How can the Byzantine Empire claim to be THE Roman Empire when

>>2684121
They WUZ

>How can the Byzantine Empire claim to be THE Roman Empire
Because it was the same state, there was an unbroken political continuity.

There's literally nothing more to it than that. It was the same political entity.

SO YOU BE SAYIN

>>2684121
Even during the Republic era, the Romans were massive Greekaboos that loved to speak and act Greek.

Furthermore, Greece spent like 700 years under the Roman state before the language switch from Latin to Greek, the cultures had been thoroughly melded by this point.

>>2684179
WE WUZ ROMANS N SHEIT?

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> Believing in the applicability of nation-states before the Napoleonic era

>>2684121
>When you fucked a state to the point when your western part of the empire collapsed they still larped as you for 1000 years

>>2684185
This

>>2684210
They were the Eastern half of the Roman Empire.

>>2684218
This, most of shitposting on /his/ comes from people trying to apply modern concepts to pre-XIX century times

>>2684457
>Eastern

>Roman

>Empire

They are more like Roman Empire jr. Their dad was dead a long long time ago. When the empire was split in half

Lets say that the Canadian barbarians invade United States and conquer every single state except California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. The union between the remaining states is preserved, and the President, the Congress, and all the other federal institutions relocate from Washington to Phoenix. United States as a country still exists, right?

Now lets say that over the course of the next century, due to changing demographics, Spanish becomes the official language and Catholicism the major denomination.

Would this USA still be able to claim continuity with the WASP USA of 1776?

>>2684468
Still the Roman Empire. Likewise the Greeks had greater cultural significance than the Romans.

>>2684472

yes, it's the institutions and culture that make a nation.

And by extending your argument even to Rome, this is what happened to W.Roman empire as well. The difference is that E.Roman empire never changed demographically drastically, and almost all of its emperors were native "roman" citizens, even though they were not Italic.

>>2684472
One point of distinction to make is how they would see themselves and how others would see them.

Medieval Western Europe, and even other Balkan states sometimes, denied their claims to Romanity (though at least partly because they saw it as a universal claim and over the whole former Roman territory in theory) and simply identified them as Greeks.

Of course the state itself, as much as it changed, was never destroyed and the Roman identity persisted even after Byzantine times alongside a developing Greek one.

Your question is interesting though because the USA already doesn't have 100% continuity with the USA of 1776. Many more waves of European immigrants came after that, including from outside the UK, and African-Americans are full American citizens as well. This already changed the culture. Catholicism was once reviled and now it's about 1/4 of a 300 million country. The USA has already lost a lot of 'continuity' but it is the same state and even roughly the same people no doubt.

>>2684121
Constantine, the Roman emperor, moved the capital from Rome to Constantinople and Byzantine empire's capital was Constantinople, ergo Byzantine = Rome

>>2684121
Sage

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>>2684175
>>2684179
>>2684185
>>2684210
>>2684457
>>2684468
>E
>R
>E

>>2684921

Therefore, Turkey is Rome too.