The death of the Roman Empire is one of the perennial mysteries of world history. Now, in this groundbreaking book, Peter Heather proposes a stunning new solution: Centuries of imperialism turned the neighbors Rome called barbarians into an enemy capable of dismantling an Empire that had dominated their lives for so long. A leading authority on the late Roman Empire and on the barbarians, Heather relates the extraordinary story of how Europe's barbarians, transformed by centuries of contact with Rome on every possible level, eventually pulled the empire apart. He shows first how the Huns overturned the existing strategic balance of power on Rome's European frontiers, to force the Goths and others to seek refuge inside the Empire. This prompted two generations of struggle, during which new barbarian coalitions, formed in response to Roman hostility, brought the Roman west to its knees. The Goths first destroyed a Roman army at the battle of Hadrianople in 378, and went on to sack Rome in 410. The Vandals spread devastation in Gaul and Spain, before conquering North Africa, the breadbasket of the Western Empire, in 439. We then meet Attila the Hun, whose reign of terror swept from Constantinople to Paris, but whose death in 453 ironically precipitated a final desperate phase of Roman collapse, culminating in the Vandals' defeat of the massive Byzantine Armada: the west's last chance for survival. Peter Heather convincingly argues that the Roman Empire was not on the brink of social or moral collapse. What brought it to an end were the barbarians.

[英]彼得•希瑟（Peter Heather）

英國曆史學傢。1960年齣生於北愛爾蘭，畢業於牛津大學，現任倫敦國王學院曆史係教授，中世紀史研究的負責人。他曾任倫敦大學、耶魯大學、牛津大學教授。希瑟是晚期羅馬史、中世紀歐洲蠻族研究方麵的權威，是對公元3至8世紀的歐洲最為瞭解的一位曆史學傢。

希瑟的曆史作品結閤瞭嚴謹的曆史考證和流暢的敘事筆法，在歐美世界擁有大量的讀者。他為Blackwell齣版社的“歐洲民族”圖書係列創作瞭《匈人》（1998）和《哥特人》（1999）兩本書。《羅馬帝國的隕落》（2005）、《帝國與蠻族》（2009）和《羅馬的復闢》（2013）則三本著作匯集瞭希瑟25年研究努力的成果，從三個角度詳盡講述瞭羅馬帝國和蠻族的衝突交流史，達到瞭晚期羅馬史和後羅馬史寫作的一座當代巔峰。