Emperors; A Survey

choi

Dominic Green, Ruling Earthly Realms. Imperial authority always was symbolic as well as actual. From his invention, the emperor was, if not divine, then the next best thing. Wall Street Journal, June 8, 2022, at page A15
https://www.wsj.com/articles/in- ... -realms-11654639969
(book review on Dominic Lieven, In the Shadow of the Gods. The emperor in world history. Viking, 2022)

Note:
(a) The subtitle "From his invention, the emperor was, if not divine, then the next best thing." "[H]is," I think, refers to the emperor -- subject of the sentence, What do you think?
(b) survey (n): "1: the act or an instance of surveying: such as
a: a broad treatment of a subject"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/survey

A "survey" on a topic, which may be translated as 总览, is literary whereas "overview" is plain English.

(c) "Mr Lieven, a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge * * * Valentinian I of Rome * * * kept Goldflake and Innocence, 'two savage and underfed man-eating bears, outside his bedroom as a warning to his entourage.' "
(i) Dominic Lieven
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominic_Lieven
(ii) Valentinian I
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentinian_I     
(321-375; Roman emperor 364-375; Latin: Flavius Valentinianus; section 5 Reputation: bears)

Roman emperor or Augustus (title) in chronological order: Constantine I or the Great (306-337; Latin for Constantine is Constantinus) > 3 co-emperors who were 3 sons of Constantine I and who governed different regions: Constantine II, Constans and Constantius II (337-361 (died of illness)) > Julian (361-363 (died days later from wound sustained in battlefield); Constantius II's cousin) > Jovian (June 363 to February 364; Julian left behind no heir, and arny chose an officer as emperor) > Valentinian I and Valens (Jovian's brothers who divided the empire between them).  
(A) Augustus (title)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustus_(title)
(was a "title given as both name and title to Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus (often referred to simply as Augustus), Rome's first Emperor. On his death, it became an official title of his successor * * * [which] continued to be used in the Byzantine Empire until the Fall of Constantinople in 1453 * * * The first true Roman Emperor known as 'Augustus' (and first counted as a Roman Emperor) was [in Latin] Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus ([English:] Octavian). He was the adopted son and heir of Julius Caesar, who had been murdered for his seeming aspiration to divine monarchy, then subsequently and officially deified. Octavian studiously avoided any association with Caesar's claims * * * As princeps senatus ('first man or head of the senate') he presided at senatorial meetings * * * He was officially renamed Augustus by the Roman Senate" in 27 BC)

In 293, Augustus Diocletian started the custom of naming the designated heir as Caesar.
(B) Latin-English dictionary:
* princeps (adjective OR noun masculine, feminine and neuter): "first"
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/princeps
   ^ princeps
   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princeps
   ^ principate
   https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/principate
   (pronunciation)
* The term princeps senatus, where princeps is a noun and senatus is genitive, is translated as "the leading member of the Senate" in the online page of "princeps | ancient Roman title" by Encyclopedia Britannica.
* Latin grammar
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_grammar

section 8 Word order: "Latin allows a very flexible word order because of its inflectional syntax. Ordinary prose tended to follow the pattern of subject, direct object, indirect object, adverbial words or phrases, verb * * * Adjectives and participles usually directly follow nouns unless they are adjectives of beauty, size, quantity, goodness, or truth, in which case they usually precede the noun being modified. However, departures from these rules are frequent.

* Alexander William Potts, Hints Towards Latin Prose Composition. New Edition. Macmillan (1886), at pages 52-53
https://books.google.com/books?i ... enitive&f=false
("a. Most grammarians are agreed [sic] that the natural position of a qualifying adjective or governed genitive is after its substantive. This certainly is the case in many customary phases, as Civis Romanus * * * Princeps Senatus * * * ")
* The English noun substance means a "noun."
https://www.etymonline.com/word/substantive
* civis (noun masculine or feminine): "citizen"
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/civis
* Romanus is an adjective (masculine), not a noun in genitive case.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Romanus
* mica (noun feminine): "a grain (esp. a glittering one: of salt, marble, etc.), crumb"
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/mica
   ^ The English noun mica 云母 came directly from Latin of the same spelling.
   ^ mica
   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mica
   ("whose outstanding physical characteristic is that individual mica crystals can easily be split into extremely thin elastic plates")
* aureus (adjective masculine; feminine aurea; from [noun neuter] aurum gold (metal or color) + -eus -ous, a derivational suffix): "made of gold, golden"
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/aureus

choi

(d) " The first emperor was Sargon of Akkad (2334-2279 BCE), a Near Eastern priest-king who found his city-state too small and conquered modern Iraq and Syria. As Elizabeth II, the daughter of the last emperor of India [King George VI], heads the Church of England, so Sargondaughter became high-priestess of the moon god in the temple at Ur. * * * [Octavian] calling himself primus inter pares, 'first among equals.' * * * The Western Roman Empire lasted five centuries and became the template for the modern European empires. Its eastern, Byzantine heir endured for another millennium, until Constantinople fell in 1453. * * * When Diocletian ([Roman emperor:] 284-305 CE) upgraded the emperor from the first citizen to divine autocrat, living up to the image 'put an extra strain' on an emperor. Add the intriguing of the Praetorian Guard, and the Romans got through 53 emperors in 311 years"
(i)
(A) Sargon of Akkad
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sargon_of_Akkad  
(table: King of the Akkadian Empire  Reign c 2334–2279 BC; He is sometimes identified as the first person in recorded history to rule over an empire; section 5 Family)
(B) Ur
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ur
(ii) Emperor of India
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_of_India
("a title used by British monarchs from 1 May 1876 (with the Royal Titles Act 1876) to 22 June 1948 * * * [after] the Indian Independence Act 1947")
(iii) Latin-English dictionary:
* primus (adjective masculine; feminine: prima): "first"
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/primus
   ^ One might ask: is there a difference between primus and princeps, both as adjectives? Probably not (I fail to find any Web page talking about it). And, "primus et princeps" (English: first and foremost) is motto of Annapolis County, Nova Scotia
   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annapolis_County,_Nova_Scotia
   (near the top of table)
* inter (preposition): "between, among"
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/inter#Latin
* par (adjective masculine singular; declension table: masculine/feminine plural  parēs): "equal"
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/par
* praetōrius (adjective masculine; plural praetōriae)   (Latin has two relevant adjectives: praetorianus and praetorianus.)
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/praetorius
* cohors (noun feminine; table: plural cohortēs): "a retinue or escort"
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cohors

(iv)
(A) Roman Empire was established in 27 BC when Octavian became emperor/ Augustus.
(B) Western Roman Empire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Roman_Empire
(286–476/480; "The terms Western Roman Empire and Eastern Roman Empire were coined in modern times to describe political entities that were de facto independent; contemporary Romans did not consider the Empire to have been split into two empires but viewed it as a single polity governed by two imperial courts as an administrative expediency")
(v) Diocletian
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diocletian
("After the deaths of [Roman emperors] Carus [himself had been Praetorian prefect and, when his predecessor died violently, was proclaimed emperor by soldiers; reign 282-283; when he died in 283, his two sons were made co-emperors] and his son Numerian [reign 282-283] on campaign in Persia, [army officer] Diocletian was proclaimed emperor by the troops. The title was also claimed by Carus's surviving son, Carinus [Roman emperor 283-285], but Diocletian defeated him in the Battle of the Margus [in 285]")
(vi)
(A) Praetorian Guard
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praetorian_Guard
(Latin: Cohortēs praetōriae)
(B) Praetorian (adj): "[first appearance in English] early 15c * * * from Latin [adjective masculine] praetorianus 'belonging to a praetor,' from praetor. Praetorian Guard translates cohors praetoria, the bodyguard troop of a Roman commander or emperor. Hence modern figurative use for 'defenders of an existing order' "
https://www.etymonline.com/word/praetorian

Latin praetōriae and cohors are defined in (d)(iii) above.
(C) praetor (n): "elected magistrate in ancient Rome (subordinate to consuls), early 15c, from Latin [noun masculine] praetor one who goes before * * * "
https://www.etymonline.com/word/praetor


(e) "The Sassanids of Persia, founded in 224 CE, had 30 emperors in three centuries, and the British have had only a dozen monarchs since 1707. No wonder that the 'Meditations' of Marcus Aurelius, the most personal testimony left by a Roman emperor, advises Stoic endurance.  Russia's Romanov lasted three centuries [House of Romanov (their surnames were Romanov]: 1613 (Michael I) - 1917 (Nicholas II)] , the Habsburgs nearly a millennium in various forms, but the Chinese are the long-distance champions * * * Their [I do not know what 'their' means: Tang emperors, Song emperors, both, or China's?] civil-service examinations and the 'neo-Confucian ideology' welded the Chinese elite to the imperial order. Mr Lieven compares the examination system to 'role of the public schools and oxbridge' in Victoria's empire."
(i) Sasanian Empire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sasanian_Empire
("or Sassanid Empire, officially known as the Empire of Iranians, was the last Iranian empire before the early Muslim conquests of the 7th–8th centuries CE. Named after the House of Sasan [Sasan was name of founder'; following Muslim conquest, imperial family fled to China], it endured for over four centuries, from 224 to 651 CE * * * The Sasanian Empire succeeded the Parthian Empire [247 BC to 224 AD; Parthia was name of a region; Cyrus II or the Great was even earlier, whose reign was 559–530 BC]")
(ii) "the British have had only a dozen monarchs since 1707"
(A) Great Britain
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Britain
("The term 'Great Britain' is often used to refer to England, Scotland and Wales, including their component adjoining islands.[footnote omitted\ Great Britain and Northern Ireland now constitute the United Kingdom.[footnote omitted] The single Kingdom of Great Britain resulted [note the past tense] from the 1707 Acts of Union between the kingdoms of England (which at the time incorporated Wales) and Scotland")

But in Olympic Games, United Kingdom is GBR; British Olympic Association (BOA) is the National Olympic Committee for the United Kingdom.

Elizabeth I of England died childless (in 1603) and House of Tudor ended. James VI of Scotland became ALSO James I of England in 1603. Still England and Scotland, despite headed by the same king, were governed separately, each with its own executive and legislative branches. Not until 1707 did the Parliament pass the law to combine England and Scotland. The monarchy before and after 1707 was
Anne, Queen of Great Britain
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anne,_Queen_of_Great_Britain
("Anne was plagued by ill health throughout her life, and from her thirties she grew increasingly ill and obese. Despite 17 pregnancies, she died without surviving issue and was the last monarch of the House of Stuart. Under the Act of Settlement 1701, which excluded all Catholics, she was succeeded by her second cousin George I of the House of Hanover"/ section 8        Titles, styles, honours and arms: titles were different before and after 1707)

James II of England had two sisters (plus a son between these two sisters who died a child, AND other younger children). The oldest daughter Mary and her Dutch husband William pushed out James I in Glorious Revolution of 1688. Anne was the second oldest daughter of James II.

In this Wiki page, Act of Settlement 1701 is mentioned at introduction.
(B) succession to the British throne
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Succession_to_the_British_throne
(section 1 Current line of succession; section 2 History, section 2.1 England: Elizabeth I "broke with the precedents of many of her predecessors, and refused to name an heir. Whilst previous monarchs (including Henry VIII) had specifically been granted authority [by Parliament]  to settle uncertain successions in their wills, the Treasons Act 1571 asserted that Parliament had the right to settle disputes, and made it treason to deny Parliamentary authority")
(iii) Marcus Aurelius
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Aurelius   
( "(121 – 180) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 and a Stoic philosopher. * * * Meditations, the writings of "the philosopher" – as contemporary biographers called Marcus – are a significant source of the modern understanding of ancient Stoic philosophy")
(iv) "the Chinese are the long-distance champions:"

I am clueless about what it  means; maybe the book explains it. It is possible that the book author misunderstood China. The longest line of sovereign, in my view, is Japan's. See Emperor of Japan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_of_Japan
(section 2 History: "The reign of Emperor Kinmei 欽明天皇 (c 509 [born in 509, reigned started in 539] –571 AD), the 29th emperor, is the first for whom contemporary historiography is able to assign verifiable dates;[15][16] however, the conventionally accepted names and dates of the early emperors were not confirmed as "traditional" until the reign of Emperor Kanmu 桓武天皇 (737 [the year he was born in; reign started in 781] –806), the 50th sovereign of the Yamato dynasty")

The second longest line goes to England: descendants of William I have held the throne.
(v) 讲座｜田浩：南宋道学的演变. 澎湃新闻, Sept 17, 2018
https://news.sina.com.cn/o/2018-09-27/doc-ihkmwytp4112786.shtml

the first three paragraphs:

"8月19日至8月20日，应复旦大学哲学学院、上海儒学院之邀，美国亚利桑那州立大学国际语言文化学院教授田浩（Hoyt Cleveland Tillman），为复旦哲学学院FIST课程“宋明理学系列专题研究”作了题为《南宋道学的演变》的讲座。在两天的授课里，田浩澄清了南宋道学的概念、梳理其发展脉络，并阐释了南宋道学的当今意义。以下文字根据课程录音整理而来，经田浩教授审定后发布。

"1.道学
在涉及南宋道学的概念时，东西方常用“理学”和Neo-Confucianism这两个词，但在使用时存在争议。中国人通常认为，Neo-Confucianism是“理学”的英译，而有些西方人认为，“新儒学”是中国人对Neo-Confucianism的翻译。例如，谢康伦（Conrad M. Schirokauer）教授认为Neo-Confucianism是一个西方词汇，在中文里并没有本义，它与理学没有关系，不能等同于理学；中国学者知道Neo-Confucianism和理学没有直接关系，所以发明了一个词“新儒学”来翻译Neo-Confucianism。虽然他的看法有问题，但还是值得我们注意。

"理学与Neo-Confucianism之间的关系十分复杂。西方学者普遍使用Neo-Confucianism这个词，但在上世纪80年代，我发现他们在使用这个词时，所表达的内容并不相同。 * * *

(vi) " 'role of the public schools and oxbridge' in Victoria's empire"

What Were Victorian Schools like for Children? Twinkl, undated
https://www.twinkl.com/blog/what ... s-like-for-children
(A) Twinkl
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twinkl  
(2010- ; based in Sheffield, England; online educational publishing house)
, whose name is likely a wordplay of twinkle.
(B) Eton College
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eton_College
("Eton College is a public school in Eton, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1440 by Henry VI" table: Gender        Boys, Age range        13–18, Enrolment 1,311 (2020) [about 200 each year])
(C) Public school (United Kingdom)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_school_(United_Kingdom)
("is a fee-charging endowed school originally for older boys that was 'public' in the sense of being open to pupils irrespective of locality, denomination or paternal trade or profession. * * * In England and Wales so-called public schools are not funded from public taxes. * * * Public Schools Act 1868 [in Victorian period] "gave the seven [public] schools independence from direct jurisdiction or responsibility of the Crown, the established church, or the government. Henceforth each of these schools was to be managed by a board of governors")


(f) "No empire 'spread [past tense and past participle: spread] so far or so fast' as the Arab caliphate. Within three generations of Muhammad's death, his heir ruled from Spain to the borders of China. The Umayyad dynasty at Damascus legitimated hereditary monarchy in Islam"
(i) caliphate
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caliphate   
("The person who holds this office carries the title of caliph * * * Often acting as little more than a symbolic figurehead, the formal office of Caliph remained from the death of Muhammad in 632 until the Ottoman Caliphate was formally dismantled in 1924.[5] During the medieval period, three major caliphates succeeded each other: the Rashidun Caliphate (632–661), the Umayyad Caliphate (661–750), and the Abbasid Caliphate (750–1517). In the fourth major caliphate, the Ottoman Caliphate, the rulers of the Ottoman Empire claimed caliphal authority from 1517 * * *  The first caliph was Abu Bakr -founder and first caliph of the Rashidun Caliphate] and the last caliph was Abdulmejid II [Ottoman]"/  view map whose caption reads, "The Caliphate, 622–750")
(ii) Umayyad Caliphate
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umayyad_Caliphate
("between 705 and 715 * * * campaigns against Transoxiana 河中地区 (Central Asia) )
(iii)
(A) Umayyad
https://www.etymonline.com/word/umayyad   
("from Arabic, from Umayya, proper name of an ancestor of Muhammad from whom the dynasty claimed descent")
(B) Umayya
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umayya
(may refer to: "Umayya ibn Abd Shams, progenitor of the Banu Umayya")

choi

—---------------------text
The talent that creates an empire is often in conflict with the skills that preserve it. The “recklessly heroic style” of Alexander the Great, Dominic Lieven notes in his new book, was a political dead end. Even in durable empires, a tension remains between the emperor, whose authority is supreme and superhuman, and the empire, in which power is managed by bureaucrats, soldiers, viceroys and local elites. Empires are founded by war and personal charisma, but they are sustained by paperwork and compromise.

Mr Lieven, a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, compares the Chinese emperor who bore the Mandate of Heaven to the helmsman of "a great modern family firm." Most heirs and emperors are not up to the job, but the system sustains them regardless. The emperor is always a "captive of his officials." Valentinian I of Rome, who seems to have found this arrangement frustrating, kept Goldflake and Innocence, "two savage and underfed man-eating bears, outside his bedroom as a warning to his entourage."

"In the shadow of the Gods" is an instructive epi, deficient only in that ['in that' is a phrase meaning 'because'] the author does not pursue his subject to the present day. Mr Lieven defnes emperor as "hereditary holders of supreme authority,"ruling disparate populations over long distances. They are usually male, notwithstanding Catherine the Great of Russia, Victoria of Great Britain, and Cixi, the dowager empress of China. The modern age, Mr Lieven argues, is a radically new era in which hereditary and sacred monarchy are [sic; should be is] "no longer viable."  

Imperial authority always was symbolic as well as actual. From his invention, the emperor was, the emperor was, if not divine, then the next best thing, tricked out in the ancient robes "sacred monarchy." The first emperor was Sargon of Akkad (2334-2279 BCE), a Near Eastern priest-king who found his city-state too small and conquered modern Iraq and Syria. As Elizabeth II, the daughter of the last emperor of India, heads the Church of England, so Sargondaughter became high-priestess of the moon god in the temple at Ur.

One of the things Romans did for us was to define empire. Under the Roman republic, an imperator was a victorious general, and later one of the two consuls. The empire began in 27 BCE under Augustus, the victor of Rome's civil wars. A "ruthless and skillful politician" Augustus mollified senatorial aristocracy with a small share of his power and a "much greater helping of top jobs and patronage." He learned from his uncle Julius Caesar's mistakes, refusing to be "officially proclaimed a living god" in Rome, and calling himself primus inter pares, "first among equals." But he accepted the divine status bestowed by local elites in his eastern empire. The geography of empire always includes a gulf of hypocrisy between the metropolis [Rome] and the provinces,  

The Western Roman Empire lasted five centuries and became the template for the modern European empires. Its eastern, Byzantine heir endured for another millennium, until Constinople fell in 1453. Yet Rome's emperors, Mr Lieven Suggests, struggled at the basic task of succession. When Diocletian (284-305 CE) upgraded the emperor from the first citizen to divine autocrat, living up to the image "put an extra strain" on an emperor. Add the intriguing of the Praetorian Guard, and the Romans got through 53 emperors in 311 years: not much different to the election cycle of the American republic, with their "never-ending" factional struggles. The Sassanids of Persia, founded in 224 CE, had 30 emperors in three centuries, and the British have had only a dozen monarchs since 1707. No wonder that the "Meditations" of Marcus Aurelius, the most personal testimony left by a Roman emperor, advises Stoic endurance.

Russia's Romanov lasted three centuries, the Habsburgs nearly a millennium in various forms, but the Chinese are the long-distance champions [long distance: distance like marathon]: their first imperial dynasty, the Qin, was founded in 221 BCE. The unification of China under the Tang dynasty (618-907 CE) led to "great economic advances and and a superb flowering of Chinese literary and artistic high culture." The second Tang emperor, Taizong, was "beyond question" one of history's greatest emperors," combining military and administrative skills with a "flair for the dramatic, flamboyant gesture." Like Marcus Aurelius, he bequeathed advice to his heirs.   

The Tang emperors were Confucians, ruling through aristocracy. Their replacements, the Song dynasty, absorbed elements of Buddhism and Daoism, and ruled through a bureaucratic elite which excelled in gathering taxes from the provinces. Their civil-service examinations and the "neo-Confucian ideology"  welded the Chinese elite to the imperial order. Mr Lieven compares the examination system to "role of the public schools and oxbridge" in Victoria's empire.  

No empire "spread [past tense and past participle: spread] so far or so fast" as the Arab caliphate. Within three generations of Muhammad's death, his heir ruled from Spain to the borders of China. The Umayyad dynasty at Damascus legitimated hereditary monarchy in Islam; not until the British Empire would another system have a wider or deper impact on humanity." The transition from the Umayyads to the Abbasids in 750, Mr Lieven notes, resembles that from the Principate of Augustus to the Dominate of Diocletian. The early Umayyads "camouflaged the reality of dynastic monarchy behind a facade of modesty and loyalty to tradition," while the Abbasids "represented imperial monarchy in full Iranian glory."

Mr Lieven’s emphasis on non-European empires is refreshing, but his story peters out, Rather like the British empire. It would have been instructive if he had pursued his theme, rather than grumbled about Donald Trump’s putative similarity to Kaiser Wilhelm II. The 1940s saw the dfeatof the German, Italian and Japanese empires, the eclipse of the British and French empires, and the mutation of the imperial idea in the age of superpowers. The only people who believe that the modern American, Russian and Chinese states are not empires by other names are American, Russian and Chinese.

Mr Green’s latest book is "The Religious Revolution; The birth of modern spirituality, 1848-1898." [Farrar, Straus and Giroux (a division of Macmillan), April 19, 2022]