Classical Empires

1. Classical Empires Characteristics of Empires Greek and Roman Traditions Han and Roman Empires Reasons for Decline

2. Characteristics of Classical Empires • Powerful military • Effective government bureaucracy • Control large territory-multiethnic and multicultural • Uniform currency and weights and measures • Service of citizens • Military technology • Uniform legal codes • Public works • Lavish public monuments • Patronize the arts and scholarship

3. Greco-Roman Traditions • Active participation in politics Greek city state, Roman republic • Aristocratic assemblies—republic?— rule by the best—philosopher kings---serve as a check on executive power • Rule by law—codified, equitable law

4. Han and Roman Empire Similarities • Highly stratified societies • Patriarchal families—Confucianism, pater familias • Agricultural base—free peasants-small farms or tenant farmers, heavy dependency on slavery and latifundias • Educated civil service—Confucian trained scholar bureaucrats, civic responsibility • Highly centralized state—dynastic, empires with appearance of limits through Senate

5. Han and Roman continued • Multicultural empires—most conquered assimilated, citizenship offered to best, extension of Roman law and building • Extensive road systems and urban communities • Subordinated women • Armies maintain the empire—internal and external

6. Decline • Empires too big—costly to defend the frontiers • Burden of taxes on the poor, some flee to evade taxes, as maintaining the grows more costly—taxes go up, few new sources of revenue, religious groups and nobility exempt • Slavery in Roman so oppressive less productive, fewer new sources, less technological development

7. Administrative problems succession—court intrigue, barrack emperors failing bureaucracies—corruption of examination system, lack of civic responsibility Roman—bread and circuses to forestall revolts • Eroding economies—decline in trade when roads not repaired or safe • Religion—Christianity a factor, but Buddhism not

8. Plagues—hit both hard, especially in cities of Roman empire • Pressure from nomads—Huns, Xiongnu, Germanic

9. Why did the west fall harder? • More multiethnic Han Chinese—a true nation that can endure beyond the dynasty, In Roman empire most live outside Italy • State and society not bond together with the same glue—China, Confucianism offers both order for family, society and state—not true of Romans • Better assimilation of “barbarians” by China, Germanic dismembered Roman empire, while nomads absorbed by Chinese • Common language—Roman never really replaced Greek in much of the empire

10. Why western Roman empire and not eastern? • Deep, engrained civilization in the east—Greeks and before • East less impacted by nomadic invasion—maybe because many enduring cities, large populations • Tribes on eastern borders were disorganized and unmotivated • After separation of empire, east no longer has to send any help to West • Even with changing political structure , little threat to social, economic or cultural continuity • No cities in the west • German soldiers fill the ranks of Roman legions • When west cut from wealth of East, the tax base dwindled