Could it be argued that the fall of the Roman Empire was an apocalyptic event, and that the the early Middles Ages could be considered post-apocalyptic?
Not at all. An apocalyptic event should be fast, unavoidable, devastating. To most people living in the Roman world there was no perceptible difference.
If you're talking about the fall of the West, rural folk exchanged a Romanized tax collector of X origin for a literate Germanic servant...that was probably Romanized...tax collector of X origin. In time these tax collectors were Germans or the subject people themselves.
Bandits plagued the roads for a long while, but then again bandits had plagued the roads during the dozens of Roman civil wars and upheavals, especially during the Crisis of the Third Century.
Roads themselves got shittier and transport more difficult, yeah, but that's hardly apocalyptic. Most social and civil institutions were preserved by the Germans because it made governance and taxation easier.
If you're talking about the fall of the East around AD 650, yeah, that was pretty shocking and cataclysmic, but again, people adapted and the quality of life everywhere was about the same. It improved in the Levant, Egypt, and Africa (religious tolerance) and worsened around the coasts of Anatolia and Greece (Muslim piracy).
>>896740
People adapted to the black plague.
>>896740
No
For the average joe there wasn't some big /HAPPENING/ and then Rome fell down like the Twin Towers
Life went on
You're blowing my mind, OP
>>896740
Literally, yes. The Book of Revelation, whence the word apocalypse comes, refers to Nero and the Roman empire. It is fulfilled. Rome fell and Christ ruled the world for one "millenium", until the beast was let loose (French Revolution and Emancipation of the Jews = the old serpent called Satan). Jesus will return a second time to smash the head of the serpent and this time it will be definite.
>>897989
Agreed. Most people likely didn't even perceive a real change in government. The vestiges of Rome survived for a very long time; Odoacer was a vassal to the Byzantine emperor, as was Theodoric. 476/410 are really somewhat arbitrary dates--Rome in the west didnt just collapse in one night, it disintegrated very slowly.
The Muslim invasions of Persia/Egypt and the Levant probably wasn't apocalyptic either. Constantinople and the Sassanids had just fought a war for 20 years in which the Byzantine Empire nearly came to an end and were really only saved because Heraclius was an extremely gifted leader; the Muslims simply exploited two empires that had ravaged each other. If that final war hadn't happened, it is entirely possible that Islam would remain a fairly contained religion.
