Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Catholic church is an institution of the Roman Empire, and it's still around. That puts things in perspective, I find, and makes me wonder if 100 thousand years from now, historians will just lump the Romans and us into the same bucket.
I've always thought of the USA as the east Roman Empire of the British Empire. The seat of the throne moved to the white house, but the USA is still culturally close to the UK. Except for the religion, which seems to come from The Netherlands and Germany.
Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
31–40 of 62 posts
Re: Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
#32One of the engines of collapse of Rome was the corrupt financial elite extending to the government that designed rules to extract maximum wealth for the elites, ignoring the long-term health of the economy. By the end, the government was essentially squeezing a dry sponge. Seems like civilisation has learned nothing.
Re: Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
#33This makes an important point, and is important to think about, but I'm also interested in how societies go to that brink and come back. I suspect there's a bit of bias in this, as you don't hear as much about the nations that come to the point of collapse and then somehow immediately recover, you hear more about those that disintegrate into decades of chaos and disorganization. The essay also points to something els…
The major rupture is the Protestant Reformation, where the split between Protestant and Catholic Christianity proves irreconcilable, and results in the end of the notional idea of a unified Christendom. This is also when you start to see an end towards the practice of writing in the literate language of Christendom (i.e., Latin) and instead move towards working in the vernacular, especially in endeavors like scientific research.
[1] The major exception is Britain, where the end of Roman rule is very abruptly realized, and there is a distinct clear horizon between sub-Roman Britannia and Anglo-Saxon Britain. But the British experience is largely the exception, not the rule.
Re: Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
#34This makes an important point, and is important to think about, but I'm also interested in how societies go to that brink and come back. I suspect there's a bit of bias in this, as you don't hear as much about the nations that come to the point of collapse and then somehow immediately recover, you hear more about those that disintegrate into decades of chaos and disorganization. The essay also points to something els…
Can you give any examples of societies that went to the brink and reversed course? I can't think of any, but I'd be fascinated to learn more about examples who have.
Re: Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
#35This makes an important point, and is important to think about, but I'm also interested in how societies go to that brink and come back. I suspect there's a bit of bias in this, as you don't hear as much about the nations that come to the point of collapse and then somehow immediately recover, you hear more about those that disintegrate into decades of chaos and disorganization. The essay also points to something els…
The best answer may well be some time in the 1500s. Recall that as the era shifts from the late Classical to early Medieval, all of these people are still speaking the Roman language (Vulgar Latin, which evolves into the various Romance languages), following the Roman religion (Christianity), obeying Roman legal codes, and in many aspects, still following Roman customs and experience the same Roman economic and admin…
The Christendom ceased to be unified a whole lot earlier: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East%E2%80%93West_Schism
Re: Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
In ancient times, wealth was based on controlling farmland and extracting food from peasants. Modern economies don’t work like that, so what you can learn from historical analogies is limited.
They're still based on controlling shares and extracting profits from workers. Very similar.
Re: Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
#37I do not get the obsession with fall of Rome being a bad thing. Look at taxation, look at big part of population being in slavery. Their military machine, roads and civilisation was basically just to crash rebelions! Today we have taxation around 30 to 70 percent. Imagine if taxes would be at 10% and we would not have to sponsor all sort of "adventures".
That's an interesting point and worth discussing. I'm not sure why you got down voted. Maybe people are perceiving some subtext that I'm not.
Probably because the vast majority of politicians who attack taxation do so specifically to destroy social programs and quality of life multipliers, instead of the war machine or any other area of bearucratic waste, inefficiency, or corruption.
For example "No new wars" becomes "No, new wars!" and all the people who screamed about government spending clap as the military spend doubles, or feign disgust but fall in line eventually because "the other guy would've done the same" as admitting they were wrong or conned is inconceivable.
Also, literally nobody is paying a 70% effective tax rate anywhere. I'd be surprised if you could find anyone paying more than 50% without misinformation. Even when taxes were 90% for a short period of time, for an extreme minority, there were loopholes that meant none of them ever paid anything close to 90%.
Re: Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
The best answer may well be some time in the 1500s. Recall that as the era shifts from the late Classical to early Medieval, all of these people are still speaking the Roman language (Vulgar Latin, which evolves into the various Romance languages), following the Roman religion (Christianity), obeying Roman legal codes, and in many aspects, still following Roman customs and experience the same Roman economic and admin…
"The major rupture is the Protestant Reformation, where the split between Protestant and Catholic Christianity proves irreconcilable, and results in the end of the notional idea of a unified Christendom." The Christendom ceased to be unified a whole lot earlier: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East%E2%80%93West_Schism
(And also note that the latest Byzantine Emperors repeatedly tried to mend the schism to secure Western aid in stabilizing their empire.)
Re: Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Catholic church is an institution of the Roman Empire, and it's still around. That puts things in perspective, I find, and makes me wonder if 100 thousand years from now, historians will just lump the Romans and us into the same bucket.
I've always thought of the USA as the east Roman Empire of the British Empire. The seat of the throne moved to the white house, but the USA is still culturally close to the UK. Except for the religion, which seems to come from The Netherlands and Germany.
> Except for the religion, which seems to come from The Netherlands and Germany.
This underestimates how Germanic, Irish, Italian, and Hispanic America is.
For example - Hot dogs, Hamburgers, Budweiser, Chrysler, Rockefeller, Disney, the New York Times, Christmas Trees, Lutheran congregations, Mennonite congregations, etc are all German.
And having stayed in the UK for extended periods for work, it is significantly different culturally speaking than much of the US.
Re: Rome Fell and Nobody Noticed
#40Ironically enough, the thing that really did Roman Italy it was Justinian’s reconquest. The Gothic War was absolutely devastating. Yersinia pestis didn’t help either, of course.