Nick Holmes, an argument in audio

Echoes of Empires

47 episodes indexed · 17 hours

Presented by Nick Holmes

Spotify

Periods · The kings, The Republic, The late Republic, The Pax Romana, The third-century crisis, Christian Rome, The fall of the west

Themes · Battle Life on the frontier Government Power struggle Religion The army

Holmes writes books about the end of the Roman world and the podcast is the argument from them, told in his own voice. Worth knowing before you go looking: it ran as The Fall of the Roman Empire until 2026, so that name now finds a different show by somebody else. He commits to a position and defends it for 47 episodes, which makes it better to argue with than a survey.

Where to start. The fall sequence, in order. Introduction and the Origins of Rome · 15 min

I feel like…

ThinkingAny

Cogitare, how it was thought and ordered

FeelingAny

Sentire, what was lived and endured

DoingAny

Facere, what hands made and did

PeriodAny

when it happens

All 47 episodes, in order. Every title links straight to the episode.

  1. Introduction and the Origins of Rome15m
  2. Rome's Path to Glory21m
  3. Hail Caesar20m
  4. Augustus21m
  5. The Pax Romana18m
  6. The Reign of Commodus20m
  7. Tacitus and the Secret of the Empire25m
  8. The Defeat of Palmyra15m
  9. Diocletian's New Empire18m
  10. Diocletian's New Economics17m
  11. Tetrarchs and Christians22m
  12. Constantine's Conversion18m
  13. Constantinople17m
  14. The Sons of Constantine23m
  15. Theodosius the Not So Great23m
  16. The Roman Empire Divided24m
  17. Stilicho Triumphant24m
  18. The Sack of Rome, AD 41024m
  19. The Decline of the Roman Army26m
  20. Was Climate Change Rome's Real Killer?17m
  21. Restoring the Roman Name?22m
  22. BONUS Episode "The Strange Tale of Attila, Honoria and Milan""8m
  23. Attila the Hun23m
  24. Dinner with Attila22m
  25. Attila's Bride21m
  26. Attila and the Last of the Romans21m
  27. The End of Attila's Empire21m
  28. The Sack of Rome by the Vandals, AD 45520m
  29. Majorian: The Last Hope of the West22m
  30. Catastrophe at Carthage, AD 46821m
  31. The End of Rome: Not with a Bang but a Whimper22m
  32. The Rise of the Ostrogoths23m
  33. Anastasius: The New Diocletian25m
  34. Justin and Justinian23m
  35. Justinian, Theodora, and the Secret History23m
  36. Belisarius and the Battle of Dara25m
  37. The Problem with Justinian25m
  38. Next Stop Carthage27m
  39. The Last Vandal King25m
  40. The Kingdom of the Ostrogoths22m
  41. The Gothic Siege of Rome28m
  42. Belisarius is Back!28m
  43. Did Justinian Make or Break the Roman Empire?23m
  44. The Romans' Lucky Break21m
  45. The Siege of Constantinople in AD 62627m
  46. The Battle of Yarmuk: Rome's Greatest Defeat?21m
  47. The Siege of Constantinople in 717/718: Byzantium's Greatest Victory24m