Overview
Assignment—Old Guy Complains about Rome’s Collapse
Read the document associated with this assignment—it’s attached to this assignment.
This document is from a Roman general in the late Empire—he’s living pretty close to the end of Rome, though the Empire is still hanging on at this point. His letter is all about the things he sees as going wrong in Rome—he’s really laying out the problems facing Rome and the things that will lead to its downfall.
Or is he? Historians have a tricky task when they read sources from the past, because they have to take into account how people felt when they wrote the sources and what kind of personal experiences shaped the way they thought about and described the world. Another way to say this is to think about each source as a single point of reference…one source can only ever tell you about how that one person described something.
Like, you can’t ever read something and say “aha, there’s the TRUTH’ because it is only ever the “truth” to that one person who wrote the source. To use a pretty modern analogy…imagine a future historian found your phone, and that was the only source they had to learn about our world. They wouldn’t really learn about the TRUTH of our world; they’d learn about your understanding of the truth of our world. They’d see the world through your eyes, which presents a different truth than if they had found my phone, or the president’s phone, or a phone from a Chinese person instead of an American.
Back to the source. When I read Marcellinus, I definitely see him describing the things wrong with the Roman Empire…he goes through a whole list of stuff making Rome weaker, poorer, and less stable. There is some “truth” here. But I also hear an old man complaining about the youth, I hear a general complaining about civilians, I hear someone who “knows best” complaining about others who don’t agree. There’s an inherent challenge for historians…which part is which? Like, is Rome actually getting poorer and weaker, or is this guy just getting older and losing touch?
That’s what I want you to do with this assignment—wrestle with the idea that documents are both sources of “truth” but also personal accounts shaped by individual experience. You need four quotes total—two that tell you something about why Rome was collapsing, and two that give you some indication of what this guy was going through on a personal level.
- The fist two quotes should deal with “facts” of Rome’s downfall…what does he identify as the most important problems facing Rome?
- The second pair of quotes should be opportunities to “read between the lines” a bit, looking for bias and perspective that might be shaping his view of things.
Four quotes, and lots (and lots!) of analysis. You should explain why the first two quotes seem reliable, like he’s telling “the truth” of the matter. The second quotes should be analyzed in a bit more detail, thinking about how he reveals his bias and perspective in these lines. Does he exaggerate? Is he being dramatic about all this? Look for the most revealing lines to explore!
As always, the point of these assignments is to interact with the source material and think about what creative and insightful analysis you can do with it! The more interesting ideas you come up with, the higher your score.