06-25-2006, 12:43 PM
Quote:the so called ' sacking of Rome ' was not at all that hefty.........I beg to defer. The Vandals sacked the city for no less than three weeks; the city never recovered and ever since, ruins have "graced" the eternal city.
The Visigoths did not kill many people (at least, that's what is written by Orosius, who is trying to show that this was not a disaster), but still, they were busy for several days. The obvious place to start looting was the palace. Several of the "treasuries of the Temple" from Jerusalem are known to have been taken away by the Visigoths from the palace; when the Arabs conquered Toledo in 711, they discovered the "table of Suleyman".
Note that after 410, parts of the nearby Forum Romanum had to be re-modeled. You must have seen the fifth-century statue bases in front of the Basilica Julia. Looting of this part of Rome was, in my opinion, systematic and intensive.
