Counting To Ruin

[Arvioustus]

Very difficult topic to be sure. Perhaps we should look to the Eastern Empire to determine when the west really fall, if it ever did. I am not well versed with the Eastern Empire but am studying. Justinian sent Belisarius to contend with Goths and Germanic tribes in Nort Africa and Italy. In Italy as it seems it was very confusing who was 'Roman' and who wasn`t. Any account Belisarius took back a good part of Africa and Italy with a surprisingly small force. I mean surprisingly, were the Goths such terrible fighters? How did they defeat the Huns then? I do think the Huns and Goths were over rated however and Caesar would not have had any difficulty with either, just that at that time when they came on the scene there was such decline. Not sure of Justinians intentions either, he wanted the west back and wanted Justinian dead? Very confusing this era. My conclusion is that there must have been such a terrible decline in the west for a long time. This was not the Rome of Caesar or the legions of Caesar. Even the Germanic or Romainized Germanic legions were nothing like they use to be either. Otherwise how could Justinian do with he did with so few men and why not obtain a larger force? The era as a whole most have been a dark age of sorts long before historians made up the name 'dark ages'. That is why the capitol went to Constinople , which was the only way of just saving a piece of the empire.

[alekandros]

eggers said:

Hey guys, im new here. I added a few tags in some topics, but never started my own topic before.

 

I'm curious about why the empire in the west fell. I know about corruption and barbarian invasions, the plagues etc etc. But i was curious about any other ideas you may have. I'm just looking for more obscure ideas here.

 

And im curious if anyone thinks maths could have something to do with it? After the romans were not known for their skills when number crunching. Today in modern life we use maths for everything, especially companies when they want to push a new product. I mean look at the PSP, i hate to think how much maths was used there!!

 

My point is, if you can use maths properly you can't advance into new technology, not easily anyway, would this have contributed to Romes downfall? I read a thread about a month or 2 ago about Rome invented electricity or something, but i'm sure they couldn't have, because they didn't have the phyics or maths to push it. The Romans used a simple counting board to add stuff up (fore-runner to the abacus), which looked like a grid engraved on a tablet, 10 across the top and 10 down. Then using little tokens they added stuff up and used it to work out very simple addition, mainly for logics for Romes varst army. If fact if you were write a number like 2,846,886,099,123,276 in roman numerals it would take approx. 16 minutes, compared to about 4 - 6 seconds in indian numbers (thats right peeps, the numbers we used today came from india, through persia, arriving in europe in about 16th century).

 

Also Rome never had a figure to represent nothing (zero, 0, to you and me) which is very important in calculations. The Ancient greek for example worked out the size of planet earth, the distance between earth and the sun, the formula to turn a sphere into a cyclinder (for map-making if you need to know), but the romans never did anything like that. Also in business if you lend someone $10 and charge the interest over the year, using a counting board you have to round the numbers up (or down) where with numbers we use today, you can work out exactly how much someone owns you (thats how we use the number we use today, and not roman numerals, thanks be the the greedy assed business men).

 

With rampant corruption, plague and no effienct method of getting any real advances, for the military, or in other field, isn't it possible that rome was destined to fall.

 

P.S. i hate maths, but im looking for any and all reasons that could have turned rome from an Capital of an empire with over a million people living in, to a town with just over 100,000

 

feel free to tear into this, i love a good argument

 

Math as a reason for the fall of the western empire is difficult to grasp. Do not forget that you are translating C into 100 to the zeroes are not important to roman numerals in that sense. As for the base form 0, I'm not knowledgable on roman math styles, but I suspect that there was a representation for 0, be it numaric or written (ie, none, zero, nothing...).

One of the discussions we had throughout my courses in college was advancements of Rome. For the most part it always came down to one thing. The Romans, for the most part, used knowledge that was already around, but used it to its maximum affect. The arch, what a wonderful thing, what happens when we increase its size....now what happens when we make many arches along the same path and connect them? See what I'm getting at? Romans used math, writing, poltics, warfare ideas that were already around, but used them to maximization.

One other thing on the Romans and numbers. I would never say the Romans didn't know how to use numbers or math. They could be maticulous book keepers, and the goverment definitely knew how to use numbers to determine taxation, grain prices.....granted it took Justinian in the Eastern Empire to correct the system, but that was centuries of decline in proper management. I was recently at the aqueduct at Pont de Gard in France, and it befuddled me to no end the precise use of mathmatics to achieve the (It think) 1 inch drop per mile span over a river valley.

There was one other thing I read here....give me a minute.

Ah, yes, the idea of electricity and romans. Why not? Are you saying that someone invented electricity? It's always been around, it only came down to understanding what it was, how to harness it and or create it. Keep in mind Romans probably still thought that lightening was a thing Zeus was throwing down at them, so.

As to the reasons for the fall of the western empire, goodness take your pick.... Barbarians, God's (Christian"s) wrath, inbreeding, lack of proper leadership, weather, lead pipes... it just keeps going. I like to simply think that it was a multitude of incredibly bad things happening all at the same time. Not a silver bullet of one thing only.