Practice question · Sort into groups
Sort each claim: does it belong to the decline narrative or the transformation narrative?
Groups: Decline and fall · Transformation
- The Roman world gradually became the medieval one
- Pottery, coins, and cattle bones show living standards crashing
- No corpse, no funeral, just slow change of costume
- Bishops and kings inherited Roman administration seamlessly
- A civilization rotted from within and collapsed
Hints
- One narrative emphasises continuity, the other material decline.
- Both are supported by different classes of evidence.
Show the answer
Decline and fall: A civilization rotted from within and collapsed, Pottery, coins, and cattle bones show living standards crashing
Transformation: The Roman world gradually became the medieval one, Bishops and kings inherited Roman administration seamlessly, No corpse, no funeral, just slow change of costume
Why
Late Antiquity scholars track institutions and culture, collapse archaeologists track material life, and the honest answer is that the West transformed at the top while it collapsed at the kitchen table.
Practise The Roman Empire and its Fall
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