Rome fell, but not the chicken: The peculiar story of a Roman emperor's favourite pet

According to the historian Procopius of Caesarea, who used earlier lost works by Olympiodorus of Thebes, the sack of Rome by Visigoth forces under Alaric in August AD 410 caused panic across the empire.

The city had not fallen to a foreign enemy for more than eight centuries. When a messenger arrived at Honorius’s court in Ravenna with the news that "Rome has perished," the emperor was initially struck with panic, assuming that the grim news referred to his cherished chicken.

Distraught, Honorius reportedly exclaimed, "But it has just taken food from my hand!"

Realising the Emperor's confusion, the messenger clarified that it was the city of Rome that had fallen to Alaric's forces, not his beloved fowl.

Honorius, according to this account, was quick to respond with a sigh of relief, "I feared that it was my beloved rooster that had perished." 

Scholars point out that Procopius, writing in the early sixth century, is the earliest surviving source for this story.

No fifth-century Roman writer mentions the incident, which suggests it might have started as satire or an exaggerated tale in Byzantine circles.

Later historians sometimes referred to it, but Jordanes’s Getica does not mention Honorius’s rooster or quote the emperor directly. 

Honorius had become emperor at age ten and spent his early reign under the care of his guardian and general, Stilicho.

After Stilicho was put to death in August AD 408, the government found it hard to respond to Alaric’s attacks. Within two years, the Visigoths marched on Rome.

The rooster story came to represent the disorder affecting the Western empire: as soldiers went hungry and citizens watched the fall of a once-mighty capital, the emperor seemed focused on a pet. 

Whether the rooster really existed or the story began as a mockery is still uncertain.

No original text records Honorius’s exact words, and the famous line showing relief that only a city, not an animal, had died comes from later versions rather than any primary record. 

Honorius stayed in power for thirteen more years after the sack, but his influence faded.

Civil wars, rival claimants, and barbarian invasions broke up the Western empire.

Regions such as Britain, parts of Gaul, and Iberia slipped out of Roman control.

When Honorius died in AD 423, the Western Roman Empire had become only a shadow of its former self. 

In the end, the story of Emperor Honorius and his rooster Roma highlighted the contrast between Rome’s past greatness and the empire’s unstable state.

Whether true or not, the tale lived on as a symbol of imperial weakness during one of the Western empire’s most troubled times.