Reflection on the weight of Rome in European culture
Introduction
Traveling to Rome is a very different experience from visiting any other city in Europe. The feeling it causes is one of arrival at a completely new place and, nevertheless, amazingly familiar. As it is for most people who arrive in the city, as a primary destination we have the famous coliseum placed the heart of Rome, and seeing it, beyond the sense of astonishment and wonder, we find a place whose appearance is quite well known. With regard to the great basilica of San Pedro, the symbolic Fontana di Trevi, the Roman forum … How are we so familiar with all this from its appearance to its history long before we can even look at these places? Where does this sense of llaneza, affinity or connection come from? Because the German novelist Goethe could not have better explained in his Roman elegies his own experience in the city, saying: temples, palaces, ruins and columns today I looked, which man who travels to take advantage knows … the world does notIt would be the world, Rome would not be Rome.
Developing
Rome has managed to occupy a special place in Western thought, partly due to this perpetual feeling of "return home". His greatness was marked by his willingness to receive ideas from other origins for his own purposes. Aspects such as its architecture, technology, art, urban and military planning are the result of the influences of other people and cultures. The total of what they did with the reworking and enrichment of these bases was unique for them and what made them an extraordinary civilization within the story. The apparently unlimited capacity of Rome for the multiple, as well as conflictive, significance makes it an extraordinarily fertile paradigm to study and try to make sense, and at the same time destabilize, both history and politics, such as identity, memory anddesire.
Christianity played a key role in culture and traditions that still exist in Western civilization. In the Roman Empire, art and architecture were of a religious nature. During the Roman Pax, the Roman culture extended throughout Western Europe. The agreement helped to romanize and civilize the western provinces in different ways. The majority of army officers located there remained in the camps, married local women and raised children under Roman culture. This promoted the growth of native towns to cities;The inhabitants of the city copied the Roman modes of clothing, language, architecture and government. This extensive period of peace allowed the Romans to build excellent paved road systems that extended throughout the empire. They built roads, some of which are still in use currently.
They were made with stone, concrete and sand, as it is done today, and connected Rome with other parts of the empire. It is from the establishment of towns and cities of the Romans that the idea of people living in apartments and establishment of goods emerged. And Christianity, on the other hand, still prosper as the greatest religion in the world;And with its "origin" being drawn from the Roman Empire, Christianity represents a transcendent link between the ancient world and modern civilization.
It should be noted that the growth of the Roman Empire extended Latin language throughout Europe. Over time, the vulgar Latin, which differed from classic Latin in grammar and vocabulary, evolved in different areas, changing to a series of romance languages. As we know, to this we owe the foundations of the Portuguese, Spanish, French, Italian, Romanian, among others. Because Latin was the language of the Roman Catholic Church and academics, in turn influenced other languages, even romances.
But the most lasting and unleashed contribution of the Romans to Western civilization is the law. The Romans accepted that the laws should be fair and equal for all people, rich or poor, and the judges recognize and learn certain principles of justice. These were based on common sense and practical ideas. It is where the iconic idea that every person is innocent originates until the opposite is demonstrated. Most legal systems in modern civilizations still follow the legal system of ancient Rome, as is the legislative body of chosen representatives: the Senate.
As we have seen, the legacy of Rome has clearly left a lasting impact on multiple aspects of modern society. In addition to being the place of birth of Christianity and democracy, the main events of contemporary history, we know that numerous aspects of everyday life date back to Roman origins;From the components of language, art, philosophy and rhetoric, to the architecture of arches, the incredible aqueduct system, among many other things. The implications of Roman influences in today’s society are obviously significant and of great reach.
However, it should be noted that, of course, not everything we would inherit from the Romans would be completely positive. In his work, Eva Cantarella tells us how, initially starting from the Greeks, the Romans take the concept of "barbarians" in reference to those invaders of non -Mediterranean European countries, seen as unlocked people. It is easy to draw a parallel line from this idea to modernity, in which, as Said knows how to stand out in his orientalism, those of the East are discriminated simply for not being the West. According to the weight of Rome in European culture: the germ of the opposition destined to grow and spread in the collective imaginary, first in the Romans and later in European peoples, was at first the product of an encounter between the East andWest. In this sense, we cite, to conclude with this point, an appointment of an exhibition mentioned in a short article by the New York Times, in which, translated, he exposes: Diversity is undoubtedly a wealth, but it is not emphasizing our differences in our differencesthat we will improve the fate of our children.
Although, as we have mentioned soon, it would be totally false to affirm that Western civilization was influenced alone and merely by the Roman Empire, taking many, if not most, of their impulses of the Greeks, their influence on Western civilization was,In short, huge. In addition to their own contribution to civilization, they brought Greek ideas back to the mainland, modifying them and transmitting them around the western world. In fact, without the Roman conquest, Greek ideas would not have reached the west;If it is not for the Roman sense of social responsibility to moderate the individualism of Hellenistic Greece, classical culture could have died without any influence in the western world. Therefore, it is undoubtedly that we affirm that the Roman Empire had a great influence on European culture. By conserving and contributing to Greek culture, Rome strengthened Western culture and traditions;The world would be very different. Europe, as we know it today, is being built over a shared culture.
conclusion
In conclusion, we should not insist very fervently on the mistakes and evils of the past, since there is not much we can do for them. It is about being able to see everything, the good, the ugly and the bad in all its splendor and from there;study our roots, understand them and try not to repeat those mistakes that were committed in the past. So we do not know with complete certainty where we are going, but where we come from and where we end up, we take care to see back as many times as necessary not to be redundant in our most atrocious errors. If ideas were born and died with the creators, there would be no civilization.
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