I am but a humble Thracian mercenary formerly attached to the Grecian contingent battalion tasked with maintaining the current peace between us. I consider it a sad, somewhat ignoble, feat wherein our peaceful adversaries have chosen a scion of the madman Nero to lead them through the current straits.
Fun fact: Part of the Roman Empire's strength was its tolerance and integration of other cultures instead of trying to impose their own. Their various Italian subjects were "allies" in name and bound by pacts of mutual assistance, but otherwise largely left to govern themselves as long as they paid their tithes.
The prospect of becoming Roman Citizens in exchange for military service enticed them to serve as auxiliary units. These units were also tightly integrated with the Roman troops, often leading to a gradual blending of cultures, a layering of identities rather than exclusively choosing them.
Sure, this wasn't some altruistic act of goodwill so much as political strategy to maximise their power, but it worked. Part of the fall was the fracturing of loyalties because later Emperors abandoned that policy and it's just not as appealing to send your sons off to war for an empire that will only ever treat you as second class subjects.
Of course, the whole thing is more complicated than I could convey in a single comment, but check out this ancient historian's blog series on "Who were the Romans?" and "Decline and Fall?".
In support of your point, here's a nice little quote from Emperor Claudius, who was also a scholar and a historian:
What was the ruin of Sparta and Athens, but this, that mighty as they were in war, they spurned from them as aliens those whom they had conquered? Our founder Romulus, on the other hand, was so wise that he fought as enemies and then hailed as fellow-citizens several nations on the very same day. Strangers have reigned over us. That freedmen’s sons should be intrusted with public offices is not, as many wrongly think, a sudden innovation, but was a common practice in the old commonwealth. But, it will be said, we have fought with the Senones. I suppose then that the Volsci and Aequi never stood in array against us. Our city was taken by the Gauls. Well, we also gave hostages to the Etruscans, and passed under the yoke of the Samnites. On the whole, if you review all our wars, never has one been finished in a shorter time than that with the Gauls. Thenceforth they have preserved an unbroken and loyal peace. United as they now are with us by manners, education, and intermarriage, let them bring us their gold and their wealth rather than enjoy it in isolation. Everything, Senators, which we now hold to be of the highest antiquity, was once new. Plebeian magistrates came after patrician; Latin magistrates after plebeian; magistrates of other Italian peoples after Latin. This practice too will establish itself, and what we are this day justifying by precedents, will be itself a precedent.
I have a fantastic book on the subject, Imperial Ideology and Provincial Loyalty in the Roman Empire, highly recommend.
We wish we had the longevity of the romans.
We'll see what happens.
I think covid was eye opener and nail in the coffin of many institutions that were already on borrowed time. Our 3rd century moment.
But un/like the romans, they transformed from the experience. Well have to see if we are as adaptable. We've only been here like 300 years. That's a blip in their history.
We shall see.
We're at 3 or 4 at worst. It's gonna get so much worse, guys. Remember that it took at least fifteen hundred years to get back to where we were.
At the same time, Rome survived the extreme corruption of the Jugurthine War, the infighting of the Social War, and three servile wars in the Late Republic, and the golden age of Rome hadn't even begun. The Empire survived Caligula, Nero, and Domitian before the reign of the Five Good Emperors even came to pass.
Where we are is anyone's guess.
Just figured I'd lighten the doom a little.
And "The Fall" was a Roman general mad his army wasn't being paid, and ignores that the capital had moved, Rome the city was still ticking along and the "Byzantine Empire" called and considered themselves Roman.
Civilization Ending and The Fall of Rome was very much a Renaissance narrative about how great they were more than actual History.
For all the people saying "This is it. We're done. It's all over.": It can get so much worse. Screwed is a matter of degree. One can get more screwed, or one can try to get less screwed.
I want to get off the "interesting times" wild ride
I don't really buy it. Rome fell for reasons a professional historian of Rome has told me are still unclear, but I don't really see a lot of parallels in our big problems, which are very new and untested.
Elites hoarding wealth to the detriment of the polity and mindless obedience to utterly incompetent cretins are truly timeless contributors, though.
Yeah, I realise it's kinda weird to post this after talking about how familiar a lot of things in Rome were, but in the narrow scope of existential problems the overlap is limited.
Liberal democracies work very differently from autocracies. The weather isn't a mystery of the gods, it's self-inflicted. Rome kept it's population in check through massive natural and to a lesser degree artificial mortality, while we have great medicine but ever-lower fertility rates. Roman peasants may have been vaguely aware of the distant land of Italy, we have information overload conveyed by machines even 20th century people struggle with. When we have a plague, it's less about escaping it, and more about convincing people they should.
Some problems are timeless - or at least haven't been dealt with yet - but I feel like putting it in terms of Rome like this is misleading and can be used to justify all kinds of things. When I've seen this meme posted before, it's usually a lead-up to really chuddy comments about immigration or loss of traditional values.
[laughs]
[cries]
[falls on own sword]
[falls on own sword]
I'm fairly convinced income inequality is the downfall of ALL empires
The tricky thing there is that it's been way, way higher than today in past eras long before anything breaks. IIRC most of the research shows it just goes up indefinitely, most of the time, and then reverses during times of collapse when the poor are finally able to loot the mansions.
I really hope actual democracies play by different rules, though.
*roughly here
Good thing trump got elected 👍
… because he will accelerate the decline of Western-centric global domination. Fasten your seatbelt - it’ll be wild.
