Political, Social and Economic Reasons for the Decline of the Western Essay

Political, Social and Economic Reasons for the Decline of the Western Roman Empire - Essay Example This essay presents a thorough analysis of possible political, social and economic factors, that could be considered as reasons to the decline of Western Roman Empire to different extent The political reasons surround the Barbarians, wars with Germanic tribes, growing power of Attila the Hun and the Hunnic Empire, and eventually the fall of the Western Roman Empire. In 15 AD the army of Garmanicus Caesar marched to Teutobergensis Saltus, The massacre had been performed by the joint coalition of German warriors. The Germanic groups spread all the way from Rhine in the west to River Vistula in the east and from Danube in the north to the Baltic seas in the south In AD 450, Attila threatened the empire and started preparing for an attack on Gaul and later invaded it. An alliance was made between the Romans and the Goths and in the Battle of Chalons, Attila is forced to retreat. In AD 452 Attila finally invaded Italy, where he laid the foundations of the republic of Venice. With the victory of Attila in Italy, the power of the Western Roman Empire weakened. The long tension over the Rhine-Danube frontier contributed a significant amount to its failure. The social reasons for the decline of the Western Roman Empire are often given as declining population, diseases, succession of emperors. Diseases had been a major problem for all empires and the Roman Empire surely suffered as diseases and plagues started spreading . Another reason is that of the people in empire being poisoned by the water that was carried through lead pipes. The succession of emperors has indeed played the most important part in the decline. The first Roman emperor had established that the emperor will designate the next emperor and based on approval by the senate, the emperor will take the thrown. This rule was followed for only the first few emperors and