History of Britain VII: Fall of Roman Britain

After its efflorescence during the 2nd Century, Roman Britain entered steep decline during the 3rd Century and the benefits of Roman civilization had all but vanished by the time that the Romans withdrew their forces and support.

[Casmaniac]

Back in the days of Arthur, the people in Britain were so poor they had to use coconuts instead of horses

[JableckiFM]

Yeah, been waiting for that - great series!

[Timmersan]

That picture of Honorius... I knew that he had a pet chicken; I didn't know it was Foghorn Leghorn!

[austinovervig]

You should do a video ranking the Roman generals during the late Roman republic Civil Wars with Caesar and Augustus! Love all the other ranking videos and would love to see your thoughts on the subject! Keep making amazing videos!!

[yorkshirepudding]

Wooo at last the Eboracum episode!

Nothing wrong with having a pet chicken in my view.

[WayneMcauliffe-fs]

You just left out Magnus Maximus and his run. He also might of settled Scotti/Irish around Wales to keep other Irish out

[Dishfire]

Roman Britain that includes all the Celtic tribes? That's why the Romans built a Wall Hadrian's Wall, these Caledonian and Picts were the today's Viet Cong❤

[TheKing-qzwd]

To my understanding, as one who hears amd uses versions of rhetoric around the concept, the "myth" of Christianity growing "on the blood of martyrs" is better said in the sense that the temporary set back of mass death among the faithful rarely is let by "fortune" or God to be a complete genocide. Afterward the remnant praises their dead in memory, which may help persuade new converts about some aspects of the faith. This to say, it is not that the Church is a Hydra who immeadiately after beheading may double itself, but like a tree is pruned so in its next season it bares more fruit. Now the veracity of all of this I have not completely familiarized myself with. I am not one whose loyalty was purchased by the blood of human martyrs, but by one divine martyr.

Anyway, this was an interesting video as usual. One certainly could see value in such a system of emporers, but one is not surprised it swiftly fell to ruin.

[histguy]

There were Greeks from Greece in the Roman senate in the mid-first century, and cities in Greece used as colonies earning citizenship even before then, not to mention all those Greeks in Italy in Republican times having Roman citizenship, such as the Neapolitans.

Aside from that, were Diocletians price edicts still being enforced a century after him? I thought they were the big failure of his reign, and already widely ignored whilst he still held office before being overturned by his immediate successors.

[neilfarrow]

You say that Roman Britain fell into a dark age relatively quickly, but looking at about our only contemporary source, Gildas (Giles Translation, section 3, Phillimore Publications, page 16) he lists 28 cities, a number of castles and fortifications. This was in the mid 6th Century, and does not suggest a collapse or 'Dark Age' . In fact, Viriconium (Wroxeter) didn't fall to the Mercians until about 650, undergoing extensive redevelopment in about the early 6th Century. Archeology is also revealing much more activity in previous Roman cities than was originally thought, but with various changes of use (Bird Oswald, Leicester) . If I remember correctly, Chedworth Villa was still receiving high-status 'Roman style' renovations into the late 5th century, well past the end of Roman Rule (as commonly accepted). Gildas himself (section 4, same source as above) offers two possible explanations as to the lack of written courses for the time, which he also was hindered by: destruction by Scots, Picts and Saxon raiders, and people fleeing abroad and taking the sources with them.

[tacocruiser]

The strategy of attacking the barbarians while they were carrying loot was used against the Turks in the 11th century as well. It worked well against the Turks too until Manzikert happened...

[alanpennie]

Cheap Egyptian cotton!
Milo Minderbinder declares himself emperor of Britain.

[IronDuke]

Septimius Severus was, of course, a Roman citizen and he most certainly could speak, and read, both Latin and Greek.Also he was not a sub Saharan African.

[kubhlaikhan]

I know of no evidence of "Saxons raiding the east coast" in the 3rd century. I think you are confusing the troops of Carausius who are known to have included "Saxon allies" with German raiders - which is something very different. There is also a great deal of confusion over who "the Saxons" were: unlike the Angles and Frisians who came from Holland, the Saxons originated in northern France. We know this because their Gallic name is, to this day, "Sassons" and northern France was known as Soissons". In fact, "Sassons" had lived in southern Britain since the Bronze Age. It was a lot easier for Carausius to recruit local Romanised Sassons than to go fetch barbarians from northern Germany! The later anarchy recorded by Ammianus is a mutiny by troops who are not getting paid due to the collapse of silver shipments. What was happening in Britain was also happening on the continent so it is not a "conspiracy of related barbarian tribes to invade Britain". The Angles, for example, lived inside the empire (in Flanders and probably East Anglia); the "Jutes" were employed as border guards in Utrecht and possibly in Kent and the Solent. You don't need to be a "barbarian" when your food supplies dry up. These are internal Roman events, not foreign invasion. And Roman civilisation didn't end because of it.