I trace the senatorial and military elite responses to the 472 civil war and the willingness of senatorial aristocrats to ally themselves with the powerful general Ricimer to restore the city. The efforts of some senatorial aristocrats from the leading families of Rome, the Anicii and the Decii in particular, attest to the continuing influence of a shrinking group of civic leaders. But senatorial aristocrats had developed ties to the Germanic generals and king Odoacer, ensuring their continued role in the recovery of Rome. The removal of a western emperor by the end of the fifth century gave increased political influence to senatorial aristocrats in an admittedly smaller city. The idea of an eastern emperor allowed for the continuation fo the ideals of empire, without undermining senatorial political ascendancy in Rome and Italy. Indeed, the growth of senatorial influence can also be seen in their involvement in religious conflicts of the day. With the absence of a western emperor and living under Germanic Kings, the popes of Rome relied increasingly on senatorial aristocrats as they asserted their independence from eastern imperial and patriarchal control.

My focus is on elites who competed for influence in the wake of events that the Romans themselves characterized as “crises.” In narrating these five crises, I emphasize the critical role in Rome of senatorial aristocrats and the slow growth of the influence of the bishops and clergy of Rome, two segments of Roman society whose continued focus on the city provides a key thread through these centuries. Although generals and emperors came and went, the institutionalized presence of the senatorial aristocracy, the Senate, and the church persisted. After each crisis, senators reinvested in the city, fueling its resurgence time and again. The bishops, too, returned to the city to restore Christian communities.

This focus on the senators and the clergy is important because, in my view, too much of the discussion of Rome in late antiquity has focused on either the catastrophic impact of barbarian invasions or the baleful influence of weak emperors and strident generals. Although I am not the first to recognize the vital role played by senatorial aristocrats nor to show the limited influence of the bishops in Rome, new information about the city in late antiquity, new scholarly work on its history, and a new appreciation of the role of the bishops of the city require a new perspective on the very old topic of the “Fall of Rome.”