I am sure we have had many threads on the history of the Roman Empire but I am reading a book called The Medieval Centuries which despite its title begins with the 2nd century AD. This book by Denis Hay written in 1953 and obviously part of my university stage I history course begins by saying that despite received wisdom and the Roman's own idea at the time the idea that the Empire collapsed suddenly under the invasion of the "barbarians from Germany and the central Asian plains" is wrong. "In fact the Romans of the third century deluded themselves. The outward structure of their society was to some extent preserved, its inward spirit was already dead. The wonder is not that the Empire finally disappeared but that it managed to survive for so long."
He seems to be saying that Rome by that time was not a trading place, but survived mostly on usury. It had earlier been a conqueror where its main motive was products - weapons, precious metals, slaves. But by the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD taxes were collected with less efficiency and more corruption, "fatal for a commercial, let alone an industrial economy. But Rome had never known either. Commerce was largely concerned with luxuries...and land exploited in big estates worked - very inefficiently - by slaves; but only a handful of great landowners regarded their estates as economic enterprises..." He said the Roman roads, often quoted as evidence of Roman grandeur, are pathetic monuments to a society which knew little real trade. "The borders were protected by enlisting the barbarous tribes on the frontiers and the regular forces were concentrated on for garrison duties in the vulnerable towns. Paid now in doles of flour and wine, the "Roman" soldier was usually not Roman or even Italian by descent." He praises some of the general-emperors but "their attitude to the decrepit society they were called upon to govern was essentially military." Caste systems took over and even the army was provided by "rough provincials, wild warriors from the perimeter of the Empire." He also praises some of the emporor notably Diocletian and Constantine.
He says it survived mostly because of its language and religion. (Not literature, but the language itself which spread to other areas.) And Christianity grew from appealing to Jewish people to other areas of the Mediterranean. He then goes on to explain how this happened, even mentioning Mithras, who I had never heard of before the thread on it. He puts its force down to the Edict of Milan mostly and the acceptance of the Nicene Creed.
Is this still an accepted view?
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