Conservation is a fundamental feature of true ruin-mindedness, but the early attempts to preserve the ruins of Rome were unsuccessful until the tourism of the eighteenth century made it clear that there was an economic benefit to the preservation and attractive presentation of the city’s ruins. Once this was appreciated, care for the preservation of the ruins from further damage and decay became an issue. Towards the end of that century, soil and rubble were removed from the bases of a number of the more significant ruins, and steps were taken to isolate them so as to protect them from harm, an innovative measure. Rome took the lead in guarding the heritage of its built environment. But since no one had ever tried to protect a building out of doors before, novel means of preservation and even of conservation and rebuilding were devised to ensure that the ruins looked their best for visitors and for posterity. Further projects of excavation were undertaken by the French and the Kingdom of Italy in the nineteenth century, and in the twentieth century the ruins were furbished up for propaganda purposes by the Fascist regime.

I focus on why the competition for power among senatorial, imperial, and military elites that had stimulated the recovery of the city of Rome in the face of multiple civic and military crises no longer was effective in the later sixth and early seventh centuries. The end of Rome’s political senatorial aristocracy and its political body, the Senate, is the final “fall” of Rome. In its place, a papal-focused city dependent on Byzantine military might would emerge in the seventh century.