out of the two which would you define the greater empire?

greater in your words, maybe who achieved more? who in their prime coudl dominate the other, etc

Roman. Longer in time, larger in territory, more stable government in the longer term.

thats what I thought.

seems like an obv answer then.

howard anything you think roman empire could have done majorly differently in order to stay kicking for another 300-500 years?

Made basic technical inventions like electricity or steam/mechanized transport. They put little stock and effort into technical advancement. Electricity is a huge leap forward. I’m frankly not sure what they’d have to invent as a precursor to either one but they did not develop technically particularly fast.

but the technology gap was huge right after for a huge chunk. i don think techonology was a problem at all for them, especially being ahead of the curb in a lot of day to day things at that point and time in terms of organization

I don't think technology was an issue for them. I'm not an expert here but my understanding was that they just became too corrupt. Not sure there is anything they could have done.

Pretty easy to argue for Rome here. That said, you could also point out the fact that Greek was the culture that the Romans looked to for inspiration, but I will still have to argue for Rome.

As for the cause of the fall of the Roman Empire, lets first decide how we define 'the fall': was it in 476 or 1453?

476 was PEAK PRIME european rome imo

The first date mentioned is the fall of the western roman empire, the other date is the fall of the eastern roman empire (byzantine).

Also, define empire.

For the majority of history, the Greeks were a mere collection of city-states with loosely common interests. These were unified to some extent as a reaction to the Persian Empire (some under direct rule, some under influence).

I suppose you mean the Hellenistic period to be the "Greek Empire". Alexander is dead, and the Greeks spend most of this time battling each other for power. This is about 150 years, and the Greeks make considerable cultural advances during this time.

I suppose the fact that the Romans defeated the Greeks decisively in the 140s BCE demonstrates that Rome is the superior military actor.

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What could Rome have done to preserve their Empire for longer time?

Welp, when your Empire is dependent on a single Emperor, you're eventually going to end up with bad emperors who squander the empire. Strengthening the Senate, and ruthlessly pursuing justice would have been a good start.

Having a strong representative style of government recreate itself under the attention of an emperor is no trivial undertaking, tho, so its unlikely that the system could rebuild without complete destruction first.

I'm unaware of a "King John and the Magna Carta" possibility in Rome, for example.

Eventually, Rome would have had to become a naval superpower too, but this probably could have waited until the 13th century.

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Fall of Rome is 1400s, BTW... Probably should do some study on Byzantium.

I raised this issue specifically because I studied Byzantine history. So often Rome is associated exclusively with the western empire.

The Romans were a vulgar copy of the Greeks.

It would've needed a new form of government and reorganisation of the army. The Republic was becoming more corrupt as time passed so that wasn't the answer and after the stability of the early Caesars, particularly Augustus, it soon became obvious that having all powerful emperors wasn't the solution either.
With regards to the army the change to professional commanders that the troops swore loyalty to made sense in a military terms but it led to the chaos of the late empire where troops were loyal to commanders rather than emperors, resulting in the many coups and the, justified, paranoia of the emperors. Chaos became commonplace rather than stability.

Rome was doomed the day they did away with the Republic. Leadership needs to be a meritocracy.

they didn't do away with the Republic, it just naturally evolved over time

meritocracy doesn't work with the leadership since the best guy will hold the job forever amassing more and more power

the qualities that get you the top job are great for preventing others to get the top job

I would choose the Roman empire
It was more well-organized, more expansive, and more powerful. It also lasted for a longer time
The Byzantine empire, despite being a successor to the Roman empire, can be considered a Greek empire in term of culture

Just mentioning some points here.

Ancient Greece, as is commonly perceived (foundation of language, philosophy, poetry and arts, culture and all modern sciences) ended as such in 335BC, when Thebes were destroyed to the ground by Alexander the Macedon (Alexander the Great).

Historically, Ancient Greece was never an empire similar to Roman Empire, Persian Empire, British Empire etc. It is some times considered as an "Empire" falsely, maybe because the influence of Ancient Greece then and now is greater than any other civilization.

Alexander the Great wasn't even Greek, he was Macedonian. He never "spread" the Ancient Greek civilization to the East. Greek was the prominent language already, as now is the English language and was spoken in all of the known world due mainly to business interactions between different civilizations. He himself not being Greek had Aristotle -one of the major figures in (Greek) philosophy - as a teacher until his early teens.

The Hellenistic period already differed from Ancient Greece, mainly because the language changed severely and has little in common with Ancient Greece, apart from developing in the more or less same geographic area.

Byzantine Empire (Roman Empire of the East) was far from Greek (culturally or otherwise). Religion was totally different (Ancient Gods/ Christianity), Greek was just the common/ official language until then (much different from the Ancient Greek language), the majority of Byzantine Emperors (Roman Emperors of the East) were Thracians (not Greeks) and Illyrians (not Greeks, today's Albania).

I think the OP question is false. Maybe Roman Empire should be compared with the Persian Empire, the Chinese Empire, the Indian Empire and such all of which were far superior than the Roman Empire in my opinion.

Goin' back to poker now

What empire are you referring to (Mauryan, Mughal, Gupta, other?), and why do you consider it far superior?

Hi there,
I had in mind the Mauryan Empire from Classical Era, which defeated the successors of Alexander at the region, united different tribes of an area more or less the same as today's India, fought bandits and private armies which oppressed the people, united the region under one administration with well organized local administration, promoted trade and well being of common people, established a freedom loving society, established many schools for the people, didn't bother to conquer other neighboring civilizations, had rules for preserving wildlife and had some kind a sustainable environmental policy for the region in general.
For such things, but mainly because no criteria were set by the OP, I would personally consider it far superior than the Roman Empire.
Bear in mind that I don't have any deep knowledge of the history of the region, and if I am mistaken somewhere or somehow it is because of this, so any arguments are welcome.

Republic > Democracy

Thanks!

They fall well short on time span, but that's just one aspect. I'd argue that the lasting influence around the world is not even close, but that is from an ignorant westerner's point of view. Certainly the Mauryan Empire had a great deal of impact with the spread of Buddhism under Ashoka.

I'm not convinced that it was greater, but I will grant that it belongs in the conversation. Far superior? That seems doubtful at best.

good discussion anace but I think the ones I described are "powerful" and kinda long lasting no? ottoman was aroudn forever but they didnt have the military expansiveness or staying power through history the other two did?

Greece is much closer to India than Rome historically. Polytheism, widely adopted universal language, development of unique arts and culture, constantly warring states, trade centers connecting important regions of the world.

Is it wrong to think about alexander at its prime and roman legion/army at its prime and if they met how it would have looked like or turned out? does it depend who invades who?