Arguably, the Ottoman Empire had more legitimate claims to Roman-ness than either WW2 Italy or the HRE, as well...Clearly he meant the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806. Or the surrender of the Kingdom of Italy in 1944. Because both these states clearly had legitimate claims on the title of "Roman Empire", right? Right?
Right?
I'd much rather see a TL where the Empire expands, peaks, and falls, but no matter how weak it gets there is one continuous legitimate line of rulers or governments, based in Rome until at least WWII if not present day. Maybe it shrinks so small that it is just a city in the middle of another, bigger state that has taken most of Italy but leaves this tiny state intact for its symbolic and cultural value.
About the second, I am not sure.Very clever, all of you , but I'm pretty sure he means something along the lines of "Rome is never captured by the Barbarians in 476 and the Roman state survives until the present." I'm not sure what POD you would need for that, but it would have to be at least in the 100s, IMHO, and preferably in the early Empire or even the Republican Period. One of Rome's main problems was its violent and unstable political culture, another was its reliance on vast numbers of slaves, which stunted the development of any sort of labor-saving device.
In order for Stilicho to be able to do that, how will you end his war against the Eastern Empire?Take the invasion of 405 to 410. Radagaisus came to a sticky end in August 406. The Vandals , Alans and Suebes attacked Gaul in December. They knew that Radagaisus had failed but they were that desperate, because Huns were at their heels.
Suppose that Stilicho does not fall. He had a reasonable plan to save Gaul: send Alarich and Goths to Gaul against Vandals.
Let´s assume it more or less works out. Vandals are destroyed, Alarich and Goths get a chunk of Gaul (like they did in 416), Rome is inviolate, and so is Spain. The surviving men of Radagaisus (who OTL joined Alarich after Stilicho fell and their families were attacked) are firmly under Stilicho´s flag, and his Roman recruiting grounds in Illyria are rid of Alarich.
What next?
This is all kinds of faulty. The Byzantines recruited plenty of horse-archer units, from the Tourkopouloi to the Alans throughout their empire's long and storied history. Further, they had cannon at the fall of the capital mounted on the walls, but the cannon-firing actually weakened the old Theodosian walls and eventually it was discontinued.It ended with their second capital city, Constantinople, being taken by what they saw as mere barbarians, who happened to have cannon that the Romans felt was beneath them to copy or develop in parallel, as they'd lost alot of turf they didn't get back either to other, er, barbaric, horse archers they also didn't see as worth copying.
Absolutism was not the Empire's problem. The Eastern Empire's decline can actually be directly linked to the abandonment of the thematic system by Konstantinos IX Monomachos and its replacement largely by foreign mercenaries, combined with the growth of feudal magnates on the Anatolian plateau and later in Thraikia. The Western Empire's destruction had little enough to do with absolutism and far more to do with those barbarians that attacked it. You know, the ones that sacked Rome twice, seized the revenue grounds in North Africa, wore down the manpower base, and so forth.jkay said:So, it can't be done with the kind of Roman Empire we had. You at least need some check on the Emperor's power, a constitutional monarchy. Better still, IMHO, is to have the much-better, but vulnerable in Caesar's day, Republic-style constitution survive, especially if you want it expand much.
Rome underwent three major constitutional changes. It started as a constitutional monarchy, then underwent rebellion to the Republic, which was much more succesful, and gradually became more complex and powerful, until finally, after centuries, it failed to adapt to a vastly changed and bigger Rome right, and decayed to warlordism. Then Caesar mostly ended warlordism by regressing it to monarchy, except his version was worse, because the Senate had started as a real check on the King, but was impotent and just there to look right under the Caesars. That's where I place the start of Rome's decline. When historians talk about the "Roman Empire," they're usually talking about it after absolute monarchy set in.
IMHO, it gets pretty improbable to have the constitutional change, whatever it is, happen much after a century after the Octavian Caesar started the Emperor's absolute rule. Back then, there was a feeling that Romans were worse off than under the Republic, but nobody saw a way to get back. Later, people saw the absolute Empire as natural, and the interest in the Republic vanished.
Here's much, much, much, much, much, more (scroll down from each link to follow arguments) , on why it would be impossible for the kind of absolutist monarchist Roman Empire we had to survive. In our time line, the absolutist Empire went on perpetual shrink after a century or two for the rest of the world to catch up militarily to the lead the much freer Republic had established.
Yeah, did their contemporaries have any better?I've been studying this question, and I say it's not completely impossible (it's been done a few times here), but not so easy, either. You'd have to find a way to get to a better ending constitution than the Roman Empire had, which was an absolute monarchy.
Absurd.It ended with their second capital city, Constantinople, being taken by what they saw as mere barbarians, who happened to have cannon that the Romans felt was beneath them to copy or develop in parallel,
That was actually the reason Constantinople fell.as they'd lost alot of turf they didn't get back either to other, er, barbaric, horse archers
Remind me, what was the constitution of Ottoman Empire? What were the checks on Sultan´s power? And Ottomans DID expand much.So, it can't be done with the kind of Roman Empire we had. You at least need some check on the Emperor's power, a constitutional monarchy. Better still, IMHO, is to have the much-better, but vulnerable in Caesar's day, Republic-style constitution survive, especially if you want it expand much.
.Suppose that a Palaiologos Roman Emperor does some smart decisions in the end of 1200 ...
Probably The MOST Likely Eventuality, Would be Something a Lot Like The World Depicted in Harry Turtledove's Young Adult Novel, Gunpowder Empire ...What if the Roman Empire never fell? How would this have changed history in Europe and the world?