Obligatory:
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We’ll forget even more history as fewer and fewer teachers are available to teach it. 
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Here is an interesting and plausible theory about why there were so many people searching for the Yeti in Central Asia…
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Yetis are real, and they think that Reinhold Messner is a myth.
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If journalism and the south side of Chicago aren’t your bag, at least read the first link. Nothing like first-person history:
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TIL some interesting hidden baseball history…
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Empires are finite by nature, inherently unstable. A system dependent on constant expansion and plunder reach limits as to how far they can go. The go from open systems with constant supply the of tribute to closed ones dependent to managing their conquests. The question realistically should be not why __ empire fell so much as to how did it keep going.
For the Romans, the Empire pretty much was on autopilot with little to no effective leadership from the top. But they created infrastructure that pretty much ran itself.
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Some key points about the book in the link:
If someone had asked me a month ago why the Roman empire fell, I might have concocted a reply implicating lead in the drinking vessels, debauchery and dissolution, and the rise of Goths and Huns. This book very cogently, and reasonably concisely (300 pages) explains how climate change and a series of pandemics absolutely destroyed what had been a pan-Mediterranean empire.
he first point of note is that the previous rise of the Roman empire had also been fueled by climate change - in this case the favorable “Roman Climate Optimum.” Starting in about 200 BC the Mediterranean region experienced increased precipitation, resulting in bountiful production of wheat in north Africa, which was in effect the breadbasket for the emerging empire. With abundant food and population growth, growth was easy, and by the time of emperor Antoninus Pius (who ruled from 138-161) the empire stretched from the north of Britain to the south of Egypt and from the Atlantic to the edges of Asia -
We always want to make it about human action – strengths and failings – when often it’s Mother Nature pulling the strings.
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