Discussing the Romano-wank.

Eh, what about Justinians Plague? I mean during this time Anatolia was entering a very long term population decline. While you may say Mesopotamia is under urbanized and full of mudhuts, the center of the Empire should be looking like a literal necropolis, full of empty monuments.
 
I always wondered on the other side if the 'Low Empire' days couldn't have had some reforms on the political, economical, and army sides ongoing to help the West side at least to survive and fare actually better. Even if it means ending this tradition, culture and nation into a new 'créole' way.

Political reform: Restore the Republican system with better checks and balances or at least codify into Roman law the Five Good Emperors succession system with Senate oversight, which will actually lead in the long run with a federalization of the Roman Empire and inevitable cultural and social consequences of such federalization, which would be more like practical Balkanization.

Some form of medievalization will also happen by the time the Huns invaded Rome since the Danubian provinces will be more militarized and will probably go together in making a slow expansion into Germania. If the barbarian Germanics will be halted at the border, they might just be contented in settling down alongside the borders as what happened in OTL in a smaller scale which will lead to the formation of Roman client kingdoms in Germania.

I still see Christianity to be around, and most likely, will not morph into the Roman Catholic Church and more or less discriminated by most of pagan Roman society but not much persecuted anymore; especially if closet Christians started to sprout out in high ranks of Roman society and start the forces of religious toleration or even Enlightenment concepts of the separation of religion and state.

Rome will be stagnant territorially though, or it could expand territorially but will not necessarily mean an expansion of administrative forces from the political center into the newly annexed areas, since administration is already heavily decentralized in most parts of the long held areas.

Administrative Balkanization will happen in Diocletian like structural manner but even more fragmented, "Civil Wars" will be common in a way that the entire Roman sphere is practically Holy Roman like and it is just like OTL's European wars and most likely concentrated in less populous and prosperous Western territories and NO INDUSTRIALIZATION, HERO OF ALEXANDRIA LIKE. A form of proto industrialization might happen but that's it, at least for a VERY LONG time.

"Romans" will get to the New World, have more contacts with China and India but the Roman New World colonies would be like a collection of separate countries, practically independent.

The Butterflies Are Staggering.
 
Political reform: Restore the Republican system with better checks and balances or at least codify into Roman law the Five Good Emperors succession system with Senate oversight, which will actually lead in the long run with a federalization of the Roman Empire and inevitable cultural and social consequences of such federalization, which would be more like practical Balkanization.

I don't see how the increasing the power of the Roman Senate will lead to federalization. The Republican senate which had been defeated by many of the great emperors, was more focused on personal wealth and the interests of Rome itself. It wasn't until the senate was totally dead that the Roman emperors started to think more in terms of the whole empire rather than just looking out for Rome.
 
I don't see how the increasing the power of the Roman Senate will lead to federalization. The Republican senate which had been defeated by many of the great emperors, was more focused on personal wealth and the interests of Rome itself. It wasn't until the senate was totally dead that the Roman emperors started to think more in terms of the whole empire rather than just looking out for Rome.

Perhaps I'm putting too much modernist perspective on things.

What do you mean when the Senate was dead? The Senate survived the fall of Western Rome by 200 years. Are you talking about the Augustan takeover of the republican system and the establishment of the Principate?
 
Perhaps I'm putting too much modernist perspective on things.

What do you mean when the Senate was dead? The Senate survived the fall of Western Rome by 200 years. Are you talking about the Augustan takeover of the republican system and the establishment of the Principate?

I meant dead meaning, basically ignored and powerless. And I am talking about the death of the Western half, since apparently the Empire never splits in this TL. I would say that Diocletian really ended the power of the senate totally. It was under him the most dramatic reforms of the empire occured.
 
I meant dead meaning, basically ignored and powerless. And I am talking about the death of the Western half, since apparently the Empire never splits in this TL. I would say that Diocletian really ended the power of the senate totally. It was under him the most dramatic reforms of the empire occured.

I agree. But we can also say that Diocletian made Rome look federal in a way, however, it also meant that the Augustus and Caesars of Diocletian's "federal regions" will always be at war with each other just to get everything back.

And that's not a good recipe if Rome wants to stop the barbarian invasions. On the other side of the coin, it could also mean that constant warfare (don't know how constant) might keep the imperial armies from deteriorating in terms of their abilities because of the military innovations that such wars could made. Post-Roman Europe is pretty much in always constant war but it survived the Mongol onslaught, at least barely, thanks to Ogedei's death.

A HRE like Western Roman Empire is something I can imagine.

I don't really know what's the POD here. Is it after the Diocletian's reforms already?
 
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