Archeologists have found the oldest evidence of chemical warfare

[Lucio Domicio Aureliano]

I did not forget anything. If you can make such simpleton calculation on Roman longevity (And the transition between republic and empire), then the Partho-Sassanian episode lasted beyond 900 years and two additional centuries as the Caliphate had difficulties subduing Tabarîstân; an area which otherwise was comparable to the times when the Byzantines were severely crammed of space, during the mid-Thematic era and significantly during the dynasty of the Palaiologos.

Maybe you should add the despotate of Epirus too. Then maybe I should add the independent post-Achaemenid Iranian kingdoms of the early Hellenistic age.



It will be interesting to see what sorts of evidence you have to support this claim.

I don´t disregard the advances and culture brought by the sassanids but, for my thinking, the romans and the greeks did more. Let´s say the Partho-Sassanian episode lasted for one-thousand year yet it´s much less than the romans. Not to mention that the Graeco-Roman society are the backbone of hte western world. Anyway, i´m also aware of the fact that the romans considered the sassanids their equal.

[Mediolanicus]

I don´t disregard the advances and culture brought by the sassanids but, for my thinking, the romans and the greeks did more. Let´s say the Partho-Sassanian episode lasted for one-thousand year yet it´s much less than the romans. Not to mention that the Graeco-Roman society are the backbone of hte western world. Anyway, i´m also aware of the fact that the romans considered the sassanids their equal.

Well, you hardly could've expected that the Pathians and Sassanids had a larger impact on western society than the Romans, can you?

While the Roman (in a very broad sence: city state to the fall of the Eastern Empire) lasted longer that the Partho-Sassanid dynasties, you can hardly say they had a large impact on history during the whole of that time...

[Lucio Domicio Aureliano]

Well, you hardly could've expected that the Pathians and Sassanids had a larger impact on western society than the Romans, can you?

While the Roman (in a very broad sence: city state to the fall of the Eastern Empire) lasted longer that the Partho-Sassanid dynasties, you can argueably say they had a large impact on history during the whole of that time...

You´re right, my bad.

[Lucio Domicio Aureliano]

Persian Cataphract, could you tell me how much of the sassanid culture or society is still present in in this day middle eastern ? I´m not being ironic, i just would like to know if you have this info. As far as i know the arabs want to erase it but it still present till today.
Thanks

[The Persian Cataphract]

I highly dispute the outdated notion of the Graeco-Roman legacy being some purported "backbone" of "Western Civilization"; what are the qualifiers to such a criterion, and who may hold such a claim? I maintain that no one can hold this banner of legacy, and that it is to the contrary a construct of Nordicist and Pan-European demagoguery, the exact same kind which has for centuries tried to cheaply peddle "Greek freedom", "West prevailing over the East" and attempted to turn figures such as Alexander III The Great and Jeshua of Nazareth into Nordicist front-figures, fitting them into Aryanistic ideals, even though the former was a northerner Greek and the latter a Semite. At the expense of Greek self-identity and national integrity. This cheap superimposition of modern Western Europe, who usually have huge problems recognizing their own historical heritage, embark upon acquiring what they consider to be "superior cultures"; a mode of thinking which would have been very foreign to their own ancestors.

Therefore I do not recognize the allusions to ancient Greece and Rome, as assumed by a number of countries. Taking inspiration from other cultures is a necessity, and paving a road to the future must be done with the help of the past... But I will never recognize some perverted illusion of America being a successor to the Roman empire. It is a fantasy, stupid beyond belief at best, and at worst a dangerous political platform.

We cannot pick and choose aspects of a culture to a liking, if one must assume legitimacy. Now this is where the Graeco-Romano-Byzantine chain of various dynasties begins to fall short; when did the Romans cease to be the Italic-originated civilization, and turn into a fully-fledged Greek monarchy? As has been pointed out by the eminent professor Richard Nelson Frye in his lauded "The Golden Age of Persia", by the late Sassanian interlude, the Byzantine rivals had come to mirror Persianate culture to such a degree that the Byzantines could no longer be perceived out of an Occidentalist approach: They had themselves become an Oriental power, which was by then centered in Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt. If true, what do we then make out of the Heracleian dynasty? The Isaurians? Komnenians? The Palailogoi and the clan of Doukas?

Indeed, we should look further back and bring the same reasoning to dynasties of the Roman Empire, which did not have Italic roots, including the Severan dynasty and a fair number of emperors of Syriac descent, notwithstanding the Palmyrans. Clearly, the issue of a purported "2000 years of continuity" is not only simplified, but flawed and dismisses that the reasoning could equally be applied to Persianate powers, dismissing the brief interludes of foreign conquerors. If so, then we are indeed poised before an ancient Iranian legacy which stretches back to the age of the Medes.

I will resume this later today.

[Mediolanicus]

I highly dispute the outdated notion of the Graeco-Roman legacy being some purported "backbone" of "Western Civilization"; what are the qualifiers to such a criterion, and who may hold such a claim?

I totally agree, but you can't dispute that the Romans did leave some heavy impressions on Western Society.

Every single law system in Western Europe (From England to Portugal to Germany) is based on Roman/early Byzantine law for example. Of course heavily influenced by "common" law in the Northern countries.
(And by common law I don't mean the English common law, but the non-written law that was used in every village court in Western Europe.)

This is of course far from a backbone of Western civilazation, but law is nontheless a very important part of a society.

This cheap superimposition of modern Western Europe, who usually have huge problems recognizing their own historical heritage, embark upon acquiring what they consider to be "superior cultures"; a mode of thinking which would have been very foreign to their own ancestors.

Any examples for this one?

I will resume this later today.

Great, it's a very interesting read.

[athanaric]

Interesting read, TPC, but how do you support the notion that "Graeco-Roman civilization" is not the backbone of today's "Western civilization"? After all, European nations and their American offspring are heavily influenced not only by the Roman law mentioned above, but also by Hellenic philosophers, by Hellenic and Roman art, architecture and technology etc., not to forget the language. Of course, there are other influences en masse as well as the respective native cultures, but Roman and Hellenic culture is certainly a very important part of all modern European cultures, different though they may be.