Medieval history begins with the dissolution of the Western Empire, with
the abandonment of the Latin world to German conquerors. Of the
provinces affected by the catastrophe the youngest was Britain; and even
Britain had then been Roman soil for more than three hundred years. For
Italy, Spain, and Gaul, the change of masters meant the atrophy of
institutions which, at first reluctantly accepted, had come by lapse of
time to be accepted as part of the natural order. Large tracts of Europe
lay outside the evacuated provinces; for the Romans never entered
Ireland or Scandinavia or Russia, and had failed to subjugate Scotland
and the greater part of modern Germany. But the Romanised provinces long
remained the dominant force in European history; the hearth-fire of
medieval culture was kindled on the ruins of the Empire. How far the
victorious Teuton borrowed from the conquered provincial is a question
still debated; the degree and the nature of Rome's influence on the new
rulers varied in every province, indeed in different parts of the same
province. The fact of the debt remains, suggesting a doubt whether in
this case it was indeed the fittest who survived. The flaws in a social
order which has collapsed under the stress of adverse fortunes are
painfully apparent. It is natural to speak of the final overthrow as the
judgment of heaven or the verdict of events. But it has still to be
proved that war is an unfailing test of worth; we have banished the
judicial combat from our law courts, and we should be rash in assuming
that a process obviously absurd when applied to the disputes of
individuals ought to determine the judgments of history on nationalities
or empires.

The immediate and obvious causes which ruined the Western Empire were
military and political--the shortcomings of a professional army and