Ebook: The Teaching Company - The Great Courses - The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

This course offers an in-depth encounter with a great masterpiece, Edward Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. It has been planned to be helpful as an introduction, but also as a companion for those who would like to read it concurrently with the Decline and Fall itself. Throughout the course, you will be thinking about the Decline and Fall from two points of view: as a masterpiece of literature and as a lasting contribution to history. Most histories written in Gibbon’s time, or even much later, are of interest today only for their literary qualities; we look to more recent historians to explain what happened in the past. Naturally, some of Gibbon’s interpretations have been questioned or supplemented, and new modes of historiography have explored topics that he doesn’t address. But the story he tells is still the best narrative in existence of more than 1,000 years of memorable personalities and events that did much to shape the world we still live in. A distinguished classical historian recently wrote, “Gibbon’s achievement remains undiminished to this day.”

Gibbon begins with what he regards as a golden age in the 2nd century A.D., when a vast territory from the Atlantic to the Middle East was ruled by the emperors known as the Antonines. Already, however, forces were in place (Gibbon calls them a “hidden poison”) that would undermine the stability of the Empire: rule by a single individual, which could all too easily be abused, and the excessive power enjoyed by a huge army that was needed to defend far-flung borders. Even a brief summary will indicate the epic scope of what follows: the rise of Christianity, with reflections on its secular significance that caused something of a scandal in Gibbon’s day; the conversion of Constantine and his founding of the new city of Constantinople in the East; the fascinating attempt to restore paganism by the emperor known as Julian the Apostate; the evolution of Christian doctrine, which was hammered out in a series of major councils that Gibbon describes in impressive depth; the development of monasticism; the threat to the Empire by successive waves of barbarians—Huns, Vandals, Goths—who gradually settled down and became assimilated; the end of the Western Roman Empire, which then began to evolve into the nations of modern Europe; the continuing survival of the Eastern Roman Empire, known as Byzantium; the rise of Islam, with enormous consequences for the Mediterranean world; the development of western feudalism; the Crusades, in which Europeans tried to win back the Holy Land; new assaults by Ottoman Turks and by barbarians led by Genghis Khan and Tamerlane; and finally, the fall of Constantinople in 1453, with which the great narrative ends. Throughout, the course will bring in criticisms and insights from modern historians in order to see the Decline and Fall from the perspective of the best specialists today. The concluding lecture will be a retrospective view of the entire book in modern perspective. You will also get to know Gibbon the man in a biographical account in the second lecture, and afterward by noticing the many places in his book where his personal experiences and values help to shape his story.