The fall of Rome was less a dramatic collapse and more the slow and eventually total decline of state services. One day, your postman become…

The fall of Rome was less a dramatic collapse and more the slow and eventually total decline of state services. One day, your postman becomes a little less reliable. He arrives less often. Then later on, he's gone, and you're not sending or receiving letters anymore. One signal of the Dark Ages is the decline of Roman documentary papyrus examples. Another is the rise of Arabic documentary papyri in their stead!

Source: Elon Musk (X) | 2026-06-24