WI Rome...?

Hey, alternatehistory.com forums :) I stumbled on here a few days ago and finally got my account verified. I saw that the people posted here were pretty cool and was wondering what people thought of the following:

What if...
1) Rome kept Trajans eastern conquests, and Augustus and Tiberius succeeded in moving the Western Empire's border to the Elbe. (I'm aware you might need to alter the world's geography a bit to make this plausible.)
2) When the western Empire collapsed, rather then the invading barbarians, it are the native Romano-Celts and similar who come out on top and assimilate the invaders?
 
Hey, alternatehistory.com forums :) I stumbled on here a few days ago and finally got my account verified. I saw that the people posted here were pretty cool and was wondering what people thought of the following:

What if...
1) Rome kept Trajans eastern conquests, and Augustus and Tiberius succeeded in moving the Western Empire's border to the Elbe. (I'm aware you might need to alter the world's geography a bit to make this plausible.)
2) When the western Empire collapsed, rather then the invading barbarians, it are the native Romano-Celts and similar who come out on top and assimilate the invaders?

First off, welcome NFB42. :)

1) The Empire was overextended even before Trajan, arguably, so even with a much more competent military they'd be hard pressed keeping the eastern gains.
2) It's tricky, but I assume it's like what happened to the Manchus invading China, right?
 
Hey, alternatehistory.com forums :) I stumbled on here a few days ago and finally got my account verified. I saw that the people posted here were pretty cool and was wondering what people thought of the following:

What if...
1) Rome kept Trajans eastern conquests, and Augustus and Tiberius succeeded in moving the Western Empire's border to the Elbe. (I'm aware you might need to alter the world's geography a bit to make this plausible.)
2) When the western Empire collapsed, rather then the invading barbarians, it are the native Romano-Celts and similar who come out on top and assimilate the invaders?

Welcome to the board! :D
1) IMO Trajan's eastern conquests could be easily kept by using some minor PODs. Healthier and longer-lived Trajan? More militaristic and expansionist Hadrian?
2) The problem was at that time, western Romans have heavily rellied on "barbarian" mercenaries... So when the migrations came, the Romans didn't have other choice than to accept them as their new overlords... Especially since those "barbarians" have converted into Christianity and adopted Roman culture...
 
Welcome NFB4, the first of your questions comes up quite a bit on the board and if you use the search function you should be able to quickly pull up a large number of threads that discuss the point going back some years.

Just note that the Administration doesn't like people reviving long dead threads without very good reason!

If I remember rightly there are a few points that people agree upon -

1) Germany outside of the area taken by Rome would require a substantial effort in order to make it of any economic benefit. This due to a variety of factors - the forests, the lack of appropriate agricultural technology, the angry locals etc. All of these points would take signficant long term effort and investment, which was out of character for Rome and indeed any pre modern state.

2) The Elbe border is not necessarily one that does provide an obvious material benefit to the Empire at the time Augustas was around. By this I mean that the common reason for suggesting a border extension is to shorten the over-all defensive line along the east. However at the time of Augustas Dacia was not a Roman possession. Further, there is some argument about whether it would actually make sense from a material point of view - in that the Rhine Border fitted well within the existing system of Roman and pre Roman transportation infrastructure but the Elbe does not. So where Rome is able to ship and move men and material easily along the river systems of France and the Rhine and come in from the North Sea or the Med, the same does not apply to an Elbe defensive line

3) Hindsight - even if we can assume that moving the border to the Elbe and incorporating the territory of modern Germany as a province actually would make sense if one has the time and resources to do so, it is not so obvious that a Roman emperor or any Roman for that matter would come to that same conclusion. Remember that the Rhine border stayed largely intact for three centuries and more - and that was because it was defensible.

With regards to Trajan - well that is less discussed so far as I have seen. As said above, I think the common view was that for all the expertise of Trajan the empire was at that point in time over extended. The revolts in the rear were certainly an issue that was hard to deal with.

Perhaps if you could find a couple of changes - one might be Trajan living another couple of years, rather than giving Rome the distraction of a new emperor who has to protect his own position while sorting out the other problems. Another might be somehow delaying or stopping the Jewish revolts - although I don't know how you'd do that as I have a scant knowledge of the causes. It could be that the Jewish revolts were tax led, and that they were sick of the burden of Trajan's adventures. Or it could be more religiously motivated. I'm not sure either way. But if the revolts had happened two or three years later the Empire would have been better able to deal with pacifying the new conquests
 
Thanks for the welcome guys :) I've had some time to think things through and am ready to continue this discussion.

1) Apparantly Trajan didn't think the empire was overextended, however even if it was, do you think an independant Spain, or an independant Britain would have posed anywhere near the level of threat to the survival and strength of the Empire that the Parthians and Sassanids ended up posing? Though it is true that there were reasons why Rome didn't try to take over the German territories, it didn't have to go that way, nor does it have to have been a single concerted effort. If the events around the battle of Teutenborg forest had gone much more in Rome's favour, and perhaps the German populace overall had more factions interested in making use of Roman rule rather the resisting it, I could see a slow push over several centuries, perhaps aided by a few ambitious Emperors looking for some propaganda victories, that would ended up with at least a nominally controlled Roman Germany, which could then provide a large buffer against invaders in later centuries.

2) Though I'm aware that there would need to be quite a different situation for the natives to come out on top over their invaders (though perhaps a roman germany would help as I said), rather then how it would happen what I'm really curious about is what if it happened. How would Romano-Celtic culture and nations have evolved if they'd come on top instead of the the barbarians. Basically, what if instead of a German-Gothic dominated western europe, the end of the Roman Empire saw the rise of a Romano-Celtic (and perhaps some Romano-Iberians), I'm really curious what people think what kind of culture and nations could've developed. Any thoughts?
 
An independent Britain would be a plus for Rome. The Britons would have approximately zero incentive to cross the Channel for war, and the Romans don't have to commit armies to defend it anymore. Boom, they get three legions back to commit somewhere else (cough, Germany, cough...or even the east, if you want to keep Trajan's conquests).
 
I'm no expert, but it seems to me that the best bet for Roman conquest of Germannia is for Julius and Augustus to each refrain from invading it, long enough for the regions to integrate themselves into the Roman world. Gaul and Brittania, as far as I know, where reasonably well integrated into the Roman-Mediterranean world at the time of their conquests. Trade existed between these regions and the Mediterranean far more than it did in Germany. If you have Roman merchants move into Germany (earlier discovery and exploitation of silver mines in the eastern regions leading to a sort of 'Silver Road' into the Empire?) and, by their mere presence, gradually Romanize the populace, a later conquest becomes easier. Think of it; Roman merchants would mean that a portion of the local population would learn Latin to deal with them better, learn advanced methods of accounting for business transactions, buy Roman luxuries in exchange for whatever Germannia can offer, and thus they integrate themselves into Rome. Then, when the time is right, an Emperor (perhaps the earlier-proposed healthier Trajan?) sends a few legions in which, with the cooperation of some local tribes, gain control.

Sound plausible?

If you want Brittania to survive as a post-Roman entity, the best bet would be to somehow have Caledonia and (optionally) Hibernia conquered. This done, the Barbarian Conspiracy and later barbarian incursions become less likely.
 
I'm no expert, but it seems to me that the best bet for Roman conquest of Germannia is for Julius and Augustus to each refrain from invading it, long enough for the regions to integrate themselves into the Roman world. Gaul and Brittania, as far as I know, where reasonably well integrated into the Roman-Mediterranean world at the time of their conquests. Trade existed between these regions and the Mediterranean far more than it did in Germany. If you have Roman merchants move into Germany (earlier discovery and exploitation of silver mines in the eastern regions leading to a sort of 'Silver Road' into the Empire?) and, by their mere presence, gradually Romanize the populace, a later conquest becomes easier. Think of it; Roman merchants would mean that a portion of the local population would learn Latin to deal with them better, learn advanced methods of accounting for business transactions, buy Roman luxuries in exchange for whatever Germannia can offer, and thus they integrate themselves into Rome. Then, when the time is right, an Emperor (perhaps the earlier-proposed healthier Trajan?) sends a few legions in which, with the cooperation of some local tribes, gain control.

Sound plausible?

If you want Brittania to survive as a post-Roman entity, the best bet would be to somehow have Caledonia and (optionally) Hibernia conquered. This done, the Barbarian Conspiracy and later barbarian incursions become less likely.
Oooo, I like this. Definetely sounds plausible to me!

About Brittania, I'm not an expert either, but I think the problem really wasn't so much external pressure, as just a failure of the locals to defend themselves without aid of the Roman military. The reasons for which would probably be hard to deal with, I mean it's natural and the Romans would definetely want the population to be reliant on the Roman military at not some local militia that could rebel. But perhaps have a bit more of the celtic martial culture survive, and have a few extra-ordinarily competent people rise up to lead the defense? But as I said I'm not as interested in the how (since I think it would be pretty difficult without some rigorous improvement of the native military ability), but more the result of a Romano-Briton and a Romano-Gaul surviving as independant realms following the collapse of the Western Empire. Would Romano-Celtic culture be any different from the Franks and Anglo-Saxons?
 
Oooo, I like this. Definetely sounds plausible to me!

About Brittania, I'm not an expert either, but I think the problem really wasn't so much external pressure, as just a failure of the locals to defend themselves without aid of the Roman military. The reasons for which would probably be hard to deal with, I mean it's natural and the Romans would definetely want the population to be reliant on the Roman military at not some local militia that could rebel. But perhaps have a bit more of the celtic martial culture survive, and have a few extra-ordinarily competent people rise up to lead the defense? But as I said I'm not as interested in the how (since I think it would be pretty difficult without some rigorous improvement of the native military ability), but more the result of a Romano-Briton and a Romano-Gaul surviving as independant realms following the collapse of the Western Empire. Would Romano-Celtic culture be any different from the Franks and Anglo-Saxons?

If there is a good emperor he might make a new system of settlement redisribuition like the inhabitant's of conqured land would be depopulated and move into a sub province ( a province were they have semi autonomy and were various tribes are put until they are moved to other places once they are romanized) and then according to the conqured area's population settler's that have number's that make up 1/10 of the population could settle in those area's and would eventually help romanize the area. This might seem asb but what does everyone think
 
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