The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

‘Gibbon is a kind of bridge that connects the ancient with the ancient with the modern ages, ‘ noted Thomas Carlyle. ‘And how gorgeously does it swing across the gloomy and tumultuous chasm of these barbarous centuries.’ Indeed, Gibbon, the supreme historian of the Enlightenment–the illustrious scholar who envisioned history as a branch of literature–seemed almost predestined to write his monumental account of the Roman Empire’s terrible self-destruction.