Rome is best civilization in history

[Tiberius Victrix]

I understand your position, although I utterly disagree with it. Despite my disagreement I believe that as an amateur in the field you have made a good case for your argument and it was certainly an interesting conversation. you forced me to spend quite few hours sifting through my pile of books and reading on internet. Good luck to you.

 

[Gurkhal]

One bows out but another joins in. This is a bit of a hyperbole, of course.

Its evident that the Greeks were the greatest civilization of the ancient world, far superior to Rome.

For the first part the Greeks created the entire intellectual foundation on which Rome managed to build anything save brutish and violent behavior. In Fantasy terms you could say that Greece produced Tolkien, while the Romans produced the numerous hacks trying to ripp off Tolkien.

Secondly, if we only take the creation of a state as evidence of greatness, then the Greeks also managed to outdo the Romans. The Greeks create numerous states and with numerous different forms of organization and government. The Romans created one state with essentially three different types of rule and all of them failed just as badly as any ancient Greek did. In fact I would even say that the Romans outdid the Greeks in screwing over their own people to a degree that the Greeks never managed.

Thirdly, the Greeks conquered the whole of Persia and reached India, something that the Romans never came close to.

 

[Tiberius Victrix]

-The fact that we are having this discussion already shows that it is not evident that Greeks are greatest civilization.

- With that said. Greek civilization cannot be more superior than Roman one, simply because Rome is part of Greek world. If you want to make a good comparison regarding Fantasy terms, Rome is more like Christopher Tolkien as he continued on where the Greece left off. Roman culture is essentially expansion of Greek one. You can only fairly compare Rome to other contemporary Greek states that were stuck in the past and failed to adapt to challenges of the new world.

-You know I do not see how having a disunited swarm of fractured city states is an achievement. I mean when Rome fell it's territory was carved up by local Kingpins. So now the dark ages of western Europe are suddenly managed to outdo Romans in matter of statecraft. I don't think this is fair towards Romans, or even Greeks for that matter. Saying that Roman state failed is essentially incorrect as after the brutal civil wars Rome managed to reform itself and reinvent it's identity several times. As far as i know very few states had managed to go through such crucial reformations as many times as Rome did and survived.
Founding the city->Kicking out kings and establishing the republic->Hannibal->Establishing a Principate-Surviving the crisis of third century-Surviving the Tetrachy- Changing the state Religion-Adrianople-Attila-Fall of western Empire- Rise of islam-disaster at manzikert- the fourth crusade- and fall of constantinople.

No other state in history has matched Romans in stubbornness. Just one of these calamities would be enough to wipe out most countries without leaving a trace.

And as for the last. It was Alexander that reached Pakistan. Not Greeks. The Greeks had failed to reproduce their one time achievement, something that Romans managed to do repeatedly. And as for screwing over their own citizens. Greek states failed to protect their own citizens and Greece was conquered and enslaved. How is that not a failure?

 

[Gurkhal]

- With that said. Greek civilization cannot be more superior than Roman one, simply because Rome is part of Greek world. If you want to make a good comparison regarding Fantasy terms, Rome is more like Christopher Tolkien as he continued on where the Greece left off. Roman culture is essentially expansion of Greek one. You can only fairly compare Rome to other contemporary Greek states that were stuck in the past and failed to adapt to challenges of the new world.

I'd say that at the best of times the Romans can be Christopher Tolkien but more often they are the random Fantasy hacks trying in vain to steal the talent and hard work they are unable to have or do themselves.

Also I would refuse the notion that the Romans were part of the Greek world. At no point did they consider themselves, or were considered, Greeks. In fact I'd say that the Romans are distinctly Italic. They were influenced by the Greeks but not nearly enough to be considered Greeks any more than say the Lydians were.

For some recommendations on a good book about ancient Italy I'd suggest the following. I haven't finished it yet but the parts I did have time to read were really interesting and thus I recommend it.

https://www.amazon.com/Ancient-Ital...8&qid=1545819025&sr=8-2&keywords=corinna+riva

Also the Greeks were adapting all the time and never stuck in the past. The sheer lunacy of that statement made the chuckle.

-You know I do not see how having a disunited swarm of fractured city states is an achievement. I mean when Rome fell it's territory was carved up by local Kingpins. So now the dark ages of western Europe are suddenly managed to outdo Romans in matter of statecraft. I don't think this is fair towards Romans, or even Greeks for that matter. Saying that Roman state failed is essentially incorrect as after the brutal civil wars Rome managed to reform itself and reinvent it's identity several times. As far as i know very few states had managed to go through such crucial reformations as many times as Rome did and survived.
Founding the city->Kicking out kings and establishing the republic->Hannibal->Establishing a Principate-Surviving the crisis of third century-Surviving the Tetrachy- Changing the state Religion-Adrianople-Attila-Fall of western Empire- Rise of islam-disaster at manzikert- the fourth crusade- and fall of constantinople.

The point I wanted to make was that the Greeks were capable of creating many different kind of states, just like the Romans could adopt theirs, But the main issue I see here is that between quantity and quality. And I think that the Greeks who invented democracy and Athens who managed to take the first few steps towards what we know today as democracy is superior to the Roman Republic. Not in quantity but in quality as they did get a popular rule and were not stuck half-way there with power ever resting in the irresponsible hands of the aristocracy.

And I will be totally honest. Political unity is not the greatest achivement by which I judge a civilization by. Cultural achivements and social progress is just as important and while the Romans do not come up empty on either, neither did they make as much as the Greeks. Hence I will totally agree that the Roman empire lasted even longer than ancient Greek history but I think the Greeks managed to do more in their time than the Romans did in theirs. Becasue at the end of the day political unity and military victories is all the Romans have to show for themselves. And guess what, those thing are gone now while the, for example, vast literary accomplishments of the Greeks remains to be read and admired by a greater degree than what was produced in Latin.

No other state in history has matched Romans in stubbornness. Just one of these calamities would be enough to wipe out most countries without leaving a trace.

Yes, the Romans had a certain zealous warmongering that few could match.

And as for the last. It was Alexander that reached Pakistan. Not Greeks. The Greeks had failed to reproduce their one time achievement, something that Romans managed to do repeatedly. And as for screwing over their own citizens. Greek states failed to protect their own citizens and Greece was conquered and enslaved. How is that not a failure?

For the first part last I checked the Macedonians were a Greek tribe or at least become one by the time that Alexander ruled as is evident by Philip II's efforts to make the Macedonians be accepted as Greeks, if they were not that already. Thus Alexander was a Greek king, of the Macedonian tribe, who conquered the East with Ionian, Doric, Achaean, Aeolian and Macedonian troops. Hence the Greeks did it.

Romans did not managed to repeatedly do their one-time-stunt. If such had been the case we would not have a long, long list of all the provinces that the Romans lost as opposed to the rare few they managed to retake, for a short while, before losing those provinces again permanently.

The last part makes no sense. What an bloodthirsty aggressor, like Rome, did falls at the aggressor's feet. Not the feet of its victims. The conquest and great enslavement happened because the Romans wanted to do it and the Greek themselves had precious little to do with if it should happen or not. Hence its more of a mark of the ever present bloodthirst of the Romans than anything else. In fact I'd still say that the Romans screwed over their own people harder than then the Greeks managed. I am pretty sure that the Greek world in general was not as caught up in civil wars, persecutions and purges, be they political or religious, as the Roman Empire was, starting with the late Republic and never really stoping. Not to mention the charming squeshing out of the small farmers during Republic's second half or so.

EDITED: Removed some stuff.