A Bizarre Conspiracy Theory: Why Some People Think the Roman Empire Never Existed ["Have we ruled out stupidity?" -- Lucy Van Pelt]

Popular Mechanics ^ | January 29, 2024 | Caroline Delbert

[higgmeister]

The Metatron on YouTube would have something to say about that.   It's a sure bet that the Donna freakazoid never read Edward Gibbon.

[Fai Mao]

I had a History professor who claimed the Roman empire never fell but simply changed forms.

His position was that (Rightly so) the Byzantines were the Eastern 1/2 of the empire. He p[pointed out that many European provinces and National borders today are, in fact, ancient Roman ones. Our months, days of the week and many other things are of Latin origin. English is, in a lot of ways, Latin with a German accent

He said it was no coincidence that Washington DC, like Rome, was built on 7 hills.

What was wild was he had a whole Biblical apocalyptic eschatology built around the fact that the US is the revived Roman empire. (The guy was a lapsed Lutheran)

Honestly, it made some sense/

[lasereye]

The gospels were composed by Romans (and Roman stooges including defeated Zealot leader John of Gischala AKA John son of Zebedee) to catechize Jews into this new and false Judaism which, if they accepted it, should also lull them into a soporific pacifism convenient for Rome.

It's hard to overstate the stupidity of the premise. The Gospels themselves record that the Jewish leaders were all deadly enemies of Jesus and that Jesus had confrontations with them. Why would that persuade the Jews to adopt this "new" Judaism?

Then there's the other books of the New Testament. They repeat many of the themes of the Gospels, such as Jesus' resurrection. Some of them refer to people mentioned in the Gospels (besides Jesus). If the Gospels are elaborate fictional accounts, then some of the New Testament books refer to people who didn't exist. What in the world was going on there? Note that the conventional dating of the other NT books is earlier than the Gospels. How does that fool account for those books?

Those are just the first couple of huge problems with his ludicrous idea.

[KarlInOhio]

The Byzantine Empire (a name not used until after it had been conquered) considered itself the Roman Empire until the Ottomans took over in 1453.

[alexander_busek]

The Byzantine Empire (a name not used until after it had been conquered) considered itself the Roman Empire until the Ottomans took over in 1453.

The Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation (Heiliges Römisches Reich der Deutschen Nation) continued to exist up until the Reichsdeputationshauptschluß of 1803, at least in name, until finally dissolving on August 6, 1806, when the last Holy Roman Emperor Franz II abdicated.

One could argue that it legally continued through the House of Habsburg-Lothringen until 1918.

Regards,

[Organic Panic]

One person on tiktok says this and popular mechanics wastes ink on it?

[Organic Panic]

Binary 2

[doorgunner69]

Free Republic has several characters that believe the moon landings were fake, so there!

[doorgunner69]

Considering some of the looney stuff I have seen referenced to them, why not?

[Peter ODonnell]

I can think of CLXVII reasons why this is a probably post ipso facto a non sequitur of colossal proportions.

[SunkenCiv]

Oh, it gets worse:

• Human origins on Jupiter's moon system? [06/17/2013]
• New English Intro to the Ganymede Hypothesis [08/11/2022]
• The Ganymede Hypothesis [11/27/2022]
• Ganymede Hypothesis [09/09/2023]
• Updated Intro to the Ganymede Hypothesis [10/10/2023]

[SunkenCiv]

:^D

[SunkenCiv]

More people read Tiktok than Pop Mech, so it’s not a waste of ink.

[SunkenCiv]

Heh...

[SunkenCiv]

The Tide Pod Challenge wound up agitating a lot of people.

[SunkenCiv]

PKD’s novel (1981)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valis_(novel)

ST:TNG (1968)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0708421/

:^)

[SunkenCiv]

:^)

• Aerosmith announces retirement mid-tour after lead singer suffers vocal injury [08/07/2024]
• Aerosmith retires from touring, says Steven Tyler's voice can't recover from injury [08/02/2024]
• What Happened to the Missing Half of the Colosseum? | toldinstone

[SunkenCiv]

It’s a pun. No, it’s a palindrome...

[cgbg]

I had an old history professor that said of the Holy Roman Empire:

“It was not holy.

It was not Roman.

and it was not an empire.”

Lol.

[Dr. Sivana]

ST:TNG (1968)

ST:TNG (1968)??

ST:TOG (1968)!!