Fall of the Western Roman Empire

Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster film Odyssey brings Homer’s epic roaring back to life and Tristan Hughes and Dr. Emily Hauser are here to unpack every storm, monster and star-making turn. From the brilliance of the adaptation to the ancient story beneath it, Tristan and Emily bri ...  Show more

What if the first New Zealanders crossed an ocean, landed in a brand-new world, and built a whole society in just a few generations?Tristan Hughes and Dr Richard Walter tell the story of East Polynesian voyagers who reached Aotearoa around the late 1200s, bringing canoes, knowled ...  Show more

Known for bringing about the fall of the Western Roman Empire - the Vandals have a reputation for violence, destruction, and conquering. Moving from Eastern Europe across Gaul, and eventually taking Carthage, their actions have been immortalised in Christian texts and Western ...

In 476, the last of the Roman emperors in the West was deposed; in 1776, historian Edward Gibbon wrote “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, and Rome’s fate became a major point of comparison for all empires. In Gibbon's view, instead of inquiring why the Rom ...  Show more

For centuries, the Roman Empire commanded unparalleled control over the world around it. It expanded its borders through trade and conquest, sucking resources from the periphery into its thriving centre - Rome. And then, suddenly, everything changed. The Empire entered a state ...

Soon after the war with Veii, Rome was sacked by invading Gauls. The event traumatized the Romans and left their city in ruins. It would be the last time a foreign army breached the walls until the fall of the empire 850 years later.