Talk:List of Roman emperors

Sources List for discussions

Title	Type	Date	Author	Start	End	Excerpts/notes related to end of the Roman Emperors/Roman Empire
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire	Book	1776	Edward Gibbon	Augustus	Constantine XI	"The entire series of Roman Emperors, from the first of the Cesars to the last of the Constantines, extends above fifteen hundred years: and the term of dominion unbroken by foreign conquest, surpasses the measure of ancient monarchies; the Assyrians or Medes, the successors of Cyrus, or those of Alexander." See also the wikipedia article Outline of The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
A History of the Roman Emperors	Book	1825	Charles Abraham Elton	Augustus (28 BC)	Constantine XI (1453)	"Chronological List of Emperors"
A History of the Later Roman Empire from Arcadius to Irene (395 A.D. to 800 A.D) Volume 2	Book	2015 (first published in 1889)	J. D. Bury	Augustus	1453	From the description: "Arguing for the underlying continuity of the Roman empire from the time of Augustus until 1453, Bury nevertheless begins his account in the year in which, on the death of Theodosius I, the empire was divided into eastern and western parts, and Constantinople began to take on the metropolitan role formerly held by Rome." Prefaced by a discussion of the terminology that preserves "Roman Empire" until 1453, criticizes Gibbon for the idea of a "Fall of the Western Roman Empire", refers to the phrase "Byzantine Empire" as "dangerous" and "highly objectionable, because [it] ... tend[s] to obscure an important fact and perpetuate a serious error", opines that the idea of Eastern and Western empires in Late Antiquity before 476 "both incorrect in itself and leads to a further confusion", reserves Eastern Roman Empire for the period after Charlemagne only, says that "No one talks about two Roman Empires in the days of Constantius and Constans; yet the relation of Arcadius and Honorius, the relation of Theodosius II and Valentinian III, the relation of Leo I and Anthemius, were exactly the same as the political relation which existed between the sons of Constantine", continues with "The resignation of Romulus Augustulus did not even shake the Roman Empire, far less did it cause an Empire to fall", and concludes that "it will be probably long time yet before the inveterate error of assigning a wrong importance to the year 476 A.D. has been finally eradicated."
Greece Under the Romans	Book	1907	George Finlay	Augustus	1204	From the preface: "1. The first of these periods comprises the history of Greece under the Roman government." [...] "The predominant feelings of Roman influences and prejudices in the Eastern Empire terminates with the accession of Leo the Isaurian, who gave the administration at Constantinople a new character. 2. The second period embraces the history of the Eastern Roman Empire in its new form, under its conventional title of the Byzantine Empire." [...] "Byzantine history extends from the accession of Leo the Isaurian, in the year 716, to the conquest of Constantinople by the Crusaders in 1204. 3. After the destruction of the Eastern Roman Empire, Greek history diverges into many channels." [...] "After the lapse of less than sixty years, they recovered possession of Constantinople; but though the government they exercised retained the proud title of the Roman Empire, it was only a degenerate representative even of the Byzantine state. This third period is characterised as the Greek Empire of Constantinople. Its feeble existance was terminated by the Othoman Turks at the taking of Constantinople in 1453."
The Cambridge Medieval History Volumes 1-5	Book	1911-1936	Henry Melvill Gwatkin, Mary Bateson, G.T. Lapsley, and James Pounder Whitney	Augustus	1453	"With the loss of the Western provinces, cause by the expansion of the Germanic peoples, the ancient Roman Empire persisted only in the East. Until it finally succumbed to the Ottoman Turks in 1453, this Later Roman Empire - this Greek or Byzantine Empire - was the true Roman Empire, its Emperors being the legitimate successors of Augustus in an unbroken line of continuity;"
The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Volume I, The Later Roman Empire to the Twelfth Century	Book	1960	C. W. Previté-Orton	Augustus (28 BC)	Leo III The Isaurian (717-740)	"The reign of Leo III 'The Isaurian' (717-40) marks the consummation of a rapid change in the Eastern Roman Empire which had been going on for a hundred years. It was then that the Empire fully entered on its Byzantine period, Greek in speech, deeply orientalized, with Christianity ingrained in its thought and ethos. This Greek speech and mentality did not obliterate its inheritance from the older Roman phase of the Empire: its inhabitants thought of themselves as Romans ('Ρωμαίοι)--to the Moslems their land was Rum; their official language was tinged with borrowed Latin words; their institutions, bureaucracy, army and navy, law and finance were developments from the Roman State. The Basileus was the true successor of the Caesars; his titles of Autocrat and Sebastos were old translations of Imperator and Augustus, and though a despot, with power to associate his colleague and heir, he was on a vacancy still nominally elected by the Senate of New Rome (Constantinople) and acclaimed before or afterwards by his troops."
The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Volume II, The Twelfth Century to the Renaissance	Book	1960	C. W. Previté-Orton	Diocletian (284)	476	The Appendices include separate lists on subsequent pages: "(1) Roman Emperors (284-476);" which includes parallel lists labeled "In the East" and "In the West" after 394, and "(2) Byzantine Emperors (from 491)" which ends in 1204 and then includes lists labeled "Latin Emperors" from 1204 to 1261, "Emperors at Nicaea" from 1206 to 1261, and "Emperors at Constantinople" from 1261 to 1453.
The New Cambridge Medieval History: Volume II, c.700-c.900	Book	1995	Rosamond McKitterick			"Appendix: genealogical tables" includes "Table 12: Byzantine Rulers c.700-c.900" on page 895 that includes "I Heraclians", "II Syrians", and "III Amorians" genealogist tables/lists of Byzantine emperors from Heraclius to Michael III.
The Roman Emperors: A Biographical Guide to the Rulers of Imperial Rome, 31 BC-AD 476	Book	1997	Michael Grant	31 BC	AD 476	Subtitle of the book: "the Rulers of Imperial Rome, 31 BC-AD 476"
From Rome to Byzantium: The fifth century AD	Book	1998	Michael Grant	Augustus (31 BC)	Anastasius I (518)	Subtitle of the book: "The fifth century AD".
The Oxford Illustrated History of the Roman World	Book	2001	John Boardman, Jasper Griffin, Oswyn Murray		1453	"The Late Empire" [...] "1453 Conquest of Constantinople by the Turks and end of the Eastern Roman Empire"
Who's who in the Roman World	Book	2002	John Hazel	Augustus (27 BC)	Jovian (364)	"Appendix II: List of the Roman Emperors"
The Government of the Roman Empire: A Sourcebook	Book	2002	Barbara Levick	Octavian (31 BC)	M. Aurelius Carinus (285)	Description: "This book reveals how an empire that stretched from Glasgow to Aswan in Egypt could be ruled from a single city and still survive more than a thousand years."
The Immortal Emperor: The Life and Legend of Constantine Palaiologos, Last Emperor of the Romans	Book	2002	Donald M. Nicol	Augustus	Constantine XI	The subtitle of the book: "Constantine Palaiologos, Last Emperor of the Romans". From the preface: "Constantine Palaiologos was the last emperor of Constantinople, the New Rome. He was killed defending his city against the Ottoman Turks in 1453. The Turkish conquest completed the transformation of the Christian Byzantine Empire into the Muslim Ottoman Empire. Constantine's death marked the end of an institution that traced its origins back to the reign of Constantine the Great in the fourth century, or indeed back to Augustus, the first Roman Emperor."
The Oxford History of Byzantium	Book	2002	Cyril Mango	Augustus	Constantine XI	"Byzantium, then, is a term of convenience when it is not a term of inconvenience. On any reasonable definition Byzantium must be seen as the direct continuation of the Roman empire in the eastern half of the Mediterranean basin, i.e. that part of the Roman Empire that was Hellenistic in its culture and language. Being a continuation, it had no beginning, although a number of symbolic dates have been advanced as marking that elusive birthday: the accession of Dioclecian (AD 284), the foundation of Constantinople (324) or its ceremonial inauguration (330), the adoption of Christianity as the all but exclusive religion of the empire (c.380), the division of the empire into separately ruled eastern and western halves (395), the abolition of the western empire (476), even the accession of Leo III (716), the last being still enshrined in The Cambridge Medieval History. To all of these dates more or less cogent objections have been raised. That, however, does not solve a problem that probably owes more to a feeling than to the kind of 'objective' criteria that are supposed to underpin historical periodization."
The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Roman Empire	Book	2002	Eric Nelson	Augustus	1453	Chapter 1 includes a subsection called "The Byzantine Period (565-1453)", which states "People don't often think of the Byzantine culture as 'Roman'. Greek, not Latin, was the language of the realm and the Orthodox Church developed apart from the Latin Roman Catholic Church. Nevertheless, the culture we know as Byzantine was the continuation of the eastern Roman Empire and saw itself in that light. Citizens called themselves Romaioi (Romans) and recognized their emperor as the legitimate Roman emperor in the 'New Rome', Constantinople."
Metropolitan Museum of Art	Website	October 2004	Department of Greek and Roman Art	Augustus (27 BC)	Anastasius I (518)	Titled "List of Rulers of the Roman Empire". It includes sections labeled "Eastern Roman Empire", and "Eastern Roman Empire (after death of Jovian)".
A Pocket Dictionary of Roman Emperors	Book	2006	Paul Roberts	Augustus (27 BC)	Romulus Augustulus (476)	From page 48: "German kings ruled Italy and the remains of the western empire withered away. The only emperor now was in Constantinople, the capital of the eastern (Byzantine) empire, which lasted until AD 1453."
A History of the Later Roman Empire, AD 284-641: The Transformation of the Ancient World	Book	2006	Stephen Mitchell	Diocletian	Heraclius	From the description: "This book presents a historical study of the Roman Empire in Late Antiquity from the accession of the emperor Diocletian 284 to the death of the emperor Heraclius in 641."
How Rome Fell: Death of a Superpower	Book	2009	Adrian Keith Goldsworthy	Augustus	fifteenth century	"Rome's fall is memorable because its empire lasted for so long -- more than five hundred years after Caesars death in Italy and the western provinces, and three times as long in the east, where emperors would rule from Constantinople until the fifteenth century." [...] "Similarly I have made no real use of the modern terms 'Byzantium' and 'Byzantine', and the emperors who ruled from Constantinople are referred to as Roman even when they no longer controlled Italy and Rome itself. This was how they knew themselves." [...] "The aim of this study is to look more closely at both the internal and external problems faced by the Roman Empire. It will begin, as Gibbon did, in the year 180 when the empire still appeared to be in its heyday, before moving on to trace the descent into the chaos of the middle of the third century. Then we will examine the rebuilt empire of Diocletian and Constantine, the move towards division into an eastern and western half in the fourth century and the collapse of the west in the fifth. It will end with the abortive effort of the Eastern Empire to recapture the lost territories in the sixth century. Gibbon went much further, continuing to the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in the fifteenth century. That is a fascinating story in its own right, but it is too great a one to be dealt with adequately here. By the end of the sixth century the world was profoundly and permanently different from our starting point. The Eastern Roman Empire was strong, but no longer possessed the overwhelming might and dominance of the united Roman Empire. This book is about how this came about." [...] "There is a bitter irony that he should be named Romulus after Rome's mythical founder and nicknamed Augustus after the first emperor Augustus."
Ancient History Encyclopedia	Website	accessed 2020	founded in 2009 by Jan van der Crabben	Augustus (27 BC)	Constantine I (337)	Titled "Roman Emperor Timeline" and ends with Constantine. Clicking on the link to "Roman Emperor", it starts "Roman emperors ruled over the Imperial Roman Empire starting with Augustus from 27 BCE and continuing in the Western Roman Empire until the late 5th century CE and in the Eastern Roman Empire up to the mid-15th century CE."
The Complete Roman Emperor: Imperial Life at Court and on Campaign	Book	2010	Michael Sommer	Augustus	Romulus Augustulus	From the book description: "The eighty-five emperors who ruled Rome for five centuries are among the most famous and notorious leaders in history."
The Ruin of the Roman Empire	Book	2011	James J O'Donnell	Augustus (31 BC)	Heraclius (641)	"A simplified table. For fuller information, see the website De Imperatoribus Romanis (http://www.roman-emperors.org), in which this is based."
From Rome to Byzantium AD 363 to 565: The Transformation of Ancient Rome	Book	2013	A. D. Lee	Constantine I (306)	Heraclius (641)	"Roman emperors during late antiquity".
Emperors of Rome: The Story of Imperial Rome from Julius Caesar to the Last Emperor	Book	2016	David Potter	Augustus (29 BC)	Romulus Augustulus (476)	Chapter title: "Final Decline and Fall: The collapse of the Western Empire (AD 411-476)".
The Byzantine Empire 717-1453	Book	2018	George Finlay	Leo the Isaurian	Constantine XI	"The Eastern Roman Empire, thus reformed, is called by modern historians the Byzantine Empire; and the term is well devised to mark the changes effected in the government, after the extinction of the last traces of the military monarchy of ancient Rome. The social conditions of the inhabitants of the Eastern Empire had already undergone a considerable change during the century which elapsed from the accession of Heraclius to that of Leo, from the influence of causes to be noticed in the following pages; and this change in society created a new phase in the Roman empire. The gradual process of this change has led some writers to date the commencement of the Byzantine Empire as the reigns of Zeno and Anastasius, and others to descend so late as the times of Maurice and Heraclius. But as the Byzantine Empire was only a continuation of the Roman government under a reformed system, it seems most correct to date its commencement from the period when the new social and political modifications produced a visible effect on the fate of the Eastern Empire. This period is marked by the accession of Leo the Isaurian."
The Imperial Families of Ancient Rome	Book	2019	Maxwell Craven	Julius Caesar (49 BC)	Maurice (and Theodosius) (602)	From Contents: "VIII The Eastern Empire to 602"; From the Preface: "To understand how this might work in the context of the emperors of Rome from the triumph of Julius Caesar in 49BC to the death (say) of Mauricius (commonly Maurice) in 602, , it is necessary to provide, in the form of an introduction, how the system arose and how it worked."; From the Introduction: "The Roman Empire lasted an astonishingly long time, in the west five centuries, with almost a further millennium in the east, falling after two centuries of terminal decline to the Moslem Ottoman Turks in 1453."
Basileus: History of the Byzantine Emperors 284–1453	Book	2019	Weston Barnes	Diocletian (284)	Constantine XI Paleologus Dragases (1453)	Subtitle of the book: "History of the Byzantine Emperors 284–1453".
Encyclopaedia Britannica	Website	accessed 2020	Naomi Blumberg	Augustus (31 BC)	Zeno (491)	Titled "List of Roman emperors" and ends with Zeno.
ostia-antica.org	Website	accessed 2020		Augustus (27 BC)	Maurice (602)	The list is divided into two sections, labeled "Emperors from Augustus to Constantine" and "Emperors from Diocletian to Romulus" (but which also includes emperors up to Maurice).
Livius	Website	accessed 2020	Jona Lendering	Julius Caesar(48 BC)	Constans II (668)	The "List of Byzantine Emperors" page is presented as a subcategory of the "List of Roman Emperors" page.
De Imperatorobus Romanis	Website	Updated: 25 February 2020	Richard D. Weigel, and others	Augustus (31 BC)	Constantine XI (1453)	List title: "The Imperial Index: The Rulers of the Roman Empire From Augustus to Constantine XI Palaeologus". From the homepage: "DIR is an on-line encyclopedia on the rulers of the Roman empire from Augustus (27 BC-AD 14) to Constantine XI Palaeologus (1449-1453). The encyclopedia consists of (1) an index of all the emperors who ruled during the empire's 1500 years, (2) a growing number of biographical essays on the individual emperors, (3) family trees ("stemmata") of important imperial dynasties, (4) an index of significant battles in the empire's history, (5) a growing number of capsule descriptions and maps of these battles, and (6) maps of the empire at different times. Wherever possible, these materials are cross-referenced by live links. These contents are supplemented by an ancient and medieval atlas, a link to a virtual catalog of Roman coins, and other recommended links to related sites. The contents of DIR have been prepared by scholars but are meant to be accessible to non-specialists as well. They have been peer-reviewed for quality and accuracy before publication on this site."

Splitting proposal

I propose that the article be splitted into three separate articles:

• 1. List of Roman emperors, covering the period until 395;
• 2. List of Western Roman emperors, presenting the emperors who ruled the Western Roman Empire from 395 to 476/480;
• 3. List of Eastern Roman emperors, presenting the emperors who reigned in the Eastern Roman (or Byzantine) Empire from 395 to 1453 (this list could be merged with the List of Byzantine emperors).

The present long list of the Roman emperors is exceptional in scholarly literature. It represents only one single claim to the succession of the Roman Empire (for example, it ignores the claims of the emperors of Trapezunt and Thessalonica). Furthermore, no corresponding article exists primarily because a corresponding article (covering the history of the Roman Empire from 27BC to 1453AD) would be an original synthesis. Borsoka (talk) 08:37, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

• Comment (Two) I don't see why you need to split 2 from 1. We should have one list down to 476 (1 & 2) and another from 395 (3). I wouldn't mind if there was an overlap by listing eastern emperors down to Zeno in the first list. T8612 (talk) 12:46, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
• Two is enough, one ending in 476/491/602/641 and the other comprising 395-1453. The question of the Roman-ness of the Byzantines can be avoided altogether by presenting (3) as a subtopic of (1). 476 and 491 don't mean much, but cutting the present list at those points is preferable to the current arrangement. Avilich (talk) 20:48, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
  • Thank you for your comments. Splitting the article into three would improve readibility as our readers would not be forced to construct their own list of the Western Roman emperors after 395 from a long list of emperors. The splitting would be in line with the sources cited in the article, or at least would not contradict either of them. From 395 emperors ruled either the eastern or the western half of the empire, and wars between the two halves of the empire were not unusual. A recent monography about the Late Roman Empire verifies the date: "With the succession of Theodosius by his sons and grandsons Honorius and Valentinian III in the west, Arcadius and Theodosius II in the east, the two parts of the Empire began to take different directions." (Elton, Hugh (2018). The Roman Empire in Late Antiquity: A Political and Military History. Cambridge University Press. p. 151. ISBN 978-1-108-45631-9.) Borsoka (talk) 02:55, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

There are very few western emperors, and readability is hardly a concern as there is already an explicit subsection dedicated to them. Indeed, your source seems to support ending the Roman list in 602 or 641, not 395, since the title associates "Roman Empire" with "Late Antiquity", and Late Antiquity is often held to have ended with in 602. Avilich (talk) 20:59, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

• Two lists is the appropriate division—virtually all lists of Roman emperors in both scholarly sources and general references include rulers of the Western Empire down to 476. Most of these include contemporaneous Eastern rulers down to the same period, although it makes sense to include these—from 395 makes sense—in a "List of Byzantine emperors". Please note that I am not arguing that the latter is not synonymous with a "List of Eastern Roman emperors", but the former title is more recognizable in English, and will avoid any confusion over whether the latter title is appropriate after say, 476 or Justinian or some time in the seventh or eighth century—an argument which experience shows is unlikely to be resolved here. Following the usual practice will result in both lists including some rulers—specifically those who reigned in the East between 395 and 476—but otherwise the division will be clean and serve our readers better than one very, very long list that doesn't distinguish between Romans and Byzantines at all. P Aculeius (talk) 12:39, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

"... virtually all lists of Roman emperors in both scholarly sources and general references include rulers of the Western Empire down to 476." That's not what we see in the assembled sources list here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:List_of_Roman_emperors#Sources_List_for_discussions 2601:14D:4F81:5400:54C8:D88E:DC7B:76F0 (talk) 19:21, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

All but two of those sources include all of the emperors down to 476; the two that don't end in the late third and middle fourth centuries, for reasons that have nothing to do with distinguishing between Roman and Byzantine emperors, and I don't believe that either of them contend that emperors after those periods weren't Roman. P Aculeius (talk) 19:54, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

• One The page is 186kb, which as a rule of thumb, suggests Wikipedia:TOOLONG. But when you break it down, the introductory text is 1673 words; the list of emperors is 10,253 words; and the remaining text (ie, references mostly) is 5,373. Based on the main focus of the article, it's borderline WP:SIZERULE. Separately, I've found a modern credible source on recommedation of a leading Byzantine scholar that support the one list so once validated, will no longer make this WP:SYNTH. So therefore, although an article split may he helpful for information digestability (but not considered necessary), I feel the cost far outweighs the benefit. First of all, this has been a sensitive topic since the 8th century that's been politicised and continues to affect modern politics and splitting the list feeds those narratives. Secondly, scholars since the 1970s have dropped Gibbon's worldview of the symbolism of Rome falling to a late antiquity view that no longer sees Rome falling, which is now further being challenged by modern leading academics which is the Empire continued on and Rome being controlled temporarily by the Goths is a temporary loss of control like the splits that Aurelian patched together a century earlier (ie, Gallic Empire and the Palmyrene Empire). Finally, if you ignore all my previous reasons, the history of this page and the arguments I see all over Wikipedia is that as soon as there is a split there will be a push to combine it again wasting everyone's time. So while I respect Borsoka's efforts and want to support his proposals regrettably, I don't see the burning why. I vote we stay with the status quo because the sensitivity to how split lists are used for narrative that's already being misused on Wikipedia on this topic and the predictable reaction once we split the list, for an article that is very readable and accessible to the reader, means there is little net value in doing this. Biz (talk) 21:52, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
  • I think that WP should reflect the most widely accepted scholarly approach when presenting history, and in this case most scholars seem to prefer a split. I can refer to the The Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c.500-1492, published several times between 2008 and 2019 ([1]), The Oxford History of Byzantium first published in 2002 ([2]), Timothy E. Gregory's A History of Byzantium published in 2010 by Blackwell, and Warren T. Treadgold's well known History of Byzantium first published in 1997 by Stanford University Press ([3]). I could continue the list. Furthermore, neutrality problem should also be addressed: the list only promotes one single claim to the succession of the Roman Empire. Borsoka (talk) 03:21, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

    If the issue is not accessibility for the reader but a matter of neutrality due to the conflict by historians to write history, then this is why I believe one list is the only way as that is what makes it neutral. (The cut off points is where the neutrality is a problem.) Succession is not relevant as it's universally acknowledged that the Byzantine Empire is more or less the Medieval era Roman Empire.

    As you mention The Oxford History of Byzantium first published in 2002, I want to note they support one list. What follows is a quote that describes exactly the problem. "Byzantium, then, is a term of convenience when it is not a term of inconvenience. On any reasonable definition Byzantium must be seen as the direct continuation of the Roman empire in the eastern half of the Mediterranean basin, i.e. that part of the Roman Empire that was Hellenistic in its culture and language. Being a continuation, it had no beginning, although a number of symbolic dates have been advanced as marking that elusive birthday: the accession of Dioclecian (AD 284), the foundation of Constantinople (324) or its ceremonial inauguration (330), the adoption of Christianity as the all but exclusive religion of the empire (c.380), the division of the empire into separately ruled eastern and western halves (395), the abolition of the western empire (476), even the accession of Leo III (716), the last being still enshrined in The Cambridge Medieval History. To all of these dates more or less cogent objections have been raised. That, however, does not solve a problem that probably owes more to a feeling than to the kind of 'objective' criteria that are supposed to underpin historical periodization."

    The Cambridge Medieval History Volumes 1-5 also supports one list. "With the loss of the Western provinces, cause by the expansion of the Germanic peoples, the ancient Roman Empire persisted only in the East. Until it finally succumbed to the Ottoman Turks in 1453, this Later Roman Empire - this Greek or Byzantine Empire - was the true Roman Empire, its Emperors being the legitimate successors of Augustus in an unbroken line of continuity;" Biz (talk) 06:38, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

Even so, these books do not cover the whole period covered by the article. We could hardly write an article corresponding the list without ignoring WP:SYNTH Borsoka (talk) 06:54, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

No argument that we need reliable and credible sources. I also accept your argument that it needs to reference that the emperors started with Augustus and ended with Constantine XI for it to be relied on. However, now I believe you are requiring a third criteria which is they also have to cover the history of this entire 1500 year period as well? So as an example, does this mean Gibbon's The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire cannot be counted as he started in the year 180AD and/or its WP:SYNTH that we connect the emperors from before 180AD? Biz (talk) 07:10, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

• Comment: there is no issue with synthesis here, and whether to include or exclude sources such as Gibbon is not particularly relevant. History supplies a variety of dates along which these lists could be sensibly arranged, and it is up to the interested editors to pick one, or to decide how much overlap there should be between them. Arguments for not splitting the list at all are really not relevant at all, since numerous discussions have already established that this is what most interested editors feel we should do. These issues all seem to be distractions from the original proposal. P Aculeius (talk) 12:55, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

  What is driving the original proposal if WP:SIZERULE and WP:SYNTH are distractions? Biz (talk) 17:13, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

• Comment (One): I support three lists over two lists if it came to it. Two lists being the most problematic because it's reflecting the traditional historical view derived from Western European sources that the Western Empire was a direct continuation of Ancient Rome and the Eastern Empire a spin-off "successor". Modern scholarly work is correcting this very misconception which would be perpetuated with two lists. This factor is one of the many reasons why I believe one list is needed to avoid these debates which are all inventions of historians. This list should not be used as a way to distinguish Roman from Byzantine (which is why I also support renaming the page). Period-based emperor list (such as Principate and Dominate), to enable linking from other articles, does though make sense. Biz (talk) 17:13, 21 February 2023 (UTC)
• Disagree (One) The length of this list is close enough to the length of the List of popes article, so it is not alone in that respect. One list consolidates all of the emperors, and avoids any arguments about how many lists and when the splits should be made (as evidenced above). Although many published texts in this area do not contain a single list of emperors from Augustus to Constantine XI (such as The Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c.500-1492), these texts are generally limited in themselves to a specific time period, and so there is no need in those texts to list all of the emperors that go beyond the timespan of the text itself. But at no point would any of those authors or editors go so far as to say that the complete list of Roman emperors was not the set from Augustus to Constantine XI. Oatley2112 (talk) 11:52, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Comment (Two): I think splitting the list into three separate ones would be overkill. The Western Roman Empire existed for barely 100 years, and had only a few emperors after the Roman Empire was split in half. If the list is split, it should be in just two articles; one for the Roman Empire from the age of Augustus until the death of the last Western emperor, and another for the Byzantine emperors. Of course, the question is on how exactly to deal with the period where the Roman Empire was not yet split, but still had two co-emperors. Would the list on just the Byzantine emperors also take into account the Emperors of the East, from before the split occurred, or only the ones after 395? --PanagiotisZois (talk) 13:44, 14 March 2023 (UTC)
• Disagree (One) Oatley2112 and Biz explain it better than I can myself, but summarized, I do not see the advantage gained by splitting the list, especially when similarly large lists (E.g. that of popes) exist perfectly fine and when alternate lines of succession are generally not considered by scholars (especially when Nicaea is seen as the legitime Byzantium for retaking Constantinople, and claims of succession by e.g. Ottoman Turkey, Russia, and the HRE are completely rejected). Furthermore, as explained by Oatley, there is no credible source that insists that the range of emperors starting with Augustus and ending with Constantine XI is not the correct list of emperors. LVDP01 (talk) 14:50, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

The idea is that the "List of Roman emperors" is already pretty long by the time it reaches AD 476, and when most people think of the "Roman Empire", they're thinking of the Latin-speaking empire based in Rome that effectively (if not legally, or beyond all challenge) ended with the deposition of the last western emperor. Meanwhile we have a separate List of Byzantine emperors covering all the rulers of the Eastern Roman Empire, substantially overlapping with the second half of this list, and there is a strong consensus for keeping it. Nobody is arguing that they weren't Roman, in the legal sense, even if their culture became increasingly Greek over the first few centuries; there is a significant degree of historical and legal continuity, unlike say, the Holy Roman Empire, which was a sort of "spiritual reconstitution" intended to give Charlemagne and his descendants a claim of authority, or the even more far-fetched claims by the Russian czars to be the proper heirs of Byzantium (if anybody here is arguing that, it's not very clear, but I agree that if that's the basis for the PoV tag, it can go).

But the proposal to split and merge the second half of this article with the List of Byzantine emperors is simply one to follow the usual historical practice and treat Byzantine history as a separate topic, making the scope of "Roman" history more manageable by using it primarily to describe the western empire, while stipulating that there was also an eastern Roman empire that grew out of its predecessor and continued for nearly a thousand years after the western one was extinguished. After all, the article "Roman Empire" is based almost entirely on the western empire, following standard scholarly practice, although it also points readers to articles about successor states, including the Byzantine Empire, and explains that briefly in the lead. The question of this proposal wasn't so much whether to split off and merge the Byzantine emperors with the existing list, but at what point in time to do it, and how much overlap should remain, since many treatments of Roman emperors include all of the eastern emperors up to 476 or so before concluding, and naturally most treatments of the Byzantine empire begin either with Constantine or Theodosius or the latter's children.

The proposal may have been fatally flawed from the start, since instead of two lists corresponding with traditional historical divisions between "Roman" and "Byzantine" history, it incorporated an option to have three lists, one of them covering a sort of intermediate period that could have begun at some point following Constantine and concluded in the eighth century, with the idea that Byzantine rulers up to that point were sufficiently "Roman" to be included under that title—which IMO misses the point of splitting the list. The idea was never to claim that the Byzantines were not a legitimate continuation of the Roman state; it was simply to cover the topics of Roman and Byzantine emperors separately to match both common expectations and scholarly practice, while avoiding the apparently endless string of talk page arguments that we don't need a separate list of Byzantine emperors because they're all listed here. And quite frankly the degree of resistance to splitting this list along those lines strikes me as bizarre, and can only be explained by some emotional attachment to the "greater truth" that the Byzantine empire was not merely a legal continuation of the Roman state, but was fundamentally identical to it, and that it is positively heretical to describe it as a successor state or anything other than completely and utterly Roman in every respect and down to its conclusion... but there we are, and we seem to be intractably stuck because of it. P Aculeius (talk) 13:44, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

First, the issue -- and this is not just a Wikipedia problem but an academia problem -- is there is no consensus when the Byzantine Empire "started". As it was a continuation, there was no start and will always be subject to academic debate.

Second, the Roman Empire ending in 476 is also no longer the consensus among historians. Treating the historian invented term "Western Roman Empire" in the same group as Republican Rome but not the "Eastern Roman Empire" is historical bias that's had a history of misuse. Case in point: you correctly call out what Charlamagne did but still use Charlamagne's argument of Latin vs Greek which is what he said why power was vacant in the East for him to take.

However, the big issue in my eyes, is that any distortion to the historical narrative is significant to modern politics. For example, this plays to the origin of the "West" and "East" division that impacts us today (ie, the post Ukraine new world order emerging of Eurasia vs the West). As history is rewritten every generation to suit their political goals, this slicing and dicing of the Roman Empire is dangerous because its the stuff of war. Biz (talk) 19:24, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, but rather than representing mainstream thought, this argument is out of step with all mainstream academia. The idea that there was no division between the eastern and western empires, and that the Byzantine empire was a direct, indistinguishable, and inseparable continuation of the Roman empire as ruled by Augustus and his immediate successors is not merely a matter of opinion, but a fringe theory. There is no connection whatever between any of this and Ukrainian history—the claim of Russia being the "third Rome" is no more than a dynastic metaphor with no legal or historical basis; even if someone descended from the Byzantine emperors married an ancestor of the czars, it does no more than allow the czars to claim spiritual descent from Roman civilization. There is no actual continuity of state or culture. I can't quite tell, but that seems to be what you're getting at.

As for 476, the exact date that the western empire ceased to be a functional state can certainly be argued—was it when Valentinian III personally slew Aëtius a generation earlier, or when the last German king recognized by the Byzantine court as ruler of Italy died, or when the conquests of Belisarius melted away? Was Julius Nepos the last emperor, because the Byzantine court didn't recognize Romulus Augustus? All possible interpretations, I'm sure amongst many others—but 476 remains the most common date for concluding histories of the western empire—or at least lists of its emperors, because he was the last emperor who was resident in and had at least nominal control of what remained of the Roman state, excluding Byzantium and the provinces under its control, and no new emperor was ever appointed or took power after that date; by the reign of Justinian, the western empire had effectively ceased to be a political unity in any form, and all that his reign achieved in relation to it was the temporary reconquest of some of its territory, as part of the Byzantine state.

I fail to see what you hope to achieve by preventing the split of this list. It does not serve some kind of "greater truth" about the Byzantines really just being crypto-Romans who have been unfairly maligned by ignorant and biased historians for the last sixteen centuries. You were willing to split the list, but only into three separate lists, the one option that it was clear would never achieve consensus. Why not follow the example of nearly all scholarship, and treat the two periods of history in different regions of the Mediterranean as distinct topics each deserving fuller exploration than is practical when they are stuck back-to-back? Nobody is denying that the Byzantine empire was in part a continuation of the Roman empire, but no reputable scholar claims that the two are identical or that they cannot be separated as topics. This persistent refusal to follow mainstream scholarship seems more like deliberate obstruction. P Aculeius (talk) 02:19, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, there is no need to get so political here. By this point I don't really care what the outcome is. Everytime this discussion comes up there seem to be no consensus on what to do and everyone end up fighting each other. I don't know if there's a way to get more people involve, although it's very likely that any kind of outcome will inevitably piss off one of the parties. Tintero21 (talk) 03:08, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Truth, not obstruction, is what drives me.

This is an article about Roman emperors. I believe it's a valid question to ask who are Roman Emperors. But I believe its also a valid question to follow with why can't we keep all of them on the same article? I already asked this before but let me ask again: the reason to split the list is why again? The burden to convince is not on those that want the one list but on those who want to justify changing this narration of history, which I'm calling out on an epistemological level.

But since we went there, let me clear something up: the term Byzantine is a political term. If we accept the meticulous research of Anthony Kaldellis, Athenian historian Laonikos Chalkokondyles in the mid 15th century advocated a neo-Hellenic identity of the Romans and was the first to use the term in this way. Which saw new life, when it replaced Charlemange's "Emperor of the Greeks" branding, in the 19th century as a result of politics of the Crimean War, which included Greece's Megali Idea. Anyone that uses the term, is making a play at historical bias, whether they realise it or not. Bias that has roots in the politics for power.

But like I said, this is an article about Roman emperors, not Byzantine emperors so we should focus on that. I do not think the Eastern Roman Empire is a copy of the earlier Roman Empire. In fact, I appreciate the term Byzantine as it helps simplify the complexity of what was the Roman empire in the medieval era. But medieval is just as problematic as Byzantine, and where I stop is when this convenience distorts truth.

Why are we using the end of the Western Roman Empire, which I do not dispute, as also the end of the "Roman Empire" (and just to tie this back to why we are here: the end of the list of Roman Emperors or a particular succession)? A date that has been mythologised and is just as arbitrary but equally symbolic as Mary Beard's thesis that the empire ended with the edict of Caracalla. Why is the ~70 years Gothic occupation considered an end to the empire and it's return is by a different empire, by the -- this is a question within a question -- "last Roman" Justinian? (Temporary as it was, it was a legacy that would have territory held onto until the 11th century.)

Yes, different administrations of the empire began to take form that they eventually became different beasts as the West became German and the East Greek. But why are we letting 8th century politics of the pope and his forgery from Constantine distort the truth? What is wrong with calling this entire history the Roman Empire, but using terms like principate and dominate like the article currently does, to break up this incredible history of Europe?

My position is there are good reasons to split this article. It's just the cost far exceeds the benefit. (And never mind the talk pages, that's assuming we can get the historians to agree where we draw the line.) Biz (talk) 05:10, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Keep one list

"The present long list of the Roman emperors is exceptional in scholarly literature. It represents only one single claim to the succession of the Roman Empire (for example, it ignores the claims of the emperors of Trapezunt and Thessalonica)"

This is a valid objection, but seems more like a reason to add Trapezuntine claims than remove western and eastern Roman ones.

Also, if you removed Roman Emperors after the final division in 395, the correct title would be "List of Roman Emperors from 27 BC–AD 395" or something like that. Otherwise the title would be incorrect to imply that it's a full list of Roman emperors. Koopinator (talk) 09:39, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

It would also be easy to add the Emperors of Thessalonica, since there were only 4 emperors of this state. Dimadick (talk) 21:26, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

• Two My view is a pragmatic one: this list should be navigable, and a split in two is justified.
  • WP:SIZERULE/WP:TOOLONG: With 188 KB it Almost certainly should be divided. 188 KB is almost twice above the upper limit of 100 kB to keep an article readable and navigable. The fact that it has only 7,687 words does little to detract from the fact that the current list is hardly navigable. A neat split in two mostly addresses the issue.
  • WP:OVERLAP/WP:REDUNDANTFORK: The fact that we've got separate List of Byzantine emperors and Succession of the Roman Empire shows there is no need for putting it all together. I mostly agree with P Aculeius that "Roman emperors" can continue until 476/480 based on the fact that WP:RS say that there were Roman emperors reigning from Rome / the Western Roman Empire until 476/480, but that the emperors reigning from Constantinople, especially after 395, may/should be considered "Eastern Roman/Byzantine emperors", which already have their own list.
  • WP:SYNTH/WP:NPOV: Although nom's rationale is focussed on WP:SYNTH, that is the least important (but still relevant) point of the three for me. I see a lot of long comments here which do not invoke any sort of policy or guideline at all, but are concerned with issues of continuity and succession. If we do split this list, it doesn't automatically somehow "demote" the Byzantine emperors from being "Roman emperors" (or at least claiming to have been, and many people accepting/believing they have been). I, for one, am content with Wikipedia presenting that claim, with lots of caveats of course, as one that is widely accepted in WP:RS, but that can be done in List of Byzantine emperors and Succession of the Roman Empire if we really want to. The fact that they already do (The Byzantine Empire was the direct legal continuation of the eastern half of the Roman Empire...) also undermines the need for a unified long list. We have no need for an uncomfortably long, hardly navigable list of holders/claimants that do not help the reader at all, and may implicitly convey a WP:POV, namely that so-and-so (the Byzantine, Latin, Holy Roman, Trapezuntine, Thessalonian, Epirote, Ottoman, Russian monarchs – I'm missing Nicean, but alright, we could always add more I guess – etc.) were still "Roman emperors", when a sentence or two with a bunch of RS suffices. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 15:12, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

    Your perspective based on policies is welcome. My issue with this discussion is the interpretation of policies, and by extension, the interpretation of sources which does not take into account modern historians and the new consensus. The intent of Wikipedia policies is not being followed.

    • WP:SIZERULE/WP:TOOLONG: Readable prose is the main body of the text and excludes tables or lists. Which means it's 1674 words as of today.
    • WP:OVERLAP/WP:REDUNDANTFORK: I agree. The Byzantine list should redirect here and the page renamed; or as Koopinator suggests, this page needs to be renamed to the years it relates to. But that aside, our opinions fall short as not relevant: Wikipedia:RELART
    • WP:SYNTH: I've previously addressed this issue, see previous discussions. The short answer is this is not true.
    • WP:NPOV: This is the convincing reason, for me at least, why this topic requires to be one list. This is for the fact there is no consensus on when the "Roman Empire" ends and the "Byzantine Empire" starts. Roman respublica or Roman imperium is what they were actually called, all other titles are inventions by historians so there will never been a static consensus. Undue weight is being placed on older historical interpretations that has now changed. The modern consensus is the Roman Empire did not end in 476 (note: the Western Roman did fall then, but that's different) so why is this list ending the list of Roman Emperors then if the other policies are not relevant?

    TL;DR: If we change the name of this page to be more specific, we wouldn't have this debate; but as it's making a claim to all Roman Emperors, then the above takes precedence. Biz (talk) 16:52, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

    Thanks for your response.

    • You have not addressed my point that 188 KB is almost twice above the upper limit of 100 kB to keep an article readable and navigable. WP:TOOBIG isn't just about readable prose.
    • This is a strange conclusion. Are you also arguing Byzantine Empire should be merged into Roman Empire per WP:REDUNDANTFORK? Surely not. The Eastern Roman / Byzantine emperors should be removed from this list because they are already mentioned in List of Byzantine emperors. Not for principle reasons, but pragmatic navigational reasons (WP:TOOBIG).
    • Doesn't address my point.
    • As I've said, if we split this list, it doesn't mean we are necessarily saying that the Byzantine emperors weren't "Roman" emperors (anymore). The List of Byzantine emperors explicitly claims they were still Roman emperors, and cites that with RS. I don't care whether the modern consensus is whether or not the "Roman Empire" "fell" in 476 or not, because that is not the question. (Yes, AFAIK, historians only say the "Western Roman Empire" "fell"; but as you say, that's a different conclusion). The List of Byzantine emperors begins before and ends long after 476, so it should be obvious that the "fall of Rome" in 476 did not stop the continued succession of Eastern Roman / Byzantine emperors reigning in Constantinople. "Byzantine" is just the commonly accepted term of convention for them (WP:COMMONNAME), especially after 476, but sometimes also already from 330. (Whether or not the emperors reigning from Constantinople after 476 were the "legitimate successors" of the emperors which until 330 had always been reigning from Rome is not even a question for me personally, but that is irrelevant. This is a WP:NOTFORUM topic about which way too much text has already been wasted on this talk page. Let's not add more.)

    TL;DR there is no need for these concerns. The lead section of List of Byzantine emperors provides enough context for readers to understand that the earliest of these are synonymous with "Eastern Roman emperors", and eventually are more commonly known as "Byzantine emperors" in historiography. What our readers need most is comprehensible, navigable lists. That's why we need to split per WP:TOOBIG. Not because the "Byzantines" were or weren't "Romans", which isn't the question. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 19:58, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

    Before I jump into this, let me summarise my position on the issues:

    • WP:TOOBIG is not entirely relevant but is also addressed with mediating factors and secondary to other issues specifically neutrality; WP:RELART makes the discussion about List of Byzantine emperors not relevant as well as the pages about Roman Empire and Byzantine Empire; WP:SYNTH is the original reason for this discussion and has been addressed; and WP:NPOV is the biggest issue and my opinion is that it can only be addressed by staying out of the crossfires of the debates by making this one list. Which is also the current status quo.

    Let's break this down and see if we can uncover the consensus.

    • WP:TOOBIG relates to readable prose only and not to wiki markup size. It also calls out not relevant to "history lists". This is a list page not a regular article so as long as the the list is in summary form (which it is) and in sections (which it is), it's readable and maintainable. It's a valid concern to want to split the list for the size due to technical issues, but overall based on Wikipedia's policy, it's mostly not a reason to do it. If you disagree, please point me to the text in WP:TOOBIG that says otherwise. Wikipedia:Splitting considers size, content relevance, notability and potential neutrality issues. So let's focus on that before we discuss this again, as what I'm calling out is NPOV demands one list even if it was a size issue.
    • I am not proposing any changes to Byzantine Empire and Roman Empire. The page on Byzantine Emperors also justifies not being changed due to RELART. Let's please scope this out for now, if we really need to discuss let's discuss it separately.
    • WP:SYNTH: It seems you want me to re-explain what was previously discussed. This was the original proposal to split the list due to not having a source which supports the entire list. In my discussion, I identified that the proposer Borsoka was looking for a source that was (a) reliable (b) references the complete list of emperors (c) narrates the entire 1500 year history of the Roman Empire. I disagreed that it needed to narrate the entire history as that's not necessary. It invalidates most reputable sources (including the now disregarded Gibbon who set the standard) but agreed it needed to reference an entire list. I provided a recently published and reliable source that meets this criteria https://drive.google.com/file/d/1I6aQjcxem4viTf_t0j8OJxPQHy_2QjVr/view and this Talk page seems to have a list of older publications that do the same (see Talk which seems to have been discounted unnecessarily or overlooked.
    • WP:NPOV: This was also brought up in the original proposal due to the competing claims of succession, especially after the 8th and then again 13th centuries: see talk WP:SYNTH. I am also bringing up that my understanding of the modern consensus among reputable historians who are published is that there is no consensus on when the Roman Empire ended and when the Byzantine Empire started. One list addresses the need of covering the majority and significant minority views that WP:RS requires and is the most neutral way to cover this topic.

    Despite all this, let's remember this is not a page about those "Empires", but a page of dynastic succession of Roman Emperors which we both agree this list were all considered Roman Emperors regardless of what label is attached to the period they reigned in. There is no challenge to WP:COMMONNAME. If the article page was to grow, which it has no reason to, and is deemed to have a technical issue due to say, a mobile phone on the international space station not being able to edit it easily, then List of Roman Emperors (x century to y century) is the NPOV-compliant solution of splitting. But given Wikipedia:Splitting makes clear neutrality issues come first, and so far, no one has made a convincing case against my NPOV reasoning, this entire discussion stops there. But another way of saying it, lets save some trees because the moment we split, we will create in perpetuity the problem of WP:NOTFORUM you raised. As I've said before, the costs exceed the benefit. Biz (talk) 23:06, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

References

The Nicaean Empire did not exist...probably

Why in the notes does it say,

"the four emperors of Nicaea, who are often seen as the "legitimate" emperors during the interregnum of 1204–1261)"

The Roman Empire had, after the Fourth Crusade attack, lost some territory. That's it. As far as there being a Roman Empire, I can't imagine they called themselves Nicaean Empire ever, just Roman Empire/Romania from Augustus to Constantine XI. I'm not saying we should stop using Nicaean, we should think about whether we need to use the word, use it if we need to, but as far as legitimateness, those Roman Emperors were 100% legitimate (putting aside things like usurping/inheriting). Middle More Rider (talk) 23:49, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

The term "Nicene Empire" is not used to delegitimize the emperors ruling from Nicaea, it is used because the #1 key to legitimacy as a Byzantine emperor was the control of Constantinople, which the Nicene emperors did not have. They are retroactively seen as legitimate by most historians today because their successor state retook the city but the rulers in Thessalonica and Trebizond had claims just as valid 1204–1261. All the successor states considered themselves to be the legitimate government of the Roman Empire and would have referred to themselves as such.

You could consider the Latin emperors as having the superior claim 1204–1261 but they are universally rejected as such today because of Catholicism and because their "empire" was effectively a foreign military occupation. Rheskouporis (talk) 18:16, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it is not used to delegitimise them, but when the Latin occupation happened, those leaders of the unoccupied parts were all legitimate Roman Emperors, as you mentioned, so legitimate is a meaningless term, which if only refering to the Romans at Nicaea would be biased. Until it was sorted out after someone from the Empire took back Constantinople, that someone could have potentially been the Romans from Trebizond beating the Romans from Nicaea, and if anyone was most legitimate it could be claimed to be the Komnenos family at Trebizond, as they were descendants of Alexios I and the emperors down to Andronikos I in whose reign the throne was stolen from the family, but inheriting and usurping were both normal forms of gaining the throne, so not historically more legitimate. In the east before Constantinople the capital was Nicomedia, but no one was called a Nicomedian Emperor of the Nicomedian Empire, or legitimate Nicomedian Emperor. Nor in the west did anyone ruling from Ravenna have to be called legitimate or Ravennan Emperor.

Also, Constantinople itself, before it had built up any history, no one had define Constantine as legitimate, because he was not ruling from Rome, he is just considered as legitimate. That's a long answer for a small point! But, they just were, so no need to mention it.

Middle More Rider (talk) 16:14, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

I would personally not include the emperors in Nicaea at all, because they (and their rivals) don't really qualify for any of the criteria established to determine "legitimacy". As mentioned before, any of them could have potentially recovered Constantionple, and had it not been for the fact that the city was recovered, all of them would be seen as mere claimants. Tintero21 (talk) 21:35, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't know why you would say that, Theodore I of Nicaea, Alexios I of Trebizond and Michael I of Epirus were all related to ancester Alexios I of Constantinople, all in that royal family, and Theodore I was married into the Angelos family of Constantinople and was an actual definite heir to the throne.

Middle More Rider (talk) 22:51, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

Yes, they all had valid claims to the throne, but that’s not my point. They lacked control of Constantinople, which is really the only factor that distinguishes “usurpers” from “legitimate” emperors. Tintero21 (talk) 01:04, 21 August 2023 (UTC)

"Laskaris dynasty (1205–1261)" section

The small-print "note" for the section "Laskaris dynasty (1205–1261)" currently says that "modern historians recognize the line of emperors of the Laskaris dynasty, reigning in Nicaea, as the legitimate Roman emperors during this period". This is ostensibly sourced to Treadgold (1997: 734). However, the statement is not supported by the source at all. What Treadgold is saying is that the emperors after the reconquest of Constantinople used regnal numbers implying that they considered their Nicaean ancestors as part of the line of Roman emperors, and that modern historians have "followed this tidy practice" as far as the naming of emperors is concerned. He is not saying anything about what modern historians consider as constituting a "legitimate" claim to succession, and he himself quite explicitly says that this naming practice "tends to distort events through hindsight" and that the Laskaris rulers as Nicaea were factually *not* successors of the pre-1205 emperors.

In any case, I'd be rather surprised if any modern historian considered it their business to make pronouncements about "legitimacy" of succession regarding historic rulers like this. "Legitimacy" was hardly a meaningful category for the contemporary Byzantines themselves, much less so for modern historiography.

This is independent of the question of whether nor not we want to include these names in the list – I'd probably tend towards removing them, as per Tintero21's arguments above, but if we keep the section, the note clearly needs to be changed, or we need a better source for it. Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:53, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Page 911-923 of the new Kaldellis history. No mention of legitimacy, just a list that includes them as the senior emperors.

• Kaldellis, Anthony (2023-08-24). The New Roman Empire. Oxford University Press New York. ISBN 0-19-754932-2.

Biz (talk) 16:16, 11 December 2023 (UTC)