Term Paper on Western Civilization: Why
did Rome fall while Byzantium survived?
The
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the greatest empire of the world situated around the basin
of Mediterranean Sea, including Turkey, Israel, Egypt, North Africa, France,
Spain, England and Portugal in the fourth century AD. The Roman Empire was often
engaged in wars with other states. The most powerful rival of Roman Empire was
the Persian Empire of the East, which consists of the states of Syria, Iran,
Iraq and Afghanistan. The great Roman Empire had existed for over 1000 years and
fell in 1453 when the Ottoman Turks had taken Constantinople. The Roman Empire
had brought the prosperity, stability and development to the western world. It
has improved the communications, trade and law and order situation. The Roman
Empire was divided into two halves in an attempt to make for easier rule and
better control. In the year 323 AD Constantine became an independent emperor and
established his eastern capital at Byzantium. Both the Eastern and Western parts
of the Roman Empire gradually established as separate entities. The Newly formed
Eastern Empire is called the Byzantine Empire.
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Fall of the Roman Empire
As mentioned above, the Roman Empire fell in 1453 when Ottoman Turks had taken
Constantinople. The question arises here that why a Great Empire like Rome did
fall down? To answer this, let us examine some of the factors, which played a
pivotal role in the fall of Roman Empire.
There are two approaches about the fall of Roman Empire; the long-term approach
and the short-term approach. The long-term approach suggests that the emperors
of late third century and early fourth century had divided the army into
borders, this made the troops to become the soldier-farmer and has declined
their efficiency. These emperors also allowed barbarians into the army, which
decreases the army’s fighting efficiency. The weakness of border troops meant
that the emperors needed more mobile troops. Hence they had expanded their army.
This expansion had paved the way for the recruitment of barbarians into the
army. The other group of historians said that the main cause of the fall of
Roman Empire was the financial problem faced by the Empire. As the Roman Empire
divided into Eastern and Western part, the Western part had fewer of the wealthy
provinces, which decreased the amount of tax collected. The West had longer
borders to defend and had to have a greater army, but paying for enough army was
the problem. The civil war during the fourth and fifth centuries also drained
all the resources of the Empire hence made its collapse inevitable.
By the time of Marcus Aurelius, there was a common practice of distribution of
pork, oil and bread to the proletariat. Due to such practice the expenditure on
the public spectacles kept mounting. In those days approximately hundred million
dollars per year were poured out on games. All these expenditures had to be
recovered from the taxpayers. By the time of Marcus Aurelius the army was mainly
composed of either the foreigners or the ignorant countrymen from the backward
parts of the country. This created a rift between the army and the civilians of
the country, which was the immediate cause of collapse of the Roman Empire. The
lack of circulating currency in the western part of the Roman Empire was the
root cause of economic deterioration. There was also massive trade deficit with
the Eastern part of the Empire, which also helps to decrease the economic growth
of the Western part of the Empire.
The decline of military of the Roman Empire was also, according to some
scholars, the major cause of its collapse. The military of the empire declined
due to many reasons and in the end it was the lack of security, which allowed
the barbarians to topple the Roman Empire. There were several factors, which
were responsible for the decline of the army. The most common and major factor
was the conflict within the army between the barbarians and the civilized
countrymen. This factor coupled with some other factors like reliance on
mercenaries, fragmentation of soldiers loyalty, lack of incentive for Roman
Citizens to enlist etc. destroyed the army of the Empire completely. One major
factor in the decline of army was the admission of foreigners in the army. Such
foreigners were granted the citizenship at the end of their enlistment. Rome was
also experienced a decrease in population, which also affected the army, and the
army gradually became completely dependent upon the foreigner volunteers.
Because of the decline of the army, the barbarians had the opportunity to
establish their own kingdom.
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Another theory about the fall of the Roman Empire is that the Empire never fell
down but transformed into a rudimentary form of Medieval Europe. Some scholars
argued that the Empire survived in the economic, political and cultural senses,
throughout the barbarian invasion, it was actually the rise of Islam in the
East, which divided the Empire culturally and eventually led to its collapse.
Hence according to the some Scholars, the Roman Empire did not fall down
abruptly for a specific reason but had transformed itself gradually.
The Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was established in 330 AD when the Roman Emperor
Constantine adopted the city of Byzantium as his seat of power and named it
Constantinople. By the year 395 AD the Roman Empire was divided into two, the
Eastern and Western, parts with separate emperors for each part. As the Western
part disintegrated, the eastern part, the Byzantine Empire had flourished. The
question is why did Byzantine Empire survived while the Roman Empire fell down?
The survival of the Byzantine Empire was actually due to the faith and
independence of the people of the empire. These people had completely different
culture and beliefs, from all the other parts of Europe and had a fierce sense
of cultural identity, which they sought to preserve at all costs.
The empire’s military was effective to defend the empire from intruders and to
retain the power of the empire for many years. The culture of the Empire had
given the people of the Empire a sense of identity, which united them within the
empire and against all the intruders. The Church also gave the people a solid
backbone to stand united and led them towards a Christian Style of life for
themselves and for the Empire. This religious style of life helped the people to
stay united in both spirit and law. The leadership was the common force, which
attracted and combined all the pieces of the empire together. The emperor was
considered the shadow and representative of God on earth and treated
accordingly. In summary, it can be concluded that the Powerful culture,
religion, military and leadership of the Byzantine Empire helped the empire
survive and flourish while the Western part the Roman Empire had collapsed.
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