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Roman Empire

Decent Essays

The Roman Empire is known as one of the greatest empires of all time, blossoming politically, economically, and culturally. Rome was quickly expanding, reaching as far as North Africa. When Octavian came into power, the Pax Romana, or “Roman Peace,” began. However, this long peace may have triggered the beginning of the end of the Roman Empire. Because Rome was not distracted by conquering foreign lands, its citizens relaxed and lived in luxury. There did not seem to be any goals they did not meet; they were so blinded by their success that they did not realize complications within their own empire were slowly emerging. Some of these emerging factors that led to the downward spiral of Rome include: the instability and corruption of …show more content…

This does not change that the government was corrupt and unstable in some ways. Both these characteristics could have led to disloyal citizens, which may have contributed to the empire’s fall.
It was not just the Roman government that was weakening but also its military. Vegetius, a Roman writer, observed that soldiers were becoming negligent and less willing to train. This may have been generalizing the army, but Vegetius was known to be an expert on military strategy, making the idea that the army was becoming lazy less far-fetched. Because of less training time, the soldiers were less used to wearing their heavy armor, so they stopped wearing their breastplates and helmets. (Doc B) Obviously, if soldiers do not wear armor, they will feel less secure when fighting and will be concerned more with their own personal safety instead of defeating the enemy. This led to failure on the battlefield, which in turn led to susceptibility to opponents. The military was shrinking, as well; many were avoiding the draft, which was not regularly given anyway, as written by Michael Grant. (Doc B) Because Michael was born centuries later, bias cannot be present in his findings. Since he was not present at the time, however, it would be convenient to have records of males skipping town to prove that people were, indeed, avoiding the draft. The evidence does speak for itself,

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