Third Century Crisis Causes

So I'm working on a pet project of mine that I've wanted to do for awhile, a youtube series on the third century crisis. I'm sifting through all the major causes and I want to know if I am missing any:

-The Antonine Plague
-Climate change and other factors (such as bordering Rome for 2 centuries) causing barbarian groups to start migrating, putting pressure on Rome's northern borders.
-The drastic debasement of coinage and the increasing difficulty the emperors were having monetary wise with maintaining their army
-the increasing inability of the emperor to keep the loyalty of the troops and respond to multiple crises points at once
-The rise of the Sassanians


I know I am probably missing a few, but this is all I can pinpoint. I don't think the succession system was an underlying cause in and of itself since that hadn't been much of a problem until this point.

The Slave population were declining as wars of conquest became restricted to the east and this made agricultural profuction suffer. Not a major cause, but it is still somewhat important as it means people who would be satisfied citizens are becoming rebels due to hunger.

The tendency of the Roman Elites, who use to really carry the republic and empire, to slip into moral debauchery and decadence after years of imperial rule and the destruction of old families in civil wars exported power to the provincial generals and away from the Roman elite. This made separatist provincial movements like the Gallic Empire not scoffed at as ridiculous. Also, the migration of the Slavs was starting to pick up in the East and this simply compounded the existing problems and made the Danube frontier a major problem.

Redhand said:

The Slave population were declining as wars of conquest became restricted to the east and this made agricultural profuction suffer. Not a major cause, but it is still somewhat important as it means people who would be satisfied citizens are becoming rebels due to hunger.

Click to expand...

The problem I have with that are :

1) Slave trade never ended : what wasn't brought from conquest in Germany, Africa or Persia, was traded either from these regions, either home-born. Numbers in rural areas didn't seem to have crumbled overnight, but the proportion of home-born raised constantly.

2) Agricultural production already suffered from climatic changes and from less interesting profit it gathered.

3) Antonine Plague as well decline of agricultural production provoked new social and technical uses : as the coloni. Roman economy was able, and did adapted, to the new conditions.

The tendency of the Roman Elites, who use to really carry the republic and empire, to slip into moral debauchery and decadence after years of imperial rule and the destruction of old families in civil wars exported power to the provincial generals and away from the Roman elite.

Click to expand...

Could we have actual evidence for the old cliché of moral decadancy?

This made separatist provincial movements like the Gallic Empire not scoffed at as ridiculous

Click to expand...

Gallic Empire wasn't a separatist movement : it's just your usual usurper that aimed Rome and failed to do so, eventually managing to hold some provincial authority before being killed by his troops.

Also, the migration of the Slavs was starting to pick up in the East and this simply compounded the existing problems and made the Danube frontier a major problem.

Click to expand...

It doesn't look like you had mass migrations, critically of Proto-Slavs. At the contrary, it looks like the half-clientelized entities along Danube were roughly the same but didn't knew the exact same crises than Rome or Rheinish peoples, and were able to pull opportunistic raids.

Rheinish people, on the other hand, suffered more from climatic changes : the coastal changes, critically. It basically forced them to unite in leagues to both pull back their neighbours (as Burgondians) and to raid Romania. Hence creation of leagues as Saxones, Francii, Alemanii.

It's actually one thing you forgot, slydessertfox, the creation of entities whom at least one point of existance was the re-designation of Germans peoples towards Rome, and raiding regularly its bordering provinces.

LSCatilina said:

It's actually one thing you forgot, slydessertfox, the creation of entities whom at least one point of existance was the re-designation of Germans peoples towards Rome, and raiding regularly its bordering provinces.

Click to expand...

Yes, I did forget this one. Could you go a little more in depth on the agriculture problems? I remember having a discussion with you about it on another thread but I can't seem to find it.

slydessertfox said:

Yes, I did forget this one. Could you go a little more in depth on the agriculture problems? I remember having a discussion with you about it on another thread but I can't seem to find it.

Click to expand...

It seems that the profit of Roman Agriculture became less interesting with the late IInd century, clearly more with the IIIrd.

- Over-Farming. Too many production made prices going down, and asked for more work on a same impoverished soil.

- Provincial concurrence.

- Reduction of manpower. Eventually, it became more profitable to not have large latifundiae and lands were "gaven" to coloni, clients, etc. around a villa. Hence as well a partial mechanisation (as the Gallic harvester).

- Crops. It's possible the crops used by Romans were less interesting.

- Raids and civil disorder. It's not easy making a profit when the consomation centers and trade roads are troubled (to not speak of your farm).

(all of these aren't definitive, or even clearly established hypothesis, they're just explanations and probably no one was the only factor)

LSCatilina said:

It seems that the profit of Roman Agriculture became less interesting with the late IInd century, clearly more with the IIIrd.

- Over-Farming. Too many production made prices going down, and asked for more work on a same impoverished soil.

- Provincial concurrence.

- Reduction of manpower. Eventually, it became more profitable to not have large latifundiae and lands were "gaven" to coloni, clients, etc. around a villa. Hence as well a partial mechanisation (as the Gallic harvester).

- Crops. It's possible the crops used by Romans were less interesting.

- Raids and civil disorder. It's not easy making a profit when the consomation centers and trade roads are troubled (to not speak of your farm).

(all of these aren't definitive, or even clearly established hypothesis, they're just explanations and probably no one was the only factor)

Click to expand...

Ah okay, this makes sense. Thanks for the info.

Another cause that could be mentionned would be the extinction of the Severan dynasty. If I am not wrong, the death of Alexander Severus without heirs is what is considered as the official starting point of the Third Century Crisis.