Roman Colonization Of The Americas
- Thread starter WrappedInShadows
- Start date
It seems to me everybody is assuming that this has to happen prior to 476 AD. You can have the roman empire last longer you know...
Yeah, but what's the point? How will that help anything?
Yes, having Rome survive to the modern day would make Rome colonizing America arbitrarilly easy. Kinda defies the spirit of the discussion, though.
They don't have to survive to the modern day, just longer than they did.
And still it is a lot easier for Rome to get what it want closer to home. You basicly ned either Rome or enemies that are as stong as Rome to fill up Africa, Europe and Asia, before America enters the picture.
Or Rome might go for the same reason Columbus went-to find an alternative trade rout to India, so as to cut out the middle men i.e. the persians.
Yes, but my point being in a surviving Rome their's no reason not to think at some point they will discover and interact with the America's.
Indeed, he is an inspiration that we can all learn from when attempting to climb the corporate ladder
.I've got one. WRE survives longer, but is still forced to deal with realistic problems, like barbarian migrations and population growth. It is a delicate balance, and often as not the emperor is overshadowed by the senior military commander. That's when someone sails west, following a rumor or a dream not unlike Columbus. Their expedition isn't large, the ships are crude but manage to survive the journey anyways, and it finds a portion of north America that is wide open and undesirable. The imperial government almost ignores it, but then an idea comes to someone high up; send undesirables there. Various small barbarian tribes, criminals, and the impoverished are sent away to what is essentially a penal colony, under the imperial pretense of giving them a fresh start. The surprise comes when, sooner or later, one of the groups survives, is not assimilated by the natives, an creates something worth trading worth on the coast. Rome has done little to no work, but they now have an American enclave, and a basis for learning how to sail effectively across the Atlantic. Exploration becomes easier, larger populations and precious metals are discovered further south, and the Romans decide that it is worth invesing in.
And with that, it's only a matter of time.
Flubber
Banned
Sorry, but no. Columbus wasn't a fucking idiot or a liar, no matter what you may have learned in grammar school.
The expedition Columbus shopped around Europe and finally sold to Spain a calculated risk based on a both known facts and estimates from other geographers. He wasn't some con man selling the idea of a doomed expedition someone else would lead. He was selling a calculated risk he himself was going to take. Columbus believed Marco Polo's reports that Japan lay close to the equator. Columbus also agreed with Marinus' classical estimate that Asia reached 230 degrees rather than Ptolemy's 180 degrees (or the actual 130 degrees). Columbus also knew that lands existed west across the Atlantic thanks to the activities of the Basque, records of the Norse, and the unknown vegetation and bodies, both living and dead, that had washed up on European shores for centuries.
Columbus was counting on finding those lands across the Atlantic and then using them as stepping stones to first reach Japan and then the Indies. Columbus was right about lands across the Atlantic, Columbus was wrong, like Polo, concerning Japan's position relative to the equator, and Columbus was wrong, like everyone else, about the length of Asia.
Most of the Americas lack obvious gold and silver, so I stand by "Germania".
And I dunno about anyone else, but I'm assuming we look at Rome in the sense of before the fifteenth century - not necessarily 476 or 1453 or 1204, but "(United or Western) Rome in 1700 AD" is beyond any possible reasonable speculation.
Except the didn't have:
- The compass
- A knowledge of ocean currents
- Reliable ocean going sailing vessels
- Knowledge of tacking (did Columbus?)
- Gunpowder
- Stirrups for the point when cavalry became useful
- 15th Century heavy armor
- Any real working knowledge of how big the Earth was
There's a pretty key difference in that we at least know that Mars exists.
What about Mexico or the "River of the Silver" (Rio de la Plata)?
you know, cavalry can be effective without stirrups as well, to name just on thing.
I think that one of the most likely places in the americas that an alternate european power would stumble upon is brazil.
The Greeks figured out how big the Earth was, so the Romans definitely knew. The Chinese had ocean going junks that managed to sale all the way to Antioch through Trajans canal. The Romans could have copied them.