476 AD: The Night Rome Fell (And Nobody Fought Back) | Full Documentary

On the 4th of September, 476 AD, a barbarian officer named Odoacer walked into the imperial palace at Ravenna and stripped the Western Roman emperor of his crown. There was no siege. No battle. No grand last stand. The emperor, Romulus Augustulus, was sixteen years old — and he simply obeyed. Rome did not fall screaming. Rome fell silent.

In this episode of Echoes of Rome, we trace the thousand-year empire's final century: the rot within — fifty years of murdered emperors, a currency debased into worthlessness, and plagues that emptied cities; the catastrophe at Adrianople in 378 AD; Alaric's sack of Rome in 410; Attila at the gates and the Vandal theft of North Africa's grain; and the quiet afternoon in 476 when the crown was packed into a chest and shipped to Constantinople