East vs West Roman Empire: Which Roman Empire was stronger?

🔴 YOU WANT TO SUPPORT THIS CHANNEL? 🔴

The revenue from this channel will be used to create better videos on Maiorianus.

🎁 The official Maiorianus merch store is now OPEN:

⚔️ SPQR Shop, excellent hand-crafted Roman rings and other items:
Enter the code "Maiorianus" to get a 20% discount on every purchase. The ideal present for any fan of Rome 😉!

Disclosures: Some links in the description are affiliate links which means that if you purchase something by clicking on one of them, your host Sebastian will receive a small commission at no additional cost to you. In this way you will be supporting the channel to improve the video production quality at no extra cost to you.

🤗 One-Time Donation?
- Bitcoin: bc1qv4lsfsplvfecrrgvmfclhga28we7mvh9563xdj
🔗 Share the video with anyone who might be interested (it helps a ton!)

#Maiorianus

[Helghast]

I think one major overlooked reason for the east to survive was the remarkable peace with the Sassanid Persian empire in the 400s. No wars in the east meant that the military and economic weight of the rich provinces could be focused to keep the government in Constantinople stable.
Having to deal peacefully with a one, highly organized state at quite the same level of the Roman Empire itself was a huge benefit, while the West had to compete with multiples competitive and aggressive german and steppe nomad coalitions.

[michaelporzio]

The East had Hellenic culture that had already endured for a thousand years. Civilization was very firmly established in the East which enabled it to survive the collapse of the West and the rise of Islam. Greece and Asia Minor were the bulwarks of the Eastern Empire. Constantinople was itself an impregnable fortress.

[matejbabjak]

An interesting aspect would be the natural resources and mining sites. I am not very knowledgeable about this aspect, but AFAIK the most of mining was located in the West - the silver mines in Spain, lead mining in Britannia etc. That would be an interesting topic for a fllow-up video, if you happen to have more details. I would also be interested about the trading between the West and the East - was there any form of advantage (similar to the modern trade agreement zones)?

[Kasadoll]

One thing that people fail to realize is that when the empire was united, even during the worst periods the West really leaned heavily on the east. And when they split apart the West had to stand or fall on its own and it fell. Losing north Africa only sped it up

[Carlo-zkcy]

The eastern provinces kept the empire running since the time of Augustus.

[worldhistorycultureposting]

Depends on the time but the Western Roman Empire had access better recruiting grounds for legions like Illyria and Gaul as well as more natural resources. The obvious negatives the longer and easier to cross border which frequent tribes took advantage of but Flavius Stilicho proved that with the right leadership it was still manageable.

[Rynewulf]

One lasted a few hundred years, the other for one thousand. Thats a pretty clear difference

[TheChamp]

"As soon as the West had fallen, the fate of the East was also sealed; and it was only a matter of time until the East would also fall." (16:16)

Didn't the East last about 750 years more (till the 4th Crusade), or about 1000 years more (till Constantinople fell to the Ottomans), after the West had fallen? Seems like more than "only a matter of time".

[mputilin]

When talking about geography he astounishingly fails to mention that the Eastern Empire had a superpower on their doorsteps - the Parthians and later Sassanids.
The danger that they represented was something unmatched by Germanic tribes, until the emergence of Hunnic Empire - which btw both had to deal with, though East had to deal with the both at the same time!

And then in the west of the Eastern Empire they had to deal with the same problem as Western Empire, which had the Rhine in the Gaul/Germania so they were in similar situation, east maybe being more interested in dealing with these raids as nothing stood between barbarians and Constantinople once barbarians crossed the Danube... The West had the Alps which meant that they thought that it is possible to kick the can further along the path hoping it will go away...

So i would say that as far as geography is concerned, both have had their own set of challenges and both should get a point.

[KKRioApartments]

A counter argument to the assumption that the West had a larger army is that more units don't necessarily mean that those units were of equal size.

The East, with a significantly higher population and richer tax base, probably found it easier to recruit enough men keep units fully staffed up to or as close to their nominal size as possible, and to pay them regularly to keep them in uniform and reduce desertions.

Even in the East, paying for the army was often problematic. It would've been even more problematic for the West to staff and pay for an even bigger army from a smaller population and with a poorer tax base.

[Frendlu]

I'm mostly agree about all the video, except the conclusion.

The Roman Empire had a serious illness, that was mostly in his western side. And to survive, needed to cut it off. You can survive, more or less if you want to sacrifice you arm infected by gragenne (cutting it) you cant if you want to keep ip all, because the gragenne gonna, eventually, "infect" the "eastern side".

The Roman Empire, to survive, needed to make some sacrifices (that is splitting in 2 sides). Was that or falling completly 1000 years earlier.

[ronb]

With regards to the army numbers, Agathias who was writing in 559 only mentions the size of the Field army, the border guards or limitanei which Warren Treadgold estimated to be around ~195k in size during the 540s had their pay permanently cancel by Justinian in order to increase the size of the much higher quality field army from ~104k to 150k. While the limitanei might have still been second rate, full time soldiers during the late 4th century, by the 5th century their pay was so low that they took up other occupations in order to support themselves, essentially becoming more of an unpaid militia force than an actually army by the mid 6th century. This makes comparing Roman army numbers during the 4th and the 6th century more complicated, those 150k troops were of the highest quality.

[thehturt]

CONGRATULATIONS, a very, very interesting video- at least for me❤
Hope your channel will survive and beat the evil algorithm 😁

[lordMartiya]

Hope one of the next videos will be about my hometown of Cremona, a relatively important city on northern Italy.

[elenilepouri]

East Rome wasnt as'well " protected" geographically as the west was- had to face all asian nomadic people and ofc Arabs but survived for 1100 yrs

[lemokemo]

We already know who won this competition.

[JeremyDA]

One Empire fell to pieces shortly after the division, while the other held on for almost as full millennium afterwards. Seems pretty clear-cut to me 😏

[olivierswanepoel]

11:09) I would say that the West has the better geography because:
1) They have the Atlantic to the West (So no enemy invasions from there)
2) They have the Sahara to the South (So no major possible enemy invasions from there)
3) They have the whole Eastern Empire to there east (So Foreign enemies have to go through them first)
4) They only need to defend 1 front, the Rhine Frontier (So you can concentrate your forces more easily and know from which direction they're coming)
5) They had the Alps protecting Italy and the Pyrenees protecting Spain (They failed at fortifying and/or building defensive lines/buildings there, thus allowing the enemy to pass through)
The West fell because they failed at protecting the 1 major border they have with they're enemies

The East on the other hand:
1) They had the Danube to the North (Constant migrations coming from there tying up forces that could be needed elsewhere)
2) They had the powerful Sassanids to they're east (They were a constant threat and constantly waging war with the east and tying up the majority of the East's armies and a lot of money)

[Romanempire]

great video Sebastian. Keep up the good work

[deputyvillageidiot]

I have one quarrel with you about the overall military and the military sizes specifically. The eastern empire relied far more on cavalry and archers, because of the threats it faced from the east—especially the Persians. A unit of cavalry would be far smaller than a unit of heavy infantry. The western empire relied on mercenaries and the Germanic tribes, especially after the destruction of its army during the barbarian invasions until its demise were met. You don’t address any of these, and I think they’re very important. The two empires had very different military philosophies.