The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

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Edward Gibbon

The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (German: Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire ) is a historical work by the British historian Edward Gibbon .

content

The work was published between 1776 and 1789 and is considered a fundamental work of modern historiography . It deals with the fall of the Roman Empire and subsequent Byzantine history in (originally) six volumes. Based on the time of Mark Aurel , the time of the imperial crisis of the 3rd century and late antiquity will be treated. This is followed by a representation of the Byzantine period. The work ends with the fall of Constantinople in 1453.

reception

The reviews contained in the work often no longer correspond to the findings of modern research, which is why it is largely out of date in terms of content. Gibbon still tended not to ask about the tendency of his sources, but to accept their statements and assessments, often uncritically. Nevertheless, it was precisely the subject matter, the high literary quality and the, for the time, impressively intensive processing of the sources that ensured that Gibbon's work with its powerful, often very personal presentation is still considered a classic today.

The work was discussed very controversially while it was still alive, especially with regard to Gibbon's remarks on Christianity . He blamed the latter for the downfall of the empire, since it tied up forces and resources that the empire would then have lacked, and above all accused the late ancient imperial church that was being formed of increasing intolerance. These and other statements were entirely new and shocked several contemporary readers. Gibbon did not view all Christian personalities negatively, however, and he judged the politics of the last pagan emperor Julian as wrong, since in Gibbon's opinion any attempt to reverse the already advanced Christianization would only have caused damage. Due to several hostilities, Gibbon was forced to defend his statements in this regard. In more recent research, Gibbon's remarks on the fall of the empire in the West are viewed critically; Rather, a more differentiated consideration of the causes of the fall of the Western Roman Empire is advocated (because Eastern Current / Byzantium, which Gibbon valued rather low, continued to exist for almost 1000 years). Little is known about the fact that even after the completion and publication of the work, under the influence of the French Revolution , Gibbon came to the view that neither Christianity nor Germanic attackers were responsible for the fall of West Rome , but civil wars. He expressed this in several letters and thereby contradicted his own thesis.

Gibbon has consulted the sources more than before, which is borne out by the numerous comments, and has questioned them, although by modern standards there are nevertheless considerable deficits. He was also the first scholar to scientifically open up late antiquity, which is a lasting merit of his monumental representation, to which modern researchers still refer today, although they make different interpretations and no longer regard the late antique empire as a military despotism. The material-rich presentation explains, in addition to the literarily successful description, the interest in his work that still exists today. Gibbon himself is sometimes referred to as the first modern historian, at least with reference to the Roman Empire.

expenditure

  • The History of the Decline and the Fall of the Roman Empire , London, 1. Vol. 1776/1789, 2. – 3. Vol. 1781, 4th - 6th Vol. 1788.
    (original edition)
  • The History of the Decline and the Fall of the Roman Empire , ed. v. John B. Bury , 7 vols., London 1896-1900.
    (Edition with numerous comments by Bury, which, however, no longer reflect the state of research; here online .)
  • The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire , ed. v. David Womersley, 3 vols., Penguin Verlag , New York 1994.
    (Now authoritative English edition with introduction and commentary; contained in Vol. 3 Gibbons Vindication .)
  • Decline and fall of the Roman Empire. Until the end of the empire in the west , translated from English by Michael Walter and Walter Kumpmann, with an introduction by Wilfried Nippel , 6 vols., Dtv, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-423-59062-9 .
    (Successful new German translation, with only the chapters up to the year 476 included. With a good introduction to the life and work of Gibbon.)
  • Decline and fall of the Roman Empire. Translated from the English by Michael Walter. With an introduction by Klaus Bringmann . 2 vol. WBG, Darmstadt 2016.
    (based on the edition by Bury and also only reaching up to the fall of the western empire)

literature

Web links

Commons : The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ↑ Reviews of the German edition (which however only includes part of the complete English work)
  2. ↑ The volumes were published in four-four format, with volume 1 being revised a total of six times, cf. Womersley, The history of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire , Vol. 1, pp. Cvii and pp. 1084ff.
  3. ↑ For the discussion of the more recent research with Gibbon see the articles in McKitterick / Quinault (eds.): Edward Gibbon and Empire . The articles in Philip Rousseau (ed.): A Companion to Late Antiquity offer an overview of the more recent research in the field of late antiquity . Malden (Massachusetts) et al. a. 2009.
  4. ↑ Cf. Nippel: Edward Gibbon , in: Raphael (Ed.): Klassiker der Geschichtswwissenschaft , pp. 25–27.
  5. ^ Gibbon: A Vindication of Some Passages in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth chapters of the History Of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire .
  6. ↑ Cf. Nippel: Edward Gibbon , in: Raphael (Ed.): Klassiker der Geschichtswwissenschaft , p. 34f.