the Bosporus Strait that Constantine[br]would later rename Constantinople,

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thereby paving the way for[br]They Might Be Giants only mainstream hit.

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Constantine had lots of reasons to move his[br]capitol east.

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For one thing he was born in modern-day Croatia,[br]also he probably spoke better Greek than Latin,

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and plus the eastern provinces were a lot[br]richer than the Western provinces and

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from a looting perspective,[br]you just want to be closer to where the good

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warring is.

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The enemies in the East, like the Persian[br]Parthians and the Persian Sassanians,

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were real empires,[br]not just bands of warriors.

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And no matter who you were in world history,[br]if you wanted to make a name for yourself

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in terms of war,[br]you really needed to be up against the Persians.

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EVEN IF you were—[br]wait for it—

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the Mongols.

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Not this time, friends.

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As the political center of the Roman Empire[br]shifted east,

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Constantine also tried to re-orient his new[br]religion, Christianity, toward the east,

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holding the first Church council in Nicaea[br]in 325.

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The idea was to get all Christians to believe[br]the same thing-

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that worked-[br]but it did mark the beginning of the emperor

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having greater control over the Church.

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That trend would of course later lead to tensions[br]between the church centered at Constantinople

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and the one centered in Rome.[br]But, more on that in a bit.

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To give you a sense of how dramatic this shift[br]was,

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by the 4th century CE, Constantinople’s[br]population had soared

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while Rome’s had gone from 500,000 to 80,000.

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And although the Byzantines spoke Greek not[br]Latin, they considered themselves Romans

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and if they did then we probably should too.[br]Let’s go to the Thought Bubble.

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There was a lot of continuity between the[br]old, Western Roman Empire,

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and the new, Eastern one.[br]Politically, each was ruled by a single

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(sometimes there were two, and once there[br]were four– but let’s forget about them

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for now)[br]who wielded absolute military power.

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War was pretty much constant as the Byzantines[br]fought the Persian Sassanian Empire

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and then various Islamic empires.

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Trade and valuable agricultural land that[br]yielded high taxes meant that the Byzantine

0:07:19.048,0:07:23.064
Empire was like the Western Roman Empire,[br]exceptionally rich,

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and it was slightly more compact as a territory[br]than its predecessor and much more urban,

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containing as it did all of those once independent[br]Greek city states,

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which made it easier to administer.

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Also like their Western counterparts, the[br]Byzantines enjoyed spectacle and sport.

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Chariot races in Constantinople were huge,[br]with thousands turning out at the Hippodrome

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to cheer on their favorites.

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Big bets were placed and there was a huge[br]rivalry not just about sports

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but also about political affiliations between[br]the two main teams,

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the Blues and the Greens-[br]Thanks for putting us on the Greens, Thought

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Bubble.[br]That rivalry was so heated that riots often

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broke out between them.[br]In one such riot, an estimated 30,000 people

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were killed.

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Thanks Thought Bubble.[br]But perhaps the most consistently Roman aspect

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of Byzantine society was that they followed[br]Roman law.

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The Romans always prided themselves on being[br]ruled by laws,

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not by men,[br]and even though that’s not actually the

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case after the second century BCE,[br]there’s no question that the Eastern Roman

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Empire’s codification of Roman laws[br]was one of it’s greatest achievements.

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And much of the credit for that goes to the[br]most famous Byzantine Emperor,

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at least after Constantine,[br]Justinian.

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I like your brooch, sir.

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In 533 Justinian published the Digest, an[br]800,000-word condensation of 1,528 Latin law

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books.

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And to go along with this he published the[br]Institutes,

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which was like a curriculum for the Roman[br]law schools that existed all through the Empire.

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Justinian, incidentally, was by far the most[br]awesome of the Byzantine emperors.

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He was like the David Tennant of doctors.

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He was born a peasant somewhere in the Balkans[br]and than rose to became emperor in 527.

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He ruled for almost 30 years and in addition[br]to codifying Roman law,

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he did a lot to restore the former glory of[br]the Roman Empire.

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He took Carthage back,[br]he even took Rome back from the Goths,

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although not for long.

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And he’s responsible for the building of[br]one of the great churches in all of time—

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which is now a mosque—[br]the Hagia Sophia or Church of Saint Wisdom.

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So after one of those sporting riots destroyed[br]the previous church,

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he built this,[br]which with its soaring domes became a symbol

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for the wealth and opulence of his empire.

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The Romans were remarkable builders and engineers[br]and the Hagia Sophia is no exception:

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a dome its equal wouldn’t be build for another[br]500 years.

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But you would never mistake it for a Roman[br]temple;

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It doesn’t have the austerity or the emphasis[br]on engineering that you see, for instance,

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the Coliseum.

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And this building in many ways functions a[br]symbol for the ways the

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Eastern Roman Empire was both Roman and not.

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But maybe the most interesting thing Justinian[br]ever did was

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be married to his controversial Theater Person[br]of a wife,

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Theodora.[br]Hey Danica, can we get Theodora up here?

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Wow that is perfect.[br]It’s funny how married couples always look

0:09:53.061,0:09:54.005
like each other.

0:09:54.005,0:09:58.048
Theodora began her career as an actress, dancer,[br]and possible prostitute before become Empress.

0:09:58.048,0:10:03.081
And she may have saved her husband’s rule[br]by convincing him not to flee the city during

0:10:03.081,0:10:05.499
riots[br]between the Blues and Greens.

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She also mentored a eunuch[br]who went on to become a hugely important general-

0:10:08.087,0:10:11.899
Mentoring a eunuch sounds like a euphemism,[br]but it’s not.

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And she fought to expand the rights of women[br]in divorce and property ownership,

0:10:14.097,0:10:17.049
and even had a law passed taking the bold[br]stance

0:10:17.049,0:10:20.589
that adulterous women should not be executed.

0:10:20.589,0:10:23.005
So, in short,[br]the Byzantines continued the Roman legacy

0:10:23.005,0:10:27.092
of empire and war and law[br]for almost 1000 years after Romulus Augustus

0:10:27.092,0:10:28.899
was driven out of Rome.

0:10:28.899,0:10:32.709
The Byzantines may not have spoken Latin,[br]and few of their emperors came from Rome,

0:10:32.709,0:10:38.031
but in most important ways they were Romans.[br]Except one REALLY IMPORTANT way.

0:10:38.031,0:10:40.649
The Byzantines followed a different form of[br]Christianity,

0:10:40.649,0:10:43.959
the branch we now call Eastern or sometimes[br]Greek Orthodox.

0:10:43.959,0:10:47.249
How there came to be a split between the Catholic[br]and Orthodox traditions is complicated –

0:10:47.249,0:10:48.959
you might even say Byzantine.

0:10:48.959,0:10:51.329
What matters for us are the differences between[br]the churches,

0:10:51.329,0:10:53.259
the main doctrinal one being about the dating[br]of Easter,

0:10:53.259,0:10:57.024
and the main political one being about who[br]rules whom.

0:10:57.024,0:11:00.005
Did I get my whom right there, Stan?[br]YES!

0:11:00.005,0:11:03.017
In the West there was a Pope and in the East[br]there was a Patriarch.

0:11:03.017,0:11:05.389
The Pope is the head of the Roman Catholic[br]Church.

0:11:05.389,0:11:09.023
He sort of serves as god’s regent on earth[br]and he doesn’t answer to any secular ruler.

0:11:09.023,0:11:12.709
And ever since the fall of Rome,[br]there has been a lot of tension in Western

0:11:12.709,0:11:16.839
Europe between Popes and kings[br]over who should have the real power.

0:11:16.839,0:11:18.079
But in the Orthodox church they didn’t have[br]that problem

0:11:18.079,0:11:22.055
because the Patriarch was always appointed[br]by the Emperor.

0:11:22.055,0:11:24.519
So it was pretty clear who had control over[br]the church,

0:11:24.519,0:11:29.779
so much that they even have a word for it-[br]caesaropapism: Caesar over Pope.

0:11:29.779,0:11:33.819
But the fact that in Rome there was no emperor[br]after 476 meant there was no one to challenge

0:11:33.819,0:11:36.054
the Pope,[br]which would profoundly shape European history

0:11:36.054,0:11:38.879
over the next, like, 1200 years.

0:11:38.879,0:11:42.569
So I would argue that in some important ways,[br]the Roman Empire survived for a thousand years

0:11:42.569,0:11:46.005
after it left Rome,[br]but in some ways it still survives today.

0:11:46.005,0:11:49.189
It survives in our imagination when we think[br]of this as east

0:11:49.189,0:11:50.629
and this as west;

0:11:50.629,0:11:53.099
It survives in football rivalries that have[br]their roots in religious conflicts;

0:11:53.099,0:11:56.959
and it survives in the Justinian law code[br]which continues to be

0:11:56.959,0:11:59.509
the basis for much of civil law in Europe.

0:11:59.509,0:12:01.097
Next week we’ll talk about the emergence[br]of Islam over here...

0:12:01.097,0:12:06.029
How’d I do, Stan?[br]Well, you can’t win ‘em all.

0:12:06.029,0:12:07.589
Thanks for watching.

0:12:07.589,0:12:09.439
Crash Course is produced and directed by Stan[br]Muller,

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our script supervisor is Danica Johnson.[br]The show is written by my high school history

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teacher Raoul Meyer and myself and[br]our graphics team is Thought Bubble.

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Last week’s Phrase of the Week was[br]“Aristotelian logic”.

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You can guess this week’s Phrase of the[br]Week or suggest new ones in Comments,

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where you can also ask questions that our[br]team of historians will endeavor to answer.

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Thanks for watching, and as we say in my hometown,[br]Don’t forget to be awesome.