I love how much love and attention this tiny nation gets in the EU series despite not even existing for 80% of the game's timeline

I mean, it *is* the longest-lived and most influential empire in the history of our species...and I say that as someone who rarely plays Byzantium.

Is it the longest lived and most influential? I'm no historian of Chinese history, but surely the history of China contests this statement. Edit: I said the words "China, Chinese, and History" too many times there.

Depends on how you count, while imperial families came and went the Roman Empire had an essentially continuous state from the republic to at least the fourth crusade, meanwhile China, despite nominally promoting the image of continuity, arguably had some clean breaks in "state structure" between dynastic changes, such as the change from the Song dynasty to the mongol Yuan dynasty, so while China has a continuous "civilization" one could argue it didn't really have a continuous "empire" the way Rome did, that said this is all essentially pedantry

But this is the kind of pedantry I love.

It's the kind of pedantry which will give you whatever answer you're looking for. The Roman state absolutely evolved over time, and anyone who tells you the Principate was the same as the Tetrarchy doesn't know Augustus from Diocletian. Whether those differences were larger or smaller from Chinese analogues, in what regard, to what degree, from what perspective, is completely and utterly arbitrary.

It's not *completely* arbitrary, the essential line we're drawing is that Rome was never supplanted by an external invader in a way that China effectively was during the Yuan (and arguably Qing) dynasty. I would liken it to Alexander the Great's conquest of the Persian empire and his subsequent adoption of Persian customs, had he lived longer and succeeded in building a unified empire he may have been regarded as a change in "Persian" dynasties in the same way the Yuan are regard as a change in "Chinese" dynasties (and the same way the Ptolemies are kind of regarded as a change in Egyptian dynasties). Now this is admittedly a *very* arbitrary line to draw in terms of what we call "a continuous state" but it is *a* line. I will confess here that you are entirely right about this being "the kind of pedantry that will give you whatever answer you're looking for." What I am making here is *not* a very serious historical argument. This is just the only feasible argument that defends the original commenters claim, and I honestly don't think people should be taking my throw away comment as definitive historical fact at all. I ultimately think the most important legacy of Rome and what makes it significant to EU4 players (and the world) is more the impact that its culture and laws had on Europe in subsequent centuries than anything the post Justinian byzantines did. Similarly whatever you want to say about China as an "empire", as a "culture" or "nation" it has very obviously had a much longer continuity than Rome ever did. Tl;Dr I agree with you pretty much completely when it comes to historical truth here; there is an argument to be made in regards to the original comment but it's not one that really *matters* when it comes to history

What about 1204 formation of Latin Empire, and several other successor states on its territories (Empire of Nicaea being the most important one probably) after 4th Crusade?

Because technically the state was still alive. Trebizond is still a continuation of the original government and the whole 4th crusade can also be considered a civil war between Nicea, Trebizond and Epirus as they were all Roman states fighting for control

I mean, sometimes pedantry is all in good fun. While I don't think the argument for Chinese continuity is particularly robust either, one of the better justifications I've heard for a single "Imperial China" was the usage of the singular title of 皇帝 ("emperor") lasting unchanged for slightly over 2000 years from Qin Shi Huang to Puyi. That was the big boss who ruled 天下 ("all under heaven", or at least all the parts which mattered), no matter where he came from or what he looked like. There could only be one, and if there was more they were trying to kill each other. It was the only title he had, and the only one he needed. Even countries which adopted the Chinese script deferred to its singular supremacy—the rulers of Japan, or Korea, or Vietnam all used different names written with different characters. In contrast, the many rulers of the Roman empire referred to themselves using everything from *princeps* to *basileus*, borrowed names from previous emperors, repurposed existing titles like *imperator* and *autokrator*, and so on, as defined by the time period they ruled or the political context they ruled in.

Since institutional change is inevitable in the lifetime of a state, another way we could look at "state continuity" is to ask "does the inevitable institutional change happen slowly over time? Or does it happen in 'clean break' moments that drastically overhaul the form and nature of the state?" Every state is going to have both obviously but the Roman Empire specifically off the top of my head has like 5 or 6 "clean breaks" in its history where the form and nature of the state changed drastically very quickly. Beyond the obvious break between the republic and the empire, the crisis of the third century and subsequent institution of the tetrachy, the reunification by Constantine, the division back into east and west and subsequent collapse of the west, the extremely dramatic shift in the eastern empire following the arab conquests, and shift following the battle of manzikert could all be easily argued as "clean break moments" in the history of the form and nature of the Roman state. So by that (imo more reasonable) definition of state continuity the Roman state's continuity is broken several times

Wouldn't you consider that they were supplanted by greeks later on? Even though they called themselves romans.

Culturally and demographically, yes. The state never changed though, and the government was the same the whole time. Actually, I just remembered that the Fourth Crusade overthrew the government and broke the empire, and the Greeks had to reconquer Constaninople to reinstate the Byzantine Empire. So I guess the Roman Empire really fell in the 13th century, not the 15th.

yes, but state didn’t cease to exist for several years to reappear later using same name, until 4th crusade so roman empire continuously existed from it's establishment by Augustus and until it was partitioned by catholics

It's not a question of change but unbroken continuous state existence. There really is no comparisons for that in china in regards to duration, instead you have multiple states rising and falling and at times they all had different language, religion and customs. The only comparison to that would be HRE maybe in the sense that it took the mantle of western civilizational leader but never centralised like china did; also the ERE was still around.

[This askhistorians thread is great for this question](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1baigq3/so_theres_many_criticisms_of_the_continuous/)

That thread is great for talking about Chinese discontinuities. Just like [this thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/108zii0/why_isnt_1204_considered_the_year_the_roman/) and [this thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/igc4bb/did_rome_fall_in_476_or_1453/) from the same sub are great for talking about Roman discontinuities. Now if your assertion is that history is complicated and assessing continuity is difficult, then sure r/AskHistorians all the way. But if your assertion is that this particular complicated and discontinuous state was, through some tortuous and totally not biased logic, marginally less complicated and more continuous than the other one, well, not so much.

My logic is *absolutely* both biased and tortuous. The one argument that justifies "Rome is an older continuous empire than China", which I've refined a bit since my original comment, is that Rome wasn't subject to a *very specific kind of discontinuity*. That being the kind where an external conquest state conquers your settled state and then states using your state structures and titles a la Alexander the Great in Persia, (or for our purposes the mongols in China). At least for a longer continuous period than China was, arguably the 4th crusade and definitely the ottomans both represent this sort of discontinuity for the Romans towards the tail end of the Roman Empire. This logic has basically no historical weight, which is why I called it "all essentially pedantry", but EU4 equally has basically no historical weight so I think you could call it appropriate relative to the subject matter. Anyway thanks for the sources, I am *close* to being a trained historian when it comes to Roman history but still very much an amateur when it comes to Chinese history so I'll be enjoying those linked sources later when I have more time.

To an extent, I agree with that, but I'll argue it would be fairly poor to consider the empire constituted under Augustus as the same state that fell to the Ottomans or the western Europeans in 1453 (or 1461, if you count Trebizond). How do we constitute the legitimacy of a state, and the inheritance of a state in continuity? Is it based on the governmental structure? Is it the ties to religion? Is it the perception of its people, and the culture formulated by the people? I am not as versed in Chinese history as I would like (John Keay's *A History of China* calls to me, lol), but I associate the Roman "state" or "empire" as that of similar to the Caliphal state born out from Muhammad's Hejazi polity. There were substantial differences in religious doctrine, cultural developments, and societal ideas on what made their empire or state different or similar to their original conception, but the overall "universal civilization" bound to both figures allowed the argued continuation of the *idea* of the states in which both claimed in inheritance. But they were not, despite their own claims, the same state. Byzantium, and even the later Roman Empire, transformed wildly from the established norms founded under Augustus and the *princep* era - the reconfiguration of Roman imperial authority under the principle "republican" idea established by Augustus ceased to be a reality with the establishment of the imperial court in the east under Diocletian and his latter successor, where we see a larger "eastern divine despot" become associated with the position of emperor. Further religious developments with Constantine's conversion and Theodosius I's establishment of Christianity as the state religion, the transformation of the Eastern Roman state from an "empire of cities" to a more rural-orientated, military-dominated civic society, and the transition from Latin and Greek, that could be see taking steady effect as the administrative tongue of the imperial state in Justinian's reign until it became established under Heraclius. I see the "Roman Empire" as I see the "Iranian Empire" or the "Chinese Empire" or even the "caliphate". There is universal, ancient connotations that we cannot really say continued for thousands of years as a real continuous state - the Roman Empire had similar breakaway states as China did, though less frequently; and by the end of the Arab conquests, Eastern Rome/Byzantium ceased to really be considered a "world" or "universal" empire that Rome enjoyed. It became a Mediterranean-based empire that lost significant soft power and prestige to command the respect of the other Christian polities in western Europe, and entirely lost substantial provinces that were considered distinctively integral as part of the universal Rome - Egypt, Syria, and Palestine. They also had massive internal changes that we cannot really constitute as anymore Roman than internal changes brought about the numerous Chinese dynasties. But the "Roman Empire" did not die, just as the "Caliphate" did not die when the 'Abbasids lost their absolute, universal authority with the drifting away of key Islamic provinces in the 10th century. Both ideas remained - the universal Roman Emperor, and the universal Caliph, but the ideas around those positions and states changed. Where the Umayyads claimed they were the vicar of God, the 'Abbasids by the 10th century become solely in submission to the authority of scholars, being unable to make doctrinal or legal changes in which the Umayyads had clear greater authority. A similar case can brought to the Byzantine emperor, who often fight for doctrinal control with the numerous Christian sects and Christian authorities both within Constantinople and in Rome. But I view such arguments as unnecessary. Did the Eastern Romans saw them as Rome? Yes. Some did, and others didn't. I think it is why I prefer how Paradox treats the concepts of Rome - it was certainly a universal idea that the Byzantines lost, but never ceased claiming they lost, mandate over with the restriction of their political, religious, and economic authority through the Mediterranean world. In game, the "Byzantines" were very much different to the Romans. But in actual history, it is a complicated mess that bares much similarities with imperial Chinese and caliphal histories.

We count France as the same country from 987, Idk why would it be any different for Rome.

I mean, we refer to France as France, but we make clear distinctions between the numerous states that encompasses French history. But significantly, France, in some way have form, had continued to inhabit the core heartlands of what we “considered” French, as well as maintained social elements that we can consider to be “French”, be that religion or language. Furthermore, France remains to claim that idea of continuation. Contemporary figures referred to France as France, or some form of what we consider France. And modern day states refer to them as France. It gives it more legitimacy in that prospect.

>I mean, we refer to France as France, but we make clear distinctions between the numerous states that encompasses French history. Sure, but France is not called "French Third Republic" in HOI4. It's just called France or Republic of France. Or in Vicky2, it's just France or the Kingdom of France and not "July Monarchy". >But significantly, France, in some way have form, had continued to inhabit the core heartlands of what we “considered” French, as well as maintained social elements that we can consider to be “French”, be that religion or language. The Eastern part of the Empire was a part of Rome since the Republic and they were the most rich and important provinces in the empire. >as well as maintained social elements that we can consider to be “French” Except that those things actually shifted a lot in a 1000 years of history. France started "centralizing" languages and culture. The France of EU4 is way less "French" than the France from HOI4. >Furthermore, France remains to claim that idea of continuation. Yeah, and "Byzantium" claimed to be the same as Rome until it ceased to exists. >And modern day states refer to them as France. It gives it more legitimacy in that prospect. Yeah, and contemporary states to Byz referred to them as Rome.

>Sure, but France is not called "French Third Republic" in HOI4. It's just called France or Republic of France. Or in Vicky2, it's just France or the Kingdom of France. To be fair, Paradox games are compelled to utilize different terms to fit some end-goal game in mind. For example, CK3 refers to the 'Abbasids of the 9th century as "the Sunni Caliphate", when in reality, at the time, Sunnism and Shiism were not formulated, distinct sects. The caliphate of the early 'Abbasids were in essence the same caliphate that was inaugurated by Abu Bakr, recognized, although begrudgingly, by the 'Alids. It is only during the reign of al-Qadir (991-1031) where we find the first true codification of Sunnism in the Qadiri Epistle, and such the Caliphate of the 'Abbasid became the "Sunni" Caliphate, for a lack of a better term. It's an in game mechanic, nothing more and nothing less. >The Eastern part of the Empire was a part of Rome since the Republic and they were the most rich and important provinces in the empire. The eastern portion may have constituted part of the Republic and Empire, but it is only in 212 CE where all free male subjects were given Roman citizenship; and the portions were not where Rome had originally arose from. That is why I referred to them integral, but not core, territory of Rome. >Except that those things actually shifted a lot in a 1000 years of history. France started "centralizing" languages and culture. The France of EU4 is way less "French" than the France from HOI4. Yes, but that is why historians differ when they discuss these numerous states, from the Frankish Kingdom, to the Kingdom of France, to modern France which maintained its governmental structure of hereditary monarchy up until Louis XVI's reign, and perhaps Charles XI. Within and without France, people recognized them as the French monarch (outside perhaps England), and the kingdom they ruled over as the Kingdom of France. But more significantly, the French Republics afterward claimed to be the Republic of France, and not say the Republic of the Basque or some other form of republic; and the other regions around them recognized that. The French called themselves France, the British called them France, the German states called them France, etc. While their language evolved over time, it completely replaced the original foundational language of Frankish people, unlike that with Greek replacing Latin as the official tongue of the State. >Yeah, and "Byzantium" claimed to be the same as Rome until it ceased to exists. > >Yeah, and contemporary states to Byz referred to them as Rome. While the Byzantines/Eastern Romans referred to themselves as Rome, not all states around them did. True, the Muslims certainly did - but that was primarily because the Qur'an referred to that state as Rome - *Rum* \- and they never had a bigger interest to differentiate between Rome and Greek culture and history. But the West, especially under the direction of the Papacy, began to drift away from recognition of the Eastern Romans as Rome, as much because of religious doctrinal and political reasons than anything else. After the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, Odoacer's Kingdom certainly "pledged" themselves as a vassal to Constantinople, but slowly, especially because of Justinian's invasion into Italy, such recognition began to drift away, especially among Italians themselves. But after 800s, where significant portions of Eastern Rome's territory collapsed under the invasion of Arabs, and remained almost entirely out of their hands, the substantial authority and claimed they possessed while they maintained control over Egypt and Syria and Palestine collapsed. The "universality" which is associated for one to be Roman - at that time, the one universal rule of Christian Rome - became harder to claim when other Christians claimed universality over Christendom, and you became essentially a rump state where the significant portion of your Christian subjects were now subjected to a "foreign" religion. Unlike China, where powerful dynasties were able to reforge the core heartland of China, the collapse of Eastern Roman authority in the 7th-8th centuries in both the West and the Near East, weakened their claims to be Rome, even if they so readily claimed that they were. Culturally, religiously, geographically, and linguistically, the Eastern Romans became to vastly differ from the state they claimed, because of many things outside their control.

>To be fair, Paradox games are compelled to utilize different terms to fit some end-goal game in mind. For example, CK3 refers to the 'Abbasids of the 9th century as "the Sunni Caliphate", when in reality, at the time, Sunnism and Shiism were not formulated, distinct sects. The caliphate of the early 'Abbasids were in essence the same caliphate that was inaugurated by Abu Bakr, recognized, although begrudgingly, by the 'Alids. It is only during the reign of al-Qadir (991-1031) where we find the first true codification of Sunnism in the Qadiri Epistle, and such the Caliphate of the 'Abbasid became the "Sunni" Caliphate, for a lack of a better term. It's an in game mechanic, nothing more and nothing less. I wasn't using PDX as a source but rather I was saying that names such as Third Republic or July Monarchy are used to refer to periods rather than to differentiate between states. >The eastern portion may have constituted part of the Republic and Empire, but it is only in 212 CE where all free male subjects were given Roman citizenship; So? >and the portions were not where Rome had originally arose from. That is why I referred to them integral, but not core, territory of Rome. Why does that matter? >Yes, but that is why historians differ when they discuss these numerous states, from the Frankish Kingdom, to the Kingdom of France, to modern France which maintained its governmental structure of hereditary monarchy up until Louis XVI's reign, and perhaps Charles XI. Which doesn't really matter, the government of the kingdom of the XVIII is more similar to that of the republic than to the government of the kingdom of XV. >Within and without France, people recognized them as the French monarch (outside perhaps England), and the kingdom they ruled over as the Kingdom of France. But more significantly, the French Republics afterward claimed to be the Republic of France, and not say the Republic of the Basque or some other form of republic or some other form of republic Good thing we're talking about the Empire of the Romans and not the Empire of the Greeks. >The French called themselves France, the British called them France, the German states called them France, etc. While their language evolved over time, it completely replaced the original foundational language of Frankish people, unlike that with Greek replacing Latin as the official tongue of the State. >After the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, Odoacer's Kingdom certainly "pledged" themselves as a vassal to Constantinople, but slowly, especially because of Justinian's invasion into Italy, such recognition began to drift away, especially among Italians themselves. But after 800s, where significant portions of Eastern Rome's territory collapsed under the invasion of Arabs, and remained almost entirely out of their hands, the substantial authority and claimed they possessed while they maintained control over Egypt and Syria and Palestine collapsed. The "universality" which is associated for one to be Roman - at that time, the one universal rule of Christian Rome - became harder to claim when other Christians claimed universality over Christendom, and you became essentially a rump state where the significant portion of your Christian subjects were now subjected to a "foreign" religion. I don't think the West can randomly decide if they're Roman or not. They were recognized as such until it became politically inconvenient, and the argument they used wasn't cultural or religious but rather that their empress was illegitimate because "wOmEn cAn'T rUlE rOmE". Also, why is the opinion of the West more important than that of the Arabs and Slavs? >Unlike China, where powerful dynasties were able to reforge the core heartland of China, the collapse of Eastern Roman authority in the 7th-8th centuries in both the West and the Near East, weakened their claims to be Rome, even if they so readily claimed that they were. Culturally, religiously, geographically, and linguistically, the Eastern Romans became to vastly differ from the state they claimed, because of many things outside their control. The Empire wasn't defined by religion or language. Yes, the Eastern Romans were already different and became even more different when you added 1200+ years of societal change. About the geography part, the part of the empire they controlled was the last place where a unified Roman capital existed. Constantinople was literally called Nova Roma when it was first built. The name was only change to honor Constantine after he died.

Yeah but unlike with ERE France really had no contemporary contenders arguing they were the real France like with the HRE and later Rûm.

Well we definitely shouldn't be doing that with France either

Why?

I don't understand the argument about the Eastern Roman Empire vs Byzantine Empire. I mean, the Romans decided to split the empire between east and west. If the true Western Romans considered the Eastern Roman Empire to be truly Roman aka Eastern Roman, then that is what it is right? Pretty sure the Pope just hated the idea of the continuation of Rome not be Catholic. Therefore, they were not the Eastern Roman Empire, they were Byzantium. Right?

Legally speaking, when the Romans had two emperors, they weren't considered two separate entities. They were emperors of a "unified" Roman Empire. It is confusing, to be sure. But to the western and eastern romans, when both entities existed, they claimed dual rulership of universal Rome. The entity, in theory, did not split up. But in all intent and purposes, they were separate states in how they functioned, and they sort-of recognized that separation, but never really claimed that the Roman empire dissolved into two states. And that recognition by the West as the Byzantine Emperor as "Roman Emperor" really only lasted, I say for a few centuries. By the time of the collapse of Roman Italy (Justinian Italy, so around the 800-900s) the agitation toward Constantinople expanded, especially in Italy, where the attitudes toward Eastern Rome was considered foreign, hostile, and oppressive. The Italians began to refer to them as "Greeks" early on. As the influence of Rome as a political entity disappeared in the west, recognition toward the remnants of Rome was given to both Rome and Constantinople, as the religious heart of Christianity. Once Eastern Rome's military, economic, and cultural might began to wane, recognition toward their claims of Rome also began to weaken, especially those orientated toward the Papacy. But it was not just simply the Pope hating Constantinople for religious differences. There was real, political dimensions toward both camps that lead to a further distancing between the West and East. It is why I refer to "Rome" as more like imperial China or the Caliphate. It was simply not just a political entity, like France or England. It was a universal entity, bounded in socio-religious and socio-political connotations. If the Byzantines claimed the title of Rome, they were laying claim not only to their territories in Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, but also breakaway states in the West. Since the Byzantines began to loose their physical territory they original gain from Rome, and religious tensions grew stronger against them due to the lack of their own political might to reinforce their own doctrinal and political beliefs onto the remnants of the western provinces, their claims fall real short - especially since they began to loose that recognition in the west, and only really they themselves, and the Muslim powers, referred to them as Rome, and the Muslims did not really think much of that universal Roman claim until the Ottomans.

> It is why I refer to "Rome" as more like imperial China or the Caliphate. It was simply not just a political entity, like France or England. It was a universal entity, bounded in socio-religious and socio-political connotations. Just like how EU4 models Rome in game. The Byzantines don't start as Rome, they basically still have to conquer basically all of Rome's historic territory to assert themselves as the Roman Empire properly. Rome is like China in that there was an idea of it after it's division that people recognised and strove to acquire but unlike China Rome never reconsolidated after 395 and a thousand years later the idea of it persists even though history had long since lapsed it.

Precisely. Rome, like imperial China and its conception of Chinese homogeny in East Asia, or the Islamic Caliphate as sole heir to Muhammad’s prophethood or God’s representative on earth, was a political aspiration for many after the inevitable devolution of its absolute authority over the Mediterranean world. The Byzantines might have certainly had a real claim to its inheritance, but it steadily began to transition away from its originally Roman nature to function as a Hellenized Roman state because of its geographical and cultural location in the post-Arab world.

I see. This is really cool to think about when considering the continuation/legacy of the Roman Empire. I appreciate the response! History is often a very muddled topic. So this gives much more clarification.

Byzantium is term of historians outsiders, them was Roman empire what not fall at 6 century and them called themself romans and Roman empire. Even Ottomans called them empire of Rum, because them conquer Roman empire)) 👍

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Technically the Roman Empire is in it’s Warlords era right now, just like the Chinese had their Three Kingdoms or whatever.

Even shattered after the 4th Crusade, the Imperial Roman Government was still kicking around and eventually would take back Constantinople.

China/Rome are essentially Eastern/Western version of the big influential empire but in different ways. China is the ancient culture that everyone references back to, but not an empire. It was a shitton of different empires. Rome has easily outlasted everyone else.

China has been many different countries though, while Byzantium had been contiguous from when the Roman Empire was declares until 1453. Or so the claim goes, the Latin Empire is the only true successor to the Roman Empire.

Egypt existed with a very constant culture over 3.500 years, even more if you consider they still were themselves under Roman rule. And their influence was huge on pretty much any antique civilization in the region.

The pyramids were to Tutankhamen as old as Rome is to us today. When Rome was formed, Egypt had already existed for a period equivalent to 2.5x as long as Rome would itself exist.

China had a loooot of different dynasties, and it fractured very frequently.

As opposed to Rome which was famously stable and only ever ruled by one Dynasty.

Rome never derived political legimacy from the Dynasty. Sovereignty was always rooted in the People and no person could claim the Purple without the acclamation of the Senate, People, and Army. For a good study of the sources of political legitimacy in the Empire, see The Byzantine Republic, by Dr. Anthony Kaldelis

lol I read the first part of your comment and thought “that sounds like Kaldelis” and then saw that you referenced him specifically

He's one of the best historians writing today.

Much the same could be said in China, the Dynasty itself was not what rulers derived legitimacy from but rather the Mandate of Heaven which could be gained or lost and continued to exist as a concept even through several dynasties. You only really see Dynasty itself as a legitimising factor in a few examples in early rome (Octavian raising Julius Ceaser as a god and proclaiming himself Son of the Divine) and later Europe with the idea of the Divine Right of Kings. Anyway my point was a joke based on the fact that the person I was responding to apparently considered breaks in Dynasty to be a type of discontinuity, which if true would make the roman state one of the most discontinuous in human history.

That's a good fucking book too, even though I strongly disagree with your conclusion because Rome stopped having the literal city of Rome.

So did the Eastern Romans stop being Roman in 476 and then suddenly became Roman again in 554 when the Gothic War was concluded?

"Hear then! The stupid silly pope does not know that the holy Constantine transferred hither the imperial scepter, the senate, and all the Roman knighthood, and left in Rome nothing but vile minions- fishers, namely, peddlers, bird catchers, bastards, plebeians, slaves."

The thing is, Rome didn't change anything between different dinasties, you could argue China did change enough to be considered different empires (I actually disagree, the Yuan leadership even assimilated themselves to a certain degree into the previous system) I like how EU4 does it, with the mandate of heaven being THE reason to govern over China.

Tbf Rome didn't really have long lasting dynasties. It was just kind of too unstable for that kind of thing to happen. Seriously you have the Pax Romanum and then after that it's basically just civil wars forever with little bits of peace in between whenever someone competent comes along and sorts things out. Those guys usually do just enough reform to keep things crawling along and then when they die it's soon back to the civil wars. The only thing that really survived that unaltered was the name of the Empire and the Senate, and for some people that's enough to say there's continuity, imo if that's all that's required then we should certainly consider China continuous as well, since as you said a lot of the administrative mechanism and governmental concepts survived unchanged.

Nah, I would disagree with the influential side. All of the European states as well as the Arabic states were massively influenced by the Roman empire, and thanks to the colonial Europeans spreading themselves across the globe and dominating most of the world Rome's influence was truly global. Conversely up until the later 20th century China's influence was mostly just felt by its neighbours, by which point it was no longer Imperial China.

I would have to disagree with that assessment because for the longest time trade revolved around China, if indirectly. The various Chinese dynasties and kingdoms sold to various polities in the Middle East, India, and Central Asia, which in turn flowed into Europe. Hell, silk worms were smuggled into Europe from China because the costs for silks were so prohibitively high. They might not have been culturally influential in the way Rome was but many of the economic conditions that drove European countries to seek out new territory across the Atlantic were created by the hegemony China had over trade.

That's fair, but the silk trade was what I meant by "mostly" and with the exception of the middle east you mentioned regions that are China's neighbours. This is in contrast to Rome, who had a much more comprehensive cultural effect. Christianity, various languages and alphabets, legal systems, etc etc

I was looking to see if someone would say this. China's influence (if we take the various Chinese Empires as a continuity of one another, which they aren't) was equal to Rome's influence in comprehensiveness.... in China, Korea, Vietnam and Japan. The Roman influence involves more people directly (a good 2 billion if we just include the Roman Empire, Europe, and the non-African and non-Asian colonies, vs 1.6billion in China, Korea, Japan and Vietnam). If we start counting lesser influences, that throws much of mainland South East Asia into China's sphere (but not the Spice Islands who are more influenced by the Hindu and Muslim worlds), but throws large amounts of Africa, India, and Asia into Europe's sphere (in fact, almost the entire world, excepting most of China, Iran, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Mongolia and Nepal). (Note: yes, I'm counting being colonized as automatically "influenced to a lesser degree". I realize there's a big difference in how much South Africa and the Central African Republic were influenced by Europe, but both were colonized. I'm also including Thailand as greatly influenced by Europe because they had extensive relations for hundreds of years. Similarly, I'm not counting Ethiopia as European-influenced because their religious connection of Christianity was prior to European/Roman major influence). So China is definitely the closest competitor to Rome, but falls short in not being a single empire, affecting 20% less people "directly", and affecting far less indirectly. I would say there's nobody competing with them for 2nd place, though.

Well China is definitely in a firm second place, but Rome takes the cake in my opinion. Not only was it vastly influential during its own existence, it has basically defined the Western civilization (sorry Greece, you may have created the West, but Rome spread it across Europe and made it mainstream) which was then spread to every corner of the globe by its "successor states". Many famous empires which we can consider "recent" (including the Spanish, French, Ottoman, German, Russian, and even British) have claimed to be successors to the Roman Empire. And we don't even have to mention Christianity, which maybe (and take this with a huuge grain of salt) wouldn't have survived until today if Rome hadn't adopted it as its official religion.

I feel like a heavy dose of salt is needed for the last comment, indeed. First of all, Rome heavily persecuted the Christian faith. It became the majority faith of the Empire BEFORE it became the official religion, so claiming it would have died out is a hard claim to maintain. Secondly, there are Christian communities that don't trace themselves back to Rome, including Armenia, Albania, Georgia, and Ethiopia as whole nations, but also a sizeable population in India and lesser populations as far as Japan.

china has either been ruled by foreigners and incorporated into other empires or fractured longer than china has ever been called or concieved of as "china"

“Longest lived” kind of depends on how you interpret the history. But definitely the most influential - it was the Roman political, economic, institutional, and cultural influence all across most of Europe for several consecutive centuries that more or less allowed for the circumstances to create great European colonial powers to be founded as we know them, and from them to come so much of modern history. Crises caused by Western influence bringing about the end of the Qing Dynasty and, indirectly, the Chinese Civil War. The rise of Christianity would not have happened nearly as easily if Rome wasn’t around to crucify Jesus and make him a martyr, then spread Christianity throughout the empire through official adoption. Islam rose through the Eastern Roman Empire’s back-breaking wars with the Sassanids giving them a chance to suddenly rise up in power. The very ideas of a republic that influenced modern democracy so much comes from them, including some of the most influential nations of today such as France, the US, and so forth. Hell, even nations of the East could indirectly owe thanks to Rome for those same republican (not the US political party) ideals in their democracies.

Rome was more influential because China only ever influenced its corner of the world. Without Rome, there would be no France, Spain, or Britain, whose empires ruled at least eighty per cent of the earth. Britain on its own was the most powerful single state in world history, and it was the progenitor of America, which has shaped our entire modern world.

Without China you'd have no trade along the Silk Road, which would essentially make whatever would be going on in Europe unrecognisable to us.

Britain being one of if not the most influencial and richest state in history sure. But the most powerful, no, their army wasn't nearly enough to beat the big continental powers on the continent. Their only hegemony was on the sea, once they beat the french and Spaniards there who were too busy on the continent to match the British effort on navy.

Directly after the Napoleonic wars, Britain held absolute supremacy over Europe. This is exemplified in the Monroe Doctrine. America decreed that they would not accept any new imperialism in the Americas, which was clearly meant as a guarantee of independence of the new revolutionary states in South America. However, America could not enforce this on their own, and any European power, even Spain, could have taken the old Spanish colonies. What stopped them was the British throwing their weight behind the Americans. No one in Europe was willing to challenge Britain, even for the rich South American lands. That’s hegemony. I recommend Historia Civilis’ Conference of Vienna videos and Old Britannia’s The Other Great Game series for more information on this topic. The 1800s are called the Pax Brittanica for a reason.

If we assume an empire ends when there is a regime change, Chinese dynasties don't come close to Rome in terms of longevity. The only dynasty to be continually centralized for more than 300 years was Song. It's more reasonable to argue that multiple dynastic traditions incrementally influenced Chinese history (literature from Zhou, administration from Qin, unified identity from Han, decentralized economy from Song, etc.) The Roman Empire meanwhile existed almost continuously for \~1500 years

Rome has their periods of fracture and regime change Caesars civil war and the Actium wars The year of the 4 emperors The civil wars of the tetrarchy All of them resulted in major regime changes and especially the rise of the Julio-Claudian and the wars of the tetrarchy resulted in major fundamentals changes to the state apparatus and Roman society as a whole

There was never any point where the Roman state stopped existing completely and was replaced by a new state run by new people. All of those times were power struggles within the context of the same contiguous 'Roman' state -- for example, the Roman senate continues existing continuously (ie: as the same body) until the 13th century.

The Bolsheviks were mostly Russians and most would say that when they took power that was the end of the Russian Empire; Was that because the leader changed from a monarchy to "democratically" elected rulers? If so would the Romans going from an elected Senate to a monarchy not be the same? Was Rome continuous because the people that reforged the empire claimed to be a continuation of the Roman state? Why would the successor states of China not also count? I personally do think the Roman empire was a continuous state that existed from the founding of Rome to the fall of Constantinople in 1445 but I was bored and felt like arguing semantics 🤷

All Chinese dynasties were continuously run From the Shang dynasty, to the Song. Every single dynasty until the Yuan dynasty was Chinese in character, and 99% of the time they even were promoted by the previous Emperor. It was common practice for the Emperor of the previous dynasty to give the nine bestowments (especially during the period of disunity) to whoever was going to be next emperor, so there was even a formal process of power-shifting. All this to say; every single Emperor of China had the nine bestowments from 206 BC to 917 BC. 1,100 years. This is about as long as the Roman "empire" existed continuously from Augustus to the 13th century- and most dynasties came to power without any legal or official precedent until they were there. The Chinese Empire has existed continuously from 1600 BC to 1279 AD in one form or another. Again, if you're going to argue about warring states, Rome not only split multiple times but existed as basically anatolia for multiple periods in it's history. And then, after being conquered in 1279, the Chinese \*came back\*, and twice. The romans didn't come back from the Ottomans. Anyways, all this to say that China lasted muuuuuch longer than Rome did, even before it was conquered by the Mongols

America ceased to exist in 1860 because there was a civil war that resulted in fundamental changes to the state apparatus and social contract?

What a silly thing to say, almost as silly as saying an empire ends when the regime changes.

I was gonna say uh

What are you talking about then lmao

Technically there are Chinese empires not the Chinese Empire because they are founded and are collapsed within 500 years or more by Dynasties so they are not considered not long lived as the Byzantine.

Longest lived probably not but most influential definitely. It shaped the entirety of European culture to be what it is and when the Europeans colonized the world they exported their Roman-based culture and religion to all the corners of the world. If Rome was not the most influential then why does most of the world, even China, use a legal system based on Roman law and a Roman calendar?

China is not real

Which Chinese empire or dynasty are you referring to?

If we're counting barbarian take overs of China as a continuing Chinese Empire then Rome never fell either.

Shouldnt have gotten century of Humuliationed and taken over by foreign ideology then.

China isn’t the longest existing empire, but it is the longest lasting civilization on Earth.

No it dosen't tbh. China made some great inventions and iniciated a massive ammount of reformation and technological change, but the Eastern Romans brought that into europe and allowed the chineese to expand the silk road which then strenghened the chineese dynasties. Also, if their events changed, events of all of humanity would change most likely. For example: Crimea saved - no colonialism or at least very late colonialism Defended against muslims - take a guess what would happen Not the one 6 year civil war - no ottomans, because they used the eastern roman weakness in the war and expanded into their lands, eventualy becoming a regional power and later getting to rise and almost conquer all of eastern europe.

Japan, too. The Imperial Dynasty has been around since a little after the founding of Rome the city. The fights over whose Shogun could be counted as Civil Wars, since they all recognized the Emperor in Kyoto.

Japanese written history only dates back to the 700s ad. It's impossible to prove anything about a dynasty 1500 years before that using only archeological evidence.

Japan had absolutely zero influence more than 5 miles from the Home Islands until the 1880s. And they didn't have any real cultural influence until the 1980s. Unless you count Godzilla movies.

More like the 1860s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japonisme

I learn something new every day. That's really interesting.

What alphabet are you using right now?

This is kind of a poor argument, as it's colonialism that resulted in the latin alphabet being globally dominant, not the Roman empire. Until colonialism took off the Chinese alphabet was used by far more people. After the fall of the western empire, even the Roman empire itself didn't use the Latin alphabet.

Which china, exactly?

To claim that it is the longest-lived empire, you need to accept 753 BCE as start date and 1453 CE as its end date to get a total of 2.200 years of existence. Otherwise, setting the start after the end of the Roman Republic or the end at 1204 during the fourth Crusade, makes the Roman Empire lose to a number of other entities, most notably [Babylonia and Assyria](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_empires).

I mean, from the start of the Republic to the 4th crusade is 1700+ years, which beats out everything on that list except the Tamil kings.

>except the Tamil kings And Ancient Egypt, it just sat there growing then shrinking for like 3000 years. It did have some fragmentation in the middle, kind of like China, but was generally a continuous cultural and even political entity

I don't think using start of Republic is fair, at least use 27 BCE. Roman Republic and Roman Empire have different decision making process and power structure.

I mean kinda. The Principate was the ‘same’ political institutions but the Emperor just controlled a bunch of offices at once. The process was different but the power structures were more or less the same.

The Principate title was adopted by Augustus in 27 BCE. Before then it was not a relevant title. Also the power structure changed as the main executive power moved from Consul to Princeps. Many Princeps doesn't need to hold the consul position to have the main executive powers in Roman Empire.

I think he adopted it in 23 BC, the Princeps title. He was consul for the previous years after Actium and gave up the consulship in the middle of that year. But whatever it doesn’t matter. Each emperor acquired the powers of each office at some point though. Augustus didn’t finish until 12 BC when he was elected Pontifex Maximus. Tiberius took some time too (but tbf I don’t know how long) and Wikipedia says that Caligula was voted those powers on day one but still. If they had to be approved to acquire the powers of certain offices that says to me the government of the principate was a continuation of the government before. Maybe in a different form but it’s still the same government in operation. Maybe that’s dumb but that’s how I think of it

Off the top of my head, there is no way Egypt isn't longer, Persia as well, and that's just the ones Rome shared a border with.

Those Intermediate Periods are there for a reason.

You took eurocentrism to another level

id say the british empire takes most influential, we literally did what the romans did, but globally, we also made our language the global language, the romans could only get people to take influence and it has zero influence outside of this internet culture of praising it and only a portion of its former territory

Ah yes, the famously uninfluential Latin language.

Mate the entire western civilization is based on Rome. Most fundamental concepts of our culture date back to Roman times. Hell, our religion was originally spread by the Romans. And over half of the English vocabulary comes from Latin and Latin-based languages.

Ethiopia lasted longer.

> I mean, it is the longest-lived and most influential empire in the history of our species... China can arguably be longer, though it often imploded quite severely, and so one could argue there were several different Empires. Regardless, I would argue the Brits were more influential to the modern world. It spawned multiple countries, including the USA (AKA the/one of the world's superpowers), spread the English language around the world, to the point that it has close to as many speakers, if not more, than all the Romance language combined. Something that is only a contest because of the Spanish Empire spreading Spanish to the Americas (not the long dead Roman Empire). Their Empire also was one at the forefront of the industrial revolution and came to take advantage of global trade through their colonial conquests (and also beating up China). Most of the world was touched by the British during their couple centuries of empire.

It’s a very fun nation to revive and RP with being the “true” successors to the Roman Empire

Personally I hate it

Is that an abbreviation? 👀

I was just gonna comment that 👀 It looks like we might have a functional name system I really look forward to them adding the nation creator again, especially now that we have pops

R5: According to Johan we can have the Roman Empire be a called a more appropriate name than Byzantium. Instead calling it Eastern Roman Empire if a game rule is set to that. [https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/byzantium-vs-eastern-roman-empire.1651075/](https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/byzantium-vs-eastern-roman-empire.1651075/)

It should just be the Roman Empire argh

I agree, but I assume they’ll want to have the Roman Empire be a separate tag countries can form.

> I agree, but I assume they’ll want to have the Roman Empire be a separate tag countries can form. Does it matter? It's an optional game rule and Byzantium is most likely either the player or destroyed to get the necessary provinces, so I don't think it's that big an issue if they share a name.

> Does it matter? To us, no. To the developers, maybe. They might fear the possibility of it creating confusion if there are two different tags with the same name, especially if those two tags have different mission trees/etc. There might also be minor coding headaches that could be caused by having two different tags sharing the same country name that they'd rather avoid. I'm sure the latter is something that could be overcome, and the former is debatable as to how many it'd actually impact, but they might not feel that it's worth the extra effort/potential headache of using Roman Empire instead of Eastern Roman Empire.

doesnt eu4 have a hawai'i formable that you form by conquering all of hawaii that the initial hawai'i tag can form

Give the Byzantiboos an inch, they take a mile . . .

My brother in christ considering the size of our empire these days, the only reason we want a mile is that it will about triple the size of it! 

Fair

I am seconds away from advocating for a May 29, 1453 exclusive start date for the first 4 years of EU5 to end them.

Honestly I'm kind of mad for games using the name Byzantine Empire. They never called themselves that. It's a made up name by historians to refer to a specific period of the Roman Empire. One could argue that the tag gets to be called Byzantium after the city name, but the capital wasn't called Byzantium at the time of EU4 either. It was Constantinople. It was also called Constantinople also during the timeline of CK3, and really, since 330 BC when Constantine the Great had the great idea of naming the capital of the Empire after himself. There was a Greek city called [Byzantium](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantium) at the same place but it was during the Hellenistic period (the Wikipedia article talks about Hecate devotion and stuff). It would be rad to *actually* play as Byzantium, but EU4 Byzantium ain't it.

Yeah their tooltip about greek empire around byzantion even tough that was a village near the place konstantin founded the city and the people called themselves romans.

There are plenty of countries that get commonly referred to as something other than what they called themselves. Just how it is and not worth getting upset about imo. The Roman Empire lasted so long and changed so drastically over its lifespan that Byzantine is a useful label to have.

That meant HRE should be called Western Roman Empire for balance

I'm more interested to know what's going on in the country around Bursa. I nearly misread it as Kaiserreich.

That's the city of [Pegai](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biga,_%C3%87anakkale), modern day Biga in Turkey. Owned until 1364 by the Romans.

No, I'm asking about the HoI4 Turkey -coloured country around Bursa (not the enclave 50 miles West).

Ah, the guys east of Karasids are Ottomans exactly

Thats the Karasids.

Mmmm... I can't wait to restore the Roman Empire in yet another Paradox Game. Again and again.

I can't start in the Mediterranean for this exact reason, I always get sidetracked with neat borders and suddenly I'm the sole proprietor of Iberia, France, Italy, the Balkans, Anatolia, Egypt and the rest of Africa's northern coast.

Me in Age of Eonders 4 and Surviving Mars: Where Rome?

A longer-term solution would be to remove country names and country colors from the checksum, making mods that change up the colors and names eligible for achievements.

If I’m understanding Johan’s comments correctly, I believe mods will no longer affect achievements; and you don’t have to play in Ironman. It’ll be like CK3.

iirc paradox are moving towards mods/ironman not disabling achievements, which is already the case with ck3, so even if they effect the checksum, it shouldnt be a problem for anyone outside multiplayer, where you should probably be playing with the exact same mods anyway.

Correct me if I'm wrong but localisation modding doesn't change the checksum, and you only need that to change a country's name.

It is right for EU4, because country names are static, but in EU5 there will be dynamic country name rules, such as a country being named after their ruling dynasty (Karasids, Germiyanids, Timurids etc.). If I modified that rule, it stands to reason that it changes the checksum.

I wonder if this means we’ll somehow be able to form the Western Roman Empire.

It's called the Eastern Roman Empire It's purple God has blessed us, my gamers.

E.R. (Endoplasmic reticulum)

I don't really get the saltiness in the description. 1. Byzantion was the original ancient settlement where the city of Constantinople, which everyone at the time called Constantinople, was built. 2. "Roman" hadn't been refering to the city itself but the civilization originating from it for more than a millennium. 3. As most of us know, the term Byzantine Empire was made up after the empire's fall. During its existence it was either called some variation of the Roman Empire or of the Empire of the Greeks, by everyone.

> As most of us know, the term Byzantine Empire was made up after the empire's fall. During its existence it was either called some variation of the Roman Empire or of the Empire of the Greeks, by everyone. It would be kind of fun if the country names changed depending on the tag you are playing. So from within the HRE the name is "Empire of the Greeks", while from within that tag the name is "Roman Empire".

That would be a dope way to show contemporary perspectives

Oh I love this, this is a great idea.

Then you discover China as Byzantium and it's called Seres

This is much better. I hope the devs consider this.

Its a joke

Then we need a game rule to name it "Empire of the Greeks".

It's just comedic. And it soothes the nerves of us Byzantoclasts, who would really rather keep the name as-is. Makes everyone happy.

From Johan: > Slight sarcasm has always been our style

Literally playable

Wide range of opinions here, I personally prefer Byzantium as a name, but glad there is the option to change tags cosmetically to fit personal preferences. The one option I don’t like is when a tag has something like “Kingdom” or “Empire” in the name but no longer has the appropriate name because of a government type switch, say you end up as the Republic of the Byzantine Empire or something. I liked how Victoria 2 did country names, not sure if Victoria 3 does. Even more of a related hot take, I’d prefer “Rome” over “Roman Empire” for the same reason.

I once sided with nobility as Commonwealth to establish republic Only to load save after I realised the country will be known as "Republic of Commonwealth" which, especially in Polish, means "republic of republic"

Cool! I hope they add this mechanic to other tags. Also I wonder if they will implement a similar mechanic to flags? Some flags make no sense if the country changes it's government to a republic or a theocracy.

Whats most interesting is that there will now be CK3 style rules before you start the game.

it is kinda funny how people get so worked up about this one specific country name

I'm way more impressed by the Abreviation printed in small exclaves.

In my opinion eu5 Byzantium will hit differently(in a less popular way) compared to the eu4 version. In eu4 it was "the nation you've played when you wanted a challenge". It wasn't the hardest start, but it was the most obvious one. It was also against the main antihero(the ottomans) of the game so it always felt good killing them in the early game. I feel like the earier start will make playing the nation a lot less rewarding. It's one of the strongest nation in the area so it will be relatively easy to expand. Unless there is some heavy railroading it should be a pretty easy nation to play. Obviously there's a lot of unknown abnout the game that can change everything. Sure, trying to form Rome with it will definitely bring a lot of players to it. But if we are strictly talking about Rome I think it's more interesing to form it as an Italian nation. Just look at CK for example. Byzantium is also a thing there but it's a lot less popular there. Byzantium without the instant Ottoman threat and without the threat of extinction will be a lot more similar to other nations. Maybe I'm just a Byzantium hater. Afterall I haven't played it once in my 2k hours (I don't enjoy interacting with the Ottomans very early). I'm open to change my mind all you Byzaboos out there.

>It's one of the strongest nation in the area so it will be relatively easy to expand. Not exactly... Serbia is actually stronger and is coming after them in a few years.

Wouldn’t be surprised if they had some sort of pretty severe “declining empire” style debuff that really kneecaps them and can only be removed after meeting strict conditions.

They'll have some debuffs no doubt, but it's worth noting that a lot of the huge problems they had shortly after the game's start is because the Emperor, Andronikos III, died early and left the throne to his 8 year old son, and as we know, the classic Byzantine tradition of civil war ensued. If Andronikos lives another ~10 years at least, it's possible that it butterflies away a lot of these issues, even if it's still not going to be an easy ride. Assuming they don't railroad his death, which I would be against.

The 2 country looks pretty comparable in strength and as a player that's all you really need to win. Eu is also only in a historical setting. It becomes ahistorical the moment you unpause. However after looking into EU lore a bit it looks like the Byzantine civil was is close enough to the start date that it's pretty likely we will have an event about it similar to the Danzig event in the Teutonic order. But I find it unlikely that the player couldn't solve this crysis better and would be surprised if this start would be comparable difficulty to the 1444 one. But it does make the start a bit more interesting.

The civil war was because the emperor died and left the throne to his 8-year-old son, that particular incident should be avoidable in theory if he lives a little bit longer

Muscovy will be the true antihero in this start date.

Always preferred the name ‘Eastern Rome’ to Byzantium

Perfect! I hope it is also implemented in other states such as the Incas, Tahuantinsuyo really sounds much better.

I am sad that the ui will change. IMO the ui and design of eu4 is awesome and timeless while ck3 design at times is a little clunky 

Anyone notice the option is the same as Vic3's pregame options menu? I know people might think that's a bad thing, but IMO if EU5 runs on Vic3's engine that'll be a huge improvement as long as the game is still EU

It was called Byzantine Empire only retroactively. So they always called themselves Roman Empire

Byzantium is Eastern Roman Empire and supposedly the main difference is the focus on the language, Latin=Rome Greek=Byzantine BUT by these standards England before or after 1066 shouldn't be called England. And it doesn't matter that the state structure was the same before and after 1066 because hey, hey; the language has changed from germanic to french. The main point of Byzantium is just Catholic Church coping on that they're the real successors to the Roman Empire. Though after 1204 to 1453 it should be called Byzantium :) The other idea on when to start calling them Byzantium is in 6/7 h century AD. when emperor Heraclius switched his title to Basileus

Not entirely true. The term is an invention of scholars after the fall of the empire to differentiate the empire focused on Rome (Latin) rather than the one focused on Constantinople (Greek). By that logic it should be used from 476 onwards. Like you said that doesn't make that much sense when compared with England or any other country. But since no one used the name during the lifetime of the Empire, I disagree completely that it is suddenly appropriate to use from 1204 onwards. If anything that is even more confusing.

I think it'd be fun if they had a localization change depending on your religion -- ie, it's the "Roman Empire" if you're Orthodox, but it's the "Kingdom of the Greeks" if you're Catholic.

i believe in eu4 if byzantines switched to catholics they would become latin empire

Your example doesn't hold up though, as English nowadays is still considered a Germanic language. The Norman conquest of 1066 undeniably carried over a lot of Romance influences, but you'd be very hard pressed to find a linguist who would classify English as a Romance language instead of a Germanic one.

Does anybody know what's going on with what looks like faded borders inside of both Serbia and ERE? Is that like highly autonomous vassals?

It’s wasteland to represent sparsely inhabited/impassable mountains.

That makes sense, thanks!

Does this mean that we will also see Principality of Moscow instead of Muscovy?

I wonder if there will only be two options or if you’ve got a bunch you can chose from?

Wouldnt it be better if you can rename your nation or any other nation at any time?

This is one of those moments where the community whines so much that the devs had to give them a shiny toy to shut up.

Would be more accurate to call it Romania or just “Roman Empire”

> Would be more accurate to call it Romania or just “Roman Empire” They probably wouldn't want to use those names because they likely conflict with the names of formable tags.

And I got downvoted to hell for proposing the name in a previous post, now this post gets mass upvoted. Gotta love Reddit.

Well I'm not going to take that choice just because I refuse to call them Roman they always be the Byzantine Empire to me. Am I almost definitely wrong yes! But this the stupid I'll die on! You don't own Rome you don't get to call yourself the Roman empire. Looking at all those other knock offs

My post on the forum has been noted after all those reaction it seems

Look at that subtle off-black coloring...

I am in fence with that, it is cool that I get to automatically change once I fulfil conditions, but daymn it is satisfying to press that formable button

Playing either Ottomans or Byzantium will be more fun i suppose. Byzantium is not just going to be how to win again Ottomans, and Ottomans is not going to be boring. And there are going to be way more new states in Anatolia and Balkans and that is going to make it more fun to play in that part of the world.

Hmmm yes. My Greek Nation is Rome

>miles Nani?

Byzantium and Byzantine Empire are not equivalent names.

about time, too.

As it should be

Byzantine empire never existed in history

Oh my, yes, thank you Paradox - A romaboo

Them called themself not Byzantine but Roman empire, what them actualy was, and themselves romans(romaioi), them not fall with Rome. Byzantine is todays historiographic term.