| ▲ | Mistletoe 2 days ago | |
I learned more here and I'm not sure I agree with your comment fully. https://www.reddit.com/r/etymology/comments/8shw5r/what_is_t... | ||
| ▲ | nemo 2 days ago | parent [-] | |
The claims about extreme complexity of the Late Roman/Byzantine state came into the popular imagination by Enlightenment and other Western thinkers who were deeply biased against the late Romans due to a long history of cultural conflict. The OP is completely correct here, the reddit comment is an extremely incomplete story. It notes that the Roman state was more complex than other Medieval states (correct), but to say that it was "too" complex is a culturally based judgment, not a fact. The origin of the negative cultural judgment about that complexity waen't coming from the Romans, they were coming from the Franks, Venetians, and later Western Europeans who in large part were repeating the old prejudices going back to the schism, but also justifying their own conquest and abuses of of the Roman people. | ||