For centuries, Rome stood at the centre of an empire, adorned with temples, theatres, racetracks, and public bathhouses. Yet by the end of the Middle Ages, much of the ancient city had vanished, leaving behind only ruins. How did this transformation occur? The decline of Rome’s built environment was a gradual process influenced by natural disasters, political shifts, and the steady erosion of resources required to maintain the city’s monumental structures, with much of this decline occurring during the medieval period.
In his new book, The Ruins of Rome: A Cultural History, Roland Mayer traces what happened to the grand architectural monuments and buildings of the Eternal City. He notes that during the days of the Roman Empire, the city suffered its share of disasters, including floods, fires, and earthquakes. However, damaged buildings were repaired or replaced, and life continued. This changed in the fourth century AD:
The legal sanction of Christianity and the emperor Constantine’s removal of the seat of imperial government from Rome to the city he founded on the Bosporus, Constantinople, contributed a good deal over time to the decay of the material fabric of Rome.
The creation of a second Roman capital led to much of the empire’s elite moving to Constantinople. They left behind their pagan temples, which gradually lost their religious function as Christianity gained dominance. While official policies sought to reduce pagan practices, there was no systematic imperial effort to destroy these structures. Instead, many temples were secularised in 408 with the removal of their cult images, and some were converted into churches. However, with Rome already filled with religious buildings, many temples were simply absorbed into later secular structures or left to decay.
Model of imperial Rome, Area of the Velian Hill and the Valley of the Colosseum in I. Gismondi’s large 1987 model of Rome, Museo della Civita Romana – photo by Carole Raddato / Wikimedia Commons
Rome’s massive sports buildings fared little better. Amphitheatres, primarily used for gladiatorial combat and beast hunts, lost their purpose as these brutal spectacles fell out of favour. Though not tied to religious festivals, such games were closely linked to the imperial cult, as only the emperor could provide them. The immense cost of training gladiators and importing exotic animals, combined with Christian opposition, led to repeated bans, with the last recorded gladiatorial fight occurring around 400 and the final beast hunt around 500. With no reason to maintain these vast structures, the Colosseum was sealed off in the sixth century. Meanwhile, chariot racing, the most popular entertainment of all, continued in the Circus Maximus through the fourth century, funded by senatorial wealth, but after the last recorded races under King Totila (541-552), even this grand racetrack, which could seat 250,000 spectators, fell into disuse.
Another major problem medieval Rome faced was depopulation. Mayer writes:
Estimations of Rome’s population vary, of course, given the lack of reliable data, but no one doubts that it decreased steeply in late antiquity. Conventional wisdom has it that Rome’s population was nearing a million by the end of the republic and probably in excess of that in the city’s first-/second-century heyday. By the late fourth century, however, it may have been reduced to 500,000. Over the course of the fifth century the population may have dropped by 90 per cent, from 500,000 to 60,000, and by the mid-sixth perhaps it had dwindled to as few as 50,000. By the eighth century there may have been not many more than 10,000 inhabitants.
There were simply too few people, and too few wealthy patrons, to keep the city’s fabric intact, and when natural disasters struck, little could be done to repair damaged buildings. Floods along the Tiber River and fires that could easily spread throughout the city often caused serious damage. For example, in 1084 a massive fire broke out during Robert Guiscard’s attack on the city. The blaze was so severe that the once-populous Caelian Hill, near the Colosseum, remained largely uninhabited for centuries.
Ruins in Rome – photo by Jeremy Thompson / Flickr
The worst natural disasters were earthquakes, which caused significant destruction to Rome’s ancient structures, weakening buildings and contributing to their gradual collapse over time. We know of major earthquakes in 847, 1231, and 1349. Besides causing buildings to collapse or suffer damage, these quakes also left large amounts of rubble and debris, which contributed to the rising ground level of Rome. Over time, structures became buried under layers of debris and alluvial soil deposited by the Tiber. By the late Middle Ages, some of Rome’s most famous buildings were covered in sediment and largely forgotten, with only their upper sections visible above ground. For example, the Forum of Trajan was buried under layers of crushed pottery in the tenth century, then covered with agricultural soil, allowing streets, houses, and gardens to be built on top of it.
While external invasions played a role in Rome’s history, they were not the primary cause of the city’s ruin. The Visigoths in 410 and the Vandals in 455 primarily looted Rome rather than destroying its structures outright. Similarly, later attacks, such as the sack of 846, caused localised damage but did not fundamentally alter the city’s built environment. Perhaps the worst destruction caused by outsiders took place in July 663, when the Byzantine emperor Constans II visited the city. The emperor decided to confiscate much of Rome’s bronze, including gilt bronze tiles from the roof of the Pantheon.
Roman Forum – photo by Bely Medved / Flickr
Mayer notes that when it came to intentional destruction of Rome’s ancient buildings, it was the Roman people who were the primary culprits. Spoliation, the practice of repurposing materials from ancient buildings, became common. This was even noted back in 458, when the Western Roman emperor Julius Valerius Majorian issued this edict:
While we rule the state, it is our will to correct the practice whose commission we have long detested, whereby the appearance of the venerable City is marred. Indeed, it is manifest that the public buildings, in which the adornment of the entire City of Rome consists are being destroyed everywhere by the punishable recommendation of the office of the Prefect of the City. While it is pretended that the stones are necessary for public works, the beautiful structures of the ancient buildings are being scattered, and in order that something small may be repaired, great things are being destroyed.
This did not stop the ongoing pillaging of stones, which found their way into churches and houses—today, many medieval and Renaissance buildings in Rome contain repurposed ancient materials. There were also many cases where ancient structures were repurposed only to be destroyed later. One famous example took place in 1257, when Brancaleone degli Andalò became the governor of the city. To quell resistance from Rome’s nobility, he ordered the destruction of more than 140 of the fortified towers – many of these were embedded in or built upon ancient structures.
The transformation of Rome during the Middle Ages was not the result of a single catastrophic event but rather a slow process of decline influenced by shifting political power, resource scarcity, and natural disasters. While much of its ancient grandeur was lost, Rome’s ruins were increasingly recognised for their historical significance, prompting preservation efforts by the end of the medieval period.
You can learn more in Roland Mayer’s The Ruins of Rome: A Cultural History, now published by Cambridge University Press. Roland Mayer is emeritus professor of classics at King’s College London. You can learn more about his research on his Academia.edu page.
For centuries, Rome stood at the centre of an empire, adorned with temples, theatres, racetracks, and public bathhouses. Yet by the end of the Middle Ages, much of the ancient city had vanished, leaving behind only ruins. How did this transformation occur? The decline of Rome’s built environment was a gradual process influenced by natural disasters, political shifts, and the steady erosion of resources required to maintain the city’s monumental structures, with much of this decline occurring during the medieval period.
In his new book, The Ruins of Rome: A Cultural History, Roland Mayer traces what happened to the grand architectural monuments and buildings of the Eternal City. He notes that during the days of the Roman Empire, the city suffered its share of disasters, including floods, fires, and earthquakes. However, damaged buildings were repaired or replaced, and life continued. This changed in the fourth century AD:
The legal sanction of Christianity and the emperor Constantine’s removal of the seat of imperial government from Rome to the city he founded on the Bosporus, Constantinople, contributed a good deal over time to the decay of the material fabric of Rome.
The creation of a second Roman capital led to much of the empire’s elite moving to Constantinople. They left behind their pagan temples, which gradually lost their religious function as Christianity gained dominance. While official policies sought to reduce pagan practices, there was no systematic imperial effort to destroy these structures. Instead, many temples were secularised in 408 with the removal of their cult images, and some were converted into churches. However, with Rome already filled with religious buildings, many temples were simply absorbed into later secular structures or left to decay.
Rome’s massive sports buildings fared little better. Amphitheatres, primarily used for gladiatorial combat and beast hunts, lost their purpose as these brutal spectacles fell out of favour. Though not tied to religious festivals, such games were closely linked to the imperial cult, as only the emperor could provide them. The immense cost of training gladiators and importing exotic animals, combined with Christian opposition, led to repeated bans, with the last recorded gladiatorial fight occurring around 400 and the final beast hunt around 500. With no reason to maintain these vast structures, the Colosseum was sealed off in the sixth century. Meanwhile, chariot racing, the most popular entertainment of all, continued in the Circus Maximus through the fourth century, funded by senatorial wealth, but after the last recorded races under King Totila (541-552), even this grand racetrack, which could seat 250,000 spectators, fell into disuse.
Another major problem medieval Rome faced was depopulation. Mayer writes:
Estimations of Rome’s population vary, of course, given the lack of reliable data, but no one doubts that it decreased steeply in late antiquity. Conventional wisdom has it that Rome’s population was nearing a million by the end of the republic and probably in excess of that in the city’s first-/second-century heyday. By the late fourth century, however, it may have been reduced to 500,000. Over the course of the fifth century the population may have dropped by 90 per cent, from 500,000 to 60,000, and by the mid-sixth perhaps it had dwindled to as few as 50,000. By the eighth century there may have been not many more than 10,000 inhabitants.
There were simply too few people, and too few wealthy patrons, to keep the city’s fabric intact, and when natural disasters struck, little could be done to repair damaged buildings. Floods along the Tiber River and fires that could easily spread throughout the city often caused serious damage. For example, in 1084 a massive fire broke out during Robert Guiscard’s attack on the city. The blaze was so severe that the once-populous Caelian Hill, near the Colosseum, remained largely uninhabited for centuries.
The worst natural disasters were earthquakes, which caused significant destruction to Rome’s ancient structures, weakening buildings and contributing to their gradual collapse over time. We know of major earthquakes in 847, 1231, and 1349. Besides causing buildings to collapse or suffer damage, these quakes also left large amounts of rubble and debris, which contributed to the rising ground level of Rome. Over time, structures became buried under layers of debris and alluvial soil deposited by the Tiber. By the late Middle Ages, some of Rome’s most famous buildings were covered in sediment and largely forgotten, with only their upper sections visible above ground. For example, the Forum of Trajan was buried under layers of crushed pottery in the tenth century, then covered with agricultural soil, allowing streets, houses, and gardens to be built on top of it.
While external invasions played a role in Rome’s history, they were not the primary cause of the city’s ruin. The Visigoths in 410 and the Vandals in 455 primarily looted Rome rather than destroying its structures outright. Similarly, later attacks, such as the sack of 846, caused localised damage but did not fundamentally alter the city’s built environment. Perhaps the worst destruction caused by outsiders took place in July 663, when the Byzantine emperor Constans II visited the city. The emperor decided to confiscate much of Rome’s bronze, including gilt bronze tiles from the roof of the Pantheon.
Mayer notes that when it came to intentional destruction of Rome’s ancient buildings, it was the Roman people who were the primary culprits. Spoliation, the practice of repurposing materials from ancient buildings, became common. This was even noted back in 458, when the Western Roman emperor Julius Valerius Majorian issued this edict:
While we rule the state, it is our will to correct the practice whose commission we have long detested, whereby the appearance of the venerable City is marred. Indeed, it is manifest that the public buildings, in which the adornment of the entire City of Rome consists are being destroyed everywhere by the punishable recommendation of the office of the Prefect of the City. While it is pretended that the stones are necessary for public works, the beautiful structures of the ancient buildings are being scattered, and in order that something small may be repaired, great things are being destroyed.
This did not stop the ongoing pillaging of stones, which found their way into churches and houses—today, many medieval and Renaissance buildings in Rome contain repurposed ancient materials. There were also many cases where ancient structures were repurposed only to be destroyed later. One famous example took place in 1257, when Brancaleone degli Andalò became the governor of the city. To quell resistance from Rome’s nobility, he ordered the destruction of more than 140 of the fortified towers – many of these were embedded in or built upon ancient structures.
The transformation of Rome during the Middle Ages was not the result of a single catastrophic event but rather a slow process of decline influenced by shifting political power, resource scarcity, and natural disasters. While much of its ancient grandeur was lost, Rome’s ruins were increasingly recognised for their historical significance, prompting preservation efforts by the end of the medieval period.
You can learn more in Roland Mayer’s The Ruins of Rome: A Cultural History, now published by Cambridge University Press. Roland Mayer is emeritus professor of classics at King’s College London. You can learn more about his research on his Academia.edu page.
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