Historia Magistra Vitae

Annalisa Merelli "1,700 years ago, the mismanagement of a migrant crisis cost Rome its empire" May 07, 2016

The mismanagement of Goth refugees started a chain of events that led to the collapse of one of the biggest political and military powers humankind has ever known. It’s a story shockingly similar to what’s happening in Europe right now—and it should serve as a cautionary tale. According to historian Ammianus Marcellinus, in 376, the Goths were forced to leave their territories, in what’s now Eastern Europe, pushed south by the Huns, in Marcellinus’s words, “a race savage beyond all parallel.” The Huns, Marcellinus writes, “descended like a whirlwind from the lofty mountains, as if they had risen from some secret recess of the earth, and were ravaging and destroying everything which came in their way.” It resulted in terrifying bloodshed, and many of the Goths—like many Syrians and others displaced by war—decided to flee. They decided that settling in Thrace, right across the Danube river, was the best solution; the land was fertile, and the river would provide defense to keep the Huns at bay.