Holy Roman Empire

Tell me all the cool things about the early Holy Roman Empire. Or the Holy Roman Empire in general.

Well whatever you want to call it, it’s either the second or third longest-lasting empire in human history. Technically the japs have the longest in history but it’s pretty much bullshit since the emperor is just ceremonial for most of Japanese history so it doesn’t really count since the actual political climate was constantly in flux. So honestly I’d say it’s the second oldest behind the eastern Romans since Japan cheats and their emperor isn’t a real emperor. Say what you want about the holy Roman emperor, he was still the head of state and not some general/shogun’s puppet.

It was neither Holy nor Roman nor an Empire.

...

>
>
>

You sure are mad about Japan man.

>implying

Because it’s like they knew man, it’s like they knew as long as they kept the same puppets then it would look like their political history was more stable than it actually was. The Japanese standard for “emperor” is so low that it wouldn’t be considered a real empire by any other society, even less so than the HRE. He doesn’t have any real power, he’s not relevant to discussions about the longest-lasting regimes since he’s not a real regime.

Well I mean they are technically holding the record for longest standing empire, but their feudalism and phony emperor kind of make that record somewhat invalid in a sense.
If I was invested in the record I'd sure be mad.

ARE YOU IMPLYING THERE WAS NOTHING COOL ABOUT IT

"H O L Y"
O
L
Y"

it was the most autistic thing ever created

Well, until you were born of course

I didn't know much about the Holy Roman Empire at all, but I'm guessing people don't really care for it? Here at least?

>Call yourself roman emperor to give respect to the romans that you admire
>Call yourself holy to give respect to god (with the blessing of the pope no less)
>People on a tibetan basket weaving forum make fun of you ten centuries later
In hindsight, it was kind of a sub-optimal thing and not exactly a state as we know them since the 17th century... but still did better than other states with similar problems (*cough* commonwealth*cough*). And it did endure until napoleon came and conquered half of europe.

Ignore the plebs , it was beautiful and perfect, and too pure for this world

Germans LARPing as Romans
Naturally anything Germanic will be targeted in the internet, also it’s name isn’t accurate for what it actually was. More like a catholic confederation of lords agreeing to call themselves an empire and help each other as a mutual defensive strategy to make them look more centralized and threatening than they actually were. Of course it was the status quo of this decentralization that allowed it to last so long. Things that don’t bend, break. The Holy Roman Emperor could bend, so he didn’t break.

>confederation of lords
To be fair, all early medieval states were that, more or less. What makes the HRE exceptional is that it never became a centralized state - rather, one could argue, several of those, with semi-satellites in the smaller states and polities.

I appreciate the actual posts, and optimism.
It's nice to hear about.

t. weeb

Voltaire is a meme. HRE was the most powerful country/political entity in Europe for some 200-300 years and it was still very relevant long after that.

This is about late HRE (after the Thirty Years' War). From a famous German jurist Samuel Pufendorf:

>Thus, there is nothing left for us to do but to call the German Empire [Reich], if classified according to the rules of political science, an irregular body resembling a monster. Through the negligent indulgence of the emperors, the ambitions of the princes, and the machinations of the clergy, it has developed over the course of time from a regular monarchy into such a disharmonious form of government that it is no longer merely a limited monarchy, though outward appearances would seem to indicate that; nor is it yet a federation of several states, but rather a cross between the two. This condition is the constant source of the fatal disease and the internal upheavals of the Empire, since the emperor, on the one hand, strives for the restoration of monarchical rule, and the estates, on the other, strive for complete liberty.

>This alone is monstrous: that head and limbs confront each other like two distinct entities.

Is there a smug historian who said something like ">Great >Japanese >Empire" (or ">Tiny >Korean >Shogunate")? Maybe Voltaireposting can be replaced...