Download Source A Questions

Rome Primary & Secondary Source Activity: Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
You and your group members will read primary and secondary source materials describing the decline
of the Roman Empire. Various reasons will be given, it will be your group’s task to catalogue the
reasons, identify if the source of the problem (internal- Rome’s fault or external- beyond Rome’s
control), and then rank each reason 1 (most impact/severe) to 5 (least impact/severe). Please answer
the questions for each source and fill out the chart before determining your group’s order of reasons.
Source
According to this source, the reason for the fall of Was it an internal (from within
the Roman Empire was…
the empire) or an external (from
outside the empire) problem?
A
B
C
D
E
Source A Questions:
1. Why were there so many emperors in just 50 years?
2. How would the instability in leadership of the empire affect people in the empire as well as people
outside the empire?
Source B Questions:
3. Using information from the first excerpt, how did Roman historians describe the Huns?
4. Using information from the second excerpt, how did the Roman citizen feel about being ruled by the
Huns?
Source C Questions:
5. How did Roman military procedures change over time?
6. Make a connection between the information from the quote and the information on the map.
Source D Questions:
7. According to the first excerpt, what natural disaster occurred and what were the effects?
8. According to the second excerpt, how did the plague affect the empire?
Source E Questions:
9. Based on this excerpt, what did Sallust say had happened among the Roman people? Use evidence
from the text to support your choice.
(a) food shortages
(b) decline in morals and values
(c) conflict between social classes
Source A: Leadership
Emperor
Reign
Cause of Death
Maximus
235-238 CE
Assassination
Gordian I & II (co-rulers)
238 CE
Suicide; killed in battle
Balbinus & Pupineus
238 CE
Assassination
Gordian III
238-244 CE
Possible assassination
Philip the Arab
244-249 CE
Killed in battle
Decius
249-251 CE
Killed in battle
Hostilian
251 CE
Possible plague
Gallus
251-253 CE
Assassination
Aemilianus
253 CE
Assassination
Valerian & Gallinus
253-260 CE
Died as slave of Persians; assassination
Claudius Gothicus
268-270 CE
Plague
Quintillus
270 CE
Assassination or suicide
Aurelian
270-275 CE
Assassination
Tacitus
275-276 CE
Possible assassination
Florianus
276 CE
Assassination
Probus
276-282 CE
Assassination
Carus
282-283 CE
Assassination
Numerian
283-284 CE
Possible assassination
Carinus
283-285 CE
Killed in battle
When [Julianus] came to the wall of the [military] camp, he called out to the troops and promised to give them just as much as
they desired, for he had ready money and a treasure room full of gold and silver. About the same time too came Sulpicianus,
who had also been consul and was prefect of Rome and father-in-law of Pertinax, to try to buy the power also. But the soldiers
did not receive him, because they feared lest his connection with Pertinax might lead him to avenge him by some treachery.
So [the soldiers] lowered a ladder and brought Julianus into the fortified camp; for they would not open the gates, until they
had made sure of the amount of the bounty they expected…he promised the troops as large a sum of money as they could ever
expect to require or receive. The payment should be immediate, and he would at once have the cash brought over from his
residence. Captivated by such speeches, and with such vast hopes awakened, the soldiers hailed Julianus as Emperor…
-Herodian of Syria, History of the Emperors II.6ff: “How Didius Julianus Bought the Empire at Auction, 193 A.D. In
William Stearns Davis, ed., Readings in Ancient History: Illustrative Extracts from the Sources, 2 Vols. (Boston: Allyn and
Bacon, 1912-13), Vol. II: Rome and the West.
Source B: Reports about the Huns
. . . Huns are never sheltered by buildings, but . . . roam freely in the mountains and woods, learning from their earliest
childhood to endure freezing cold, hunger, and thirst. . . Huns are not well adapted to battle on foot, but are almost glued to
their horses, which are certainly hardy, but also ugly . . . Like refugees-all without permanent settlements, homes, law, or a
fixed way of life-they are always on the move with their wagons, which they leave . . . Like unthinking animals, they are
completely ignorant of the difference between right and wrong. Fired with an overwhelming desire for seizing the property
of others, these swift-moving, and ungovernable people make their destructive way amid the pillage and slaughter of those
who live around them.
-Roman History by the Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus, c. 380 CE.
adapted from http://www.shsu.edu/~his_ncp/AmmHuns.html
[He] . . . considered his new life . . . better than his old life among the Romans, and the reasons he gave were as follows: . . .
The condition of the [Roman] subjects in time of peace [is worse than war] . . . taxes are very severe, and unprincipled men
inflict injuries on others. . . A [wealthy lawbreaker] . . . is not punished for his injustice, while a poor man . . . undergoes
the legal penalty . . . The climax of misery is to have to pay in order to obtain justice. . . [He said] that the laws and
constitution of the Romans were fair, but deplored that the governors, not possessing the spirit of former generations, were
ruining the state.
-Priscus, Roman ambassador to the Huns, 449 CE., reporting a conversation he had with a former Roman citizen whose
land had been conquered by the Huns.
adapted from: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/priscus1.asp
Source C: Military Issues
[Before the year 400 CE] foot soldiers wore breastplates and helmets. But when, because of negligence and
laziness, parade ground drills were abandoned, the customary armor began to seem heavy since the soldiers rarely
ever wore it. Therefore, they first asked the emperor to set aside the breastplates . . . and then the helmets. So our
soldiers fought the Goths without any protection for chest and head and were often beaten by archers. Although
there were many disasters, which led to the loss of great cities, no one tried to restore breastplates and helmets to
the infantry. Thus it happens that troops in battle, exposed to wounds because they have no armor think about
running and not about fighting.
Concerning Military Matters by the Roman Historian Vegetius, c. 450 CE
Source D: Acts of God?
In the second year of the reign of Valens (366 CE) . . . the Roman world was shaken by a violent and destructive
earthquake. . . The shores of the Mediterranean were left dry by the sudden retreat of the sea . . . but the tide soon returned
with the weight of an immense [flood] which was severely felt on the coasts of Sicily. . . Greece, and Egypt . . . fifty
thousand persons had lost their lives in the flood [in the city of Alexandria alone] . . . [T]his calamity. . . astonished and
terrified the subjects of Rome. . . and their fearful vanity was disposed to [see a connection] between the symptoms of a
declining empire and a sinking world. . .
-Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 1776-1788.
More important in initiating the process of decline was a series of plagues that swept over the empire . . . which brought
diseases [from] southern Asia to new areas like the Mediterranean, where no resistance had been established even to
contagions such as the measles. The resulting diseases decimated the population. The population of Rome decreased from
a million people to 250,000. Economic life worsened in consequence. Recruitment of troops became more difficult, so the
empire was increasingly reduced to hiring Germanic soldiers to guard its frontier. The need to pay troops added to the
demands on the state’s budget, just as declining production cut into revenue.
-Peter Stearns, Michael Adas, Stuart Schwartz, Marc Jason Gilbert, World Civilizations: The Global Experience,
Pearson Education, 2000.
Source E: Patriotism
After Sulla had recovered the government by force of arms, everybody became robbers and plunderers. Some set their
hearts on houses, some on lands…The whole period was one of debauched tastes and lawlessness. When wealth was
once counted an honor, and glory, authority, and power attended it, virtue lost her influence, poverty was thought a
disgrace, and a life of innocence was regarded as a life of mere ill nature.
From the influence of riches, accordingly, luxury, [greed], pride came to prevail among the youth. They grew at once
rapacious and [extravagant]. They undervalued what was their own; they set at naught modesty and continence; they
lost all distinction between sacred and profane, and threw off all consideration and self-restraint.
-Sallust, Roman politician, in his work Conspiracy of Catiline Chapters 11-16: “Life in Rome in the Late Republic, c.
63 B.C.” In William Stearns Davis, ed., Readings in Ancient History: Illustrative Extracts from the Sources, 2 Vols.
(Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1912-13), Vol. II: Rome and the West, pp. 135-138.