Rome And Han China Comparison Essay

Like its Persian predecessor, Alexanders empire reached the western slopes of the high Pamir, but not beyond.At that time, seven warring states were busy fighting each other in eastern Asia.Individual histories for each abounded, but until recently, few attempts existed to compare the two.

Like its Persian predecessor, Alexanders empire reached the western slopes of the high Pamir, but not beyond.At that time, seven warring states were busy fighting each other in eastern Asia.Individual histories for each abounded, but until recently, few attempts existed to compare the two.

At the formative periods of the western and eastern styles of exercising imperial power, the ancient empires left rich and influential legacies.

China pulled through numerous fragmentations and invasions, and remains a unified nation.

To the west of the empire, the Roman Republic was busy fighting the Samnites, mountain folks in central Italy.

The ephemerality of Alexanders empire highlights the greatest achievements of the Roman and Chinese empires, their stability and longevity.

Two thousand years ago, the Old World of civilization underwent its first imperial age.

The Roman Empire and the Han Dynasty of imperial China coexisted with Parthia and Kushan, spanning the mid-latitude of Eurasia and northern Africa.The Roman Empire did not recover from its fall, but its will to power and many ideas have become cultural genes of western culture. In the global village, the heirs to the ancient empires must interact closely, and for that, to know each other, including their traditional roots.What were the characteristics, the respective strengths and weaknesses of the ancient superpowers of the east and west?Five years after the Greeks gathered for their first Olympic Game in 776 BCE, the host of centuries-old city-sized feudal states in China received a new company, Qin, the future empire builder.Eighteen years after the investiture of Qin, tradition had it that Rome was founded on the hills beside the River Tiber.The unification by Qin was the definitive turning point in Chinese history, which initiated its imperial age.The Republic led Rome to acquire an empire in less than five centuries, before Julius Caesar started the civil war that destroyed it.For the purpose of comparing two careers of rise and fall, it is convenient to shift their relative timelines.I match up the unification of China in 221 BCE and Caesars march on Rome in 49 BCE, so that we can talk about the progress of their imperial age, here shaded in grey.Strong states in China vied to become ba or the hegemon, the leader of lords.Rome had conquered Italy before it expanded overseas, but until the Social War of 91-87 BCE, it preferred to be the hegemon of Italian allies, from whom it demanded troops to fight under its command.