The
Roman Empire reached its greatest size at the beginning of the second century
AD. By then the empire was so large that it became increasingly difficult and
expensive to manage and defend its borders. The barbarian hoards continuously pushed upon
the northern and eastern boundaries, discouraging the border economies which were further discouraged
by the heavy taxes required to maintain the army.
The end to incremental territorial conquests meant a sudden stop to the huge influx of wealth and (cheap) slave labour. All these factors went hand in hand with the Empire's decline.
The empire
had reached such a size that it eventually had to be split into two manageable halves, West and East. The western half
eventually succumbed to successive barbarian invasions from around 475AD
onwards. The
picture left shows Italy and the capital of the West: Rome.
The
Eastern half with its capital at Constantinople (Bizantium-Istanbul) survived
through to the 15th Century when its walls were breached first by the Venetian
crusaders and then by Turkish cannons. The picture shows the Eastern half and
its future capital marked as "Byzantium".
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"Map Roman Empire 117" was written by Giovanni Milani-Santarpia for www.mariamilani.com - Rome apartments