Classical education, for me, means exactly the sort of education where you would learn about the transition from republic to empire. We must have a different de

Classical education, for me, means exactly the sort of education where you would learn about the transition from republic to empire. We must have a different definition but I agree on the more general point that a lot of attention is being paid to the fall of Rome and we sometimes ignore the collapse of the republic. I think part of it is that the end of the republic is so well documented, and that documentation so thoroughly studied and responded to up through the 19th century that it's hard to come up with anything really new to say. The period immediately after the fall of the empire has precious few surviving contemporary accounts. Much is known only through archaeology or very fanciful writers like Isidore of Seville, and so there is a blank canvas to project one's hopes and fears.