ROMAN EMPIRE AND THE HAN DYNASTY IN CHINA
Rodrick Carter
HIEU 201
Liberty University
29 November 2014
Roman Empire and the Han Dynasty in China
The Roman Empire and Han Dynasty in China are two kingdoms that, despite the geographical difference between them, managed to achieve great success and failure in equal measure. Both were characterized by imperial dynasties that were headed by the emperors and they held large territories. Both of these kingdoms faced various challenges after their formation that became a major stabling block, but due to good leadership, they both managed to overcome and achieve success. Nevertheless, due to different reasons, both the Roman Empire and the Han Dynasty declined and fell. This paper
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Nevertheless, their skills in the battlefield were tremendous.
The Roman people managed to spread their Latin language across Europe and over a period of short duration, Latin became known as the Romance language. Italian, Portuguese, French, Spanish, and Rumanian all developed out of the Latin language. For instance, in Latin the word freedom is pronounced or written as libertas, it was translated in Italian as liberta, in French as libertein, in Portuguese as liberdade, in Spanish as libertad, and in Romanian as libertate. This is a clear indication of how rich the Roman language was and the influence it had on other communities across the world.
Romans were also known to be the greatest builders and architects. They built the longest and the largest roads during the ancient period. The Roman roads that stretched for about 56, 000 miles had 29 highways. The Romans built the roads to transport their soldiers across their large territory and also used it for trade. It is one of the reasons the Roman Empire became more economically prosperous than any other territories in the ancient world. On the other hand, Han Dynasty also had better roads. They are known to have established the Silk Road which was used to conduct trade and to link the dynasty to different markets. Majority of the products that Han people sold were artwork. One reason that the Han Dynasty stood out during the
The Pax Romana was characterized by political stability, an increase of commerce, as well as cultural diffusion. Augustus was the emperor during this period, he got rid of the declining Senate and introduced the Principate; allowing an effective bureaucratic government to be introduced to Rome. Overtime Rome also granted the conquered populations the opportunity to become citizens. With the help of Rome’s technical innovations like roads, concretes, and arches the amount of trade that went on increased drastically. With military posts on these roads people felt safe traveling to other regions to trade. Because of this Rome’s culture and religion was able to diffuse, especially to the west. All these things were able to create a period of prosperity in Rome.
Both Rome and Han China equivalently constructed similar roads, bridges, and water development systems all to strengthen their economy. Verifications of this can be seen when Rome fully realized the potential of arches and bridges in their road systems that spanned more than 400,000 km of roads that were used for trade. Correspondingly, they also built aqueducts as a form of water engineering to constantly bring in a flow of water to the cities and towns. Similarly, Han China built massive fortified roadways for trade and walls for fortification comparable to the Great Wall of China as a means of defense. Also in comparison to Roman aqueducts, Han China built water canals as means to direct water as they pleased. These similarities defined their engineering skills as these inventions and constructions were used to help strengthen their economies. Rome built and constructed roads to aid their trade systems and make easier routes of travel. Furthermore, they used aqueducts to get water into the city saving money and the need for human labor. Similarly, Han China used their fortified roads to trade much easier and as a means of safer travel. This went hand in hand with China’s water canals that also aided their economy by directing water where needed saving much money and limiting the need for human labor as well.
Rome built on aristocratic landlords expanding out from city-states. Rome relied on slavery for their economic base in which a third of the population were slaves. Rome invented concrete and engineered things like aqueducts that brought water to parts of the city. Mechanisms for political integration in the roman empire were based on bureaucracy that was less complex than the Han dynasty and relied on local elites and middle class to control provinces that were less centralized. There was a greater emphasis on law codes and a common legal system. Monuments and triumphal processions played up the glory, stability, and civilization of the empire and its rulers which was considered an idealistic ideology. Rome also had a cult organized by deceased emperors from the past. They would use colonies to foster unity and integration throughout its empire by the means of colonies that were considered military outposts that were not intended for the use of population integration. Latin was encouraged to be learned throughout Rome, but it never took over the Greek language in the East since post
The Han Dynasty and the Roman Empire were two grand empires that rose out of preexisting territories and provided relative peace over wide areas. The collapse of the Qin Dynasty (221-206 BCE), which was the first great land-based empire in East Asia, came after a period of war, confusion, and tyrannical rule. Due to the political disorder that stemmed from the early dynastic activity, the emergence of the Han Dynasty (206 BCE- 228 CE) sprung to focus on restoring order. On the other hand, the rise of the Roman Empire (44 BCE- 476 CE) originated from consolidating authority over aristocratic landlords and overriding the democratic elements of the earlier Republic. Instead, the Roman Empire redefined the concept of “citizen” as subjects to
The Han and Roman Empires are very important. They have greatly influenced the past, and many other societies worldwide. The Han Dynasty and the Roman Empire have different outlooks on technology, the Han Dynasty view technology as a practical application used to ease the workload of people, while the Roman Empire views certain technology as needed, despite the creator. If not for the technology and the technological views of the Han and Roman Empires, the world would be a much
Han Dynasty and Roman Empire have many cultural aspects including religious, geographical, and political similarities that can be compared, though many differences are also widespread during this era. Though Roman and Han political structures, both emphasized bureaucracies, they came to them quite differently. Through many amounts of expansion, both societies spread culture and earned money, though expansion was eventually their downfall. Their religions differed greatly, with Rome, emphasizing polytheism and Han China focusing on Confucianism. The differences and similarities between these two civilizations are to be discussed in this essay. One might ask, Which civilization yielded the best
Though they were both able to trade due to their expansions and coasts, Rome did much more trade than Han China. Also, due to this vastness, both societies’ cultures were spread all over the world (which led to other civilizations forming) and their economies were boosted (which led to better conditions for the people).
The Roman Empire is still known today as one of history’s most powerful period. Rome government had stick rules and policies. The Roman government at this point was known as the Roman Republic. The Roman Republic was controlled by the roar Rome. Bureaucracy was ran throughout the region, but Rome did not want this nor could they afford it. However, they did allow small cities to run a lower level of government. The exercise of indirect rule thus became a basic principle of imperial government. The business of local administration and jurisdiction was delegated to the existing communities of city or tribe. This type of structure was deemed to be a weakness to some historians because of the consequences. Consequences that allow a third level government to enforce the emperor’s rules. Because of the expansion of the territory, this was the only reasonable way for it to function normally. The empire was a "commonwealth of cities" which acted as economic and cultural of the Roman world and were integrated into the administrative system as local foci of government. This imperial ruling was first implemented by Rome. It came about because of social trends and not the Roman strategic policies that was often changed by Romanized upper class citizens. These upper classman brought about firmness throughout the land with their strategic and educated planning.
Both the Han Dynasty and the Roman Empire became massive empires and dominated their region for a long time. In addition, both of these empires also had large impact on the world and extremely influenced the development of human civilization. Even in the modern times, the Han Dynasty and the Roman Empire have been the major subjects of historians and scholars especially when dealing with the development of stable societies . Although both of these empires grew in massive size, their political, economic, social and religious developments are extremely different. The objective of this paper is to analyze and compare the Han Dynasty and the Roman Empire in terms of political, economic, social and religious developments. It also opts to evaluate their overall impact to their
The Han Dynasty and the Roman Empire vary in their political development and achievements. The Roman’s developed two different codes of law, one that applied to citizens and another that applied to non-citizens. Rome’s trade routes were built using stone, which made it very easy for merchants to travel from one city to another over a vast amount of land. China, however, used a single code of law for all their citizens and conquered peoples, and used a long and treacherous trail in their trade; that lead to the Middle East. Even though these two civilizations held many differences, they also shared rulers who personally oversaw their governments to prevent numerous dilemmas and used expansive trade routes to build up their economies and
Throughout history, there were various empires which developed into great, powerful forces. These empires expanded their lands to new places but, these empires ultimately came to an end. Amongst these great empires, were the Han and the Roman empire. Both were great in power but, due to political, social, and economic causes, they came to an end. Although they do partake in the equal shares of corruption and problems with the military, they also had fair shares of differences, regarding their declines. For example, the Han empire had decentralization and rebellion while Rome had shifted in interests and developed war issues. These differences and similarities are bits of history which help to comprehend why these empires are no longer
The Roman Empire and the Han Dynasty were both some of the greatest empires in their time. The fall of the Roman Empire was followed by the fall of the Han Dynasty. Three major things that contributed to these empires falling were the economic troubles these empires were going through at the time, taxation was a huge trouble for some of these empires, trade was also a big contribution, and being economically weak had an impact as well. Political reasons were a major of why these empires fell, both these empires had problems when it came down to their rulers, both these empires also split into two at a point, as well as the gap between the rich and the poor.
The decline of China and Rome both shared similar economic strife in that they were both subject to barbarian and nomadic invasions, therefore having to spend large amounts of money on frontier defense; however, they differed in that the Han Empire collapsed in part due to the high taxes imposed on the peasant class resulting in a large peasant rebellion, such as the Yellow Turbans, while in Rome tax collections was in danger of abandonment as residents of the empire were few in number and in financial difficulty. In addition, the two empires were similar socially because of large epidemics, diseases, and plagues that caused a population decrease. Also, both experienced a
Han dynasty emerged into power back in 221BCE after the fall of Qin dynasty 206BCE. They were the original pioneers when it comes to political systems and structure of the society that lasted more than 2000 years in China. On the other hand, the Roman Empire controlled the western Mediterranean and they had various advancements in technology and science. The Romans had different engineering accomplishments considered to be different from those of the Han kingdom. They formed the basis of the establishment of the western legal codes. This research is aimed towards analysis the similarities and the differences between the Han dynasty and the Roman Empire. The consequences of their differences are also analyzed in this research.
There were two major similarities between the Roman Empire and Han Dynasty. Both the Roman Empire and Han Dynasty were great empires that had large land areas under their control. Han China and the Roman Empire put a lot of effort into building and expanding their territories. The Han Dynasty expanded their territory further Qin boundary and Romans wanted more territory for military uses. They manufactured streets that helped with trade and built new buildings, pipes, and