Lead Poisoning: The Silent Fall of Rome

The Roman Empire didn't fall because of barbarians. It fell because of lead poisoning,

and one man tried to warn everyone but got silenced. His name was Vitruvius, a Roman architect

who wrote about the dangers of lead water pipes in 15 BC. He literally documented

how lead workers went pale and sick, how the metal corrupted the blood. But here's the thing.

The wealthy elite who profited from lead mining and pipe manufacturing had him dismissed

as paranoid. They called his warnings unscientific. For three centuries after,

Romans kept drinking poisoned water while their leaders became increasingly erratic and violent.

The cognitive decline was real. When I discovered Vitruvius's writings in a university