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It was also a region scarcely populated in comparison to the east, that why the western Roman empire fell.....not enough people to substain such a large empire.
I think the population density was not so much different in late antiquity. Possibly was even higher in West Mediterrana, given the many invasions that especially from 5th century have left much of the Balkans desert and a century later will turn areas of Anatolia desert during the Arab invasions.
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Romans achieved the unification of the former Helenistic empire within the Roman empire, but when the empire fell, there was only anarchy. Should Justinian have recovered at least one third of western empire!!!
It was a long and complex process. The empire was not the same in every historical period, it was always changing. In 3rd century it was already a strange organism, not a highly centralised monarchy as other empires, but sort of conglomerate of several self-living entities living together in a more or less stable equilibrum. The apparition of Tetrarchy marked this dissolution of central power and then the break in the Eastern and Western empire.
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They also forgot the west, when they could have conquered (definitively) a large part of the former empire, not parts of Italy, Spain, Sicily.
The Byzantines invaded Italy and North Africa only to destroy the Ostrogothic and the Visigothic kingdoms. They deliberately avoided to occupy or fight the territories in the hands of Italics or Iberians or their armies, city garrisons etc. Have you read the Wars of Justinian by Procopius?
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The west dawned the consequences of the fall of Constantinople during the Hapsburgs, during the 16th century..."The Turkish Peril".
Also must be said that the Romanian principalities, which preserved their independence, have win some devastating battles against Ottomans (the Battle of Vaslui has made the higher loses in an Islamic army by a Christian army ever, some tens of thousands dead), and they constituted one of the main causes for the Turks not advancing too fast into Europe. The Turks were fearing these principalities, not so much for their military force, which was not so much significant, but for their natural defence behind the mountainsd and Danube.
The west was always, since antiquity, a vast land covered by woods. Suetonius said that an squirrel could travel from the Pyrinees to the Gibraltar Straight (the Columns of Hercules) withouth touching ground. Germania was totaly covered by woods, France was a vast expanse of woods with few inhabited cities.
The sucess of Rome was due to the fact that Italica had a vast population and Europe was almost deserted, they had more Greek influence..and Etruscans that also came from the east.
The East had perhaps three or four times more populations, civilized lands, the great realms left by the generals of Alexander that were conquered by Rome.
All technicians, intellectuals and "technocrats" in the empire were "Greeks" "Syrian-Greeks", Jews, Roman were mostly illiterate, peasants until they became powerful.
Byzantines did try to get hold after the fall of the empire, I believe they conquered Rome and part of Italy for a while, Sicily, a strip of visigothic Spain during 70 years.
The west never had any unity, there's no west..there's no Europe. The French always made alliances with the Turks against Spain, Venice's main trade partner was Istambul, etc, etc.
The East had perhaps three or four times more populations, civilized lands, the great realms left by the generals of Alexander that were conquered by Rome.
In 14 CE, the population in million was like this:
So you can see that the Latin West numbered 25 million (Italy - 8 million) and the Greek East 20 million. In respect of level of civilisation, you're right. Even today Anatolia, especially the western and southern coasts, is packed with still imposing ruined cities.
I believe that the estimate is very conservative, as the Roman Empire had at its peak more than 100 million inhabitants. Probably the population in the west shrank during the period of unrest, around 200, when the Pax Romana was lost.
I believe that the estimate is very conservative, as the Roman Empire had at its peak more than 100 million inhabitants. Probably the population in the west shrank during the period of unrest, around 200, when the Pax Romana was lost.
I tend to think is accurate. Not only because the guys who made it surely studied every possible source, but based on the density of ancient cities, their sizes and amount of ruins throughout the territories of the empire, I think is impossible to have had 100,000,000 inhabitants. Germany has today close to this number and such a population requires a volume of buildings and so that even if spread on an area as big as the Mediterranean basin, would have left more traces than what we see today. Also, if the empire would have had at some point such a big population, would been capable of raising an army of several millions, even some tens millionbs, which was not the case.
But that was at the higuest point of development, a few years into our era.
Then came decadence, plagues, civil wars and when cities could not be protected and the population shrunk so much that no taxes and armies could be levied.
Rome was not destroyed by barbarians, but by itself.
Middle Ages started during the last stage of the roman empire when the system collapsed.
"Furthermore, the eastern empire, though it soon lost much of its tax revenues in the Balkans, was able retain a strong economic base in Asia Minor, Syria and Egypt, allowing it to support strong armies (Wade-Perkins 2005, p61). By contrast, much of northern Italy, parts of Gaul and Spain, and eventually North Africa by the early fifth century had been subject to repeated incursions and then conquest, severely eroding the revenues and manpower available to the western empire (see Ward-Perkins 2005, p62)".
Last edited by pampliment; 10-14-2015 at 07:44 AM..
I believe that the estimate is very conservative, as the Roman Empire had at its peak more than 100 million inhabitants. Probably the population in the west shrank during the period of unrest, around 200, when the Pax Romana was lost.
The hypothetical 100 million includes also African and Asian populations, not only Europe.
The hypothetical 100 million includes also African and Asian populations, not only Europe.
In that table, the estimate for the total population, including Asian and African, is 45 million.
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response to radical Islam
