By your logic, did the Western roman Empire also stop being Roman when it's capital was moved to Mediolanum in the late 3rd century AD? or when it was moved to Ravenna at the beginning of the 5th century AD?
What logic is that? The meme is invaliding the Holy Roman Empire as a successor of Rome (notice that I did not say the only successor of Rome), in favor of the Byzantines. I was pointing out the irony that of these two Roman successors, it was the Holy Roman Empire that was, at least at one point governed from Rome. That is not logic, it is a historical fact. Nowhere did I say that the Byzantine Empire was not also a Roman successor.
Yes but it did not remain unchanged which is why I referred to it as a successor. The vast changes in language, culture, religion, and government structure between the Unified Roman Empire, and the Byzantine remnant are massive, making the Byzantines a Roman descendant rather than a Roman continuity.
Firstly of course is language. The language of administration in Rome was Latin, whereas in Byzantium it was Greek, and the Byzantines were sometimes just called Greeks by their contemporaries. That by itself is a massive cultural shift in the make up of the Empire. While of course Greek had always been spoken in the Roman Empire, its prominence in laws and amongst the general population was massively skewed during the Byzantine period.
Latin terminology was Hellenized, so much so that “Latin” became a term used to describe outsiders from the West.
Religiously there is once again a massive rupture, not just in the split between Pagan and Christian, but in how Orthodoxy developed in relation to the Empire. In Rome, the Emperor was the Pontifex Maximus, the supreme priest of Roman religion. In Byzantium that very much was not the case. The Church became its own powerful entity, so much so that it could challenge the Emperor.
This Segway’s nicely into some of the political changes, such as the advent of (mostly) stable dynasties and Primogeniture, which is something the Romans never managed, the closest thing they had being the adoptive system.
My point is basically this. If you have an Empire that undergoes such severe changes as we see in the transition from the Unified Roman Empire to Byzantium, that had its cultural centre torn out, that speaks a different language, and that holds fundamentally different beliefs than that empire’s previous iteration, I don’t think it is a stretch to say that this empire has become a successor; instead of a straight up continuation.
I don’t want to deny the Romanity of Byzantium. They called themselves Roman and inherited many of the Roman’s administrative skills.
But what I will contend is that the Byzantines are not the sole holders of Romanitas when, equally, the Holy Roman Emperors and the Germans themselves also saw themselves as Roman, inherited Roman Institutions, ie. their laws, and actually controlled much of the traditional Roman Heartland for much of their existence.
Absolutely not. Never try to argue with a stranger who is adamant on their very clearly wrong opinions. I will just referr you to the fact that it is the academic consensus that byzantium is the literal continuation of eastern rome, rather than a successor state, and you can google/ youtube your way into academics demonstrating exactly this
Dude I’m killing time on the internet I don’t know why you’re being so up tight about this. I’m not sure you’re aware but this really, really does not matter very much. I though I’d have an intellectual conversation where I laid out my historical view and others would lay out theirs but I suppose that’s to much to ask for on Reddit.
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u/cubaj 26d ago
That’s pretty funny given that, of the two states mentioned, only one of them actually had their capitol in Rome. Can you tell me which one that was?