I think best were probably the Chinese, who have lived on through this day, and managed to repopulate the world without conquering anything.
China has gone through tons of empires over the period of it's existence. All it's existed as is a group of people that we collectively call Chinese. It has been conquered by foreigners repeatedly and has been divided into many different states many times. Calling modern China the same state as the Han empire would be like calling NATO the re-emergence of the Roman Empire. Sure the territory, culture, customs, language and form of government have changed and there is no continuous government or unity. But a lot of the people are partially decedents of the old empire.
And no, the Chinese have not gone for millennia without conquering anything. For one thing, what we call China is a bunch of conquered peoples that were forcibly integrated. For another thing they've invaded a buttload of places that aren't part of China. Mongolia, Vietnam, Korea and Tibet were all occupied for centuries.
Well, yeah, I rushed through the post, and left out details; didn't want to spend too much time posting
You're right, they're not the same thing. But culturally, they're very similar. They speak the same language, eat similar food, have similar cultural values. An empire that formed in the past shaped the boundaries and unity that the future empire uses.
I mean, you can't say NATO is the same as the Roman Empire, because you simply can't unite them as the same country. The EU has tried. Some members like Turkey, Italy, Spain, Slovakia, France are just too culturally different, even if most of them are white.
And what I meant by "repopulate the world without conquering anything" was that they've never invaded the USA or Australia and yet have managed to build up little Chinatowns in their cultural capitals. Ethnic Chinese everywhere have a strong impact on the world economy.
What I'm trying to say is that I view an empire's quality from their cultural impact.
For example, now, we're all communicating in English.. you can blame the English/British Empire for that, not the USA. My country switched from Arabic script to Roman alphabet, that's an impact of the Roman Empire and the British. Some Americans still speak Latin, it shows the impact of how the Roman culture still lives on... yet many Chinese today still speak and write similarly to the Chinese Empires of the past.
While arguably, modern China doesn't have the same governance or anything related to the Han/Qin/etc Dynasty, you'll find a good deal of modern PR China people who actually identify themselves with the Han/Qin/etc Dynasty and see it as part of
their history. Similarly, you'll find Turks who recognize their cultural background as Ottomans, and plenty of Iranians who still consider themselves Persians (and not really Macedonians). Empires rise and fall, their military and governance goes obsolete, but that's how I consider the continuation of an Empire's spirit.
What political simulation were you playing, Muz?
Cyber Nations. Horrible, oversimplified game mechanics. But that kind of simplicity makes it a powerful metagame, similarly to how Neptune's Pride's simplicity makes the game focused on diplomacy. Alliances are run similarly to nations. Most of the real game is quite meta-game. Wars are won not only over stats, but over psychology. Propaganda plays a vital role. Negotiation/people skills/emotions affect an alliance's health. Training and getting people to work together changes the game.
It's a bit off on some political bits - there's no resources to fight over, and trolling/griefing is a political motivator, but wars are started over many other things similar to RL. Culture does run strong, though mainly that culture is based on internet culture, following what sites they were recruited from or via mergers, mass exoduses, historical in-game conflicts/survival, intolerance to certain cultures.
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Topic: Dem Romans (Read 10627 times)