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Which was the superior half of the Roman Empire?

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Poll Question: WHICH IS THE SUPERIOR HALF OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE?
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34 [77.27%]
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  Quote Vlad Catrina Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: Which was the superior half of the Roman Empire?
    Posted: 29-May-2005 at 12:47
I have no doubt that the east was richer in culture, religion, and history.(and empires)
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  Quote Beylerbeyi Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 29-May-2005 at 17:14
The East, of course.
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  Quote EvilNed Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07-Jun-2005 at 14:47

Originally posted by Reginmund


Oh, but it is true, the West did bear the brunt of the German tribes. Now wether it bore the brunt of barbarian invasions in total, that's another matter. Not counting the Sassanids, they were hardly barbarians.

The sassanids were non-greek, thus they were barbarians, and considered barbarians by romans (since the romans considered all non-ROMANS to be barbarians).

 

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  Quote Komnenos Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07-Jun-2005 at 15:27
Originally posted by EvilNed


The sassanids were non-greek, thus they were barbarians, and considered barbarians by romans (since the romans considered all non-ROMANS to be barbarians).




Not quite and far from that, of all the contemporary Empires, the Sassanid Empire was the only one to be treated with due respect and considered as equal to their own by the Byzantines, and indeed vice versa.
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  Quote dorian Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10-Jun-2005 at 19:31
The Byzantine Empire (eastern) was glorious. Constantinople was the center of the world.
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  Quote GENERAL PARMENION Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-Jun-2005 at 05:26
The Hellenic Byzantine Empire ofcourse !
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  Quote Laelius Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-Jun-2005 at 12:08
Eh the Eastern Empire was but a paltry shadow next to the greatness that was Rome.

Edited by Laelius
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  Quote Belisarius Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-Jun-2005 at 14:13
Originally posted by Laelius

Eh the Eastern Empire was but a paltry shadow next to the greatness that was Rome.

Hey everyone! It's Edward Gibbon!
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  Quote Guests Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25-Jun-2005 at 07:50
This really isn't a fair comparison, because by the time there were separate Western and Eastern empires, the empire was in serious decline, and furthermore, the western empire faced much stronger and constant attacks than the east, and was more open to invasion. What I mean by this is that the majority of the eastern half was not in Europe, so the Balkan peninsula almost always served as a barrier for the empire when the Goths and Huns invaded. The western half, on the other hand, was almost entirely in Europe, and the frontier was wode open to invasion, which caused more damage and hastened the empire's decline.
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  Quote dorian Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25-Jun-2005 at 12:36

Originally posted by TheSicilianVespers

This really isn't a fair comparison, because by the time there were separate Western and Eastern empires, the empire was in serious decline, and furthermore, the western empire faced much stronger and constant attacks than the east, and was more open to invasion. What I mean by this is that the majority of the eastern half was not in Europe, so the Balkan peninsula almost always served as a barrier for the empire when the Goths and Huns invaded. The western half, on the other hand, was almost entirely in Europe, and the frontier was wode open to invasion, which caused more damage and hastened the empire's decline.

I don't think so. Byzantine Empire had more dangers to face up. First of all the most important danger came from the Persians. Sometimes these two Empires managed to cooperate but the wars between them were frequent. The germanic tribes were also dangerous specifically after the Byzantines had conquered Italy. It was easier for the nomadic tribes of Eurasia to reach the Byzantine Empire because of its borders in Asia. The Slavs was a big trouble for the Byzantines just like Arabs and Avars. And after all these, the Ottoman Turks.

"We are Macedonians but we are Slav Macedonians.That's who we are!We have no connection to Alexander the Greek and his Macedonia�Our ancestors came here in the 5th and 6th century" Kiro Gligorov FYROM
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  Quote Guests Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Jun-2005 at 07:16
Originally posted by dorian

I don't think so. Byzantine Empire had more dangers to face up. First of all the most important danger came from the Persians. Sometimes these two Empires managed to cooperate but the wars between them were frequent. The germanic tribes were also dangerous specifically after the Byzantines had conquered Italy. It was easier for the nomadic tribes of Eurasia to reach the Byzantine Empire because of its borders in Asia. The Slavs was a big trouble for the Byzantines just like Arabs and Avars. And after all these, the Ottoman Turks.



You don't understand. The Byzantine half had more easily defendable borders than the western half, so while under attack of both the Huns and the Germans, the empire was wide open and a perfect target to attack, unlike the eastern half, which was across the Thracian strait and really sitting by well off as their brothers in the west were slaughtered.
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  Quote dorian Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Jun-2005 at 14:33

Excuse me? The eastern half was across the Thracian strait? I suppose that youre talking only about the wider area of Constantinople coz as you know the Byzantine Empire included Balkans, Minor Asia, Egypt, modern Iraq, Syria, Libanon, Israel, Caucasus. So why its borders were easier defendable?

"We are Macedonians but we are Slav Macedonians.That's who we are!We have no connection to Alexander the Greek and his Macedonia�Our ancestors came here in the 5th and 6th century" Kiro Gligorov FYROM
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  Quote TheodoreFelix Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Jun-2005 at 15:25

They were richer provinces. The east was undoutably richer than then west was.

 

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  Quote Constantine XI Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Jun-2005 at 23:11
I wouldn't say the Western Empire was WIDE open to invasion. Yes, the Western Empire had to face the wrath of the Goths and Huns, but the Eastern Empire had to face their full brunt first. Perhaps the West would have done well to learn from the invasions suffered by its Eastern sister. But the actuals borders of the West open to serious invasion (i.e. the Rhine, Upper Danube and Britain), were shorter than the lower Danube, and enormous eastern front which confronted Byzantium. Also, the enemies faced by Byzantium were typically more numerous, better equipped, better organised and more varied in their military composition.
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  Quote TheodoreFelix Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Jun-2005 at 23:28

While the east did get hit very hard from Barbarian invasions but never did they head into Constantinople itself. While in the west, the germanic tribes did. They sacked it, and even settled within the empires land.

Even after the wide opening left by Andrianople. The Goths and Vandals simply took a nice gold payout and left. The very next year, the East emperor already had replaced the legion with a goth army. The west was far too instable for such things and did not get as nice of a treatment, it was, Rome was sacked continously. On top of that it was broke.  Vandals took Carthage. Britain, France and Spain never compared to the richness of the east, which had thriving cities such as Antioch and Alexandria. On top of this these lands had overall higher populations ie better recruiting ability. 

 



Edited by Iskender Bey ALBO
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  Quote J.Caesar Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 20-Mar-2006 at 23:40
Belisarius did make the Vandals and Goths look like very inept fighters when he retook N.Africa and Italy. His numbers were so few. Just think that the Germa and Goths were seriously over rated. Roman legions in their prime decimanted them just like Belisarius did, with the excpetions of a couple of traps. The old emprire had much dificulty with parthia however, losing most of their battles there against the horse archer of Parthia. Eastern empire had to contend with them and their successors forever. Also, Rome was not really much of a city in the 5th century when the Goths came. It was seriously depopulated due to plague and malaria. This was an enormous impact on the west. The Easterners had more imunity against these deseases .( prolonged exposure for centuries earlier)
Howver, comapring the Byzantine forces against Roame in her prime would be very dificult. If it was hand to hand inafntry of course the west would win.

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  Quote Guests Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19-May-2006 at 07:58
They conqured the Parthian capital 3 times in the second century AD.
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  Quote Achilles Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19-May-2006 at 15:50
Originally posted by EvilNed

Originally posted by Reginmund


Oh, but it is true, the West did bear the brunt of the German tribes. Now wether it bore the brunt of barbarian invasions in total, that's another matter. Not counting the Sassanids, they were hardly barbarians.

The sassanids were non-greek, thus they were barbarians, and considered barbarians by romans (since the romans considered all non-ROMANS to be barbarians).

 



The term Barbarian in latin means a Bearded One. (from the Latin-Barbaros, meaning beard.)Later it began to mean a foreigner, and then a non-roman.  So depending on which version of the translation you use, the Sassanids were barbarians.
Der Erste hat den Tod,
Der Zweite hat die Not,
Der Dritte erst hat Brot.

Fur immer frei und ungeteilt
-always free and undivided-

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  Quote Bosniakum Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19-May-2006 at 18:06

I think the problem with this topic is that some people compare the western and eastern part ot the Empire after the split, while others compare the Byzantine and original Roman Empire whose central power was in the west.

When comparing the West and East after the split, then of course the Eastern was more powerful or it would not have survived.  When comparing the original Roman Empire whose center of power was in the west to the later Byzantine Empire, then of course the Roman Empire was stronger in every way I think.
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  Quote Constantine XI Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 20-May-2006 at 01:11
Very good point there, Bosniakum. But I think the thing is that the Byzantine Empire had to survive in a very different world to the one Rome was a part of in the 1st century AD. This is critical in making a comparison between the two, the pressures and resources which weighed on those two Empires were very different and our assessment of how virile those nations were should be made with that taken into consideration.
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