When Rome Fell, the Chief Culprits Were Climate and Disease. Sound Familiar?

Undark ^ | March 16, 2018 | Madeline Ostrander

[C19fan]

‘ARE WE ROME?” asked the author Cullen Murphy a decade ago, in a provocatively titled book that compared the 21st-century United States with the final days of the Roman Empire. Lately there’s been no shortage of Cassandras who emphatically answer yes.

“The speed with which we’re recapitulating the decline and fall of Rome is impressive,” opined the conservative commentator Bill Kristol, in a tweet this past July, taking issue with President Trump’s treatment of the press. “What took Rome centuries we’re achieving in months.” And the Cornell historian Barry Strauss bemoaned the parallels between alleged American failings and those of ancients in an online column for Fox News in October 2016: “Just think about what Rome had and what we have. Morals out of a bacchanalia? Check. Abuse of public office for private purposes? Check … Oh the times, oh the customs! Where is Cicero when we need him?”

[C19fan]

When people talk about parallels between Rome and the US they usually mean the fall of the Republic not so much as the fall of the Western Empire. I read about disease and history. The Roman Empire started to be ravaged by epidemics when regular trade opened up with China, Central Asia, and India via the Indian Ocean or the Silk Road. Roman women luved silks but plague went along for the ride too.

[miss marmelstein]

Those noxious chariots really messed up the atmosphere. All that Roman smog!

[Gay State Conservative]

So climate caused,or helped cause,the fall of Rome? Yah,OK...I can see all those SUVs circling the Colosseum and all those 747s flying overhead.

I saw a documentary not long ago that said that there's irrefutable evidence that Central Park in Manhattan was once enveloped by a glacier almost a mile thick.And yet for centuries there hasn't even been a hint of a glacier there.

[butlerweave]

I thought it was Poor Leadership ,LOL , the First Demonut Party

[Gay State Conservative]

See Post #3

[fruser1]

Socialism defeated rome.

[ClearCase_guy]

I would disagree.

I think the Roman Empire disintegrated as a cohesive unit because of uncontrolled migrations of people who would not assimilate. The laws, the culture, the political administration could not handle the influx of outsiders who held on to their barbarian ways.

Sound familiar?

[LYDIAONTARIO]

Hostile illegal immigrants and sexual perversions. History repeats.

[JPJones]

“The speed with which we’re recapitulating the decline and fall of Rome is impressive,” opined the conservative commentator Bill Kristol,

One of the major contributors to the fall of Rome was migration, you putz.

So build a Wall.

Romans SHOULD have done that.

[JPJones]

What is NOT mentioned is:

There WAS a Roman Warming Period, there were NO SUV’s and it was WARMER than the Current Warming Period.

And when it ended, Rome did indeed fall.

Warming is good.

[IYAS9YAS]

I think the Roman Empire disintegrated as a cohesive unit because of uncontrolled migrations of people who would not assimilate. The laws, the culture, the political administration could not handle the influx of outsiders who held on to their barbarian ways.

This.

[machman]

I would disagree.

I think the Roman Empire disintegrated as a cohesive unit because of uncontrolled migrations of people who would not assimilate. The laws, the culture, the political administration could not handle the influx of outsiders who held on to their barbarian ways.

Sound familiar

BINGO, WE HAVE A WINNER.

[Ueriah]

A fellow historian!

Yeah, I would agree that it was the Gothic and Hunnic migrations that really did in the Roman empire.

[jmaroneps37]

Bull Shiiet! Rome fell because Romans didn’t want to fight anymore so some of their Legions were 80% and more non Romans who were there for the money. When ruthless barbarians came after them they collapsed.

[gibsonguy]

Right! Moral decay and she didn’t defend her borders that’s what killed Rome and the did not have half of thier ruling class trying to get as many barbarians as possible to flood the country.

[gibsonguy]

Right! Moral decay and she didn’t defend her borders that’s what killed Rome and the did not have half of thier ruling class trying to get as many barbarians as possible to flood the country.

[SMARTY]

Reading Gibbon, I think he said (to explain the immense disproportion of slaves to others), the gold, silver and other precious materials which were available, was NOT enough for valuation of commodities in the empire.

Slaves became currency... does THAT sound familiar?

[miniTAX]

Indeed, Rome thrived thanks to the well documented Roman climate WARMING period and fell because of immigration and because of its corrupt politicians and stupid “elite” the like of Bill Kristol.

[hinckley buzzard]

Explanations of "Why Rome fell" are as numerous as explanations of the cause of the American Civil War. Serious historians understand the principle of multiple causation, ie, events of this magnitude are determined by a confluence of factors.

It is true, the rise and fall of Rome parallels climate fluctuations. This has nothing to do with us today because we are undergoing no such fluctuations. It might, if the predicted cooling begins to occur.

[Lurkinanloomin]

It was illegal immigration that caused the fall of the Western Empire.