‘The Demographic Collapse of Pagan Rome’

“Official Roman documents and texts of every kind from as early as the first century, stress again and again the pernicious consequences of Rome’s low and apparently declining birth-rate.”

As cities became smaller and weaker, “the Empire survived …only through the continual importation of barbarians and semi-barbarians. Far then from being a threat, the ‘barbarians’ were seen as a means by which Rome might make good manpower shortages. The problem was that no sooner had the latter settled within the Imperial frontiers than they adopted Roman attitudes and vices.

“Quite possibly, by the end of the first century, the only groups in the Empire that was increasing by normal demographic process were the Christians and the Jews, and these two were virtually immune from the contagion of Roman attitudes.”

http://gatesofvienna.blogspot.com/