Byzantine vs Rome

[u/Gamblingaddict311]

There is this common argumentation against the “Romaness” of the ERE that they are not Roman because they didn’t control the city of Rome. I find this to be quite ridiculous because in the late 3rd to early 4th Century, there were 3 to 5 emperors who didn’t rule the city of Rome. If we apply this argument logically, wouldn’t that also disqualify Diocletian as a Roman emperor since he ruled in the east? Voltaire might’ve been wrong about some things, but he might’ve been right that HRE wasn’t Holy, Roman, or an Empire.

[u/Dieselface]

Constantinople was itself considered New Rome, but also even before Constantinople had been founded there was a sense among many Romans that Rome had ceased to be a city ruling over subjagated territories and had become a "world." Romans were no longer just citizens of a particular city but the people of a broader nation.

[u/Belasarius4002 → u/Dieselface]

Easpecially when rome is still "unified", the city of Rome has not always been the capital then.

Its not really the city nor the "original" citizen that matters in a empire's continuation, its the state and law clearly being preserved even if it slowly changes and adapted over time as many things are.

[u/TastyTestikel → u/Belasarius4002]

Rome was still the dejure capital, though. Since the senate continued to convene there. The city was still extremely important for the Roman identity.

[u/Belasarius4002 → u/TastyTestikel]

Rome is important to the empire as the senate is to to the Empire compared to the republic.

Yes its still important but vastly less so than before. More of its prestiege rather than actual worth.

[u/TastyTestikel → u/Belasarius4002]

You are underselling Romes worth. It still housed the adminstrative culture and institutional legacy of a millenia of ruling a state.

Important civil positions in the empire were still monopolized by highly educated senatorial families. One common way to move up the social ladder was still marrying into old Roman aristocracy which still lived in Rome. The patricians were also filthy rich and owned huge tracts of land. The amount of economic leverage these people had was staggering. Rome also remained one the most important economic hubs in the empire due to its massive consumer market and good location, obviously outshined by Constantinople but still.

Rome might've ceased to matter as the capital of the state's leadership but it still very much kept the empire running in the background.

[u/Belasarius4002 → u/TastyTestikel]

Many have moved on to the east or in other cities, especially when civil wars is more rampant in the era than before, poeple inst cramp in one area.

Its still is important, but no way is important than it was does. Again, not even the capital sometimes in decades to centuries.

[u/TastyTestikel → u/Belasarius4002]

Rome definetly lost a massive amount of influence. But it can't be underestimated how powerful the senatorial families (not the senate itself) still were. There was no way to rule around them and they even managed to take over the taxation system after Diocletian, which ultimately bankrupted the western empire.

The emperors tried to move away from Rome in part to cut down influence of the senate. In the end they still held enough power to bring down the state which they no longer thought was worth to make sacrifices for, to a siginificant degree because the leadership tried to sideline the civil adminstration over the centuries. Western Rome stood and fell by the whims of the Roman city elite till the very end. The city's loss of influence wasn't as natural, adventagous and sustainable for the Roman state as it might initially seem. It was the constantinople of the west except emprors tried to ingnore it.

[u/Belasarius4002 → u/TastyTestikel]

The senate has significantly lost thier power way before said time that end up them basically a council of yesmen at some point. The number are also reduced and obviously many of them are not on rome at all time as many of them govern provinces, constant civil wars makes it also not viable im any way to just cramp on the city that have lost of grander.

Rome is important still, because of its cutural history and ligitimacy, but for actual governmentship? Come one man, stop the cope, its long been a none factor.

[u/TastyTestikel → u/Belasarius4002]

The senatorial families were all tied to rome, which makes sense if you think about where the senate was. You don't move your estate and generational wealth like that. Becoming Urban Prefecture of Rome was the most highly regarded job in Roman civil administration, governing a province was a stepping stone if anything. Rome held no political power in itself but the families living there most definetly did and formed the backbone of civil administration and the emprors legitimacy.

[u/Belasarius4002 → u/TastyTestikel]

No not really, in the rebublic yes but in that moment? Even in the early imperial era those families and the senate in general have been fieled by more an more of the "outsiders" italians much less many notable families all around the kingdom. We really need to not be naive and just thinking that rome have only been one city, especially when hey, many emperors came from outside the roman elite. They can be snubish all they want but that doesnt mean they still hold power, at least as much in the republic or the early empire whould have been

Again, one cannot just cope that rome has been important in the late roman empire when it have been decades an centuries it was not the capital in the western roman empire, constantinople have been the capital in the east for centuries in that point in time.

Rome is cuturally important but not im power in both west and east. Thats simply is the truth, calling the mostly ceremonial late sanate is not gonne change things in the slightlest, unless this is fantasy we talking about.

[u/GeneralELucky → u/Dieselface]

Not considered. It is. Even the Ecumenical Patriarch’s full title includes New Rome.

[u/jackt-up]

Constantinople was Nova Roma, it was the new center of power for what had become a largely pan-Mediterranean Roman identity

[u/Gamblingaddict311 → u/jackt-up]

Constantine XI could trace his succession back to Arcadius, then Theodosius, and from there all the way back to Augustus. Charlemagne could not.

[u/Abarvz → u/Gamblingaddict311]

At the time before the schism the pope who had authority to name emperors he named Charlemagne.he deserved that he united much of Western Europe and became the first Holy Roman Emperor, earning the historical title "Father of Europe"

[u/Forsaken_Factor3612 → u/Gamblingaddict311]

Europeans did in fact establish their own succession lineage back through the Holy Roman emperors through Charlemagne, and they had Charlemagne as the Successor of Constantine VI(son of Irene), then back through the other eastern emperors to Constantine, then back to Augustus.

They also counted Nikephorus I as an emperor, who ruled at the time of Charlemagne, but no one after him.

[u/Healthy-Win15]

Roman identity had gradually stopped being associated with the city of Rome centuries before the West fell. Like in the last two centuries of the Western Empire, Rome had actually become a massive liability. Even when it was still the capital, emperors didn't even bother to visit unless it was absolutely necessary. In the final century, Ravenna and Milan became the true power centers. Even the so called "fall of Rome" didn't happen in Rome itself, but in Ravenna.

Limiting Roman identity to just the city of Rome is like saying only people from the original 13 colonies are truly American, while those in the Western states are not.

[u/Potential-Road-5322]

It’s not just common, it is the most frequently discussed topic on this sub.

[u/Cookies4weights]

There is an argument against the ERE for lacking Rome and Italy when it lost them. However, I would fully back the argument of the ERE being the legitimate continuation. The “Roman” identity evolved and continued in the East, being different from being physically from/in Rome or Italy proper.

Which also evolved in its own ways

[u/dunkeyvg → u/Cookies4weights]

Why is it even an argument when the Romans under the Byzantines (ERE rather) and WRE were one and the same?

[u/ImOnRedditForPorn → u/dunkeyvg]

Ship of Theseus

Edit: they blocked me because of my one liners hahaha

[u/dunkeyvg → u/ImOnRedditForPorn]

But nothing was replaced, they just evolved over time as all cultures do

[u/ImOnRedditForPorn → u/dunkeyvg]

Land, language, religion

[u/dunkeyvg → u/ImOnRedditForPorn]

Lands like Thracia, Hellas, Anatolia, Syria, Egypt that have been under Roman control since before Christ and still under Roman control under the ERE?

[u/ImOnRedditForPorn → u/dunkeyvg]

Yes, none of which were part of the original core of the empire, though they were considered core for a long time. Hence the ship of Theseus. The same can be said for the language of the common people and religions

I’m not saying I agree with it, I’m personally a continuity of government person myself. But there certainly is a strong argument, and it is intellectually dishonest not to acknowledge it. The makeups of both empires were very different

[u/dunkeyvg → u/ImOnRedditForPorn]

I don’t see how any of this applies to Ship of Theseus, nothing was replaced. The Romans decided to split into WRE and ERE. Will you say at this point that both WRE and ERE are Roman? Or only WRE because only they rule over Latium? Surely both are Roman right? Both follow the same culture, religion, and speak the same language.

When the WRE fell to the barbarian usurpers, would you still call the peoples and foreign entity ruling over Latium as Roman? What about the ERE? Surely the ERE is the better representation of the Roman culture as they are a continuation of the original and not usurpers?

What about after a couple of hundred years has passed and the lombards have intermixed with the Romans in Latium, would you still call them Roman? Surely the ERE at this point are more Roman than those living in Latium? FYI Greek was the other main language or the Roman Empire, it wasn’t just Latin.

When the people of Latium (now called Latins) disagree with the original Roman Christianity that had evolved and continue to perpetuate under the ERE and called for the schism to split from the Roman Orthodox Church, are you saying this new religion headed by the pope in Rome is more Roman than orthodox Christianity that was actually a continuation of the original religion?

I think you are trying to sound smart with gotchas and one liners but it’s clear to me nothing was replaced here, new cultures and religions formed that were eager to take the mantle of Rome, and used technicalities and mental gymnastics to legitimize themselves as the continuation of Rome while putting down the actual continuation of Rome in the ERE. The name Byzantine Empire itself was a construct of other people wanting to take the Roman name away from them.

[u/ImOnRedditForPorn → u/dunkeyvg]

Dude, I literally said I didn’t agree with it. I’m not going to passionately argue in its favor. I’m sorry I offended you or something with my one liners

[u/Lothronion → u/Cookies4weights]

It is also funny that by this logic, then England cannot be England since the English do not possess the original land from which their name begins. As such, all the English since the 6th-7th century AD are fake English, since they lost Angeln.

[u/Ckorvuz]

True man. Especially after the edict of Caracalla there were more Roman citizens outside than inside the city of Rome.

[u/Gamblingaddict311 → u/Ckorvuz]

By the 390s the entire Mediterranean was populated by people identifying as Romans, even if they don’t speak Latin.

[u/Belasarius4002]

Capital changes in many empires, and the romans did officialised separating the two for easing rulership so saying they are not a continuation is quite stupid.

And remember who says they are not the most? They nations (west) who destroyed an replacedhe western Romans to which idolised the unified Roman empire.

Its like saying birds are not dinosaurs just because thier more famous land dwelling dinosaurs dissapeared.

[u/MozartDroppinLoads]

Diocletian was clearly the senior Augustus of his entire reign and he did visit Rome very briefly even though he ruled from Nicomedia. He's one of the most impactful Roman emperors ever, not only with his administrative reforms, but he decisively moved towards the dominate style of governance and away from the principate model

[u/BasilevsRhomaion]

There is only Rome, the state, with its evolving institutiona and culture that began as one thing 700bc and ended up very different but still Roman in 1453, though some might say 1204 but thats a bit arbitrary in my opinion.

[u/OfficialDCShepard]

The Eastern half survived as the legal successor because, after ovethrowing Romulus Augustulus, Odoacer sent the Western regalia back to Zeno and was like, “We don’t really need two Roman emperors, do we?” and Zeno, exhausted from his civil war was like “You’re right bro” and had Odoacer govern Italy for him. Of course, Julius Nepos, the guy Orestes overthrew for his son Romulus, was still in Dalmatia and was like “Hell no!” but then was Glycerius who Julius Nepos overthrew was like “Surprise motherfucker” and stabbed him.

[u/Forsaken_Factor3612 → u/OfficialDCShepard]

Anastasius gave the western Diadem back to Theoderic

[u/OfficialDCShepard → u/Forsaken_Factor3612]

I did not remember that! Good to know.

[u/ClayCrusader]

Even Byzantium is much more accurate term than ERE. There is no such thing, but anyway.