Ancient and ArchaeologyÌý permalink
the roman empire
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Message 1.Ìý
Posted by faran1 (U2570961) on Thursday, 24th November 2005
is someone know something on the roman empire?
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Message 2
Posted by hallamhal (U2549864) on Thursday, 24th November 2005
yes im readin a book : legionarys were 1000troops. 80-120 troops= century which could put their sheilds over their heads called a 'testudo' formation, meaning tortoise. the roman empire was made in 48 B.C.after caesar beat his rival, pompey the great, at the battle of pharsalus. it ended with hunnic invasions in 451 A.D.
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Message 3
Posted by Alaric the Goth (U1826823) on Friday, 25th November 2005
The Roman Empire was centred round the Mediterranean (Middle (of the) Earth) Sea. Various Italian city-based civilisations had existed, with that of the Etruscans being important, but the City of Roma came to eclipse them all. It was a Republic until Julius Caesar. He was a successful General, and had fought in Gaul (now France) and won bloody victories. (He came across with legions to Britain a couple of times (55BC-54BC IIRC) but did not add the island to the Empire. That came later, with the 43AD invasion and conquest of Britain by the Emperor Claudius).
The Mediterranean was essential to the Empire. (North) Africa was its main grain-supplying region: if that grain supply were blocked, starvation would result, particularly in the city of Rome. Most of the expansion of the Empire can be seen as a policy of providing as large a buffer zone as possible to protect that Sea from Rome’s enemies. In the east the Persian Empire was the problem. So Rome added Palestine, Syria and Asia Minor (modern Turkey) to its territories.
Romans spoke Latin, but when conquests in the East added many Greek-speaking lands to the Empire, that also was a widely used language.
In Africa, the Moors and various desert nomads were the problem. The Sahara itself was relatively uncrossable however, and the Roman cities along the coast were fairly safe, at least from the south.
The Northern frontier was more difficult to establish. The legions pushed the boundary to the rivers Rhine and Danube, but that still left a gap. So they fortified this making a ‘limes’ (=‘boundary’, pronounced lee-mays) over the high ground between the two great rivers. To the north lay the great woods of Germania, inhabited by warlike Germanic tribes, such as the Alemanni and Saxons.
In Britain, Agricola and other generals at various times had tried to extend the Empire into Scotland (at that time inhabited by people the Romans called the Picti (painted ones). Bur these were not lasting conquests, and Emperor Hadrian settled on a frontier across what is now Northern England, building his famous Wall from the mouth of the river Tyne to the Solway.
The Romans worshiped various gods: Mars the God or War, Jupiter, ‘Father of the Gods’, Bacchus the God of wine and rejoicing, etc. But from around 33AD Christianity started to spread across the Empire from its beginnings in Palestine. The Apostle Paul, a Jew but also a Roman citizen (this gave you various rights) converted various Greek-speaking people in cities like Corinth, Ephesus and Rome itself, where he died.
The Roman view of people they conquered was that their gods were just the ones the Romans already had, but under different names. So the British Celtic god, ‘Sul’, was believed to be the same as the goddess Minerva, and in Bath there was a temple to Sulis-Minerva as a result. They resisted Christianity (at first) because it claimed that there was One God and that all the others were false gods, or worse. So Emperors like Nero persecuted them severely, putting many to death in the arenas (arena is a Latin word for sand, as this covered the floor of the stadium to soak up the blood form gladiator fights, execution of criminals, etc.).
Emperor Constantine in the early 4th century accepted that Christianity should be the official religion of the Empire. He also decided that a new capital was needed, given how much the Empire now extended east, and chose Byzantium for this. There he built the city of Constantinople (using Gothic mercenaries, I should add), and it was always a Christian city from the start, unlike Rome. It is now Istanbul, of course.
The Empire fell in the west in the 100 or so years from about 375AD. This happened for all sorts of reasons, the most dramatic being the arrival of armies of Germanic people like the Visigoths, who killed an Emperor at the battle of Adrianople). The Huns from Central Asia had pushed people like the Goths westwards.
Under Alaric the Goth, the Visigoths sacked the city of Rome in 410AD.
Franks, Burgundians, Suebi and Vandals were other German tribes who came into Western Europe. The Vandals went on through Spain and got ships to cross to North Africa. It was their disruption of the African grain supply to Rome, and their piracy in the Mediterranean, that helped bring down the Roman Empire in the West.
In the 5th century the Huns themselves arrived in Europe and did terrible damage under their leader, Attila. But he died of a nosebleed (allegedly!) after he had married one of his several wives!
The last few emperors ‘ruled’ from Ravenna on the east coast of Italy. Their 'rule' did not amount to much: real power by then was in the hands of generals like Stilicho, who were of Barbarian origin (i.e. Vandals, Goths, Huns, etc.).
The last western Emperor was Romulus Augustus, in 476.
The Eastern Roman Empire, or Byzantine Empire, went on for many more centuries until Constantinople fell to the Turks in 1453 or so. It was mainly Greek-speaking. It lost North Africa and much of its Middle Eastern lands to the armies of Islam in the 7th/ and 8th centuries. -
Message 4
Posted by TonyG (U1830405) on Friday, 25th November 2005
is someone know something on the roman empire?Ìý
What, in particular do you want to know? The Roman empire was huge, laste dhundreds of years and bequethed a lot to western european civilisation. Visit any library and you will see that lots of people know lots of things about the Roman Empire. -
Message 5
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Friday, 25th November 2005
Re: Message 3.
Alaric,
thank you very much for this excellent survey.
Kind regards,
Paul. -
Message 6
Posted by SHOUTINGman (U1918139) on Tuesday, 6th December 2005
Yes interesting fact. Julius Ceasar was never emporer.
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Message 7
Posted by faran1 (U2570961) on Tuesday, 6th December 2005
rply to messege 6
ceaser really was an empror but only before he went to fight the persians he was asassinated by his own people.
ceaser in tactic view was geninus because he managed to destroy his biggest enemys.But he thught that no one could kill him or betrayed him.If I'm not mistaken he was asassinaited by brutos,he was from the senat[if I'm mistaken so please correct] Yes interesting fact. Julius Ceasar was never emporer. Ìý -
Message 8
Posted by SHOUTINGman (U1918139) on Wednesday, 7th December 2005
Nope he was declared dictator but not Emperor. He was killed because the senate feared he would declare himself king and as Tacitus states they had had 7 of those and that was a round number (enough).
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Message 9
Posted by Richie (U1238064) on Wednesday, 7th December 2005
just like to back up Ye Merry. Gaius Julius was never an emperor and never wanted the throne. What he wanted was the dictatorship and to leave a history behind for posteriity
his enemies however were legion and most of them feared the fact that his blood would qualify him for the throne, and his mistress Cleopatra was an eastern potentate who they felt had undue influence on him and with a royal heir (caeserion) a dual Egyptian-Roman Imperial line with its roots in un-Roman practices would be the result of a Julius Caesar Dictatorshuip -
Message 10
Posted by marduk-slayer of tiamat (U2258525) on Friday, 16th December 2005
yes im readin a book : legionarys were 1000troops. 80-120 troops= century which could put their sheilds over their heads called a 'testudo' formation, meaning tortoise. the roman empire was made in 48 B.C.after caesar beat his rival, pompey the great, at the battle of pharsalus. it ended with hunnic invasions in 451 A.D.Ìý
WRONG!!
the roman empire persisted well beyond 451 A.D- it survived for 1002 years longer than that! it was still a major player in europe till the early 13th century! -
Message 11
Posted by hathor_101 (U2740307) on Sunday, 18th December 2005
yes, the romans may have contributed significantly to modern western civilisation, but they actually stole most of their so called "inventions" from the greeks when they conquered them. But other than that i dont have any complaints about them.
And you've all pulled up some amzin facts.
and i dont think that the romans were around into the 13th century, medieval italy had formed by then. i think it was the last caesar in the 13th century. -
Message 12
Posted by COPTICATHANASIUS (U2726860) on Sunday, 18th December 2005
If you think of the Roman Empire as Italy or Italians then it ended in the 5th century (we can disagree whether in 410 or 451AD). But if you think of it as continuation of the first state and though different in many ways still retained some of its initial spirit and identity then it ended in 1453AD when the Byzantine Empire ended. yes, the romans may have contributed significantly to modern western civilisation, but they actually stole most of their so called "inventions" from the greeks when they conquered them. But other than that i dont have any complaints about them.
And you've all pulled up some amzin facts.
and i dont think that the romans were around into the 13th century, medieval italy had formed by then. i think it was the last caesar in the 13th century.Ìý -
Message 13
Posted by hathor_101 (U2740307) on Sunday, 18th December 2005
you raise a very good point, i applaude you
but if we are talking about the super power that was the original roman empire, then it did end before 1453. -
Message 14
Posted by COPTICATHANASIUS (U2726860) on Monday, 19th December 2005
It might have ended before 1453, but when exactly? Was it when Constantine moved the capital to Constantinople in 325? Was it when the barbarians invaded Italy in the 5th century? Was it after Justinian's death in 565? Or was it later? There is no doubt that the Byzantine Empire in many ways was Greek rather than Roman but up until the final destruction of Byzantium in 1453 by the Ottomans the Byzantine thought of themselves as Rum.
When did the empire cease to be a superpower if that is your definition of the point at which the Roman Empire ended is not an easy thing to define. I know some people use it to date the collapse of the Roman Empire to the age of Marcus Aurelius in the 2nd century.
you raise a very good point, i applaude you
but if we are talking about the super power that was the original roman empire, then it did end before 1453.Ìý -
Message 15
Posted by marduk-slayer of tiamat (U2258525) on Monday, 19th December 2005
It might have ended before 1453, but when exactly? Was it when Constantine moved the capital to Constantinople in 325? Was it when the barbarians invaded Italy in the 5th century? Was it after Justinian's death in 565? Or was it later? There is no doubt that the Byzantine Empire in many ways was Greek rather than Roman but up until the final destruction of Byzantium in 1453 by the Ottomans the Byzantine thought of themselves as Rum.
When did the empire cease to be a superpower if that is your definition of the point at which the Roman Empire ended is not an easy thing to define. I know some people use it to date the collapse of the Roman Empire to the age of Marcus Aurelius in the 2nd century.
you raise a very good point, i applaude you
but if we are talking about the super power that was the original roman empire, then it did end before 1453.Ìý Ìý
i have found that people often ,mistake the fall of rome for the fall of the roman empire-or that they completely forget the eastern empire based on prejudices against those "effete and effeminete" hellenes. btw in greece the words hellene and rhomaioi are interchangeable-the turks call the greeks both rumeli and yuana (i think-its only the west that refuses to acknowledge medieaval greece, and indeed modern greece, as being the inheritors of roman power. -
Message 16
Posted by COPTICATHANASIUS (U2726860) on Monday, 19th December 2005
I think we agree in many things but we differ when you describe "medieaval greece, and indeed modern greece" as the "the inheritors of roman power." Although Byzantium in the days of Justinian in the 6th century and perhaps in the age of Heraclius in the 7th century could represent a state's "power" that is akin to Roman power in many ways, I would not say that Byzantium afterwards, or for that sake modern Greece, has inherited the power of Rome. It might have ended before 1453, but when exactly? Was it when Constantine moved the capital to Constantinople in 325? Was it when the barbarians invaded Italy in the 5th century? Was it after Justinian's death in 565? Or was it later? There is no doubt that the Byzantine Empire in many ways was Greek rather than Roman but up until the final destruction of Byzantium in 1453 by the Ottomans the Byzantine thought of themselves as Rum.
When did the empire cease to be a superpower if that is your definition of the point at which the Roman Empire ended is not an easy thing to define. I know some people use it to date the collapse of the Roman Empire to the age of Marcus Aurelius in the 2nd century.
you raise a very good point, i applaude you
but if we are talking about the super power that was the original roman empire, then it did end before 1453.Ìý Ìý
i have found that people often ,mistake the fall of rome for the fall of the roman empire-or that they completely forget the eastern empire based on prejudices against those "effete and effeminete" hellenes. btw in greece the words hellene and rhomaioi are interchangeable-the turks call the greeks both rumeli and yuana (i think-its only the west that refuses to acknowledge medieaval greece, and indeed modern greece, as being the inheritors of roman power.Ìý -
Message 17
Posted by marduk-slayer of tiamat (U2258525) on Monday, 19th December 2005
in terms of prestige is what i actually meant, i just couldnt remember the word-and i agree with you on the power thing actually, though in raw military might, up till about 1000 the E.R.E had practically tyhe same military abilitis due to the thematic system, and moder greece's armed forces is about the same as the roman empires population during the 1st century!
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Message 18
Posted by COPTICATHANASIUS (U2726860) on Tuesday, 20th December 2005
Even Sudan (you could include also Niger, chap, has armed forces about the same as the roman empires population during the 1st century!
in terms of prestige is what i actually meant, i just couldnt remember the word-and i agree with you on the power thing actually, though in raw military might, up till about 1000 the E.R.E had practically tyhe same military abilitis due to the thematic system, and moder greece's armed forces is about the same as the roman empires population during the 1st century!Ìý -
Message 19
Posted by marduk-slayer of tiamat (U2258525) on Tuesday, 20th December 2005
sudan? yeah but there not roman or of roman heritage.....their sudanese
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Message 20
Posted by marduk-slayer of tiamat (U2258525) on Tuesday, 20th December 2005
(above)-im just bing petulant there
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Message 21
Posted by hathor_101 (U2740307) on Tuesday, 20th December 2005
you know, i think that the person that started the topic just wanted to know about the height of the roman empire, not its end. not that i dont find everything so facinating, ( imyself choosing the ancients egyptians over romans) but it would be good if we could give them some facts on that.
kind regards,
hathor_101
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Message 22
Posted by COPTICATHANASIUS (U2726860) on Wednesday, 21st December 2005
A thread although created by one person does not belong to the initial querry as more and more people add to it, and it is the more educating and helpful when people use it to discuss other things withion it.
I would like to venture today by saying although Rome was fascinating in many ways it was not great if we measure 'greatness' in a different way that does not include brutal power and cruelty. When Rome or 'The Eternal City' fell in 410 AD St. Augustine did not weep for her. Her imperialism, cruelty and oppression had caused her fall. She was not a kingdom of 'light' or a city of 'God'. you know, i think that the person that started the topic just wanted to know about the height of the roman empire, not its end. not that i dont find everything so facinating, ( imyself choosing the ancients egyptians over romans) but it would be good if we could give them some facts on that.
kind regards,
hathor_101Ìý
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