Byzantine Empire Decline

For 500 years, Rome was considered the center of the world and had impacted the world like no other. Its great accomplishments and innovations that were made have pushed human intelligence to the fullest. The unstoppable Roman Empire always believed it was a force that would never fall, but everything good will probably come to an end. While some of its blame can be pointed toward outside forces, a majority of its problems was inner conflicts and poor political choices. The major reasons for the fall of the Roman empire was due to diseases, political affairs, economic decay, outside forces, religious conflicts, and a weakening government. One of the major factors that affected the Roman decline was a series of plagues that had swept over …show more content…
There were many differences between the two empires. There were many reasons on why the Byzantine did not end up like the western half. The Byzantine empire was the part of the original Roman empire that did not fall, because before the collapse an Emperor had established a capital in the eastern half to promote stability. The Byzantine empire had a stable Roman life compared to its Western counterpart. However, while it was still Roman lifestyle, they were a Greek speaking nation (Stearn 194). This allowed the Byzantines to still access knowledge that was left behind from Ancient Greece nations. The government running this empire was a strong solid centralized government that didn’t experience the same amount of threats from invaders, it had stronger armies protecting the frontier borders. Upper-class Greek citizens were knowledgable in traditional Greek and Roman military tactics, this allowed them to hold strong general position and recruit able bodied soldiers who could be trained. While they were a strong military force, they were too ambitious in trying to regain control over the Roman territories in the west. These military campaigns “exhausted and financially drained” the Byzantine empire, halting their expansion into the west (Stearn …show more content…
They weren’t as well organized and there wasn’t a centralized government until many years later. Civilian life dramatically declined after the fall of the Roman empire, all the advancements that dominated the land were forgotten and their lives set back to a more barbaric period. These people did not live like the Romans, they spread themselves thin and lived in isolated villages. This period lacked communications and trade between these villages. The western empire was controlled by Germanic tribes that were establishing small kingdoms throughout the empire. This was a type of feudalism that was arising in the Western empire. “Greater lords provided protection and aid to lesser lords, called vassals, who in turn owed their lords military service, some goods or payment and advice (Stearns 210).” While this practice was not that efficient in the west, it did work well for them for a time. Western politics only improved after a royal Frank house had established a monarchy. They were able to take control of considerably large amount of land, “based in northern France, Belgium, and western Germany” (Stearns 211.) One of its family members, Charles the Great, wanted to bring the west to a new glory. This young ruler set up an empire and restoring the educational system in churches, this help intellectual activity to steady grow in the empire. There was a growing popularity and importance in religion