Rome 2.0, or how the Renaissance rediscovered antiquity
When the Germanic leader Odoacer dethroned the minor emperor Romulus Augustus in 476, the Roman Empire effectively ceased to exist. With this event, many achievements of antiquity were lost – some irretrievably, others fell into oblivion for hundreds of years. It was only with the advent of the Renaissance that changes in European communities were so serious that they returned to the achievements of the ancient Romans on a larger scale. So what were the causes and consequences of the Renaissance?