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Taverner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:10 PM
Original message
Did the Roman Empire ever end?
Think about it - historians state the Roman empire ended in the mid 400's when barbarians sacked Rome. However, the Roman Catholic Church persisted, and ran Europe - bringing in the Barbarian Aristocracy to its fold. This culminates in Charlemagne in 800 being crowned Emperor of the new Holy Roman Empire. Historians like to joke that it was "neither Holy, Nor Roman, Nor an Empire" - but I like the expression "walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and it has feathers...it's a duck." The Holy Roman Empire may not have been Holy, but it was Roman in design and Empirical in its desires. Two Crusades and several inquisitions took place under the HRE.

The Vatican controls Europe pretty much from this point on up to the Reformation. Even post reformation, the Vatican is in charge of a large part of Europe - and this continues well throughout the enlightenment and up until the secularization of Europe.

So...my question is, did the Roman Empire ever end?
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ChairmanAgnostic Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:13 PM
Response to Original message
1. yup.
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Taverner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:13 PM
Response to Reply #1
2. When did it end?
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Selatius Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:32 PM
Original message
One date is 476 AD, when the last emperor of the Western Roman Empire was overthrown.
His name was Romulus Augustus, and he was deposed by a Germanic chieftain known as Odoacer. Ravenna, capital of the Western Roman Empire, was overrun and taken.
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Taverner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:36 PM
Response to Original message
15. But although the city of Rome may have been sacked..."Rome" contiuned for a while
The Vatican soon became the only place that linked all of the kingdoms, as Christianity was spreading rapidly.

400 (give or take a few decades) years later, the Holy Roman Empire, a Papal Theocracy, is established and the game goes on...
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Selatius Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:43 PM
Response to Reply #15
19. It's debatable. The Byzantines would most certainly dispute your accounting of power succession.
The stronger Eastern Roman Empire (later the Byzantine Empire) claims to draw direct lineage back to Rome itself, and they survived well into the 1400s. They had always disputed the Catholic Church attempting to lay claim to authority that they themselves have never claimed to give up. They merely assert the seat of power moved from Rome to Constantinople under Constantine.
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LanternWaste Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 01:10 PM
Response to Reply #15
27. I think the burning of Rome is (in addition to being factual...
I think the burning of Rome is (in addition to being factual) a metaphor for the decline of direct Roman influence, architecture, and dominance over Western Europe and North Africa. Part and parcel of the Empire was its direct influence, architecture and dominance-- remove those facets, and for all practical purposes, there is no Roman Empire. Or rather, remove those facets and we're left with the Dark Ages which I think is solid evidence for the discontinuation of the Empire.

I believe the concept you're looking for is Acculturation-- which, though giving the appearance of the continued existence of a culture or kingdom, is actually slowly and methodically replacing it.
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leftofthedial Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:17 PM
Response to Original message
3. when they nailed Spartacus to the tree
it was over for me
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cliffordu Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:20 PM
Response to Reply #3
5. lol
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L. Coyote Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:20 PM
Response to Original message
4. The Empire collapsed, but cultures continue and Rome influences the West to this day.
We may have very recently extripated a signature culture trait of the Roman Empire, slavery, from our culture, but many other cultural features from the Roman era of "Western Civilization" remain, like slave belief systems (religions), armies, warfare, invasions, conquest, torture, execution,... the list goes on.
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stillcool Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:21 PM
Response to Original message
6. Follow the money?

Network 1976
http://www.filmsite.org/netw3.html
Arthur Jensen:
You have meddled with the primal forces of nature, Mr. Beale, and I won't have it, is that clear?!You think you have merely stopped a business deal - that is not the case! The Arabs have taken billions of dollars out of this country, and now they must put it back. It is ebb and flow, tidal gravity, it is ecological balance. You are an old man who thinks in terms of nations and peoples.There are no nations! There are no peoples! There are no Russians! There are no Arabs! There are no Third Worlds! There is no West! There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and immane, interwoven, interacting, multi-variate, multi-national dominion of dollars! Petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars, reichmarks, rins, rubles, pounds and shekels! It is the international system of currency which determines the totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things today. That is the atomic, and subatomic and galactic structure of things today. And you have meddled with the primal forces of nature, and you will atone!

He pauses for a moment - and speaks normally with a question to Beale, but then continues:

Am I getting through to you, Mr. Beale? You get up on your little twenty-one inch screen and howl about America and democracy. There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM, and ITT, and AT and T, and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon - those are the nations of the world today. What do you think the Russians talk about in their councils of state - Karl Marx? They get out their linear programming charts, statistical decision theories and mini-max solutions and compute the price-cost probabilities of their transactions and investments just like we do. We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies, Mr. Beale. The world is a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable by-laws of business. The world is a business, Mr. Beale. It has been since man crawled out of the slime, and our children will live, Mr. Beale, to see that perfect world in which there's no war or famine, oppression or brutality. One vast and ecumenical holding company, for whom all men will work to serve a common profit, in which all men will hold a share of stock, all necessities provided, all anxieties tranquilized, all boredom amused. And I have chosen you to preach this evangel, Mr. Beale.

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Taverner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:25 PM
Response to Reply #6
8. Ahhh Network, I love that quote and movie
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Dorian Gray Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:23 PM
Response to Original message
7. Christianity
and it's popularity sort of spelled the end of the Roman Empire. I guess you could say that it evolved into the HRE, but Papal rule was different than Emperor rule in that it was more of a religious empire than a political one.

I certainly don't view them as the same empire, but I could see where you might try to say one led right into the other.
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Taverner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:28 PM
Response to Reply #7
10. True - but I would argue that the linear progression went like this
Roman Kingdom -> Roman Republic -> Roman Empire -> Roman Papal Empire
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Dorian Gray Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:59 PM
Response to Reply #10
21. Yeah....
They did. I consider all four of those to be separate entities, though. (Even though the Republic and the Empire truly bled into one another.) The HRE, however, took a few hundred years to gain a foothold on Europe. There was a distinct time period that separated them, and the feel and rulers were very different.
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Warpy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:32 PM
Response to Reply #7
13. Yes and no
Until the battles of the reformation had been fought and won, Rome was the First Estate, the law that even kings had to bow before. The Roman Empire had simply vested its power in the church and lasted a lot longer than it's given credit for, mostly because people had to turn to the church to find literate people who could conduct their business for them, including business of state.

Personally, I think what finally broke Rome's power wasn't so much the rebellion of the Reformation but what had allowed it to happen, the invention of the printing press. Church scribes were no longer needed to produce the few bibles in the largest cathedrals. With bibles readily available and other printed material coming into existence, people at the top became literate and realized what a tissue of lies they'd been sold by Rome and rebelled. Thus, the Reformation. Mother church reformed, but too late to hang onto her power.
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Taverner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:38 PM
Response to Reply #13
16. Technology - it will save us all if it doesn't kill us first
And yes, I think that was a big factor - just as the internet will eliminate the need for government.
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Warpy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 01:02 PM
Response to Reply #16
23. Don't hold your breath on that one
although it's eliminated the need for right wing news outlets for those of us who are awake.

It certainly made propaganda dissemination a lot more difficult. Propaganda is debunked the day it hits the net.

Unfortunately, those of us with access and the knowledge and desire to use it are still in the minority.
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Taverner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 01:03 PM
Response to Reply #23
26. I'm not talking anytime soon
A lot of things have to take place first
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Dorian Gray Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 01:00 PM
Response to Reply #13
22. The First Estate...
the historical period is so fascinating. I, myself, see a distinct difference between the Empire and the HRE, but I also realize that papal influence was so strong because of the Roman influence.

Regardless, it's a fascinating period of history. (Well, thousands of years of history!)
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sarcasmo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:27 PM
Response to Original message
9. When everyone maxed out their credit cards and couldn't pay them back.
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Taverner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:28 PM
Response to Reply #9
11. HAHAHAHAHA
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MrCoffee Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:28 PM
Response to Original message
12. We're in the Black Iron Prison
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Taverner Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:39 PM
Response to Reply #12
17. ARAMCHEK SAVED THE WORLD
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mainegreen Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 01:03 PM
Response to Reply #12
25. The empire never ended!
Pink lasers! Pink lasers!
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muriel_volestrangler Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:32 PM
Response to Original message
14. Popes have rarely had enough temporal power to be called an 'empire'
They've been one of several major European political players at various times, but they haven't had the control an emperor does. And the Holy Roman Emperor was frequently a figurehead rather than a true 'emperor'.
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Recursion Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:41 PM
Response to Original message
18. Odoacer deposed Romulus Augustus in 476, ending the Dominate
The Senate continued in the west for another century or so but eventually acknowledged its own irrelevance.

As far as the question of protocol goes, that was the end of the Empire as such in the west. The Pope is "simply" the Bishop of Rome and at no point was an official part of the Imperial hierarchy (for that matter, the Bishop of Rome rose to greater prominence precisely because the apparatus of the Empire had collapsed).
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Jack Rabbit Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 12:43 PM
Response to Original message
20. Yes, the Roman Empire ended
The collapse of the Empire in the West (476) brought about a complete breakdown in law and order and the accompanying breakdown of commerce. These had been in decline throughout the fifth century as the Western Empire slid downward, but the final conquest of Rome by Odoacer the Scirian, who was later replaced by Theodoric the Ostrogoth, ended any chance of Rome making a comeback under the Caesars.

The Church took over the institutions of education in the former Western Empire, thus preserving some semblance of civilization, but was ill equipped to enforce laws. In time, political power shifted to local warlords, who claimed fancy titles like Earl, Duke and King. This was not the Roman Empire at all, but medieval Europe.

Charlemagne was the closest the West came to restoring the Empire, but after his death his Empire was divided among his sons. The central control promised by his reign collapsed.

The Eastern Empire lasted until 1453, when it was supplanted by the Ottoman Empire.
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PATRICK Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Feb-29-08 01:02 PM
Response to Original message
24. Read some
of the encyclicals of the present pope and his namesake from the WWI era. I think you might surmise his political judgment and the authoritarian religious and cultural hegemony of Europe as Christendom are indeed in some sort of archaic continuity as you describe. Hopefully that stays mostly in his mind and in your somber analysis and withers away like all dead roots eventually must. The notion of empire itself is coming to its own decline as a human political institution as much from the changes to the physical world as its consciousness. Unities that once only a physical imperium could carve out and maintain are instead shared globally even by petty or isolated nation states, in ideas, technology, marketplace economy and more and more shared culture- and the need to be interdependent to survive with stressed world resources.

The pathetic PNAC vision would simply superimpose American dominance over global unity and models of real cooperation. Every moral midget wants a crown. No one needs robber barons and military fear and pyramid money/resource controls to "save" the world. And they are weaker and easier to put down for all the nukes and all the tech and power they rattle about in their little playpens. If the people, protective of their unites and rights, care to.
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