Faction Faction Tourney RD: 4

[MiniKiller]

Round 3 is over and 4 is about to begin. Here are the previous rounds stats...

Round 3 Results:

1-Spainish 16
2-Almohads 14
3-Dans 12
4-The people of Novgorod 7
5-Aregonese 2

Round 2 Results:

1-Golden Horde 15
2-French 9
3-Swiss 9
4-The Papacy 6
5-Hungarians 3

Round 1 Results:

1-English 19
2-Germans 9
3-Russians 5
4-Polish 3
5-Sicilians 0


Round 4 will end Saturday 2/8/02
I will be having one bonus round for a 5th entry to the final round. Those factions will be any who have recived 9 or more votes. So far thos faction in the bonus round are...

Bonus Round (2/8/03)

1-Almohads with 14 votes
2-Danes with 12 votes
3-French with 9 votes
4-Swiss with 9 votes
5-Germans with 9 votes

Championchip Round (Date TBA)

1-England
2-The Golden Horde
3-Spain

[MiniKiller]

For this round I chose the Italians becasue I am mostly Italian and I like their flag

[rasoforos]

my vote goes to the Byzantines. They are unique , they are cool , their generals kick ass , their cavalry is mean

[[RDH] Spetz Natz]

OMFG...I dislike all these choices...but I'll have to go with Byzantines...simply because they never broke their alliances with me in every single one of my campaigns...unlike those other 3 jerks listed here

[Alrowan]

turks all the way... i loathe byzantine

[Konstantinos Palaiologos]

Byzantines for me of course.

Long live the Eternal empire

Konstantinopel the real capital of Greece.

[rasoforos]

no its not actually. open a history book and see what 'helleene' meant for the byzantines , its time we stop eating the religious propaganda fodder. and since you are new welcome to the forum.

[Konstantinos Palaiologos]

Thanks for your welcoming, but there is not such thing as "religius propaganda" in my post.

It depends which period of the Byzantine Empire you examine.
At the "Late" period (900-1453) Byzantine Empire is not longer a "Roman" one but a "Greek" one.

The term "HELLENE" no longer means a man which is not christian(as till then) but a citizen of Byzantine Empire.
You can find this not only at scripts made from Byzantine writers but also from Western writers from the same period.

[Leet Eriksson]

I would have gone for byzantines,but then i went for turks.they make good helva.

[Big King Sanctaphrax]

I'm voting for the Byz, on the strength of their Kataphraktoi, and Byz infantry, which rule in early.

[The Last Emperor]

I took the Biz for their unique and strong units, especially the V.Gs.

[Teutonic Knight]

Byzantines are winning w00t

[Divine Wind]

I choose byz. Great Civilization with lots of history and cracking units = )

[rasoforos]

the byzantines are winning this one hands down i think.

konstantinos palaiologos , the first person to use the word 'helleene' openly was probably georgios 'plithon' gemistos in Mystras , after the fall of Konstantinople. And if i remember properly he got excommunicated ( he was not exactly a christian in the first place however ). Do not forget that before greece became an indepentent nation the church would use the terms 'romioi' and 'roman-orthodox' ( the term greek-orthodox comes much later ( i quote neoklis sarris in that)) ,the hord 'helleene' was not used. Of course after independence the church and patriarch( that had and still has all the leaders of the independence movement excommunicated i have to add) had to show how much they contributed to it and they started using terms like greek-orthodox , hellenochristianic civilisation etc , and they do the same even today.

[Rosacrux]

rasoforos

Byzantium is a part of Hellenic history and that's a fact. Can you deny the Greek-ness of say Alexander the Great, because he opressed the rest of the Greeks? Then why do you deny the Greek-ness of the late Eastern Roman Empire? Hell, after 700 AD all emperors save the Isavri (Armenian) were of Hellenic origin. Most of the patriarchs too. Not to mention the governement structure - manned entirely by Hellenes.

I don't share the "tha paroume tin poli" sentiments of K.P. (nationalistic crap, if you ask me, and very dangerous in times like today) but I don't either reject a huge part of the Greek history, based on just the same narrow-mindness you are blaming K.P. is guilt of.

Other than that... way to go Byzantium We'll kick ass in the final too

[Xicote]

I voted for the Turks. Nice challenge being hemmed in by two strong factions. You gotta love the Jannisary Inf and the Turcomon foot.

[Aleborg]

Turkish. Very nice to play with them.

I like also Byzantines, but imo is abit easy to win with them.

[rasoforos]

rosacrux , i do not believe comparing alexander to the byzantines is valid.

There was a common history of the roman empire and the greeks of course. The byzantine emperors would make sure to wipe out anyone who was greek , the murders and prosecutions went all the way to the 9th century AD until the final Hellenic element was destroyed or converted , the proof to that is a)the eradication of the greek religion b) the destruction of greek arts and statues c) the conversion of greek temples to churches or the destruction of them( all palaiobyzantine and mesobyzantine temples are built with materials taken from greek temples and this can be seen even today , a good example is the temple of hagia sophia in Thessaloniki , its lower part is made by marble and you can still see ancient greek text on it , even the parthenon was converted into a church(&#33) .
It cannot be denied that the Byzantines were calling themselves Romans and not Greeks ( eventhough as you say the majority of them were greek and practically all of them were speaking greek) , moreover 'greek' meant the Pagan , and as you know being a pagan was punishable by death.
To my oppinion the byzantine empire , although largelly greek in population , was not greek in spirit . I do not doubt that the emperors and officials were mostly greek ( appart from the Isaurs you forgot armenian tzimiskis as well ) in origin , but being greek in origin does not make you greek , especially if you do not consider yourself one.
Moreover i am openly opposing the effort of the church to control modern greece by political means and the promotion of their , clearly false and paradoxical, idea of hellenocristianic civilisation and hellenorthodox religion.
As to the 'greek history' as you describe the byzantine era being part of , i believe that the greek history was in a hubernating state during most of the byzantine era since philosophers were killed as wizzards in the protobyzantine period and they were nonexistent later on , the art was completelly different , much of the technology was lost , the mentality of religious tollerance and free spirit gave way to phanaticism against anyone who beleived something different and to ideas like ' if the church says so then so be it ' ...that as you know unfortunatelly haunt greece even in our days.
In conclusion : were there greeks inside the roman empire: Yes , was there an influence: Yes ,was there a common way of thinking : No , were the byzantines greek in origin : Yes mostly , were they really greek in spirit :No


hey it must be the first time we disagree in something

[Rosacrux]

Well, some valid arguments and some not so valid. To explain myself: It is true that christian Roman empire (be it east or west) loathed the “Ethniki” (remember the term?) as they called the non-christian Greeks and Romans (“pagan” wasn’t used widely as for Greeks and Romans).

It is also true that all emperors (save Julian… poor sod) tried to eradicate the non-christian elements of the empire. What is not true, is the way you are trying to identify the Greek (Hellenic, if you prefer it so - I know I do) element with the pagan element.

Even though I am an avid admirer of the ancient Greek culture and I really despise the christian church and to an extend the religion in general, I have to say that Greece had the largest christian population from the very beginning of the spreading of the new religion. I know you don’t like it, neither to I, but it’s historical fact. Of course, most Greeks had mixed in their version of christianity quite a few Greek elements, but they were mostly christians.

So, the public spirit was in favor of the New Religion, ages before the complete hellenization of the Byzantine empire. The emperors followed the public consensus, not some absurd beliefs of their own.

Allthough I do consider myself the whole helleno-christianic civilization stuff a pile of crap (the Orthodox church betrayed the Hellenes more times than I can recall) I can’t deny the ties and bonds that got the Christianity and the Hellenes together after a certain point.

But, hell, let’s just agree to disagree

[rasoforos]

yep i ll agree we just dissagree , although we do not dissagree than much it seems. i Like your oppinion concerning the role of the church , i just wish more people were thinking this way

[Leet Eriksson]

I remember a christian arab tried to spread christianity among the greeks,of course when he took control of greece that is,its just that the people disagreed with him and killed him

[Akka]

Heirs of the Roman Empire, cultured, with glorious history and universal spirit, with prestige and style...

BYZANTINES ALL THE WAY

[ICantSpellDawg]

golden horde blows - they cant even create units - they just let their military die out in the game and have no idea who to conquer

how could they be one of the best factions?

PLUS we cant even play them, so i nominate them for worst faction

this post didnt mean to be abraisive, sorry

[MiniKiller]

lol its ok, yes we can play as them, its a mod that allows us to play every faction in the game, they voted for the golden horde as they would control them not the AI

THIS ROUND IS OVER rd 5 up shortly