In September of 476 AD, a Germanic general named Odoacer removed the teenage emperor Romulus Augustulus in Ravenna and sent the imperial regalia to Constantinople, and very few people alive that year seem to have treated it as the end of anything. This documentary follows the whole fall of the Roman Empire across more than three centuries, from Marcus Aurelius and the Antonine Plague to the kingdoms of medieval Europe that grew up in Rome's place.

It starts with the last of the good emperors and the murder of Severus Alexander in 235, then the Crisis of the Third Century, when armies made and killed emperors, the silver disappeared from the coin, and the empire split into three in 260. Postumus held Gaul, Britain and Spain for most of a decade, and ordinary Romans learned to get by behind new walls. Diocletian rebuilt the state as something closer to an army, and Constantine gave it a new capital, a gold coin that held its value for seven hundred years, and a new faith.

From there the West comes apart a piece at a time: Julian's attempt to bring back the old gods, the disaster at Adrianople in 378, the settlement Theodosius made with the Goths, Stilicho's execution in 408, and Alaric's sack of Rome two years later. After 476 come Theoderic ruling Italy as a Roman, Justinian's war to take it back, the collapse of Roman Britain, and the Church that carried Rome's language and law into the medieval world.

Along the way you'll hear from historian Dr. Colin Elliott of Indiana University, author of Pox Romana, and ancient coin dealer Dean Kinzer of Kinzer Coins, from conversations recorded on the channel earlier this year.

This is the Fall of the Roman Empire series recut into a single film, because you asked for it in the community poll. The sources for these centuries are thin, late and often contradictory, especially for the third century, so I tell you where they disagree and I'd encourage you to read them yourself.

THE FULL EPISODES:

Every chapter is its own episode in the Fall of the Roman Empire playlist on the channel.

COMING IN DECEMBER: The Fall of the Roman Republic, the full documentary.

The Money, Borders, Power framework primer is episode 115.

GUESTS

Dr. Colin Elliott, Indiana University. Book: Pox Romana: The Plague That Shook the Roman World (Princeton, 2024). Podcast: Pax Romana Podcast. YouTube and X: @ProfCPE

Dean Kinzer, Kinzer Coins: kinzercoins.com and startancients.com

CHAPTERS

0:00 Odoacer and the emperor nobody replaced

1:19 Introduction

2:54 Marcus Aurelius and the Antonine Plague

30:47 Severus Alexander and the murder of 235

40:14 The Crisis of the Third Century

1:02:04 260 AD: the empire splits in three

1:13:49 Postumus and the Gallic Empire

1:48:21 Daily life during the crisis

2:33:44 Diocletian rebuilds the state

3:01:41 Constantine the Great

3:14:43 Julian the Apostate

3:40:44 The Battle of Adrianople, 378

3:58:22 Theodosius and the Goths

4:23:45 Stilicho, the last Roman general

4:43:21 Alaric sacks Rome, 410

4:57:38 476: the last western emperor

5:23:15 Theoderic the Great

6:01:38 Justinian's reconquest of Italy

6:30:48 The fall of Roman Britain

7:01:26 How the Church inherited Rome

7:29:27 What happened after Rome fell

8:33:34 Closing

SOURCES

Ancient: Cassius Dio, Roman History; Herodian; the Historia Augusta; Lactantius, On the Deaths of the Persecutors; Eusebius, Life of Constantine; Diocletian's Edict on Maximum Prices; Ammianus Marcellinus; Zosimus, New History; Orosius; Jordanes, Getica; Procopius, Wars; Gildas, On the Ruin of Britain; Bede, Ecclesiastical History; Gregory of Tours, History of the Franks.

Modern: Kyle Harper, The Fate of Rome (2017); Colin Elliott, Pox Romana (2024); Peter Heather, The Fall of the Roman Empire (2005); Bryan Ward-Perkins, The Fall of Rome and the End of Civilization (2005); Adrian Goldsworthy, How Rome Fell (2009); Chris Wickham, The Inheritance of Rome (2009).

On the Ides of March, March 15, 44 BC, Julius Caesar was stabbed to death by more than sixty senators in the Curia of Pompey, and two days later the Roman Senate voted to keep every one of his acts in force. This episode follows how the Roman Republic reached that point and why killing the dictator could not bring it back.

It starts with Caesar's return from Munda in 45 BC and his triumph over fellow Romans, then the honors voted by a Senate he had enlarged to about 900 and filled with his own men. By February of 44 he was dictator for life, an office the old Republic had capped at six months, and his face was on Rome's silver. I follow the "Rex" episode on the Alban Mount, the two tribunes he removed from office, and the Lupercalia, where Mark Antony offered him a diadem and he pushed it away while the crowd cheered.

The conspiracy was led by men who owed Caesar their lives or their careers, since Gaius Cassius Longinus, Marcus Junius Brutus, Decimus Brutus, and Gaius Trebonius had nearly all been pardoned by him or given their offices by him. I go through the warnings as Suetonius and Plutarch tell them, the morning of March 15, Tillius Cimber's petition, Casca's first blow, and the twenty-three wounds at the foot of Pompey's statue.

The turn comes on March 17, when the Senate met in the Temple of Tellus, granted the killers an amnesty on Cicero's proposal, and confirmed Caesar's acts in the same session, because too many offices, provinces, and veterans' land grants depended on them. After that come the reading of Caesar's will, the funeral and the fire in the Forum, the conspirators leaving Rome, and Gaius Octavius claiming his great-uncle's name.

Our narrative sources wrote long after the fact, and on the big questions, like whether Caesar wanted to be king or why the Senate voted the way it did, I show you where they disagree so you can read them yourself.

THE FALL OF THE REPUBLIC ARC:

Tiberius Gracchus • Gaius Marius • The Social War • Sulla • Spartacus • Marcus Crassus • Pompey the Great • Julius Caesar • The First Triumvirate at Luca • The Murder of Clodius • Crossing the Rubicon • The Ides of March (you are here) • Cicero • The Pattern: How Republics Really Die

Next: Cicero: The Voice That Couldn't Save Rome.

The Money, Borders, Power framework primer is episode 115.

CHAPTERS

00:00 The men who killed Caesar, and the vote three days later

01:32 Welcome back

03:00 Caesar comes home from Munda, 45 BC

06:20 From six months to dictator for life

08:00 Rex, the diadem, and the Lupercalia

12:16 The conspiracy of men Caesar pardoned

16:56 March 15, 44 BC: the killing in the Curia of Pompey

20:38 March 17: the Senate keeps Caesar's acts

22:42 The will, the funeral, and the fire

25:27 Who inherits a republic

SOURCES

Suetonius, The Deified Julius 76 to 89; Plutarch, Lives of Caesar, Brutus, and Antony; Appian, Civil Wars, Book 2; Cassius Dio, Roman History, Books 43 and 44; Nicolaus of Damascus, Life of Augustus; Cicero, Letters to Atticus, Book 14, and Philippics 1 and 2. Modern: Ronald Syme, The Roman Revolution (1939); Barry Strauss, The Death of Caesar (2015); Adrian Goldsworthy, Caesar: Life of a Colossus (2006).

Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon in January of 49 BC, and over the next four years his civil war against Pompey the Great and the Senate ran from Italy to the battles of Pharsalus in 48 BC, Thapsus in 46 BC, and Munda in 45 BC, where the last army fighting in the Republic's name was destroyed.

Weeks before the crossing, on December 1, 50 BC, the Senate voted 370 to 22 for Caesar and Pompey to give up their armies together, and the consul Gaius Claudius Marcellus set the vote aside. A small group of hardliners held the procedure of the chamber, and on January 7, 49 BC they passed the final decree against Caesar. The tribunes Mark Antony and Quintus Cassius fled north to him, and Caesar crossed with one legion.

This episode follows what came after the river. Pompey and the consuls abandoned Rome and left the treasury behind. Caesar pardoned Domitius Ahenobarbus at Corfinium and called mercy a new way of conquering, then threatened to kill the tribune who stood at the treasury doors. He beat Afranius and Petreius in Spain, risked everything crossing to Greece, nearly lost at Dyrrachium, and broke Pompey's cavalry at Pharsalus with a hidden fourth line. Pompey was murdered on the beach at Pelusium, and Caesar wept when he was handed his signet ring. Cato read Plato through the night at Utica and chose death over Caesar's pardon.

By 45 BC every institution that existed before the Rubicon was still standing, and every one of them operated with the permission of the man who had won. Caesar's own account of the war never mentions the Rubicon, so I'd encourage you to read his Civil War next to Plutarch's lives of Caesar, Pompey, and Cato and notice where Caesar goes quiet.

This is Episode 137 of The Roman Pattern.

The Money, Borders, Power framework primer is episode 115.

CHAPTERS

00:00 The Republic outlived the Rubicon by four years

01:29 Welcome back

03:05 When did Caesar's command run out?

05:39 The Senate votes 370 to 22 for peace

07:18 The final decree and the tribunes flee

08:21 Crossing the Rubicon, January 49 BC

12:23 Pompey abandons Rome and Caesar's mercy at Corfinium

14:35 Seizing the treasury and paying for the war

19:22 Dyrrachium and the Battle of Pharsalus (48 BC)

24:20 Pompey's murder in Egypt

26:19 Thapsus, Cato at Utica and Munda

32:51 The Republic still standing, on one man's permission

SOURCES

Sources: Caesar, The Civil War; Plutarch, Lives of Caesar, Pompey, and Cato the Younger; Suetonius, The Deified Julius; Appian, Civil Wars, Book 2; Cicero, Letters to Atticus; The African War and The Spanish War (by officers of Caesar); Cassius Dio, Books 41 to 43.

Modern: Adrian Goldsworthy, Caesar: Life of a Colossus (2006); Robert Morstein-Marx, Julius Caesar and the Roman People (2021); Ronald Syme, The Roman Revolution (1939).