What role did the goths and the vandals play in the decline of the roman empire?

Answer 1

The Vandals had a fairly significant role in the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, as they conquered most of Roman North Africa, which was the largest supplier of grain to Italy. However, after this they made no overtly aggressive actions towards the Western Empire.

The Goths role was arguably much larger. They launched several devastating attacks on the city of Rome in the late 5th Century, and took virtually all of Gaul (except for a rump state held together by the Roman commander Syagurius), though all of this land would later be taken from the Goths by the Franks. When the German elements of the Roman Army rebelled in 476 AD, destroying the much smaller Roman forces and toppling the Western Empire, Emperor Zeno of the Eastern Roman Empire sent the Gothic warlord Theodosius to stop them, but instead of returning it to Roman rule, he took the Empire for himself. Therefore, ultimately the Goths were the ones responsible for the collapse of the Western Empire, but not the Eastern Empire, which was conquered by Turks almost 1000 years later. If you want to know when the united Roman Empire collapsed, it was in 395 AD, when it split into the two halves, but neither the Goths nor the Vandals had anything to do with that; it was due to civil war.

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