Romulus Augustus, also known as “Augustulus” which means “Little Caesar” in English, was the 98th Roman Emperor and the last Emperor of the Western Roman Empire. His father had worked up to the position of “Magister Militum” which is the leader of the whole military, and tried to kill the emperor Julius Nepos, but failed. The emperor got away, but never reclaimed his emperorship. Instead of becoming emperor himself, Orestes proclaimed his son, Romulus, as emperor in the hopes that the common people of Rome would think “Hey, that kid Romulus (who was 10 years old) is a cute emperor!” instead of “that guy Orestes killed the emperor! let’s get him!” This tactic proved effective, since the people never rebelled, but the Barbarians outside of Rome didn’t care how old the emperor was. Shortly after Augustulus became emperor a barbarian chief named Odoacer came to Rome and demanded them give him 1/3 of Rome’s total land, which Orestes promptly refused to do. Odoacer then kidnapped Orestes and tortured him to death, which left a child in control of Rome, and the military refused to follow a child, meaning Odoacer was able to walk right up to Rome, walk through the city, walk through the palace, and politely asked Romulus Augustulus to kindly step away from the throne and Rome as a country. We have no idea what happened to him, or if he had any children, or how far he went from Rome. What we do know is that Odoacer began to rule Rome, though never took the title of emperor, instead being a king of Rome. This brought the Roman Empire to its end after 503 years. The Eastern Roman Empire, also known as the Byzantine Empire, continued for some time, but the Western Empire was the true heart of Rome, and without it the Byzantine Empire was a completely different Empire.
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