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Rocky Nugent
Mr. Balmer
World History Honors
2 October 2015
The Fall of the Western Roman Empire
Imagine a volcano. Pressure builds and builds, until it erupts, causing chaos.
This is what happened to the Western Roman Empire. The main causes of the fall are internal.
Yes, there are external problems, like wars, that brought literal destruction, but those only
followed the corruption of the Empires structure. The fall of the Western Roman Empire was
caused by many things, internal and external conflicts.
The first conflict within the empire is a lack of loyalty and patriotism. The
Western Roman Empire had become something that its citizens werent proud of anymore. The
majority of the population thought that the civilization wasnt even worth saving and were
removed from proactivity (Doc 1). The soldiers even werent loyal to Rome. They were only
loyal to their commanders, who just wanted to be the emperor. Rome had to recruit mercenaries
to defend. The great empire itself, with all its army, had to resort to hiring mercenaries to fight
for them (Fall ppt). Being taught patience, the military spirit was buried (Doc 2). The peoples
will to fight just died out.
The next conflict within the empire is the economy dying. Trade in general was
dangerous. Invaders made trade by sea and roads hard and unsafe. Wealthy people spent silver
and gold on items from Asia, which made precious metals in Rome scarce. Due to this, Rome

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needed to change the currency. The empire made coins with less silver, causing inflation. And,
with the use of slaves, there were many unemployed. Abundances of slaved caused that
unemployment rate, but it also caused wages to lower. With inflation and low wages, the growth
of economy was halted (Fall ppt, Doc 3).
The final conflicts, coming outside of the empire, are war and invaders. War
was the final tipping point for the empire. Agriculture decreased due to farmland becoming
infertile as they were destroyed by war. This caused food shortages. With little food, starvation
broke out. Alongside starvation, disease spread (Fall ppt). Claiming a myriad of lives, starvation
and disease took the heart out of the empire. Besides that, the military wasnt in its best shape.
Their once proud, powerful army has become mostly German mercenaries (Doc 4). After the
internal crisis, Rome was not in good shape to fight off invasions.
There are many causes to the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Economy,
citizenship, and military are the main ones. If they maintained a better economy, people would
have been more proud and given an effort to save the empire. This goes alongside citizenship.
Rome didnt have the support of the people, which left it corrupted and unstable. Then the
military. They had a disloyal, unreliable military. They had lost faith in the empire, which helper
lead to the fall of it. In the end, the Western Roman Empire was on a slippery slope, just waiting
to fall.