Deposition of Romulus Augustulus
The Germanic commander Odoacer deposed the last western emperor, the boy Romulus Augustulus, and sent the imperial regalia to Constantinople — the conventional end of the Western Roman Empire.
- Date
- 4 September 476exact dateDate in the Julian calendar
- Place
- Ravennatoday: Ravenna, Italy · Western and Central Europe
- Participants
- Odoacer, Romulus Augustulus, Western Roman Empire, Zeno, Byzantine Empire
- Threads
- Europe in the Roman age (1st–5th c.)
- Also known as
- Fall of the Western Roman Empire; End of the Western Roman Empire; Переворот Одоакра; Падение Западной Римской империи
In 475 the general Orestes drove out the emperor Julius Nepos and placed his young son Romulus on the throne. The next summer the barbarian federate troops in Italy, refused a third of the land of Italy, proclaimed their officer Odoacer king. Orestes was captured and executed at Placentia (Piacenza), Odoacer took Ravenna, and on 4 September 476 Romulus was made to abdicate; Odoacer spared him and sent him to live on an estate in Campania.
Instead of naming a new emperor, Odoacer had the Senate send the imperial insignia to Zeno in Constantinople, declaring that one emperor was enough, and ruled Italy as king while nominally acknowledging the eastern emperor. Contemporaries hardly saw 476 as a turning point — Nepos was still recognised in Dalmatia until 480 — but later historians made it the conventional end of the Western Empire and of antiquity.
Connections
Consequences
- Theodoric takes Ravenna490 – 5 March 493 · Western and Central EuropeZeno sent Theodoric to overthrow Odoacer
Related events
- Division of the Roman Empire17 January 395 · Western and Central Europethe western half set apart in 395 ended in 476
- Coronation of Charlemagne25 December 800 · Western and Central EuropeThe first emperor in the West since the deposition of Romulus Augustulus in 476
Same participants
- Council of Chalcedon8 October – 1 November 451 · Balkans and Anatoliavia Byzantine Empire
- Vandal sack of Rome2–16 June 455 · Western and Central Europevia Western Roman Empire
Meanwhile in the world
Other regions, within 25 years of this event
Eastern Europe
- Early Slavic cultures: Prague-Korchak, Penkovka and Kolochinc. 450 – c. 700
- Kyi, Shchek and Khoryv: the legendary founding of Kyivbetween 500 and 700
Balkans and Anatolia
- Council of Chalcedon8 October – 1 November 451
The same period
Sources
- Wikipedia (English): Deposition of Romulus Augustus
- Wikipedia (English): Fall of the Western Roman Empire
- Wikipedia (Russian): Переворот Одоакра
- Wikipedia (Russian): Падение Западной Римской империи
- Ward-Perkins B. The Fall of Rome and the End of Civilization. — Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
- Корсунский А. Р., Гюнтер Р. Упадок и гибель Западной Римской империи и возникновение германских королевств (до середины VI в.). — М.: Изд-во МГУ, 1984.
- Wikidata: Q4350094