Rome Sacked/ Falls to Barbarians

Interviewer: "Hello sir, can you  tell me what happened here?"

Citizen of Rome: "Rome was...sacked!"

Interviewer: "Please, tell me the story from the beginning."

Citizen: "Alright, I will tell you the story of the Visigoths. It all really started with the Battle of Adrianople 378 A.D.  Rome had an embarrassing lose to the Goths. After that, our emperor Theodosius I put many of them in the Roman Army.  When he died, that's when the barbarians broke Rome's treaty and selected a new leader: Alaric.  Alaric started after Greece, then Italy in 401. He lost, however, and again in 403 so he left Italy.  In 408, Rome was having some power troubles, so Alaric decided to go after Italy.  Lucky for him, the Western Roman emperor, Honorius, had the great Roman general killed resently before.  Honorius also had many other barbarians killed and the remaining actually joined Alaric's troops.  By 409, the Visigoths had surrounded Rome, but Alaric took a tribute and left.  After spending a hard winter away, Alaric demanded more from the Romans.  When Honorius refused, the Visigoths in 410 once again had Rome as a target.  An alli of Alaric opened the gates of Rome on August 24th and the barbarian army raided the empire for three days.  They didn't find any food because us Romans have been starving ourselves, and they left most of our architecture in tact. And now here I stand today, the once great empire of Rome, destroyed."

Interviewer: "Can you please tell me what you think the impact of this event will be?"

Citizen: "Terrible things!  This was the greatest empire ever; our people have no protection!"

Interviewer: "Wow, this might be a great impact on the world just because you all think that you are so vulnerable."

Citizen: "Maybe some of it is in our heads, but this establishment has been in power for almost 800 years!"

Interviewer: "Yes, and who knows what life will be like without any emperor of our society"

Citizen: "Madness"

Interviewer: "Well, thank you for the interview."

Picture of Alaric, the Visigoth's king.  The Fall of Rome unofficially starts what is known as the "Dark Ages' of Europe and the Roman Empire was completely gone by 476.

("sack of Rome." World History: Ancient and Medieval Eras. ABC-CLIO, 2010. Web. 2 Nov. 2010.")