POLL: Is Byzantium a Continuation of Rome?

Was Byzantium a Continuation of Rome?


  • Total voters
    195
"Continuation" is an odd word here. I think no matter how much one thinks of the Byzantines as a separate empire, everyone would have to acknowledge some ways in which they were "a continuation of Rome." A different question would be "Was Byzantium Rome?" or "Was Byzantium the Continuation of Rome?"
 
Byzantium was Rome until the Ottomans inherited most of the important Roman administration and such and thus became Rome, Destroyer of Worlds.
 

youtube: The Crusades - Pilgrimage or Holy War?: Crash Course World History #15

Okay, the 4th Crusade, the crazy one. The Crusaders were invited by the Venetians to use boats to travel to Jerusalem. Instead of payment, were asked by the Venetians to conquer back the city of Zara across the Adriatic, I think in modern day Crotia. The Crusaders did so, and then both they and the Venetians were ex-communicated by the Pope.

Then, invited by the "would be" emperor Alexius 3rd of Byzantium [his father was a disposed emperor], and promised money if they would help him. He had issues and was slow in paying, Mourtzouphlos took over, also slow in paying.

Crusaders sack Constantinople in 1204.

Yea, altogether a real mess. Never invited armed soldiers to a city and then be slow in paying them.

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PS I'll admit that I'm jealous of John Green, and tends to think he gets a lot of overhype, I mean, both his books and his movies for crying out loud. But on this one I think he does pretty well.
 
Last edited:

Anawrahta

Banned
Yes if we consider wales to be the third rome.
Wales arguable has direct lineage to sub-roman britain and to roman britain.
Perhaps charles, prince of wales is the heir to the roman empire. :winkytongue::openedeyewink::rolleyes:
 
Yes.

They started as a delegated subdivision of the Empire and the only differences were caused by the changes in circumstances.

For exemple, them using the Greek language was already a fact before the division, and most of the institutions were initially kept, such as the Senate.
 
Yes lmao, the Greeks called themselves Romaioi until the early 20th Century in some places, to say nothing of the direct political continuation. A better argument might be when the direct continuity of the Roman Empire breaks, where you could possibly argue for 1204.

Did you just quote JR oppenheimer?

Isn’t it technically Oppenheimer quoting the Bhagavad Gita?
 
I like to say it was the Empire Formerly Known as Rome. Inhabited by a drastically changed Roman people. What it meant to be both had changed over the millennium since Constantine made a new capital. Which could be considered a change in stages for the empire as well.
 
Not after 1204. Whatever was ruling Constantinople and the surrounding lands after 1204 certainly wasn't a "Roman Empire" in any sense of the phrase.
 
I like to say it was the Empire Formerly Known as Rome. Inhabited by a drastically changed Roman people. What it meant to be both had changed over the millennium since Constantine made a new capital. Which could be considered a change in stages for the empire as well.

It wasn't formerly known as Rome. It was currently known as Rome for its entire existence.

The whole term Byzantine is a complete anachronism. We should refer to it as the Roman Empire. The fact we don't is only because of a Western European bias.
 
The Byzantines were the continuation of Rome until a more worthy successor appeared in the form of Denmark (who acquired Romanitas by serving in the Varangian Guard; Norway's failed conquest of England forfeit Norway's claim, and the Danes achieved Caesaritude). Through translatio imperii, Denmark gave its claim to august imperium to the United States with the sale of the Danish West Indies in 1917.
 
It wasn't formerly known as Rome. It was currently known as Rome for its entire existence.

The whole term Byzantine is a complete anachronism. We should refer to it as the Roman Empire. The fact we don't is only because of a Western European bias.

There were apparently people in remote corners of the Aegean who were still calling themselves Romans in the early 20th Century.
 
Yes. You can make a case that the Roman Empire fell after the Arab conquest as what was left was an ethnically homogenuos Greek speaking population compared to the multi-ethnic Empire of old. However, that does open the can of worms that the Roman Empire, ie. Roman dominated Empire, ended after the Crisis of the Third Century and what replaced it was a multi-ethnic empire untethered to Rome of old. Rome eventually became an irrelevant backwater long before the fall of the West. Can you even call the Empire post-Crisis of the Third Century Roman?
 
Yes, unless your criterion for what the Roman Empire is is based on who owns Rome, which admittedly isn't that strong of a case (did de Gaulle stop being French the moment Paris fell?).
 
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