Should We Use The B-Word (Byzantium)?

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00:00 Intro
02:20 Origins of "Byzantium"
05:01 The State
14:04 The Nation
29:58 When to Use It
Music:
Imperator: Rome Soundtrack - We The People
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - The Clemency of Titus
Crusader Kings 2 Soundtrack - Komnenos
Imperator: Rome Soundtrack - Tyrrenum
Imperator: Rome Soundtrack - Caesarion
Imperator: Rome Soundtrack - Hegemony
Footage
Rise of the Empires: Ottomans (2019)
Gladiator (2003)
Rome (2005-2007)
Barbarossa (2009)
The Last Legion (2014)
Tarihin Efsaneleri | Halid Bin Velid (1. Bölüm) | TRT Belgesel (2021)

[@RomabooRamblings]

Get an exclusive Surfshark deal! Enter promo code ROMABOO for an extra 3 months free at surfshark.deals/romaboo

[@qwizzler]

Kkkkkkkkk you can't afford Brazilian discord? 😂😂😂

[@hondacbrification]

Orthodoxy have its very deceptive attitude since it deliberately concealed the fact they rebranded Hungarian-MacAr-Scythian rulers as somehow they own Orthodox figures which is how Béla 3rd Hungarian king got rebranded as Alexios Jewnanistani king just as the entire Cuman-Coman dynasty, Varangiai Urak-Rurik as Kijewish Rus etc

[@Hrafnskald]

With Surfshark and Romaboo, we can all say "Ecce Romani!" ;)

[@alexkirrmann8534]

wtf? This is splitting hairs argument, they can be both? I don't think we need to reinvent nameplates, anyone who knows what a byzantine is knows they were roman.

[@svon1]

i cracked the case, the Pagans are the True Romans and the Christians are illegal usurpers ....thus the Empire fell with Maxentius...... the Pagans slowly withered away over the coming centuries

[@Dian_Borisov_SW]

In Bulgaria, our teachers refer to the byzatines as "romeis" (ромеи) and thought us that they are basically romans (which makes the fact that we waged war for centuries against romans super cool), but still separated them from the "real" romans. Which is confusing for adults, let alone kids

[@RomabooRamblings]

How much Byzantine history do they teach in Bulgaria?

[@jaydenburgher2651]

I'm pretty sure the Arabs and Muslims do that too. For the same reasons

[@Dian_Borisov_SW]

@@RomabooRamblings Mostly covered the wars between the two states and the intricate politics between them, which in itself is a ton. Obviously, we all know about Basil II

[@DonnellGreen]

@@Dian_Borisov_SW Probs to Bulgaria for Teaching Basil II it is always a hard Topic to talk about someone who won a Decisive War against your Home Country . (Im Italian So Obvisouly I Like Basil II)

[@tylerellis9097]

@@Dian_Borisov_SW How does Bulgaria address the 160 years of Byzantine rule? Where do Byzantine cultural and institutional influences stand?

[@Theophanis_Ketipidis]

We Greeks called ourselves Romans interchangeably with Greeks as late as the 70s. You see it even in old movies. Only lately the term is not that common. However, people of Greek descend outside of Greece like in Turkey, Syria and Lebanon call themselves Rum up until today!

[@user-qd4td7yb8e]

Most in Greece are Slavs who beLIEve they're Greek.

[@danielradu3212]

Yet you still have issues with Macedonia's international name. Probably Romans (the Latin ones) had the same issue with Late Antiquity Greeks (Eastern Romans).

[@Theophanis_Ketipidis]

@@danielradu3212 30' video and yet you still have no clue what you are talking about. What relation do the southern Slavs have with Macedonia?

[@danielradu3212]

@@Theophanis_Ketipidis Well, they inhabit parts of Ancient Macedonia, they embrace the Macedonian symbols and declare themselves Macedonians. After centuries of Roman occupation a resurgent Macedonian state in the Balkans would be normal to expect.

[@Theophanis_Ketipidis]

@@danielradu3212 Not really, other than the Greeks there were no other people identifying themselves as Macedonians before WW1 so why would one find normal to expect a Macedonian state?

[@MCMLXXXVICCXII]

We still call and name them ''Roman/Rum'' in Turkiye but official history teaching reffering them as ''Byzantion'' after a point. So far we call almost the whole Balkan region as ''Rumeli'' which literally means ''Roman soil'' in Turkish. The city of ''Erzurum'' literally means ''Roman land'', also. Non-muslim natives of the western Turkiye are called ''Rum'' which means ''Roman''. Only western narrative classify them as Byzantion etc. to seize that title of ''Rome'' and legitimize themselves as the continuance of it.

[@georgezissis9244]

Always good to get the non western point of view. Helps me in understanding history.

[@MCMLXXXVICCXII]

@@georgezissis9244 One of the most important thing about the history is it is written by the victors :)

[@Northwind20]

As a Greek when I first found out about this it blew my mind.

[@borisfrlic]

Correct. They say there are still some 10 million Serbs in Turkey today - some from Janissaries, other from before Turks in Phrygia, Lycia, etc... Have you heard of anything like that?

[@MCMLXXXVICCXII]

@@borisfrlic Can not say something like "10 million Serbians" but there are quite some "millions" of people descendants of the Balkan region in general spread across the modern Turkiye. Some from Janissaries some from convertions in general and some know some doesn't know their heritage as usual.

[@Duke_of_Lorraine]

Dare I say, it's quite a byzantine question.

[@matthewmagda4971]

Poor Byzantium... didn't they already endure enough name changes??

[@Duke_of_Lorraine]

@@matthewmagda4971 being called strange exonyms can be funny sometimes. Greeks still to this day call my country "Gallia", "Gaul".

[@gregoryheers2633]

@@Duke_of_Lorraine Yes, because calling it France and calling you Franks sounds like an insult to Modern Greek ears.

[@Duke_of_Lorraine]

@@gregoryheers2633 I've heard it's because of that cursed 4th crusade.

[@user-qd4td7yb8e]

​@@Duke_of_LorraineMost in Greece are Slavs who wish they were Greek. See "Greeks, Latins, Iberians and Jews were, and are, NOT Blond!"

[@tyvamakes5226]

"The Tang Dynasty wanted to steal R-words. Raviolis." -Romaboo Ramblings, when talking to Dovahhatty. In all seriousness, the Byzantine word is in a similar situation as the Spartans, who weren't called Spartans but Lacedaemonians. @Spectrum has already covered it in his video about that misconception.

[@rockstar450]

Constantinople WAS the new capital and almost all split governments before that had the primary Augustus in the East. From the early 4th Century onward, New Rome was the capital until the 4th Crusade robbed the empire of its resources to defend itself and ultimately fall to Mehmed II, who crowned himself Caesar of Rome in tribute to the conquest.

[@genovayork2468]

If looting the capital means robbing the empire of its resources, then that empire is not a too functional country.

[@Muramasa1794]

@@genovayork2468 the amount of wealth Constantinople had at the time was hundreds of years of valuables, priceless artifacts that date back to Classical Rome and even to the BC era. The wealth was used by the state to get out of disastrous wars

[@genovayork2468]

@@Muramasa1794 Yes, did I say it wasn't?

[@rockstar450]

@genovayork2468 the citizens thought it was a civil war. Business went on as usual though much of the fighting. The seizure of the city was a betrayal by Christians that humiliated the Pope and doomed the Crusader states. From here on we'd see increasingly pointless civil crusades and the Ottomans had an easy run, killing far more Christian life. The 4th Crusaders were doomed to hell by their evil leaders who lied and manipulated them into multiple excommunications, which is horrible for those at that time, clearly holy men to be there in the first place.

[@genovayork2468]

@@nikusja5864 No, Egypt was more longevive. Also stick to topic.

[@Ntyler01mil]

Certainly there's a difference between the Roman Empire before Constantine and the Roman Empire after Constantine. It's useful to have some sort of shorthand to refer to the different time period being discussed. The word “byzantine” has the negative connotations as meaning “scheming” or “convoluted,” so I understand the resistance to using it to describe the post-Constantine Roman Empire. However, personally, “Byzantine” immediately conjures up the qualities of the later empire- its style of art and architecture, its manner of dress, its court customs, etc. More neutral terms might be the “Medieval Roman Empire”, “Later Roman Empire”, or “Orthodox Roman Empire” “Eastern Roman Empire” seems to be the main alternative, but I find that to be a little misleading because the Empire regained large parts of the West, and held on to Southern Italy into the 10th Century.

[@WagesOfDestruction]

Something changed

[@sonnymak6707]

All empires changes. The Roman Republic were different from the Roman Empire later. It is laughable that we moderns are determining the identitity of ancient people . They are not here to tell their side of the story. I will go by what the ancient people wrote. From the Emperor , Patriach , bishops diplomat, chroniclers and foreign enenmies Arabs Turks Bulgarians Serbians Persians even all the way to India and China call the Empire centred in Constantinople Roman. All of them called that Empire Rome and the inhabitants Roman. The only people not calling them Romans were the Latins , Franks and their cultural descendants. No one would have given two hoots what these Latins and Franks thought or call of the Constatipnople Romans if not the fact that they went on to have the renaisance 18th century enlightenment and the Industrial revolution to conquer the world and imposed their world view and scholarship on the rest of us. The Byzantium Empire did not exist. Only Roman. And even though th Empire was gone by 1453. Romans and Roman lands still existed until early 20th century.

[@BorninPurple]

In what sense though? This makes absolutely no sense! The Roman Empire of Theodosius and Constantine was certainly very different from that of, Augustus Caracella and Aurelian. The Roman polity lasted a very long time, shifting from an Republic, to an Empire (but even by the late Republican period it was an Empire) to a nation-state (after Caracella gave universal citizenship), each era with different laws, political ideals and perceptions of what constituted "Roman" (over a 700 year period in the West). Do we consider those times any less Roman because of those changes? Of course not! This argument is a non-sequiter because it makes no logical sense when you stop looking at this from a surface level. Were the English any different from the English now at the time of Alfred the Great, Charles I, Oliver Cromwell or George V? Even though they went through various changes in that time-span legally, linguistically or politically? The answer is no, and the Roman case isn't any different!

[@KevinJohnson-cv2no]

@@BorninPurple Byzaboos clawing their damn nails to the bone trying to maintain the slightest relation to Rome lmao. Cry harder, The Roman Empire (Western Rome) thought of the Byzantines as a bunch of LARP'ing dorks

[@brandbw]

⁠@@BorninPurpleI like where you were going with your comment, but a huge flaw is in the last bit of your point. The English were very much different during Alfred’s time versus Cromwell, Charles, George etc. They were very much Anglo-Saxon rather than English. From 899 to 1066 they weren’t English like we know them. It wasn’t till Henry IV that even our rough conception of English identity form. That’s why there is something to say about the shift in terminology when describing the Eastern Romans/ Byzantines. Roman is a fickle thing because one is not wrong saying a person in Gaul in 300 AD was very much Roman, as were the folk in Constantinople. But while the Skelton of Roman identity remained one can’t argue that the religion, culture and even spoken/ written word no longer was that of the Romans of Constantine. Their was no unified church across the Mediterranean, Latin was not spoken nor used in documents. The ERE evolved into a Greek empire naturally. This flower sprouted from Rome but became a “cross-pollinated” plant with elements of the inherent Greek culture that was in the proverbial soil. Side note- the ‘Byzantines’ saw and called themselves Roman, they were the children of Rome. At the end of the day they were Roman, but a variation that evolved into a Greek empire due to the culture that existed in this side of the empire removed from the anarchy of the Germanic kingdoms. They are Schrödinger Roman’s, both are and aren’t at the same time, it’s just easier to use a Byzantine when teaching the subject/ discussing it.

[@marshallsilverstar9636]

I think there is a wrong understanding of modern greek culture . Greeks today see both ancient greeks and eastern romans as their ancestors .

[@sotos-js4sf]

i am greek can confirm

[@captainmccuckin2698]

They do see themselves as ancestors but genetically modern greeks are middle eastern

[@marshallsilverstar9636]

@@captainmccuckin2698 well as far as i know the opposite is true

[@captainmccuckin2698]

@@marshallsilverstar9636 yes because the study on it is banned in Greece and there are not many copies

[@marshallsilverstar9636]

@@captainmccuckin2698 What study is that? (I mean it's characteristics )

[@viriathas9910]

Wow, imagine an Irish historian referring to something as "the most thoroughly base and despicable form that civilization has yet assumed" while discussing something on the other side of the channel.

[@DimitriHellas]

oh well the potato boy got mad that his ancestors greatest achievement was to put bombs in cars

[@pyropulseIXXI]

you losers just read single quotes and think you have an undersetanding. Modern history is a joke; it believes in literal fairy tales as truth

[@genovayork2468]

​@@DimitriHellasNo.

[@user-qd4td7yb8e]

​@@DimitriHellasIncas are potato boys. The Irish are leprechauns.

[@tylerellis9097]

@@DimitriHellasDamn, savage

[@user-hq3ht2hp6x]

A very interesting historical fact. In the late Ming Dynasty in China, a military book recorded that a Lumi(噜密) ambassador brought a matchlock with a special long barrel. This was different from the original matchlock in China. Its power could A little larger than the Spanish and Chinese matchlocks.Lumi is actually the transliteration of Roma, but when we look at the illustrations printed in the book, you will find that there is an Ottoman with a turban on it.🤣 It should be said that at that time, both the Arab world and China referred to all people in Asia Minor as Romans. BTW, the book name is 《神器谱》written by 赵士祯.

[@olbiomoiros]

We still call ourselves Ρωμιοί. It was more popular prior to 1821. Also the term Ἕλλην during the Byzantine period (the period could be called Byzantine, but the empire itself can only be called Roman) was a taboo, because those who identified with it were often pagans.

[@borisfrlic]

The entire “Hellenic” revival is Phanar scheming and imperial ambitions. Ofc Phanar only pretend to be Christian and the serve Satan, so they love little boys, etc... this was part of the “Hellenic revival” You know that almost all the Greeks in Thrace up / north are hellenised Serbs, Vlahs, and Albanians? Then later some Romans proper were brought in with the population échange with Turkey. Phanar must be destroyed. Emperor Dušan went to kick them out of Constantinople after becoming Autocrator of join Serb / Roman Empire, and the poisoned him on the way there.

[@gilpaubelid3780]

Yes, we still call ourselves Ρωμιοί/ Romans. It means "Greek" in the greek language and it's a definition that the term "Roman" obtained during the byzantine period. Due to the fact that, among the people with Roman citizenship, Greeks were the ones that had become the core and rulers of the empire during the medieval period the term "Roman" started to be associated with them and came to mean the ethnically Greek. With this definition we're using the word Ρωμιοί for ourselves till this day. As just another word that means Greek (like Γραικός and Ελληνας), not as a different non-greek identity. We don't claim that we have some kind of connection with the ancient romans whenever we're using the term Ρωμιοί. Our connection is solely with the medieval Greeks/byzantines. Ελλην was never a taboo (it was used during the entirety of the byzantine period the same way that the rest of the greek ethnonyms were used). It just had two definitions. It was used as a national term that meant "Greek" or as a religious term that meant "pagan". Identifying as Greek wasn't considered a taboo (that's how Byzantines self-identified), identifying as pagan on the other hand wasn't considered as something good.

[@gilpaubelid3780]

@@Ragnarok__ You can't be that ignorant so you are probably a troll. I'm not interested in wasting my time with trolls.

[@w0lfgm]

In what way did the Italians win!? Genetic and cultural - mixture of Germanic (Goths, Langobard, Arab Muslims in Sicily and later Normans as well Spanish (Gothics, Barberish Arabs as well as Hellenic in the Sicily).... As well as Punic (Cartagenian origin) as well ignoring the fact that the teachers of young nobles were Greek- speaking community

[@mikel3359]

​@@gilpaubelid3780absolutely correct

[@AttaBek1422]

In the Arab world we still colloquially refer to the Byzantines as ‘Romans’. In fact we use the term Roman to describe Greek Orthodox Christians instead of Roman Catholics (we just call them Catholics). There’s a whole chapter in the Quran called ‘The Romans’ talking about the Byzantine’s war with the Sassanids which was happening in the background of the Prophet Muhammad’s preaching

[@legateelizabeth]

Not calling the Roman Catholics with the Pope in Rome 'Roman Christians', but using 'Roman Christians' to describe the Christians who at this point are predominantly in Russia sounds like an incredibly convoluted naming system.

[@AttaBek1422]

@@legateelizabeth It has nothing to do with the city of Rome but with how we perceive the Roman Empire. We see the Byzantines as the continuation of the Roman Empire (like they did) so we call people affiliated with their (Greek Orthodox) church Roman Christians. Note that Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox are two separate groups with separate churches.

[@nel7105]

@@legateelizabethyou guys aren’t actually Roman, you’re Frankish. It would make more sense to simply go by Frankish Catholics who have the Patriarch of Rome since you refer to the other 4 patriarchs in Orthodoxy “Greek”

[@legateelizabeth]

@@nel7105 Well I'm a British Buddhist so I'd certainly hope I'm neither Frankish, nor Roman, nor Catholic or I'd be having quite the identity crisis. :D

[@Cklert]

@@legateelizabeth Ironically, us Catholics don't refer to ourselves as "Roman Catholics" usually. That's actually a term more used by Protestants. We just call ourselves Catholics and that's that.

[@domapusic]

I am all for using terms "byzantine" and "eastern roman" interchangeably in every youtube video covering the subject.

[@Rayan2Musikahan]

Agree considering history is already confusing as it is.

[@tituspullo9768]

​@@Rayan2Musikahanwith even a small amount of interest or study you would really have to try to be confused by the subject

[@borisfrlic]

Neither are correct

[@azouitinesaad3856]

it's not about the term call it whatever you want the problem is when people think it's not the Roman empire and it's something separate from it or trying to imitate the Romans.

[@davidliddelow5704]

Its actually really common to call historical peoples something other than what called themselves. For example in the english civil war the terms cavalier, roundhead and puritan are all slanderous names given by their enemies. The puritans called themselves “the godly” or “philosophers” and I don’t think anyone thinks we should start using those.

[@blugaledoh2669]

Philosophers? Lol wtf

[@jonirischx8925]

A interesting point, but in this case the self-identification is actually relevant, and not the type of titular self-aggrandizing for a creed, as in your example about the puritans. Because if Eastern Rome is seen as a legitimate successor (which is very hard to argue against), then the self-identification becomes an important point of contention. Had they not identified as roman, there would have been a good argument against their 'romanness'. But they did. So it's important to take it into consideration in the debate.

[@jonathanccast]

Definitely think we should start calling the Puritans "the godly". "The godly" vs "the quasi-papists" is much more accurate than "cavaliers" vs "roundheads", which makes it sound like long-haired cavalry officer Oliver Cromwell should have been on the "cavalier" side.

[@midshipman8654]

Octavian the emperor is another channel relivent example. China is another as its a name for a single dynasty that came and went. Others are cato the elder/younger.

[@Mikeos42]

The "Democratic Republican" Party of early US history called themselves Republicans, but were only distantly related to the current Republican Party founded in the 19th century. It's another good example of a term applied retroactively by historians for clarity.

[@midshipman8654]

byzantine can also mean “of byzantium”, that is, the state based in byzantium/constantinople/istanbul, which IS very descriptive of a core characteristic throughout its existence. That it was a state whose lynchpin was that city. Its also practical given that Rome itself, mostly through Papal power, was an active polity doing its own thing throughout the period. Kind of like how we retroactively use the term “Octavian” when he didnt go by that name in his life. or more extremely callinging china china even though that was the name of a single dynasty. Saying that it wasn’t the roman empire would be wrong, but byzantine is also a very descriptively useful way to refer to it as too. its a pragmatics thing.

[@tylerellis9097]

Aw shit here we go again

[@jonathanadams8835]

Although "Empire of Constantinopolitans" was never used, one of the names Western Europe used for the Medieval Roman Empire in the 13th Century was the "Empire of Constantinople". It was your duty to attend to the business of your legation and to give careful consideration, not to the capture of the Empire of Constantinople... --Pope Innocent III on the Fourth Crusade.

[@RomabooRamblings]

True, it's even in the title of the Liudprand's account of his embassy

[@vladprus4019]

Also it's worth to note that "Latin empire" wasn't the name of the state, it's emperor it had three official variants of the title "Emperor of Romania (land of the Romans)", "Emperor of Constantinopole" and "Emperor of Romans"

[@Popepaladin]

@@vladprus4019 I think this is a pretty interesting point. Since Latin Empire is also a later name given by historians, should we also just call it Roman Empire? I think the historiographical name is useful, when you read "Latin Empire", you immediately know which sixty year period it refers to.

[@alanpennie8013]

​​@@RomabooRamblings You can see why the term Byzantine Empire came into common usage. It's just a slightly different (shorter) rendering of Constantinopolitan Empire

[@mg4361]

In Croatian, "bizantinski" (a.k.a. byzantine) can mean sneaky, corrupt and untrustworthy. Having said that, we were taught the usual nomenclature of eastern empire until the time of Heraclius and Byzantine afterwards. It also fits neatly with the settlement of the Slavs in the area and the start of our own national history.

[@damianpaez]

Based Croatians lmao

[@dawnbreakermultiverse941]

I do still find it crazy that "Romans" actually still existed into the early 20th century like when Greece took Lemnos a couple children encountered the greek soldiers and the conversation went like this Some of the children ran to see what Greek soldiers looked like. ‘‘What are you looking at?’’ one of them asked. ‘‘At Hellenes,’’ the children replied. ‘‘Are you not Hellenes yourselves?’’ a soldier retorted. ‘‘No, we are Romans." the children replied. Like that actually crazy Romans still existed in the 1910s and 20s.

[@paulmayson3129]

For God's sake, why is everyone repeating that anecdote? This comes from the personal account of Panagiotis Peter Charanis, a Byzantinologist Greek-American who was born in Lemnos in 1906-1908, and was just 4 years old when the Greek State liberated Lemnos from the Ottoman Empire in 1912. Having not even started grade school at the time, I think we should not base a rift of Hellenic and Rhomaic Identity on the mistake of a little child. We Modern Greeks still call ourselves not only "Hellenes" and Greekness as "Hellenesmos", but also as "Rhomeoi" and Greekness as "Rhomeosene", that means "Modern Romans" and "Modern Romanness".

[@KevinJohnson-cv2no]

LARP is apparently all that's needed to claim legitimate identity in history lol

[@BorninPurple]

Turks still refer to Greek speaking muslims in Turkey and Cypriot Greeks as "Rum". Cypriot Greeks refer to themselves still as "Romioi" (being Greek Cypriot myself)

[@majorhumbert676]

Gypsies refer to themselves as roman. I know it's supposedly refers to a different word, but it sounds exactly like "roman" in some languages. It makes me wonder why they picked that word out of all words. Romanians named their nation after Rome.

[@dersuddeutschesumpf5444]

​@@KevinJohnson-cv2no That's exactly how cultural identity works, yes

[@starkillerdude1914]

Better we keep it Byzantine rather than calling it turkish history

[@Darius78659]

Historical accuracy and truths are important than your prejudices. “Byzantine” empire is the real Roman Empire.

[@olbiomoiros]

No one calls it Turkish. The Ottoman rule came by after brutal conquest and brought massacres and discrimination to those who called themselves «Roman ». they had a different culture, religion, language, all foreign to anything Roman. They were a foreign invading people from Central Asia. Calling the Turks Roman is pure stupidity.

[@olbiomoiros]

It’s Roman. Its official name was Βασίλειον τῶν Ῥωμαίων (Kingdom of the Romans). End of story. The term Byzantium is nothing but an anachronism.

[@greekcomenterperson446]

I think he implies that turks are going to start apropriating it like they try to do with the anatolian peoples like the hittites and the trojans

[@andreamarino6010]

​@@olbiomoirosNot supporting the ottomans claim and neither their empire but, come on. Rome did the same to many populations, Carthage was yeeted out of history, Gauls genocided, Jews expelled and so on. The negative view of the ottomans come mainly becaude they were muslims. And ofc their actions from ww1

[@voinea7]

This makes me think maybe "the byzantine period/age of the roman empire" could be a decent phrasing to keep things clear.

[@JoJoKaiser1504]

Man, these videos are so well made that they enrich my taste buds and quench my thirst for historical questions I wanted answered, but never manage to fully visualise what it is that I want to know. History is so cool man...

[@sethgaston8347]

Always love your use of nuance. Another great video 🎉

[@gregoryheers2633]

YES!! AMAZING JOB!! THANK YOU!! You have said everything that I have been thinking and more! Thank you for saving me the trouble of debunking all these arguments myself, and doing a better job at it than I would’ve ever done! It might be the first time I get so excited over a KZbin video. It was simply incredible; it was as if you had been reading my mind. In a way it’s not too surprising, since we have been reading the same book! “Romanland“ is one of my favorites. I have already shared this video with over a dozen friends. God bless you!

[@user-qd4td7yb8e]

God doesn't side with Mary idolaters. "Queen of heaven" is irrefutably a goddess title. Satan counterfeited the "church."

[@TAKE_BACK_BRITAIN]

@@user-qd4td7yb8e I’m not sure what this has to do with anything but that’s low-key based. Catholics worship Mary more than they do Jesus.

[@user-qd4td7yb8e]

@@TAKE_BACK_BRITAIN The connection is obvious: the Byzantines claimed to be Christian but they were heretics for the reason I gave which is in a very long list.

[@gregoryheers2633]

@@user-qd4td7yb8e Completely irrelevant and ignorant comment. If you have anything of essence that would like to say that’s actually on the topic, I am listening.

[@borisfrlic]

Bc Catholicism is only christian on paper

[@potat2976]

In Egypt and i think also the entire arab world, we use roman for the byzantine empire when it controlled egypt and the levant and north africa, once it lost it we just called it byzantium, or just idk we use it interchangeably

[@noahtylerpritchett2682]

I personally strictly avoid using the word Byzantine. No fucking shit the word was invented by Germans to pretend Germans are Roman do to holy Roman Empire. and only idiots would seriously call Germans as Roman in the dumbest intellectual deficiency. So I avoid the term Byzantine to my own. And would prefer saying Roman. That's how I do it.

[@compatriot852]

Makes sense. When the Byzantine empire lost most of its land, Latin had stopped being widely used, the entire governmental system changed, etc.

[@noahtylerpritchett2682]

@@compatriot852 if the United States lost lands the people and government doesn't cease to be American. The Roman Empire likewise doesn't cease being Roman. Say the "Anglo" culture of America is diminished and the capital DC and the original 13 colonies lost and Spanish gains predominance, the citizens are still American and the culture while changed still has influence from the foundation. There's to acknowledge it gain Mexican Spanish influence. If we compare a US and Mexico relationship to Greco-Romans. My analogy has flaws and isn't perfect but it's what I'm saying

[@imperator7828]

>implying the HRE reassembled the original boards to start with? It had the same exact changes you applied to "Byzantium"

[@MegaUMU]

Love the conclusion to the B-word. Its really ez to use as the b-word is easier to write than Eastern Roman Empire as the b-word already references the medieval roman period of the remaining eastern Roman Empire. I do think i have still lingering negative feels about the word as its often used to deny the "Byzantines" the romanes they lay litterally decent from (using the Theseus analogy ofc)

[@ironinquisitor3656]

More on the "They spoke Greeeeek not Latin so not Roman!" The upper-class Romans even in the late Republic in the 1st century bc spoke Greek as a second language. So does that mean Julius Caesar wasn't Roman since he also spoke Greek? Eastern Rome ruled over Latin speaking lands in it's history such as southern Spain southern Italy and Sardinia and parts of the Balkans. When the Romans conquered the Greek lands was it not part of the Empire? Same with Gaulish lands when the subjects spoke Gaulish? Even Romans in Rome referred to Greek and Latin as "their languages."

[@jaydenburgher2651]

I mean also early Rome fought wars against the Latins and denied them citizenship for a long time. Even in the time of Cicero, since he was not literally from the city of Rome, but from latinum he was often called a foreigner. So it's not like Roman identity was synonymous with speaking Latin

[@jaydenburgher2651]

Also you had emperors of Byzantium like Justin and Justinian who's first language was Latin

[@tylerellis9097]

@@jaydenburgher2651 Justinian himself recognized Greek as the Modern Roman language and labeled Latin “their ancestral language”

[@InAeternumRomaMater]

​@@jaydenburgher2651 Because they were Thraco-Romans, literally the Romans of the Proto-Romanians

[@InAeternumRomaMater]

​@@tylerellis9097 Where is that?

[@byzansimp]

The best point raised in this video is the statement that "having one identity does not bar you from having another one". Being Greek in culture does not also stop you from being a Roman, who adheres to Roman laws, traditions and customs as much as a Latin-speaking Italian from the Republican era. It is true that Greek learning was the main form of education in the Eastern Roman Empire and the average student would learn Sophokles or Plato over Latin writers such as Plautus or Cicero, but these students still embraced their Roman identity. Hellenism as a thing didn't really start until the 11th or the 12th century, among the Komnenian literati when the Empire came into much contact with the Latins, who claimed the Roman identity for themselves and degraded the Eastern Romans as "effeminate Greeks", so the Komnenian scholars developed their Ancient Greek heritage as an anti-Latin reaction, and this identity strengthened even more after the Latin conquest of Constantinople. The Hellenic identity increased over time in the later years of the Empire, but the Romans as a whole (not counting just a few individuals) never dropped the Roman identity either, as best exemplified in the final speech of Constantine XI Palaiologos ("descendants of the Greeks and the Romans").

[@viperking6573]

Also he said " we will win just as we fought Carthage, Gaul, the Bulgars " or something like that, clearly stating that the idea of being the Roman Empire and being Roman citizens was the main one

[@Viddao]

In the Medieval Byzantine context, saying that Greeks aren't Romans is about as silly as saying Californians aren't Americans or Texans aren't Americans.

[@KevinJohnson-cv2no]

It's not really the Greek vs Roman identity that people care about; identities can co-exist if they compliment each other. It's the Pagan vs Christian divide that mainly trashes the culture of the empire, robbing it of the martial vigor that defined the Roman polity & pacifying the state. "Byzantine" has become a by-word for pointless rituals and ceremonies which have no real world impact; there's a reason for that.

[@SpartanLeonidas1821]

@@viperking6573source?

[@SeanHH1986]

plenty of greek culture fanboys from even the legend of the creation of rome. they believed they were trojans

[@Pan472]

As a Greek myself: in short, we call ourselves Romans (Romaioi, Romioi). This is how we identify ourselves, even to this day, even by a decreasing rate. Does that mean we're the actual Romans themselves? No, everyone knows we're Greeks. We're just identifying as Romans, because the ERE passed into our hands for 1123 years. And before 330, Greeks, due to Caracalla, could call themselves Roman citizens. That's why being a "Rhomaios" is an integral part of Hellenic identity. Because the Roman Empire was basically handed down to us, and we continued it. Through this alone, it shows that even if all other aspects of the empire were Greek (except law), it didn't stop being Roman.

[@ThomasGazis]

You definitely are wrong! The Greeks despised the Romans, seeing them as illiterate brutes!

[@skylinelover9276]

As they said Culture is more important than DNA... Because there is no such thing as pure race, Europeans especially in Mediterranean are mostly mixed European Hunter gatherers DNA, Neolithic Anatolians farmers DNA etc... And the East Romans is just like that, but they represent and enriched the Hellenic civilization not Latin, Albanian, Bulgarian culture and traditions.... That's the hard reality

[@helpIthinkmylegsaregone]

Romanians have entered the chat

[@joraninator]

my super sexy solid argument for naming it Byzantium is: Its sounds cool. source: It is known.

[@marshallscot]

It is very satisfying to see that Adam Conover has become the catchall mascot for midwits.

[@TrajGreekFire]

With all that old historian bashing imagine if he dared to criticize Majorian while defending Ricimer, that would be pretty cool

[@Michael_the_Drunkard]

He is right though

[@TrajGreekFire]

@@Michael_the_Drunkard Gibbon? nah

[@geordiejones5618]

The simple answer is that being Roman meant different things over time, much like being Egyptian or Persian or German or Chinese or Indian. All those areas and the Mediterranean have seen a lot of ethno-cultures who identify with a particular name or origin or modern occupation, but its all just lines on a map dictacted by military posture and political clout. Every two hundred or so years of Roman history there's enough change that some from the early Republic wouldn't like the middle Republic, who feel the same about the early Principate. Being "Roman" used to mean you were a wealthy landowner who lived in the original boundaries of Rome, but Caracalla extended that identity to anyone who wanted within the pre crisis imperial borders. Being Roman is not one thing because if you brought a 200 BCE era Roman to the height of the Principate, he would be horrified to see barbarians (non Italians) in the legions, the Senatorial class neutered, and obscene displays of decadence, wealth and excess. If they saw the era of Constantine he'd die of an aneurysm. Every Republican would look upon the Roman world with shame, the same way the Greeks looked upon the post Phillip/Alexander Hellenic era.

[@heofnorenown]

You could have just said that culture changes over time, and the meaning of belonging to a particular culture changes as the culture changes.

[@pipebomber04]

A roman is a citizen of the roman state. Italians and latins were also not initially romans until they were granted citizenship. The southern italians were greek by the way and acquired citizenship earlier than other greeks.

[@Meirstein]

All the empires you listed will almost always have an additional name tacked on to denote the change in time or ruling government. For instance, the Achaemenid Persians were the ones with Cyrus and Darius, while the Parthian and Sassanid Persians were the ones who fought against Rome. The 25th Dynasty of Egypt was ruled by Nubians while Ptolemaic Egypt was ruled by Greeks. The German Empire had the Kaiser, while Weimar Germany was what came after. If somebody wants to use Byzantine as a descriptor of the Roman empire after the loss of Rome and transition to a Greek-speaking, orthodox christian empire, they'd have a pretty good foundation for doing so.

[@skylinelover9276]

As they said Culture is more important than DNA... Because there is no such thing as pure race, Europeans especially in Mediterranean are mostly mixed European Hunter gatherers DNA, Neolithic Anatolians farmers DNA etc... And the East Romans is just like that, but they represent and enriched the Hellenic civilization not Latin, Albanian, Bulgarian culture and traditions.... That's the hard reality

[@onemoreminute0543]

This video honestly deserves more attention. The second half focusing on how the Romans in 'Byzantium' saw themselves and how there was actually a clear difference between 'ethnic' Romans and 'citizen' Romans is fascinating in regard to understanding the whole thing.

[@Cheesenommer]

Now I want to hear more about Kaldelis hot takes

[@rockstar450]

He's one of those contrarians that doesn't think Justinian wasn't a top 10 emperor, which falls appart the more you learn about his reign.

[@alanpennie8013]

He's the most interesting Byzantinist currently writing.

[@DrRomaioi]

Would love you to do a video on how the Roman state viewed Italians and the papal states after charlemagne, whether they were still Romans in their eyes or increasingly foreign like the franks.

[@baneofbanes]

In the later stages of the Byzantine empire Latin sort of evolved to be equivalent of Barbarian. Also it was common across the western Mediterranean to call all Western Europeans Franks regardless of who they actually were.

[@wewenang5167]

Nah, the Roman consider the Papal state as barbarian because...they were literally decendence of Goth and Lombards from Germany. All the Popes were not ethnically Italian.

[@rockstar450]

Charlemagne was a Frank and never intended for the Roman title to be significant. His son only inherited it by accident since the brothers died. Italy was already absorbing Germanic influence before the west fell

[@strategos1871]

​@@wewenang5167 If we ignore the fact that the italians (both medieval and modern) speak the most latin language, are culturally closest to classical latin, base their laws off roman law, practice the same christian rite as they did as subjects of rome and are genetically the closest to classical romans, then you might be correct in calling italians germanic. Just because they were conquered by a small band of barbarians doesnt mean the romanness of the italians was lost.

[@BlueLena]

They were considered barbarians and were hated.

[@dziosdzynes7663]

People are just too biased/clouded by modern countries. "greece is like ancient greece and italy is rome", when in truth it's far more complicated and obviously the statement is fundamentally wrong. people who actually research will eventually see that "greeks" and "romans" are parts of the same bronze age tribes. modern people/historians just like to make things simpler even if it means being wrong for the sake of politics and clinging on to false identities.

[@viperking6573]

Imo as an italian, I also always thought of other romance speakers to have as much roman heritage as italy does, I don't understand why people narrow it down to Italy. Italy was the center for many years, but in many years it also wasn't, plus then Italy came under the control of different cultures, Franks, Lombards, Eastern Romans themselves, so is much more like a mosaic than a single color itself. Of course today I see how Greece and many countries around the Balkans have roman heritage, but many people do not!

[@SpartanLeonidas1821]

@@viperking6573Greeks are the Heirs of the Hellenes & Romioi! That is undeniable & we laugh at anyone that tries to prove otherwise! 🤣

[@jonmiller6787]

100% agreed. If your Turkish, it's the Ottomans, if you're Iranian it's the Achaemenids, if you're Lebanese it's the Phoenicians. I think people just pick the oldest coolest national power that had vaguely the same ethnic heritage to point to to be like "See? We had a cool ancient empire too!!"

[@Phaedon53]

It is called continuity , I think , and some nations around the world can, without any doubt, claim it as their documented history. There's nothing wrong with that.

[@genovayork2468]

​@@jonmiller6787 Turkey is a direct successor of Ottomania in every sense of the word "direct". And the Achaemenid Empire and modern Iran have the same name and are inhabited by the same people.

[@YeS1711]

Great video. Thank you for your research and efforts!

[@thaneofwhiterun3562]

I mean, if we consider that an earlier Roman emperor granted citizenship to all subjects of the emoire. And that many of these emperors weren't exactly of Latin stock, like Aurelian who was Dacian and Julian the Apostate who straight up considered himself Greek. Then it is completely reasonable to accept that Byzantines, though they may speak Greek (not all of them, there were Latins in the Eastern Roman Empire, particularly on the Balkans) and be in a different land, were Romans all the same.

[@ShayPatrickCormacTHEHUNTER]

Citizens of the empire yes, romans no. The only romans are the italians of today.

[@skylinelover9276]

As they said Culture is more important than DNA... Because there is no such thing as pure race, Europeans especially in Mediterranean are mostly mixed European Hunter gatherers DNA, Neolithic Anatolians farmers DNA etc... And the East Romans is just like that, but they represent and enriched the Hellenic civilization not Latin, Albanian, Bulgarian culture and traditions.... That's the hard reality

[@sercravenmohead3631]

Just sounds like identity politics, Greeks larping as their conquerors. “Ey yo Popadapaulis, we wuz Romans n’ shiet”

[@MarianLuca-rz5kk]

​@@ShayPatrickCormacTHEHUNTER The Romans from the Italian Peninsula were much germanized by Goths, Lombards, Franks, Germans, for about 1000 years, until the Renaissance Italian Republics.

[@Rudero3]

One thing I want to add to this great video, the Byzantium/Byzantine usage, I'm a "Byzantine" Catholic. Though officially, we use the Constantinopolitan Rite, it's usually just abbreviated as Byzantine Rite. My specific church in the US, uses the term Byzantine to stress our difference from the Roman Catholics BUT to keep the ethnic tones out, we don't like to use Greek Catholic or even Ukrainian Greek Catholic, since the Byzantine Empire is Roman, and thus, comprised of more than just a single ethnicity. Attempts at changing the name have had some weird results. I was once attending liturgy at another one of my church's churches, like in direct jurisdiction, but it used the name "Eastern Catholic" and we had a family of Romans on vacation visit and they had NO IDEA what we were doing. I remember the mother saying "We thought it was Eastern Catholic as in eastern United States." FURTHERMORE, this is unique to my city I think, in like 2019, a massive priest abuse scandal was discovered in the Roman clergy, and our archbishop issued an order for us to use Byzantine as a term more, and for our priests to stop dressing like Roman priests and return to the Constantinople style of dress, to distance ourselves from our Roman neighbors in an attempt to preserve our Church. There was major fear that the Byzantine Catholics, the Ukrainian Greek Catholics, etc, would see protests and vandalism (like the Roman churches around here did) if they were considered "too Roman." I must also mention, my hometown is the capital of all "Byzantine" Catholics in the US, after the Soviet Union destroyed our original HQ in Ukraine, the clergy fled here and set up shop and the word Byzantine was specifically chosen to avoid the nationalistic tone that an ethnicity would have and Constantinopolitan was avoided because it's way too long and would just confuse everyone since if you look up Constantinople now, you find Istanbul, and that opens another huge debate. Love the video, I use the term Byzantine with extreme pride, to me, the first Byzantine emperor is Augustus Caesar, as there is an unbroken line from him all the way to Constantine XI. I've seen the term Romano-Byzantine Empire used, because calling it the Eastern Roman Empire sometimes makes people think its an offshoot, like the Holy Roman Empire was, rather than the actual empire itself, just like 1/2 of it, or by the like 800s, 1/5th of it. I do want to add, the idea that the Roman state changes over time but still remained Roman, can be paralleled to China. China went through many dynasties, Qin, Han, Wei, Jin, etc, etc, and they didn't stop being Chinese. The language transitioned from ancient Chinese, to Classical Chinese, to modern Mandarin. The laws changed and so did the structure. The Qin had a powerful prime minister and a militarily active emperor, the Han had 3 high officials, with divided abilities, and an emperor uninvolved in military affairs, and the last two dynasties, the Ming and Qing, had exceptionally large bureaucracies, large complex militaries, but the Qing was massive due to being expansionistic, while the Ming was more nationalist and decided to stay in China's preexisting borders for the most part. All those dynasties are STILL Chinese, just like all the transitions of the Romans are still Roman, as I said, unbroken line from Augustus to Constantine XI.

[@GrecoByzantine1821]

Byzantines were Greeks in everything and typically Romans only by name! 🤫 The Eastern Roman Empire was in language and civilization a Greek society. Bulgarians were Turkic or Slavs?Rus were Swedish or Slavs? Holy Roman Empire was Roman or Germanic empire?Moghuls were Turkic or Indians?Safavids were Turkic or Persians? Byzantines were Romans/Italics or Greeks? I can give many examples were a nation have a different origin from its initial name: 1)Bulgarians were initially a Turkic nation but gradually Slavicised so nowadays they consider themselves a Slavic and not a Turkic nation , 2)Moghuls had a Turco-Mongolic name but it was an Indian Empire in language, ethnicity and culture, 3)Russians name is derived from the Rus' people, who were a Swedish tribe, and where the three original members of the Rurikid dynastry came from but nowadays they are an East Slavic nation! 4)Safavids were initially a Turkic/Kurdish dynasty but gradually their nation and whole dynasty became fully persianised! 5)Holy Roman Empire was an empire made by Germanic people, who they talk Germanic dialects and had a Germanic culture, so the were "Romans" typically only by name! Same way the 6)Eastern Roman Empire initially was a Roman Empire but gradually fully Hellenized in every aspect like language, culture and also main ethnicity. Linguistically, Byzantine or medieval Greek is situated between the Hellenistic (Koine) and modern phases of the language. Since as early as the Hellenistic era, Greek had been the lingua franca of the educated elites of the Eastern Mediterranean, spoken natively in the southern Balkans, the Greek islands, Asia Minor, and the ancient and Hellenistic Greek colonies of Southern Italy, the Black Sea, Western Asia and North Africa. At the beginning of the Byzantine millennium, the koine (Greek: κοινή) remained the basis for spoken Greek and Christian writings, while Attic Greek was the language of the philosophers and orators. Byzantine was generally known to many of its Western contemporaries as the Empire of the Greeks. This was because of the dominance of the Greek language, culture, and population. Greek was not only the official language but also the language of the church, literature, and commercial transactions. Most historians agree that the defining features of their civilization were: 1) Greek language, culture, literature, and science, 2) Roman law and tradition, 3) Christian faith. The Byzantine Greeks were, and perceived themselves as, heirs to the culture of ancient Greece, the political heirs of imperial Rome, and followers of the Apostles. The Byzantine Greeks were the Greek-speaking Eastern Romans throughout Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. They were the main inhabitants of the lands of the Byzantine Empire (Eastern Roman Empire), of Constantinople and Asia Minor (modern Turkey), the Greek islands, Cyprus, and portions of the southern Balkans, and formed large minorities, or pluralities, in the coastal urban centres of the Levant and northern Egypt. Throughout their history, the Byzantine Greeks self-identified as Romans (Greek: Ῥωμαῖοι, romanized: Rhōmaîoi), but are referred to as "Byzantine Greeks" in modern historiography. Latin speakers identified them simply as Greeks or with the term Romaei. Use of the Greek language was already widespread in the eastern parts of the Roman Empire when Constantine moved its capital to Constantinople, although Latin was the language of the imperial administration. From the reign of Emperor Heraclius (r. 610-641), Greek was the predominant language amongst the populace and also replaced Latin in administration. At first, the Byzantine Empire had a multi-ethnic character, but following the loss of the non-Greek speaking provinces with the 7th century Muslim conquests it came to be dominated by the Byzantine Greeks, who inhabited the heartland of the later empire: modern Cyprus, Greece, Turkey, and Sicily, and portions of southern Bulgaria, Crimea, and Albania. Over time, the relationship between them and the West, particularly with Latin Europe, deteriorated. Byzantine Greeks weren't Latin/Romans. You should know the period when Byzantines with Belisarius reconquered Italian peninsula. They even ruled Rome itself for more than 220 years. This period is well known for its Greek Popes! They called those Popes Greeks for a reason! Simply because they were GREEKS!🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷 Ethnicity is not always connected to religion. Ksekolla to mualo sou. You probably has zero knowledge about the ancient Indo-Greek Kingdom who converted to Buddhism. Is that means that after their conversion they ceased to be Greeks? Of course no, they were still Greeks! kzbin.infogicXr7WsTyE?si=XqvhmcCiiyZyNHMq Ancient Greek Buddhist Kingdoms. They still considered themselves as Greeks and not Indians. If you still don't understand that then you are a moron. Same way the Byzantines Christians were Greeks and NOT italic-latin-romans. kzbin.info/www/bejne/e6XVo2N7ap6aZ6Msi=tYUSkcV7xrZS1j4K

[@Rudero3]

@@GrecoByzantine1821 first I'm aware of Greco-Bactrians, second Romans aren't an ethnicity, they're a citizenry. Emperor Caracala I think is the one to extend citizenship to all in the empire. I'm having a hard time understanding your thesis statement because it doesn't sync up with my thesis statement. Also the Mughals are Mongols, direct descendants of Genghis Khan. The Safavids are multi ethnic, at least in their ruling family, since they had Kurdish, Azeri, and Pontic Greek heritage. I don't remember calling you a moron as I don't even know who you are or how your comment connects to mine. You seem to really be caught up on a modern concept of ethnicity. Or did you interpret my statement as anti Greek? Also, the Bulgarians are not Turkic, the Bulgars are. You cannot assign ethnicity so quickly to a people who took a few centuries to form. Like the Macedonian Slavs, they're historically protean. You seem real hung up on the Greekness of the Byzantines/Eastern Romans, which is fine but they can't be exclusively Greek, empires cannot be mono-ethnic states. Which is why Roman and Byzantine are not ethnic terms. If we look at the Byzantine Empire by the time Emperor Basil II died, you have a state that includes Greeks, Bulgarians (the Slavic people who have assimilated the Turkic Bulgars), Italians, Croatians, Bosnians, Albanians, Georgians, Armenians, assuredly some Turkic tribes that were migrating into Anatolia, assuredly Arabs that got left behind when the Caliphate retracted, Jews, and Vlach/Aromanians, and that's just naming the ones that come to mind. The Emperor of the Romans is not not the Emperor of the Greeks, if he was just that, the others ethnicities wouldn't be too thrilled to take orders from him. Did you even watch our man's video or did you just come here to fight in the comments lol. Straight up, I don't even know if you're replying to my message specifically or replying to the video and accidentally commented through mine. Our topics aren't even the same lol.

[@user-hq3ht2hp6x]

A very interesting historical fact. In the late Ming Dynasty in China, a military book recorded that a Lumi(噜密) ambassador brought a matchlock with a special long barrel. This was different from the original matchlock in China. Its power could A little larger than the Spanish and Chinese matchlocks.Lumi is actually the transliteration of Roma, but when we look at the illustrations printed in the book, you will find that there is an Ottoman with a turban on it.🤣 It should be said that at that time, both the Arab world and China referred to all people in Asia Minor as Romans.

[@Rudero3]

@@user-hq3ht2hp6x I've actually heard this story before, yeah, Lumi is close to Luoma, which is modern Mandarin for Romans. And yeah, the western portion of Anatolia has been called Rum for a while. The Balkans were further called Rumelia, if I am spelling that correctly. Thus, it would be easy to say that most of the Balkans people have a claim to the Romano-Byzantine legacy, since empires cannot be mono-ethnic.

[@ansibarius4633]

@@Rudero3 "second Romans aren't an ethnicity, they're a citizenry." That's a bit too easy. They were both a citizenry and, at least initially, a people (or a subset of the Latin people) with their own language, religion, traditions, etc. All of these were encapsulated in the "mos maiorum" that kept defining Roman self-perception well into the empire. Also, pointing to the fact that the emperors kept extending the citizenship infinitely as proof that Romanness was merely an administrative matter (as the argument seems to be) is a bit of a one-sided approach, as it ignores the internal opposition that did exist against this liberal approach to citizenship and identity, most notably from the Senate. It was the policy of the emperors, and they won, but the fact that they won does not necessarily make their more pragmatic, maybe even cynical, perspective on what it meant to be Roman the only valid one.

[@kaloarepo288]

"Byzantine" is purely a useful historical academic term to describe this Greek speaking eastern extension of the Roman empire - the term has its drawbacks but that's no different to other useful historical academic terms like "Merovingian", "Carolingian" Plantagenet," "Angevin" "Dutch", "Holy Roman Empire", "Viking" and many many more.

[@wardafournello]

Rome .From the Greek word ῥώμη (rhṓmē), which means strength,this is how it is written in ancient texts. Rome was founded based on Greek myths, and the kings of Rome were of Greek (Corinthian - Lacedaemonian) and Etruscan origin. The name Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantine Empire is a Greek theme.And since the Greeks use both names, this is what is accepted. The word rome - ῥώμη , followed the seat of the emperor, the military power, that's why Constantinople was called New Rome, and after the fall of Constantinople, Moscow was called the Third Rome.

[@corpi8784]

BTW the Roman Empire was never a nation it was always an Empire (multicultural & multireligious) Even the early Roman republic was not a nation state between Etruscans, Greek polities and different Italic tribes.

[@RomabooRamblings]

It's up to debate how much on an empire it was in the later Byzantine perios

[@corpi8784]

@@RomabooRamblings It was up to the 12th century The final phase after 4th crusade/ 1204 AD sure is debatable

[@TrajGreekFire]

@@corpi8784 we know that Andronikos III had latins around him and John VI allowed cuman refugees to settle in the empire there were also venetians and geonese settled permanently in biggest cities if Andronikos III didn't died prematurely I can see Archea, Rhodes and duchy of Archipelago reintegrated into the empire with their greeko-frank populations

[@minutemansam3122]

​@@RomabooRamblingsthey had an emperor as their head. That makes them an empire in the traditional sense

[@marsaeternum1003]

Easrern Rome, Roman Empire or Medieval Roman Empire, anything else is an insult.

[@hashemaljarah2560]

I am from Jordan, and I used to hear the word “Byzantine” from KZbin, and our educational curricula call the Byzantines “dawlat al-rum (the Roman state)" and after that they started writing “dawlat al-rum (the Roman state)” in parentheses, the Byzantine state, Our fathers & grandfathers & a few of the current generations still call the Byzantine Empire “dawlat al-rum (the Roman state)" & The Byzantine land is called "Bilad al-Rum (the Romania/Roman land)", and fact some still called the Mediterranean Sea the "Bahr Rum (Roman Sea)". I'm sorry for any spelling mistakes.

[@onetwothreefourfive12345]

As a big fan of the Eastern Roman Empire, I use both. I know some people use "Byzantium" as an insult, but when I say it I just think of it a word for the Romans once Byzantion became their centre of power. And practically, in writing there is something called "graceful variance", which is where you use a different word for the same thing for the sake of variety. Saying "Eastern Roman Empire" every time is not only longer but can be repetitive

[@stargazer-elite]

Perfectly said

[@orrorsaness5942]

I use Rhomania

[@genovayork2468]

​@@orrorsaness5942 Which is wrong, the "h" is futile, it is Romania.

[@orrorsaness5942]

@@genovayork2468 ok! Romania

[@healthmain]

Perfect tl:dl summary at 28:00. They are Byzantines because the western European powers had their own agenda in denying the "Romaness" of the Eastern Roman Empire.

[@kompo1012]

How much of the local population considered themselves Romans instead of say Spartan, Athenian, Anatolian, Syrian, Egyptian etc..

[@rhomaioscomrade]

"And because there are two natural lords in the world - one secular, and one spiritual - that this little island had: the Basileus of Constantinople and the patriarch of the great Antioch, before the Latins took it. Because of that, it was of use to know perfect Rhomeika* to send scriptures to the Basileus, and good Syriac**. And this is how their children would learn, and how the secretary business would carry on with Syriac and Rhomeika, until the Lusignans took over the place, and they would learn Frankish*** thereafter. And Rhomeika barbarized****, as things are today, and we write Frankish and Rhomeika, since in the world they don't know what we're speaking." *Greek, **Aramaic (possibly liturgical), ***Middle French, ****they got mixed (vocabulary-wise) - Χρονικόν [Κύπρου] (Chronicle [of Cyprus], Leontios Machairas, c. 1458

[@WagesOfDestruction]

Let me give you a personal experience, my grandmother's nationality identification was British. My grandmother was born in Russia and immigrated to Australia in her forties during the late 1940s. She was not a Christian, did not speak English much or well, she not even like English food or culture. Never went to the United Kingdom yet she consistently self-identified as British. This was quite common at the time.

[@pyropulseIXXI]

A nation is a group of people; groups of people are often named for the location, and when a new people move in, they 'take' the name despite not being of that group of people. But virtually all Europeans are apart of the same 'family' with virtually all of them being from Germanic tribes; Celts and Gauls were just earlier Germanic tribes.

[@user-qd4td7yb8e]

The United Kingdom doesn't exist. Dumbocracy and Kingdom are mutually exclusive. A king is a man with the final word, and maximum authority, among mortals. Modern so-called monarchs are more like jesters on par with the Burger King. But dumb people want the glory of the past while gullibly accepting the stupidity of the present; in this case, that bandwagon fallacy, demoncracy. Liberalism is poison.

[@user-qd4td7yb8e]

​@@pyropulseIXXII am not Germanic. "Virtually all" is like saying virtually all Mongoloids are Chinese.

[@pyropulseIXXI]

@@user-qd4td7yb8e All white people come from ancient Germanic tribes

[@backisgabbeYT]

@@pyropulseIXXI While true that all Europeans have a shared ancestry saying Celts and Gauls (Gauls are Celts, so odd to differentiate them) were germanic tribes is wrong. Germanic is contemporary to Celts in ethnic history and quite far away from the common ancestor.

[@lyricusthelame9395]

14:56 surely it can't be that terri- SWEET JESUS, WHAT THE HELL?!

[@midshipman8654]

what would the eastern roman ethnic names be for those from and living in the area around rome and central italy? Surely there would be a difference there and there were still old senatorial families around living in the various italian city states and villas in the early middle ages as well Something like latinoi? And what about people actually livinh in rome? I think a big point is that Rome, the physical city, was still an active entity, so its kinda semantically troubling to differentiate what “kind” of roman you mean. Though you could say “papal” a lot… which is based in Rome and does also take much legitimacy from its romaness. Saying eastern rome is kind of confusing too because for most of the time there is no western roman empire. but the east part is still kinda necessary since it also in part distinguishes it from Rome physically.

[@Tata-ps4gy]

Well said! My take is this. The nation and state is Rome. The period in which Constantinople was the capital of Rome is called "Byzantine Period". Noone thinks that the Napoleonic Empire isn't French because we call it Napoleonic France. "Byzantine Rome" could refere to Rome during the Byzantine Period, the third period of Roman history (fourth counting the shirt monarchy).

[@Phaedon53]

"ἀλλὰ μετὰ κυρίων καὶ αὐθεντῶν αὐτῶν καὶ ἀπογόνων Ἑλλήνων καὶ Ῥωμαίων........ἐλπίδα καὶ χαρὰν πάντων τῶν Ἑλλήνων ." "...descendants of Hellenes and Romans .....hope and joy of all the Hellenes." From the last speech of emperor Κωνσταντίνος Παλαιολόγος.

[@gregoryheers2633]

That’s literally from the last day of the Empire’s life. In my estimation, Constantine was trying to appeal to all his subjects, including those with Hellenizing tendencies (mainly the intelligentsia, who had begun heading in a more Hellenic direction ever since the Fourth Crusade).

[@Phaedon53]

@gregoryheers2633 That is only one of the many sources in that direction. The Hellenization of the Empire was already on tracks since the 7th century , after the establishment of Greek as the official language. When paganism stopped being a threat , even the self-identifying terminology got enriched with the terms Greek and Hellenic. The 4th crusade was surely the final strike on Romanitas. The Nicaean Empire , the Despotate of Epirus, etc , were purely Greek states.

[@ntonisa6636]

That "speech” fragment, which many love quoting to death in these pointless youtube polemics, and in fact the entire siege account part of that chronicle has long been proven to have been added by Makarios Melissenos over a century after the events. It may be useful in demonstrating what the bishop of Monemvasia wanted to propagate to his audience in the late 1500s but it does very little to demonstrate the defunct empire's ideology or what Constantine could had actually told his troops.

[@Phaedon53]

@@ntonisa6636 That is one out of many, dear Antonio. Since you are Greek , you know the facts and the sources , right? www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/romi/eikones/smerdaleos_2/APAT9SMERD01.jpg www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/romi/eikones/smerdaleos_2/APAT9SMERD08.jpg www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/romi/eikones/smerdaleos_2/APAT9SMERD09.jpg www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/romi/eikones/smerdaleos_2/APAT9SMERD10.jpg www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/romi/eikones/smerdaleos_2/APAT9SMERD11.jpg www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/romi/eikones/smerdaleos_2/APAT9SMERD14.jpg www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/romi/eikones/smerdaleos_2/APAT9SMERD17.jpg www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/romi/eikones/smerdaleos_2/APAT9SMERD18.jpg www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/romi/eikones/smerdaleos_2/APAT9SMERD19.jpg To name a few...

[@gilpaubelid3780]

​@@gregoryheers2633Then your estimation would be incorrect because there are plenty of sources from the entirety of the byzantine period where Byzantines are clearly saying that they are Greeks. And you're saying that actual Greeks had "hellenizing tendencies"? Considering the fact that they were Greeks it was much more than just a "tendency".

[@olbiomoiros]

Φῦλον* is a tribe, φύλλον is a leaf.

[@cosmopolitanbay9508]

I usually mention it as the Eastern Roman empire, as a synonym of the Byzantine empire, but change over to the latter, saving myself an extra word :)) But medieval Roman empire is a nice term as well. Years ago I found the term 'Byzantine commonwealth' used by e scholar from the university of Texas. It opens the door to a new reality and explains quite a bit.

[@darkforce6763]

I definitely suggest reading the work Ρωμηοσύνη (romanism/romanitas) by John Romanides. He makes the exact same arguments with a different approach (combining the theological history of the Roman and Frankish states and explains much of the origins of the dispute.

[@paulmayson3129]

Rhomeosene is just Modern Romanness as it survives in Greece. But I would abstain from using the term for Medievel Romanness, for the simple reason that the Medieval Romans never used the word.

[@darkforce6763]

Ρωμηοσύνη is simply a romaic term for the Romanitas. Its not exclusive to the modern neogreek "identity" but it goes way back in our culture. In modern times it has the additional context of the need to return to our Roman roots and reject the neogreek identity (it also means bravery and honesty in many cases too). @@paulmayson3129

[@genovayork2468]

John Romanides? Seriously?

[@darkforce6763]

Ναι. Υπάρχει πρόβλημα; @@genovayork2468

[@skylinelover9276]

As they said Culture is more important than DNA... Because there is no such thing as pure race, Europeans especially in Mediterranean are mostly mixed European Hunter gatherers DNA, Neolithic Anatolians farmers DNA etc... And the East Romans is just like that, but they represent and enriched the Hellenic civilization not Latin, Albanian, Bulgarian culture and traditions.... That's the hard reality

[@cloudftw113]

I tend to use it interchangeably with the proper name of the Eastern Roman Empire or Roman Empire. Partially becuase Byzantium rolls of the tounge better than Eastern Roman Empire (which is lowkey a mouth full)

[@DonnellGreen]

So true and when you say Byzantium people automatically know you are talking about Purple Christian Rome

[@cloudftw113]

@@DonnellGreen To be fair, I'd say that awareness mostly came relatively recently (at least for those who don't study and/or follow Roman history)

[@Galahad_Du_Lac]

I think historiographical terms are useful for avoiding confusion and categorizing as long as they aren’t taken as the actual historical name for the state.

[@gurigura4457]

It's a bit like referring to pre-imperial Augustus as "Octavian". Okay, the name he was known by was Julius Caesar - but that's just confusing when discussing that period. Byzantium is in a similar (if less necessary) situation.

[@guillecalahorra9546]

Just imagine having to write Eastern Roman Empire everytime instead of Byzantium, it is an historiographical term for a reason

[@KevinJohnson-cv2no]

@@gurigura4457 Except Octavian did not transform into a wholly different being upon taking the name Augustus. He didn't suddenly start believing in a new god, start speaking a different language, swap out the location of the palace, abandon Roman fashion & aesthetics, etc. so the comparison falls a bit flat.

[@Galahad_Du_Lac]

@@KevinJohnson-cv2no Acting like there was a sudden shift between the older Roman way of doing things and the Byzantine way of doing things is just silly. Also, Christianity was establish in Rome long before Byzantium was left as the rump state.

[@KevinJohnson-cv2no]

@@Galahad_Du_Lac If by "established in Rome" you mean carried by the whispers of slaves & peasants in back-alley provinces, then sure.

[@strategos1871]

Imo its best to still call it the roman empire but the people greco-roman. That way there is still the distinction of their unique culture while also not ignoring their romanità (like byzantine) or denying the italians theirs (like just using roman)

[@gamemaker1234]

Can you do a video on what it meant to be a 'Roman'? You touched on it a little here. But what were the values that a 'Roman' held and what differentiated a 'Roman' from a barbarian and did these change? It can be race, language or ethnicity because we see those born outside of Italy, who spoke Greek and were not traditionally Roman or Italian being referred to or referring themselves as Romans.

[@thaneofwhiterun3562]

I think I'm cool with using it interchangeably. Since it is a bit of an alternative term, kinda like calling the Portuguese Lusitanians. In my opinion, yeah, the empire changed. But it changed because of practical reasons. It carried it with itself the history and conscience and continuity of the old Roman world. I have read the Alexiad, and I understand that Anna did read the ancient historians and philosophers of Rome, and completely saw the Empire as an uninterrupted continuation of that tradition.

[@lilestojkovicii6618]

B word is Germ cope You cant convince me otherwise

[@geoDB.]

Graikos and ellin might be used similarly to how greeks today use different terms to refer to greeks and mainland greek as ellines (greek) and elladites (grecians)

[@lebendigesgespenst7669]

I think it’d be much simpler to call them the Eastern Roman Empire. Because, well, that’s what they were. And it quickly and easily distinguishes them as medieval Rome vs the older eras of the Roman Empire which people ususally think of first when hearing just “Roman Empire.”

[@TGeoMin]

You can call them as you like, but they are my ancestors not yours. I am from Mystras and i am a Greek.

[@morsecode980]

I have an analogy for the “Byzantines” Imagine the Roman Empire as a ship at sea. From its founding until 476, it was always captained by a Latin from Italy, eventually with a Greek as first mate. In 476, the Latin captain abandoned ship. The Greek first mate said “Well, I guess I’m in charge now” and took the wheel until 1453.

[@nikonikos8]

A question to this: we often overlook I believe the fact that even in ancient times pagan times the Roman mythology was born out of the Greek one. Not only the gods but also the myth of the very founding of the city of Rome itself. Meaning that Ancient Greece gave birth to Ancient Rome in its mythological aspect . Meaning that Palaiologos was not only a Roman emperor but that also even Sulla or Numa stood in a direct context with Achilles or Alexander the Great . Romans and Greeks were bound to each other from the very beginning onwards

[@nikonikos8]

Edit: I mean by that , that we can’t by example view the Athens of the 14 century differently from the Athens of the 1 century bc . In opposite of that, it is not correct to claim that the Augusta treverorum was able to legitimise the holy Roman emperors heritage . Greece was always without a doubt a elemental part of Roman culture history and mythological understanding . Never would had Vergilus put the newly conquered Germania minor into the same status of Romanitas as he would do so with the country from which his Minerva derived from

[@edmeister4031]

I've always made this equivalent: Let's say in the future, America decides to move the capital from the East Coast to the West Coast. Let's also say that the government decided to split administratively, and we now had two Presidents, one in DC, and one in L.A. Let's also say that throughout the years, the Western half allows for more immigration, and they also start speaking Spanish more than English, because it's easier, and because they have hybridized their culture and become more latino-focused, and even the majority of the populace becomes Catholic. The years go by, and the Western part of the country becomes richer, and more important, now bear in mind, that they are all still part of the same entity. So years pass, there's a lot of instability that happens in the East. Then, suddenly, after hundreds of years, let's say that Canada invades and dismantles the entirety of the US east of the Mississippi, but the Los Angeles centered Western US stays standing. Would that make the remaining Western, Catholica, Spanish-speaking US not the US? Or would it simply be that the US lost territory to an invading force?

[@haroldhayes4824]

Moving further forward, what if, over time, the Western Half collapses and LA is dominated by Canadians (who also now consider themselves Americans). To further distinguish themselves, the Western Americans decide to also embrace an ancient Indigenous identity. After the fall of LA, are the Westerners still Americans? Either that or we acknowledge that identities are ephemeral and ever-changing.

[@mybodyisamachine]

Would you call that country the United States?

[@MatthewStidham]

China was not Buddhist when it was founded. Is it still Chinese? Old English is incomprehensible, were Elizabeth I and Athelstan both monarchs of England? The United States has changed almost every aspect of our election system, our senators are now directly elected, we have completely rewritten the electoral college rules, and we have modified how our representatives are allocated by eliminating the 3/5 compromise, are we still the United States? Every country changes, just like the Roman Empire did. I agree, there is no clear point to say where the Eastern Roman Empire became the Byzantine empire. They are the same empire, just like how Biden and Washington are both Presidents of the United States.

[@MausOfTheHouse]

In my school we called it Byzantium because it's just much more convenient than saying "Eastern Roman Empire". We regonised them as the true heirs of Rome (since we're Georgian), but called them by the B-word regardless.

[@alanpennie8013]

Just so. There is a certain amount of ideological contamination around this name, but it's still a useful one.

[@ZillahThe]

I like how you said it's the Byzantine part of Roman history. That's how I look at it.

[@v4facade]

For those wondering about Anthony Kaldellis' top 10 Eastern Roman Emperors 10. Theodosius I 9. Leo III 8. Alexios I 7. Basil II (Yes, really) 6. Manuel I 5. John I 4. John III 3. Anastasius I 2. Constantine V 1. Constantine I Source: History of Byzantium Podcast Episode 265 I don't necessarily have any problem with the Emperors he chose, but their placement does kinda suck.

[@DimitriHellas]

i have no idea how you can say the unholy germanoid league has any similarities to Rome

[@Popepaladin]

If nothing else, HRE shares some continuity in ideals of universal monarchy with late Roman empire.

[@davidkasparov8043]

because unlike you, he actually has some knowledge of history rather than falling for the lame, false and tired epikk voltaire meme that microdick pop-history fanboys love to shill

[@jebbush2527]

Redditor

[@davidkasparov8043]

@@jebbush2527 le ebin voltaire meme is peak reddit: uneducated pop-history nonsense with no basis in reality, peddled by downs syndrome crayon-eaters that have deluded themselves into thinking they're smart because they have access to wikipedia. Cry harder.

[@jasoncassios7114]

One of your best videos to date. Relevant to the subject is this clip from a Greek TV documentary on the Greeks of Corsica, some 40 years ago. The old lady by the name Justine is asked by the Greek where she's from, to which the lady responds: "Ime Rhomaia!" ("I'm Roman!") Parts that weren't liberated by the Greek Army in the 20th century, still had their residents self-identify as Rhomaioi (Romans), calling their language "rhomeika". Yet Westerners, as well as neo-Greeks, still like to insist that the term "Rhomaios" was simply a self-identification on a purely citizen level Makes you wonder Link for the clip: kzbin.info/www/bejne/h3epnWiQn6aCes0si=-XDM05iieHZSSU2h&t=340

[@achilleuspetreas3828]

I don't know if you're Greek or not but Greeks called themselves Roman and Greek interchangeably until recently and I still know many fellow Greeks who do, including myself. It's not a dialectic, it can be both. Unlike this video, most people called them Greeks outside of the Frankish West. The Rus used Greki, the Bulgars Graikos, (Chalatar inscription), the Armenians used both Roman and Greek (Horrom and Yuna) (Emperor Romanos was addressed as Kaysrn Yunats' Romanos: Caesar of the Greeks Romanos) and the Georgians used exclusively Berdzen and their land Saberdzneti which also referred to Ancient Greece, and the Greeks....though it was used (at least once) to refer to Ancient Romans (Hadrian and his Roman-Armenian alliance), but the berdzulita the Berdzuli language, always meant Greek, as opposed to hromaelebrita, the Roman language aka Latin. One can be both Greek and Roman. Even Emperor Constantine Porphyrogennitos describes the Maniots as Hellenes only in reference to their recent pagan past, but ethnically as "ancient Romaioi" clearly using Roman to mean Greek. It wasn't always a synonym, but it very much could be.

[@jasoncassios7114]

@@achilleuspetreas3828 I am Greek, but I know how our Greco-Romans ancestors saw themselves; and they saw themselves as Romans. You have to take into consideration the average, everyday man, who called himself "Roman" not because he thought that he descended from the ancient Romans, but because that's what was handed down by his forefathers. Our Rhomaioi ancestors though of Constantine the Great as the leader of their nation, New Rome-Constantinople was their capital, and Rhomania (Land of the Romans) was their fatherland. And no, they didn't use the name Greeks and Romans interchangeably. I could point that the Arabs called us Rum, and they made a very clear distinction between the Yunan (ancient Greeks) and the Rum (Romans - "medieval Greeks"). If we always used it "interchangeably", then people even in the early 20th century would respond that they are "Rhomaioi" when asked by the Greek liberating soldiers. Whether we like it or not, our forefathers became romanised in consciousness, and they retained it even after the Greek Revolution of 1821, hence why they referred themselves as such in the Ottoman occupied lands. You couldn't be both a Hellene and a Roman, since Hellene denoted that someone was a pagan, the second worst thing after heretic. And for that daemonisation responsible is the Church. That's just how it is. Changing your national identity doesn't mean that the ancient Greeks vanished. People change their national identity when their old one dies out for various reasons. It's human nature to adapt in order not only to survive, but to thrive. You have to remember, that no matter how the others call you, you have to take into consideration how a population calls itself and how it self-identifies, how it sees itself. And whether we like it or not, our forefathers saw themselves as new Romans.

[@achilleuspetreas3828]

@@jasoncassios7114 I think we agree more than disagree, aderfe. To the point of identifying as Roman, yes, sometimes they appear synonymous but I don't believe it to be an actual synonym. I see it in the same way as a father (Rome) and mother (Greece) with their son ("Byzantium"). The son takes on the identity, legacy, and name of his father, but his mothers influence is seen in many ways from running the house, from food and music to teaching him to speak. Constantine the Great is a real mythological character being an anthropomorphized version of Constantinople and the empire itself, having a Latin speaking father and a Greek mother. I also think of the Church. As much as I value our philosophical tradition in our faith, I know that our faith is descended from the Jews, and if anyone challenges that and says we have a "Greek" faith and not one descent from Judaism, that angers me, even though I am proud of my Greek. On your point of the Arabs, yes, they called them Rum, but during times of war they used that as in insult in the same way that the West used Greek as an insult. To the Arabs, they would confirm the Rum as being descendant of the Yunan at times of friendliness but would say that the Rum were not because they don't deserve it because to them, it was Christianity that made them abandon the sciences of the ancient Greeks. I'd recommend the book: Byzantium Viewed By The Arabs by Nadia El Cheikh for more on this topic. She does not come from a philhellene or Greek nationalist point of view on the topic. The point of the Greek liberators, I'll quote someone in the comments who summed it quite well, "that comes from the personal account of Panagiotis Peter Charanis, a Byzantinologist Greek-American who was born in Lemnos in 1906-1908, and was just 4 years old when the Greek State liberated Lemnos from the Ottoman Empire in 1912. Having not even started grade school at the time, I think we should not base a rift of Hellenic and Rhomaic Identity on the mistake of a little child." "You couldn't be both a Hellene and a Roman, since Hellene denoted that someone was a pagan, the second worst thing after heretic. And for that daemonisation responsible is the Church." Yes, until the 11th century whereabouts, you couldn't be both a Hellene and a Roman because yes, it meant pagan, but once that connotation was lost, we see the word slowly being used again, because the meaning of the word shifted and no longer had the same stigma. We see this in Procopius' history of wars where he says that more than once that Hellene was now the word used for the "old faith". "ἀλλὰ τριβώνιον ἐνδιδυσκόμενος ἱερεῖ πρέπον τῆς παλαιᾶς δόξης ἣν νῦν Ἑλληνικὴν καλεῖν νενομίκασι," "but he clothed himself in a coarse garment appropriate to a priest of the old faith which they are now accustomed to call Hellenic" When I mean Greek identity I don't mean the use of the word Hellene Έλληνες solely, but to mean that the people recognized their shared culture and ancestry (however much, even if only partly) from those people along side their (Patriarchally) Roman one, whether that be in the form of Γραικος or something else, just as Achaeans was used before Hellene. That the two identities of Roman and "Greek" became thoroughly one, something that cannot be (or shouldn't be) separated or "divorced" so to speak. As Emperor Constantine Porphyrogennitos said in Chapter 49 of De Administrando Imperio: Νικηφόρος τὰ τῶν Ρωμαίων σκῆπτρα ἐχράτει, καὶ οὗτοι ἐν τῷ ϑέματι ὄντες Πελοποννήσου ἀπόστασιν ἐννοήσαντες, πρῶτον μὲν τὰς τῶν γειτόνων οἰκίας τῶν Γραικῶν ἐξεπόρϑουν Nicephorus was holding the sceptre of the Romans, and these Slavs who were in the province of Peloponnesus decided to revolt, and first proceeded to sack the dwellings of their neighbours, the Greeks, He uses Γραικῶν to refer to the Peloponnesian Greeks, but then when talking about the Maniots aka the descendants of the Spartans, he says this in the following chapter. Ιστέον, ὅτι of τοῦ κάστρου Μαΐνης οἰκήτορες οὐκ εἰσὶν ἀπὸ τῆς γενεᾶς τῶν προρρηϑέντων Σκλάβων, ἀλλ᾽ ἐκ τῶν παλαιοτέρων Ῥωμαίων, οἵ καὶ μέχρι τοῦ νῦν παρὰ τῶν ἐντοπίων Ἕλληνες προσαγορεύονται διὰ τὸ ἐν τοῖς προπαλαιοῖς χρόνοις εἰδωλολάτρας εἶναι καὶ προσκυνητὰς τῶν εἰδώλων κατὰ τοὺς παλαιοὺς Ἕλληνας, οἵτινες ἐπὶ τῆς βασιλείας τοῦ ἀοιδίμου Βασιλείου | βαπτισϑέντες Χριστιανοὶ γεγόνασιν. The inhabitants of the city of Maina are not of the race of the aforesaid Slavs, but of the ancient Romans, and even to this day they are called ‘Hellenes’ by the local inhabitants, because in the very ancient times they were idolaters and worshippers of images after the fashion of the ancient Hellenes; and they were baptized and became Christians in the reign of the glorious Basil. This shows not only that Hellene was still used to mean pagan at the time, but why did he use Rhomaioi to refer to ancient Greeks? Why wouldn't he just use Graikos? Just as it's a dialectic to say that Roman only meant Greek in the Hellenic sense at this time period, it is still a dialectic to say that it had nothing to do with what it meant to be Greek either. It's fascinating but I think it's a little more nuanced than both sides like to believe it was.... Thank you for being civil, my friend. Very rare on the internet lol

[@mikel3359]

​@@jasoncassios7114The name Romeos which became ethnonym for Greeks does not mean descendant of Rome. Romeos probably means a Hellen Roman citizen and especially a Christian Hellen in the era of the transition from polytheism to christianity

[@jasoncassios7114]

@@mikel3359 The name "Rhomaios" literally means "of Rome". And for that case, New Rome, Constantinople. There's no "probably" in it. They called their own country "Rhomania", "Land of the Rhomans" The word "Hellene" was the second worst thing someone could call you, (the first was "heretic"), since it denoted paganism. Rhomaios = the romanised Christian Greek. I don't get why you keep denying the roman character of the Greek of these times. It's as if people don't change consciousnesses...

[@MaxStArlyn]

Great work.

[@vespelian]

Thirty years ago I got to visit the last enclave of Eastern Rome at Mount Athos in Greece.

[@musicomp4949]

Well done this was a geat video!! Nevertheless, I felt that you are cherry picking- You believe in the uniterupted romaness of the empire as a 'nation' or 'ethnicity' and the video presents sources and arguments from confirmation biases. The inhabitants were aware of their Greek ethnicity(at least the Greeks since the empire also included Greek speaking subjects). You did not present the emergence of Christianity as a pivotal moment for 'Romaness'. Roman was a political and religious term- Roman adheres to the political and military prowess of Western Rome which the Eastern Romans maintained as favourable but it also meant being Greek or Greek speaking AND Orthodox. Do not forget that Christianity shaped though the Greek world and language. Because Hellene meant Pagan the Greeks sought to show their Christian ideals through the concept of Romaness. In the late stages of the empire many Easter Romans emphasized their Greek ethncicity ( see last speech of Constantine the last emperor-the Alexiad the letter of John Vatages to the pope ("Apostolos Vacalopoulos notes that John III Ducas Vatatzes was prepared to use the words 'nation' (genos), 'Hellene' and 'Hellas' together in his correspondence with the Pope. John acknowledged that he was Greek, although bearing the title Emperor of the Romans: "the Greeks are the only heirs and successors of Constantine", he wrote. In similar fashion John’s son Theodore II, acc. 1254, who took some interest in the physical heritage of Antiquity, was prepared to refer to his whole Euro-Asian realm as "Hellas" and a "Hellenic dominion). In their schools the Easter Romas had as their main readings the Heliad and the Odyssey and NOT the Eniad which modern italians are being taught in their schools even to this day. I could say more but I will stop it here- Kaldellis is only but one source -you could have compared him with Vacalopoulos, Runciman and other byzantinologists who have very opposing ideas. Sorry for the long message!! and sorry for my disagreement it is well intended!!

[@starkillerdude1914]

Because we all know if the Byzantium Empire had surfshark they wouldn't have been moved by the turks

[@jokesterthemighty227]

If the ship was rebuild each time from the same person, then it's still HIS ship. Genetics also have the same question, every 10 years we have replaced all cells in our body, are we still we?

[@legateelizabeth]

Well that’s a good question though. ARE we the same person we were 10 years ago? You’ve probably got a whole different worldview, social circle, and like you said body. Would you say you’re the same person? Or is that continuity of experience and the name you apply to it just useful to mark yourself as the new person built on top of the old one?

[@davidliddelow5704]

The other half of this question is what exactly is different about Italy for it to surrender the Roman name? The Goths ultimately learnt latin and converted to catholicism. The Senate kept meeting until the 8th century and Roman emperors kept being crowned by the pope.

[@TheDAWinz]

Catholicism was made on a forged document so that the pope would have more political power and no longer have to answer to the Roman Emperor.

[@mazmurlo9283]

5:45 The Holy Roman Empire did control and rule over Romans. Not even the ones of Rome, the Romansh, of southern Switzerland (at the time part of the HRE) were and still are a group of Romans who have continued to identify as Roman up until the present.

[@Haverlock]

The flaw in this logic is considering the swiss people

[@giannisa134]

Add to this list the Greek speaking population of Istanbul who still call themselves Romans and of course the Romanians.

[@baneofbanes]

So did the Franks, and the Goths, and the Arabs, and the Lombards, and numerous other empires.

[@mazmurlo9283]

@@giannisa134 yeah, just talking about the ones living in the HRE. Iirc the Greeks of Ukraine/Russia will also still call themselves Romans

[@gilpaubelid3780]

​@@giannisa134Greeks, not greek-speaking.

[@TheDAWinz]

Fantastic video Romaboo, very accurate it's what i've thought for the longest time as well. The comparisons to modern similarities also helps when showing this to the laymen.

[@MausOfTheHouse]

Average War Thunder/Roman history enthusiast

[@adythedog]

The problem with the term nation is related to the fact that its meaning has changed over time, while for other languages ​​it is a neologism (new word). In my native language, Romanian, the Latin natio would have been translated as "nație", which, until the 18th century, meant ethnicity, not nation. If other peoples who continued to use Latin in one form or another inherited the word nation, I think its meaning changed. It has changed from ethnicity to the modern sense of nation, which corresponds to a nation state.

[@skylinelover9276]

As they said Culture is more important than DNA... Because there is no such thing as pure race, Europeans especially in Mediterranean are mostly mixed European Hunter gatherers DNA, Neolithic Anatolians farmers DNA etc... And the East Romans is just like that, but they represent and enriched the Hellenic civilization not Latin, Albanian, Bulgarian culture and traditions.... That's the hard reality

[@jacoblinde7486]

Out of curiosity, what are your problems with Dr. Kaldellis's top 10 Byzantine Emperors list? I'm assuming that you're referring to episode 265 of the History of Byzantium Podcast "The 10 Greatest Emperors with Anthony Kaldelis".

[@RomabooRamblings]

I thought it was very inconsistent, as Kaldellis flips between "this one was very influential" and "oh, I just really lime this guy". That being said the only two on it who wouldn't have made my own list are Theodosius and Manuel.

[@jacoblinde7486]

@@RomabooRamblings That's a good point. I was definitely surprised by Theodosius, even if he was only at number 10. I was also confused about why Alexios I Komnenos was below Manuel.

[@onemoreminute0543]

Who would you have added to your own list, in place of Theodosius and Manuel?​@@RomabooRamblings

[@onemoreminute0543]

​@@jacoblinde7486I can at the very least see Manuel being number 10 on the list, but yeah, he shouldn't be above Alexios. Theodosius... get that guy out of here. He severely weakened the empire through the civil war, failed to take care of the Goths, massacred the population of Thessaloniki, and left the empire in the hands of his two piss poor sons.

[@giannisgiannopoulos791]

Great video food for thought. All those who claim from 800 to today that the Eastern Romans were not Romans because they spoke Greek probably ignore that the Roman Republic, the same as the Roman Empire in Italy and its Eastern parts, was also Greek-speaking. The Roman Republic had already adopted the Greek culture, and thus someone can argue that the Roman Empire's culture was always Greco-Roman. What happened was actually that the not Holy, nor Roman G E R M A N I C Emperors of the Ottonian Dynasty of the West and their successors, started to call the Romans of the East Greeks in order t,o retaliate for the several humiliations they suffered from Emperors such as Basil I or Nikephoros II who were messaging or telling them that they will never be Romans because they were Barbarians, and also to consolidate the title of the Roman Emperor for themselves, something that Constantinople had never recognized for them. How ridiculous was that! The disdainful misnomer "Byzantine" consolidated its usage by the Renaissance offsprings, the Greekaboos Enlighteners of the infamous Age, who glorified the ancient Greek spirit and hated the Church and everything "backward" Christian to their guts, and hence the Roman Empire of the Middle Ages, the bastion state of Christianity. They were biased, hence untrustworthy, and certainly outdated. It's not unusual at all to meet Greeks, "minions" of the European enlightenment, ask them about the "Byzantine" Empire, and receive answers full of contempt like " C'mon, the Byzantines were neither Greeks nor Romans but a bunch of Emperors of Balkan, Syrian, Armenian and Arab descent, who spoke broken Greek!" For them, the last Greco/Roman Emperors were Constantine I (maternal side) and Julian the "Hellene"! They soon start parroting the glorious days of Ancient Greece from the Iliad to Alexander and even... Cleopatra, and they turn their heads the other way when they pass in front of a church where the flag/symbol of Orthodoxy and of the Eastern Roman Empire is waving. How ridiculously ignorant is this?! The Greeks, of course, did not just all of a sudden, vanish from the face of the earth after Julian just because they became Christians! IMHO what you say about Roman nationality is correct. The Romans, the same as the Greeks before them, always believed that the civilized world was anything that was lying inside their Romanized or Hellenized world. When Emperor Heraclius defeated the Persians and also used the title Basileus/King next to the Emperor of the Romans, he wanted to emphasize this special national identity of the civilized Romans who with the help of Christ, our Lord and Savior, defeated the heathen Persians. Those were the Romans of his time according to him. Civilized and Christianized, in an Empire with the homogeneity of a Kingdom. Lemme close with a few words about the Turk or even the Russians. What kind of Romans do they claim to be?! Did they E V E R take action in the name of the Roman Empire? N E VE R! The Russians were Christianized by Constantinople, adopted the Imperial double-headed eagle for prestige, and are bragging that they are the third Rome, constantly undermining the religious primus inter pares authority of the Ecumenical Bishop of New Rome/Constantinople in the Orthodox world now that the City is under Turkish hands ever since the 15th century. The Turkish part is even hilarious! Just note that the Muslim Turk celebrates every year his victory in Manzikert against the Romans! 🤣 Please, I can't stand this absurd monstrosity anymore. Thanks for sharing your precious thoughts and yes, Kaldellis is great. His lists are not!

[@ZeRo-bx7lp]

In my history nerd club, we usually say Byzantine just to differentiate the medieval Eastern Roman Empire from Late Antiquity. In reality, the long passage of time meant it was always a slow transition from the old pagan Roman Empire, to the medieval Orthodox Empire. We know they never called themselves that and we still say 'Romans' when we want to acknowledge their link to the Ancient World.

[@albundy9918]

I learned in school that Byzantium was that part of the roman empire that survived another 1000 years and those people were romans. Western catholic propaganda didn't reach this shores.

[@jonathanadams8835]

5:23 Another issue with a "Holy Roman" nationality is that the HRE acknowledged that it was not based off a single nation. "Life and victory to the army of the Franks, Romans and Germans" -Laudes Imperiale for the Holy Roman Emperor

[@zelkovas]

Great video as always! I basically agree with everything you proposed in this video so I don't have any big comment. It surprised me that you used Kaldellis and I immediately remembered another book by him called "The Byzantine Republic" that delves more deeply on the political continuity and identification with the Old Rome and and the Republic. I am an undergraduate student of History and I am developing a historiographical research on Michael Psellos right now, so I am reading a lot of Kaldellis. Though I agree with you in regards to his hot takes, he is a specialist in Greek historiography, Hellenism in Byzantium (it's even the name of a whole other book by him) and Plato, and Psellos is closely related to all of this (and he has many books on Psellos as well), so I can't ignore his academic career in that regard. In my opinion, the best name is "Medieval Roman Empire", using 'medieval' only to denote the time period - it's funny to think that the entirety of the Middle Ages is defined by the Roman Empire's continued existence during the period). Eastern Roman Empire is also cool I guess. Unfortunately, it's not easy to get rid of the 'Byzantine' label after centuries of usage, so I prefer to use it to denote a period, kind of like we talk about the Principate and the Dominate.

[@fallennarcotic6981]

Ancient romans and ancient Greeks melted into one big civilisation. This civilisation changed from paganism into Christianity and kept the empire alive til 1453. Then it’s people split. Some continued with Latin and some with greek thus creating new nations. It’s easier to understand if one doesn’t try to use a label by any means. Also modern Greeks do not consider only ancient Greeks but also eastern romans as their ancestors. I’m sure Italians do as well. Hence the saying „Una faccia una Razza“.

[@Shthophyckq]

But in my opinion, The Eastern Rome was a true Rome in some 5-6th centuries in the times of Justinian and Maurice, when it almost restored the old great Rome, but in the 7-8th centuries when it lost Levant, North Africa and most of Italy including the Ethernal City itself, and Latin was not used as an official language, it was a Byzantine Empire as a successor state. Do you think that Kingdom of Soissons was also the real Roman Empire? And the Barbaric Kingdoms that were also reffering to themselves as the balkanized Roman states?

[@AnAngelineer]

"Eastern Roman Empire", while technically more accurate, is quite a mouthful and inconvenient to say repeatedly in a conversation. Unlike the Holy Roman Empire which abbreviates into the very easy to say "HRE", "ERE" doesn't sound very good. This is 100% subjective and not based on data, but me and everyone I talked to about history doesn't perceive any stigmata around the word Byzantium anymore. Feels perfectly fine to use this word nowadays, as academics have shifted away from the clichés and errors that were associated to that word before (maybe not totally, but there sure is progress when compared to 100 years ago!). As you kinda say in your conclusion : it's a shortcut for us modern people to talk about that specific part/phase of the roman empire. And it's fine that way IMHO.

[@ddwkc]

As long historiography still uses this term, I think we should be ok with it. Unless there is a consensus on historians all around the world to stop using this term, we can still use the term to identify the period and still be aware it is a continuation of the long Roman legacy we know and love!

[@viperking6573]

I don't think we can, names are powerful, and in order to see the truth of history we should call it Roman Empire, not Byzantine Empire

[@ChristianAuditore14]

It's okay to say a lie because everyone says it?

[@Michael_the_Drunkard]

​@@ChristianAuditore14you're related to Ezio Auditore 😮😮😮😮😮

[@Meirstein]

@@viperking6573 The problem is that labels need to have a meaning. When someone is talking about "The Romans" or "The Roman Empire," they are 99% of the time referring to the entity that lasted until 476. People use the Byzantines because they are referring to a specific political entity in a specific part of the world at a specific time, and demanding that people call them the Roman Empire as well is detrimental because it makes things needlessly confusing.

[@dersuddeutschesumpf5444]

​@@ChristianAuditore14 Using the Term Byzantine to define the eastern Roman empire of the Middle ages is completely legitimate

[@RPe-jk6dv]

eastern roman empire or empire of the rhomaoi is correct. but after ca. 600 it was a greek state not a roman state. byzantium is shorthand to make clear that the rhomaoi were romans as the french are franks.

[@baneofbanes]

There’s a difference between Roman and Latin.

[@RPe-jk6dv]

@@baneofbanes no true roman without latin.

[@Vang2009]

well the Eastern Roman empire was more Greek than Latin so I guess people use the word "Byzantium" To differentiate The Greek Roman Empire from the Latin Roman Empire. Or at least that's how I see it. Yes they are Roman, but their also Greek. However I will still be using "Byzantium" as to describe the Eastern Roman Empire.

[@Pan472]

For the part, which you say that "Roman" during the ERE didn't mean Greek... It basically did mean that. Because in the segment in which you, rightfully, cite all these excerpts indicating that Romans *did* ethnically distinguish themselves ethnically and racially from all other nations... The Greeks aren't mentioned. They're not mentioned because they're extinct. Far from that. But because "Rhomaios" did eventually come to mean "Hellenas" or "Greek". It might not have been used interchangeably, as others claim, but "Rhomaios" did come to mean "Greek". Which again, survives to the present day amongst some Greeks. And in the 19th century, we used "Rhomaios" or "Romios" to identify ourselves.

[@princelourenco1914]

for real, Byzantium is my favorite country to ever exist, and I like to call it Byzantium just cause it sounds better then (Eastern) Roman Empire, but they are Rome, and not that desgrace called HRE

[@orrorsaness5942]

Facts

[@MrCmon113]

Holy Romans have 1) city of Rome 2) emperor with penis 3) latin language 4) dapper looking priests 5) aryan chad genetics