Ok? When did the English become Danish?

… do you know where the term ‘English’ comes from?

Can you point to me on a map where the Anglo-Saxons came from?

Do you know what a ‘Briton’ is?

It’s like you understand every era by the definition at the end of it. And soft power is soft because it can be denied - it’s just influence.

Okay cool, so your argument is now nothing more than “soft power exists”, not “The Catholic Church had any serious amount of soft power”, fan-fucking-tastic, glad you’ve spent all this time to say absolutely nothing.

Let’s go back to the source then… Who had institutionalized assimilation before the Romans? I don’t just mean there was assimilation…I mean a group comes in and converts others into becoming them in a systematic fashion

The Ancient Hebrews, for one, whose process of assimilation was far more ritualized and rigid, and mandatory for existence in the polity, than Rome’s. The Assyrians. Han China in the Warring States period.

Hard and soft power. You really don’t get it.

Hard power is the ability to impose one’s will by force; soft power is the ability to impose one’s will by persuasion or subtlety. In no case does it mean “Utterly failing to push an objective forward”. That is a lack of soft power.

Rome split. The pieces continued to act like Rome behaviorally.

In what sense? Your entire bizarre view of Rome is based around an idea that their assimilative institutions were somehow more rigid and formalized than previous ones. European polities after the fall of the Western Empire not only lacked any rigid assimilative institutions, they often rejected assimilation altogether, and numerous ethnicities were born of the lack of institutions capable of assimilating or even maintaining cultural hegemonies in the post-Roman polities.

The remaining institution of Rome, the Roman Catholic church, had incredible power over many of these pieces,

No.

then later soft influence,

The hard power of the Papal States was minimal and regional at best, quarreling with other Italian states and sometimes the borders of the HRE; the only Europe-wide power the Catholic Church had was always soft power.

, over most of Europe known as the holy Roman empire.

…

The HRE was not most of Europe, even at its height as the Carolingian Empire.

The soft power of the church faded with the rise of capitalism.

The soft power of the Church died in the Thirty Years’ War, as increasingly centralized states began to deal with issues of pluralism and national unity; itself derived from the Protestant Reformation. The soft power of the Church was dead in the most backwards states of Europe even before the bourgeoisie became ascendant.

We still act like Rome. The behaviors never ended. That’s the through line

Your core objection to the unique influence of Rome was that it ‘conquered’; you defined conquest by assimilative processes, but your points have absolutely nothing to do with cultural assimilation or, for that matter, reality.

Jesus… They’re the same damn group! Yes the power of the Pope waxed and waned. The church and the nobility were intertwined! The Pope doesn’t matter, the institution does!

The same Catholic Church whose dictates were repeatedly ignored by both the common people and the nobility?

And every coronation was done by at least an arch bishop. Who were a compromise between the church and the king.

That’s not even close to true. In many coronations in many kingdoms, bishops presided, or even no clergy at all. You really don’t have the slightest clue about what you’re talking about.

And do you have any idea how incestuous the royal families of all of Europe were? Not just individually, but between each other

For most of the Medieval period, not very. The intensified incest was largely a product of consolidated royal families and increased international travel in the Early Modern Period.

Your don’t seem to understand the difference between hard and soft power. And my whole point is people in power flowed from Rome, to the church, to the aristocracy of Europe, to capitol

No, my point is that your perception of the soft power of the Church and of Rome is utterly bizarre conspiracy shite with an extremely modern view of how society functioned at a basic level during the Medieval period, and thus having no fucking relation to the reality of the Medieval period.

Okay, this is just objectively how the holy Roman empire worked. That’s not even a slightly controversial statement

The HRE was one player in European politics in the Medieval period and Early Modern period. There was no ‘secret club’ of European royalty; dynasties ruling European polities rose and fell all the goddamn time. The HRE in particular was infamous for being unable to control its aristocracy, or its bourgeois, for that matter.

Legitimacy of other European royalty was not significantly connected to the HRE or to Rome.

How do you think the Pope was able to dictate terms to royalty? They controlled coronations, marriages, and pacified the people.

Jesus fucking Christ.

The only coronation the Pope nominally controlled was that of the Holy Roman Emperor himself. And that only nominally. The Pope was involved in royal marriages only insofar as issues of consanguinity or dissolving marriages was concerned. The Pope’s control over the common people was fucking marginal, considering how many kings were excommunicated and considered it only a minor annoyance.

The Pope didn’t ‘dictate terms’ to royalty. Fuck, the Pope was literally imprisoned and overthrown by royals numerous times throughout the Medieval period, including by the Holy Roman Emperor.

The nobility tolerated this because there was a give and take, their relatives were given high rank… It’s the origin of the term nepotism

The origin of the term nepotism is from Popes appointing their own nephews as cardinals. Nepos.

This is also very basic European history.

A lot of this I can excuse as you being a too literal and uncharitable, but there’s no two interpretations on this one

I don’t know if you have a hard on for Rome or what, but I don’t think you’re being serious

Nothing about this discussion, regarding the Medieval period and the HRE, has anything to do with the Roman Empire. This is purely over some really bizarre Da Vinci Code level perception of the Catholic Church and Medieval period that you have.

There was war, there were other empires. People intermingled and intermixed, sometimes under rule from another group. There was assimilation, but in an organic process

And… what part of the process was less organic about Roman assimilation?

I do think the HRE was more Rome than Germanic - what language did they speak? Not Greek, Aramaic, or any Germanic language - it was Latin.

Are you fucking kidding me right now?

The HRE was overwhelmingly a German-speaking state.

And in the East you had the Byzantine empire doing the same damn thing, spreading soft influence to Eastern Europe

This… this the same Byzantine Empire whose cultural footprint outside of religion is negligible outside of the Greek heartland it clung to?

Jesus said we don’t need temples or coin.

That is a profound misunderstanding of early Christianity.

Constantine rebranded the Roman religion under Jesus’s name, and carefully picked it’s practices to control the people

… except the practices and values of Nicaean Christianity differ radically from traditional Roman religion, traditional Hellenic religion, and the Neoplatonism of the 3rd century AD.

The HRE kept control over the aristocracy through marriage, ceremony, and through relatives in the clergy. They let the kings have their kingdom while controlling the secret little club of European royalty. They held the legitimacy of all of them in Rome.

Fucking what.

And even now, a few family lines always seem to be the ones in power. The meeting places and the titles change, but each rising and falling empire goes back to Rome

Jesus fucking Christ.

Genital mutilation, cannibalism, rape, racism, all put onto this perverse kink pedestal.

Definitely not the Centurii-chan I’ve seen, and I follow their art. The worst of their’s I’ve seen are some jokes about colonization that could be seen as in bad taste, and a joke about people using slurs when playing multiplayer games.

Hyper fixation or not some things are messed up to be so obsessed over.

Uh, okay.

You’re describing what I said with more words

“Romans were the first to do conquest.”

“No, they weren’t.”

“You’re just saying what I said.”

???

The difference between Vikings (or wherever else, they’re just an example) and Romans is the assimilation.

… do… do you think pre-Roman peoples didn’t practice assimilation?

That’s why there were so many more Romans, because they constantly expanded what it meant to be Roman. There were concentric circles of Roman-ness starting with just the city inhabitants down to the newly conquered territory at the fringes

By the time that people on the fringes of the Empire were considered Romans, Romans had lost the cultural hegemony necessary for assimilation, which makes this a very dubious claim.

Also, Rome was around for a long time. Their practices changed drastically during that time. It ranged from much worse than what I described to completely peaceful assimilation.

I can honestly think of no period of Roman history in which the scenario you described was the norm.

But my real problem wasn’t the violence, it’s the wealth extraction… That model lived on through the holy Roman empire, then “the West”. There’s so many horrible knock on effects to this, ones we’re living through now

…

… do you think wealth extraction doesn’t predate the Romans? For that matter, you think the HRE is more rooted in Roman practice than Germanic practice? For that matter, you think the West demonstrates the most horrific form of wealth extraction in the modern day?

No one really did conquering - they would take land, take slaves,

… that’s what conquest is.

But Vikings were Vikings, even if they occupy a settlement, the people of the settlement do not become Vikings

… only because the Vikings were typically small numbers of warriors? And post-Roman, for that matter.

When Rome conquered a place, they’d levy most of the men into the legion, and when they finished their service they became Roman

That’s… not how it works.

First, the Legions were for citizens only. Non-citizens were not permitted to enlist.

Second, the Auxiliaries, what you’re probably thinking of, were partly conscripted, but mostly volunteer, and very selective about their recruits. In no reality would they have taken most of the men of a region.

Third, the process of Romanization was gradual and largely unenforced - the Romans did not care if the native provincials became Romans or kept their native culture. The Romans, in fact, held a worldview wherein other peoples were better at certain things than the Romans, and that this was a good thing, because it meant Rome could organize their superior efforts for the greater good of the Republic.

Fourth, most regions after Roman conquest retained a great deal of self-government, as the Romans did not want the trouble of overturning local practices, unless they interfered with something like collecting taxes.

Fifth, Roman conquest was rarely so simple as “The Romans have conquered this place now” - there were often many graduations of Roman control which regions went through, and few regions had the same journey. The moment of conquest you’re imagining, where the Legions march through after putting the enemy’s armies and leaders to the sword, is not very common.

Sixth, the process of ethnic cleansing and assimilation are both widely attested to in the pre-Roman world, by peoples much more brutal about it than the Romans.

What was the ruin of Sparta and Athens, but this, that mighty as they were in war, they spurned from them as aliens those whom they had conquered? Our founder Romulus, on the other hand, was so wise that he fought as enemies and then hailed as fellow-citizens several nations on the very same day. Strangers have reigned over us. That freedmen’s sons should be intrusted with public offices is not, as many wrongly think, a sudden innovation, but was a common practice in the old commonwealth. But, it will be said, we have fought with the Senones. I suppose then that the Volsci and Aequi never stood in array against us. Our city was taken by the Gauls. Well, we also gave hostages to the Etruscans, and passed under the yoke of the Samnites. On the whole, if you review all our wars, never has one been finished in a shorter time than that with the Gauls. Thenceforth they have preserved an unbroken and loyal peace. United as they now are with us by manners, education, and intermarriage, let them bring us their gold and their wealth rather than enjoy it in isolation. Everything, Senators, which we now hold to be of the highest antiquity, was once new. Plebeian magistrates came after patrician; Latin magistrates after plebeian; magistrates of other Italian peoples after Latin. This practice too will establish itself, and what we are this day justifying by precedents, will be itself a precedent.

The Roman Emperor Claudius, who was also a scholar of history (his writings are sadly lost)

No. No. They were really decended from gods and raised by wolves. /S

Funny thing is, one of the key parts of Roman legend was also that their city was founded by a bunch of literal criminals and exiles that no one else wanted, and this was a theme that they constantly returned to - both positively (as in referring to the wisdom of Romulus in accepting outsiders of merit, whatever their reputation) and negatively (as in referring to Rome as the ‘cesspit of Romulus’, a place of base realities instead of high-minded ideals).

They kind of invented the idea of conquering other civilizations,

I, uh, got some really bad news for you about the pre-Roman world

If only we could throw those criminals against basic decency and aesthetics to the lions, like the good old days!

Or at least enter the Cybertruck in a demolition derby so it can serve some purpose.

The deliberate misunderstanding of the Roman Empire necessitates a pre-existing worldview through which to misunderstand it.

Beautiful

He just loves Roman history,

True.

WW2 history,

What? WW2 history is one of the less common things I post or talk about. About the only place it comes up regularly is in historical photos, and even then that’s mostly because it’s a well-photographed war.

the space fascist future of 40k,

… I didn’t realize being a 40k fan who thinks space dystopia is a space dystopia was all that exceptional.

and criticizing the past sins of socialism more than the rise of fascism while completely ignoring all sins of capitalism.

I guess all my constant criticisms of capitalism and the rise of fascism are being ignored in this analysis?

It’s fine I’m sure. Just a turbolib. He believes in democracy. Probably.

Turbolib is when you advocate for harm reduction, and the more harm reduction you advocate for in a society where even the vast majority of the proletariat are hostile towards the idea of socialism, the more turbolib you are?

Forgive me for thinking that national changes need the consensus of the people, a task we as leftists must work towards; I’m sure your holsum vanguard party will perform a successful coup any day now.

The Punt Empire. An empire so antithetical to Western values that the British Library sponsored a genocidial campaign in Africa to erase evidence of its existence.

What?

So can you explain what’s with the anime girl roman memes with all the sexism and racism?

As I said below

Mostly it’s just absurdist jokes and memes by a Filipino Romaboo with a terminal case of Horny.

Centurii-chan is internet-overdosed, that’s for damn sure, but unless “Being terminally horny” is sexism, I don’t think I see it. As for racism, there are certainly some edgy jokes, and Centurii-chan doesn’t always take racism as seriously as they should, but I don’t think I’ve seen anything that’s degrading towards PoC. Which, itself, would be a little weird, considering the artist is, themselves, most likely a PoC.

I also don’t get the fetish that the people over in non credible defence have either. War, guns and killing glorified and memed. So bizarre.

Many people in NCD, or at least the original (especially pre-Ukraine War) NCD, were vets or involved in the defense industry at some point in their lives. Some were bitter, some were cheerfully detached, but in both cases, humor over the absurdity of the military and fascination with military engineering were uniting features. Many of them were… bizarrely knowledgeable on military engineering and specs, both modern and historical. An attraction to those with a certain hyperfixation, one might say.

Military engineering is impressive and militaries the world-round are likewise full of fascinating absurdities - interests I share with that original demographic, even though I have never been a part of the defense industry or in the military.

It is, we don’t tolerate fascists or their apologists in the HistoryMeme or RoughRomanMemes comms.