Roman republic was good and the empire was decent in the beginning

No it wasnt

Republic was extremely corrupt

Their reliance on slaves really fucked em good

Empire was also corrupt

It's surprising they lasted so long

Not many emperors lasted very long tho

All governments are corrupt but the Roman system obviously worked

Civilized mass swathes of Europe

You mean the emperor getting assassinated and replaced every few years later on in the empire

Slavery doesn't work because of that

What do you mean

Barbarians were perfectly civilized

Not at all

Yes they were

They had stable social structures and culture

That's just Roman propaganda

sure, they had civilization, but they were primitive

They make barbarians out to be idiots

How so?

Let's be honest, the romans were technologically shit too

Thousands of years of tribal despots

They relied too heavily on slaves so they didn't advance their technology. It's a large reason they got wrecked in the end

The romans hired so many barbarian mercs as soldiers

And remember

Who had op cavalry compared to Rome

Yes they did

They had technology

they're not as caveman like as you probably think

They were relatively benevolent conquerors

Rome?

parthia?

Rome destroyed entire cities

They did have technology but they didn't continue to advance on it because of their reliance on slaves

Sometimes, of course they did

you have to sometimes

I think they were pretty advanced still though. Cement wasn't rediscovered for a long time after the western side fell right?

You don't have to raze cities to the ground

Famous one

Carthage

still the best civilization to ever exist