Time and History 11:00 P.M. Edward Gibbon Finishes His Opus

About major and minor historical events around the clock such as Edward Gibbon completing his masterpiece the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.

HISTORY AROUND THE CLOCK

11:00 in the Evening

June 27, 1787. After 22 years of painstaking work, Edward Gibbon finished his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. He conceived the book--the greatest classical work of historical literature in the English language--on Oct. 15, 1764, "at Rome ...as I sat musing amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefooted friars were singing vespers in a Temple of Jupiter." Gibbon finished the last lines of the last page in a summerhouse in his garden and celebrated by taking a walk among his acacias.