East Falls, West Survives

[AtriumCarceris]

I don't know if this has been asked before, apologies if it has.

I'm been considering making a timeline that gets the Western Roman Empire to survive, and the Eastern Roman Empire to fall at around the time the West fell IOTL. I've stopped myself from doing anything with this premise because I don't know much of anything about the subject.

So I ask you citizens of AH.com to help me out. How can we keep the West afloat, and cause the East to fall, with minimal POD's, with no POD's before 395AD?

Another related question since I don't know anything about this subject, what materials would you all recommend for one to learn about this subject? Books, websites, stuff like that?

 

[Typo]

The base problem with the premise is the fact that the east is far more likely to survive than the west.

The Eastern half of the Roman empire have always being much richer than the west, provinces like Gaul and Britannia were, in fact, often net drain on imperial finances. The population of those places were also very very low compare to say, Egypt or Anatolia. In fact, the initial incursions by barbarians into the west were often motivated by the desire to obtain farmland which were depopulated anyway. The only real productive area of the west that I can think of is North Africa, and maybe Sicily and parts of Italy itself.

This is pretty much set in stone by 395 AD. You would need the barbarians to somehow almost completely ignore the west and focus on the east instead, and even then it's kinda iffy.

 

[AtriumCarceris]

I'm aware of the difficulties. I had hoped that multiple POD's could help mitigate them.

Now while I said I didn't know much about this subject (and I don't) I did/do have some ideas that I didn't voice in the op.

To go through the list of main problems with this premise:

First and foremost we should probably put a (series of) strong effective ruler/s in the West who actually cares about solving some of the problems Rome faced. It doesn't win the day for the premise, but I think it'd help make my task easier.

Part of the premise is to get the East to just die, and I thought it'd be possible to use the Plague of Justinian to help move this along. Make it worse, but only in the East. Probably best to also go ahead and kill Justinian and any other good successor. This can help cause political problems that can lead the East on a downward spiral.

We have the barbarian problem, and one thing I can think of is slowing down the migrations. An obvious way to do this is to slow down the Huns, but I can't off the top of my head really think of a way to do this. Another option might be to kill off a bunch of them. Perhaps the Huns don't allow so many refugees. Also, if I remember correctly, some groups migrated through the East, so perhaps we can kill off sizeable chunks through the previously mentioned plague, or perhaps new ones. This might be a stupid suggestion though since I don't know who was where, when.

If we deal with some economic problems, perhaps an effective ruler somehow builds some new trading centres in the West, we can help fund a better army to deal with the barbarians that way.

I'm really hoping that my premise is possible a combination of POD's. By just making everything go the West's way, and everything go against the East.

 

[Typo]

First and foremost we should probably put a (series of) strong effective ruler/s in the West who actually cares about solving some of the problems Rome faced. It doesn't win the day for the premise, but I think it'd help make my task easier.

Definitely, it's unlikely, but plausible, for the WRE to "chance" a series of men who were as capable as Aetius or Stilicho and who can hold on to power like the Kommenians did in the Byzantine era.

Part of the premise is to get the East to just die, and I thought it'd be possible to use the Plague of Justinian to help move this along. Make it worse, but only in the East. Probably best to also go ahead and kill Justinian and any other good successor. This can help cause political problems that can lead the East on a downward spiral.

You do realize that by Justinian's time the WRE was already destroyed right?

The only way to get this to work is to redirect all the attention of the Barbarians on to the ERE somehow.

If we deal with some economic problems, perhaps an effective ruler somehow builds some new trading centres in the West, we can help fund a better army to deal with the barbarians that way.

You can't just "build" trading centers, not when the area was economically backward as the west was

I'm really hoping that my premise is possible a combination of POD's. By just making everything go the West's way, and everything go against the East.

I think that holding onto England, Gaul, and most of Hispania is probably not possible, I do see a rump WRE composed of Italy, Sicily, and North Africa though, much like how there was a rump Byzantium consisted of the Balkans, Greece, Thrace and Anatolia

 

[Monty Burns]

The only way to get this to work is to redirect all the attention of the Barbarians on to the ERE somehow.

That would be important - but quite difficult. Whereas the eastern Germanic tribes did the most wandering, the western Germanic tribes entered Roman land as well, yet stayed close to their homeland, for example the Allemanians or the Franks. Similarly, the Saxons went to Britain. I think that one possibility to get this is the Roman Empire conquering Germania Magna up to the Elbe. Then, the Eastern Germanic tribes might go inot Eastern Rome and the East-Elbians might conquer Germania Magna, with the Romans keeping the Rhine frontier.

You can't just "build" trading centers, not when the area was economically backward as the west was

Very true. I'd say that agricultural inventions such as a heavy plow and better seeds to make agriculture in the North more profitable could help. If this happens early enough, there would be a much higher Romanized population in Gallia and Britannica and hence less free land for the Germanics to settle. Furthermore, a higher Romanized population might be able to assimilate more Germanics. At the very leasts, the higher Roman population can field more troops.

Considering Spain and Marocco, one could make these more profitable by establishing trade to West Africa. If the Harbours on the Spanish atlantic coast are important merchant cities ruling the trade with ivory and spices from the Guinea coast, this might be sufficient to preserve a Roman state there or at least interest by a Western rump Empire in these regions. The Romans at least had the tech to do so.

I think that holding onto England, Gaul, and most of Hispania is probably not possible, I do see a rump WRE composed of Italy, Sicily, and North Africa though, much like how there was a rump Byzantium consisted of the Balkans, Greece, Thrace and Anatolia

With OTL tech, this is probably inevitable. The Western Roman Empire will have problems surviving, and as you said these provinces do not contribute very much.

 

[mailinutile2]

After Adrianople, it could very well go that way.
Let's say Gratian does not cede Illyricum and that Theodosius is less skilled

 

[AtriumCarceris]

You do realize that by Justinian's time the WRE was already destroyed right?

Nope. That's why I asked all you lovely people so we can cure lapses of knowledge like this.

You can't just "build" trading centers, not when the area was economically backward as the west was

You're right of course. Another lapse of judgement on my part.



Yet another lapse of judgement lies in the timeframe restrictions I placed. Luckily for me, it seems everybody has been ignoring that.

 

[AtriumCarceris]

So before I let this thread move into oblivion, could anybody acquiesce to my latter question?

Books, websites, and the like to help me learn about this era. Anything anybody would think is helpful?

 

[Cook]

I am currently reading Adrian Goldsworthy’s “The Fall of the West” and highly recommend it.

 

[Rex Romanum]

I remember reading a TL in this forum with this scenario, the title is "Different Movements of the Huns" or something like that...
The POD is that the Huns were moving southward across Danube and then resulting into fall of Constantinople, Gothic Greece, Hunnic Anatolia, Sassanid Syria, and Vandal Egypt, meanwhile the Western Roman Empire largely survives because of Stilicho...
I highly recommended reading that, it's quite good...

 

[Basileus Giorgios]

Basically what Typo said. Perhaps if you have a POD before 408, you can avoid having the Theodosian Land Walls built, which helps a lot with toppling the East, but the Eastern Empire is just a much tougher nut to crack for the barbarians, which is why it emerged in 491 not just mostly in one piece, but entirely intact, and with a booming economy. A succesful take over of the East requires a run of terrible Emperors, the bureaucracy to collapse (which never happened in OTL, not even post Yarmuk), Egypt to somehow be lost, and, most importantly, for Persia to gain a different, decent set of Kings and to avoid HER own barbarian problems. Taken in isolation, each of these PODs is reasonable, but otherwise it's very difficult.

 

[AtriumCarceris]

I am currently reading Adrian Goldsworthy’s “The Fall of the West” and highly recommend it.

I'll definitely look into it.


Basileus Giorgios - Are you saying it requires all of those things to happen?

 

[Uxi]

Basically what Typo said. Perhaps if you have a POD before 408, you can avoid having the Theodosian Land Walls built, which helps a lot with toppling the East, but the Eastern Empire is just a much tougher nut to crack for the barbarians, which is why it emerged in 491 not just mostly in one piece, but entirely intact, and with a booming economy.

The East was quite often invaded and split with dissension. It was getting through Constatinople's walls that proved impossible. Good idea.