How are the western roman empire and the eastern empire different?

Answer 1

The eastern and western parts of the Roman Empire were not separate. They were two units of the same empire. The terms Eastern Roman Empire and Western Roman Empire have been coined by historians. The Romans did not use them. The political difference between these parts of the empire occurred when there were co-emperorships with one emperor in charge of the east and one in charge of the west. Therefore, in such cases they were two jurisdictions, one under each emperor.

In the 280s Diocletian established Nicomedia (in north-western Turkey) as the imperial seat in the east and Milan (in northern Italy) as the imperial seat in the west. Constantine the Great designated Byzantium (in Greece, some 70 miles west of Nicomedia) as his imperial seat in 330 and renamed it Constantinople. He ruled from there as sole emperor. Twenty-seven year after the death of Constantine, two brothers, Valentinian and Valens established a co-emperorship, with the former in charge of the west and the latter in charge of the latter.

Historians argue that after the death of Theodosius the Great in 390 the empire became split. This was not due to a political decision. It was down to circumstances. Theodosius I was succeeded by his two sons (Arcadius in the east and Honorius in the west) who were young, inexperienced and incompetent. This resulted in politicians in the east and west conspiring against each other and a loss of unity. Moreover, soon after this the western part of the empire was invaded by Germanic peoples. Under the strain of this, the western part lost political cohesion. There was infighting and usurpations, resulting in the Romans being unable to deal with the invaders effectively. Eventually this part of the empire fell. At times the eastern part of the empire meddled in the affairs of the western part.

The eastern part of the Roman Empire was not affected by the mentioned invasions and continued to exit for nearly 1000 years. Historians have coined the term Byzantine Empire to indicate the eastern part of the empire after the fall of the western part.

Answer 2

The fundamental difference between the two empires of Rome is the religion. The West was considered the Roman Catholic Empire and the East the Eastern Orthodox. The split was caused by a dispute over whether or not religious figures should be portrayed in picture or not, though the actual descision to divide the empire was done over a fight of what type of bread to have at mass.

Answer 3

One of the main differences between the western part and the eastern part of the Roman Empire was ethic as the ethnic composition of the conquered peoples was different. Another difference were the great economic importance of Egypt (which produced 50% of the grain imported by Rome to feed its large population, cotton, linen and many luxury goods) and Turkey and Syria, which provided the link to the silk road which crossed Central Asia and reached China. On the other hand, Italy (in the west) was the most highly urbanised and the wealthiest area of the empire.

A feature of the eastern part of the empire was the strong Geek influence. Prior to the Roman conquest of the eastern Mediterranean, the Greeks had conquered this area and then created three Greek states, in Turkey (the kingdom of Pergamon) Syria (the Seleucid Empire) and Egypt (the Ptolemaic kingdom). This created the Hellenistic period, a period in which this area became heavily influenced by the Greeks. Alexandria of Egypt, the second largest city in the Roman Empire, was a Greek city. So was the third largest city in the empire Antioch (in Syria). Pergamon, Syrmia and Ephesus (in Turkey) were the next biggest cities and were Greek. In the west, apart from Rome (the largest city), only Carthage matched the size of these Turkish cities.

Another difference between these two parts of the empire arose when Christianity spread around the empire. They developed two different versions of Christianity and churches. One of them was Latin or Western Christianity, which was the main Christian church in the west. Later it came to be called Catholic. The other was Greek or Eastern Christianity, which was the main Christian church in the east. Later it came to be called Orthodox.

Answer 4

There was no such thing as an eastern Roman empire and a western Roman empire. It was a Roman empire. Period. Historians are the only ones who denote eastern and western, but they do this for clarity when speaking about certain sections or aspects of ancient Rome. Now, as for comparison between the eastern and western sections of the empire, the eastcrn section was wealthier than the western and consequently lasted longer than the western section and the eastern section was more heavily influenced by the Greek culture than the western part.

Answer 5

The Western Empire was Latinised. The Eastern Empire was Greek.

Answer 6

The Western Roman empire was Latin influenced while the Eastern Roman empire was Greek influenced.