The invading army reached the outskirts of Rome, which had been left totally undefended. In 410 C.E., the Visigoths, led by Alaric, breached the walls of Rome and sacked the capital of the Roman Empire.
Alaric and the Visigoths fought back by sacking Rome in 410 CE. When the Western Roman Empire fell in 476 CE, it was replaced by a series of kingdoms ruled over by the very Germans that the Romans so despised. Yet, even as Rome fell, it spread its romanitas to the Germanic tribes.
