Roman Empire vs Han Empire

[Aepsilons]

If you are interested in Chinese armors, check out this article. Paper is definitely not a person's first though when talking about armor, but it is very effective against arrows and slashing weapons. The Chinese used it as far back as the Tang Dynasty.

http://mandarinmansion.com/articles/Chinese Paper Armour.pdf

This article is worth a viewing as well.

Thanks for the pdf link, @SvenSvensonov ! Very ingenious these Chinese are !

 

[cnleio]

Song dynasty, still equip steel armor named Mountain Grain Armor /山纹铠

Ancient Mountain Grain Armor:

Song's Mountain Grain Armor (not 100% real)

Real Mountain Grain Armor should look like

Mountain Grain Armor

 

[MarkusS]

Han = China
Romans = America
Huns = Russia

America will soon collapse like the roman empire did china is proof that han civilization was always Superior to romans as china still exists. Eurasian power will always destroy western civilization due to westerners being douchebaggery, history is repeating. Opinions?

@MarkusS @Nihonjin1051 @Peter C @SvenSvensonov @TaiShang @ChineseTiger1986

lol the roman empire did not collapse, it evolved, transformed in the roman church and comquered the world, including china. So i dont see your issues.

 

[TheTruth]

lol the roman empire did not collapse, it evolved, transformed in the roman church and comquered the world, including china. So i dont see your issues.

Oh yeah because of all those military bases in China right now, right?

China destroyed Euros by simply repelling nomads. Then Euro culture was completely leveled and replaced by China's gunpowder/paper+printing/compass+stern-mounted rudder technological society. You'd be running around in a forest in a grass skirt somewhere if it weren't for China.

 

[Grand Historian]

Yay, equations from an anonymous guy from a forum i never heard of. Sounds legit.

In any case, i did not fail to realize anything, i was even generous (as i also believe 5.000t is too low), by adding ten fold the output to that "feel of general scale", which curiously brings me very close to this "source" you got.

Still 50.000 is less than 80. 000. And we're talking just iron here.

So, they say, but no source for eastern Han, no nothing. Just "i saw". That doesn't do it, sorry....

Somehow a guesstimate for Roman Britain is extended to represent the entire Roman Empire.

Not to mention that the Roman Empire was contemporary of the Eastern Han while the statistics are for Western Han.

The equations were flawed to begin with Needham assumed that each iron office only had one furnance and that the iron sites were limited to 49.

A cursory glance at primary sources would show you that the estimate and variables are ridiculous.

From 漢書,王貢兩龔鮑傳

今漢家鑄錢及諸鐵官，皆置吏卒徒，攻山取銅鐵，一歲功十萬人已上。
The present day(anywhere from 48-44 BC as Gong Yu died in 44 BC) mints and iron ministers(overseers that manage various jade/gold/silver/copper/iron quarries),send out soldiers to mine copper and iron,more than 100,000 men are employed in a iron office(showing that iron offices contain multiple furnaces) throughout a year.

If you are incapable of distinguishing Western Han from Eastern Han or that the population doubling wouldn't have any impact on iron production only shows your incompetence.

Song dynasty, still equip steel armor named Mountain Grain Armor /山纹铠

Mountain pattern armor was first used during the Tang while it brigandine armor replaced it during the late Ming.

 

[powastick]

Song dynasty, still equip steel armor named Mountain Grain Armor /山纹铠

Ancient Mountain Grain Armor:
View attachment 160147
View attachment 160149

Song's Mountain Grain Armor (not 100% real)
View attachment 160150

Real Mountain Grain Armor should look like
View attachment 160151
View attachment 160154
View attachment 160152
View attachment 160153


Mountain Grain Armor
View attachment 160158
View attachment 160156

I didn't know the Chinese had these armor. . I wasn't aware of it even it was depicted in shows.

 

[Aegis DDG]

The following was my post 1 year ago on the similar topic Alexander VS Qin, starting by analysing the Qin's terracotta army:



1. stone armor: they wouldn't produce a brand new design just for the tomb, would they? Those stone armor however were based on the real armor, isn't a simple logic ? Futher, the emphasis here are

-A. the flexible design that fits right into modern human body studies, akin to modern age armory design.

-B. the sheer amount of time consumed to make such armors today : 344-444 days per armor. And those holes (square and round shaped) of 800 pieces were connected together by hair-thin metal strings!! Whatever Qin was doing, its military mass production facility must be humongous to produce just that 8,000 stone armors for the already-discovered part of the tomb alone (surely there could be more, or much more such armors in the undisvoered parts of the tomb, and those were not the only armors that Qin produced at a time which included the real armors for the entire army, logically were only a tiny fraction of them). They should be identical to the real metal armor, because like everything else Qin emperor wanted a REAL DEAL for everything in his tomb to protect him in afterlife, not some fancy models. So, imagine the true size and high tech - streamlined process of the production, quality control and size of the real military complex and underlying skills and economy size they reflect - that's the point.


2. On those >90cm bronde swords: the keys are

-A. chromium plated high tech deployed was 2,000 friggin years ahead of anything Alexander could come up with. That was only the known part of Qin's technologies. Are you certain that was the only part? It was so advanced of its time that makes you wonder what's more in the undiscovered tomb that we don't know yet.

-B. Alexander used bronze weaponaries? short bronze swords <60cm. Which side do you think would be slaughtered if an equal number of infantries from Qin and Alexander confronting each other, one using 90cm swords while the other 60cm?


3. those 2 life-size bronze chariots unearthed: assembled together by 8,000 standard pieces! including the tiny bronze metal strings placed under horses' mouthes - as thin as human hair. What kind of friggin technologies to produce those 2,200 years ago? Go to a 21th century mass production weapon factory, say, a M-16 rifle factory, do they have 8,000 pieces for one M-16? 800? or 80 pieces? What do 8,000 standard sub-pieces mean to you? Go to a Leopard MBT facotry in Germany today, do they have 8,000 standard sub-pieces for 1 tank? Or go to a Toyota factory and ask them the same question. Again, just pause a moment here to imagine the sheer sophitication in industrial design, production processing ( including Just-In-Time style stock delivery known from Toyota in modern time), degrees of modernity implied in these factories just for production and assembling of these 8, 000 standard pieces, and the sheer standard of quality control... underlined by those 2 "simple" bronze chariots. Yes, they were just command&control chariots, not combat ones, but technologies they represent would make the combat ones worse, the same or even better? Did Alexander have anything remotely similar?


4. on the 40,000 (from only already discovered part of the tomb )parabolic arrow heads that were indeed modern bullet-alike, imagine the sheer accuracy of these suckers! the sheer deadly piecing strengh after combining them with crossbows (almost a semi-automatic machine gun), multiply that with Qin's huge @rse numbers. How could it be possible for Alexander to deal with Qin's quality and quantity? Furthermore, what most impressed me is the margin of error of mass production of these arrow heads' parablic shapes, which is said to be measured in terms of about 1 mm - almost equivalent of making them again using modern high precision German machinaries. In other words: 40,000 friggin "IDENTICAL bullets"! Picture that.


Above are only a small part of known FACTS (proven by the ongoing new discoveries of relics of the tomb), not hearsays, of Qin's awesome high tech of designs, numerous advanced industrial knowhow centries ahead of its time, and nevertheless Qin's HUGE arse military complex production facilities a bit akin to today's USA+China putting together in relative terms. What Alexander had at a time to match these in any shape and colour?

it's a bit like Somalia Vs USA? an overstatment? perhaps not.

The similar could be said on Roman VS Han. The Romans were much weaker on virtually anything you care to measure vís-a-vís the Han. The Romans were lucky that they didn't border on Han Empire really.

That advancement was due to the Warring States periods, when Millions where mobilized for warfare.

 

[Audio]

Somehow a guesstimate for Roman Britain is extended to represent the entire Roman Empire.

But this is what you did. In this exact thread, quoted some figures (we'll get to this figure in a moment, how you got it and how reliable it is) from some forum for a Chinese region, then used that figure to extrapolate the total Chinese output.

The equations were flawed to begin with Needham assumed that each iron office only had one furnance and that the iron sites were limited to 49.

No need to talk about Needham anymore or flawed equations, as you are no stranger to them, i gave my position on this earlier, 5000t is too low, rather concentrate on definitively proving your points on how iron production was larger.

A cursory glance at primary sources would show you that the estimate and variables are ridiculous.

From 漢書,王貢兩龔鮑傳

今漢家鑄錢及諸鐵官，皆置吏卒徒，攻山取銅鐵，一歲功十萬人已上。
The present day(anywhere from 48-44 BC as Gong Yu died in 44 BC) mints and iron ministers(overseers that manage various jade/gold/silver/copper/iron quarries),send out soldiers to mine copper and iron,more than 100,000 men are employed in a iron office(showing that iron offices contain multiple furnaces) throughout a year.

If you are incapable of distinguishing Western Han from Eastern Han or that the population doubling wouldn't have any impact on iron production only shows your incompetence.

What primary sources are you offering? All i see as your source are a bunch of squares, not even a link.

You need to stop with condecension ASAP. I am very friendly for now as i am still giving you the benefit of the doubt that you're not a 50 center (although im leaning that you are and Grand Historian is just a handle meant to intimidate, as we will see below) who gets paid to glorify the middle kingdom. This can change very soon, and i can be very nasty. Accompanied with links which you seem to be missing. A sneak preview is below.

Mate, let's not forget, you picked the equations from which you deduced output tonnage from a "rough look at Wagner's numbers". He even admits he hasn't really counted all that well and adds "I made no pretense that this was anything more than just an estimate." It hasn't escaped my attention that there was no such disclaimer when you were refering the same numbers.

ancient industry - Page 4 - Historum - History Forums post #36, dated 2012, a full year from the recycled wisdom you decided to distribute from the Chinese history forum.

Smoke and mirrors so far mate, eerily reminiscent of 50 centers. Do better, use less words like incompetent, fail to realize. And then to be caught using some rough cut numbers presenting it as gospel, tsk tsk, extrapolating them to cover the whole of China while screaming about extrapolations of Roman Britain output covering whole empire, tsk, tsk, tsk being named Grand Historian in light of all that fixing of data presented tsk tsk tsk.....i'd say you're the only one here who fails to realize something.

Next up, dismantling the myth of 100.000 workers per furnace/office. Although, if you take a read on the forum i quoted, in that thread you will find it's already done, by the same sinophile that came up with those equations.
I'll enlighten you in my next post about this. If needed, we'll see if you come to your senses in your next reply. As a hint, i will know about the numbers of employed (not really, slaves and convicts) through records of rebellions at various iron offices.

 

[MarkusS]

Oh yeah because of all those military bases in China right now, right?

China destroyed Euros by simply repelling nomads. Then Euro culture was completely leveled and replaced by China's gunpowder/paper+printing/compass+stern-mounted rudder technological society. You'd be running around in a forest in a grass skirt somewhere if it weren't for China.

China got westernized. Communism itself is a german invention (Karl Marx). China bases its current society completly on western values, business methods and technology. China exists as our cheap market place. Beside that...China never achieved the technological level of rome...and also not the military one. It is also strange that rome did influence China...But china had zero impact on rome.

compass and stern mounted rudder exist in europe since 4000 years. Way before china even existed. Beside that Europa had understanding about the celestial movements, orbits and so on. China never had an Aristoteles. There is a reason why chinese history is completly ignored in the world.

 

[Audio]

overstatment? perhaps not.

The similar could be said on Roman VS Han. The Romans were much weaker on virtually anything you care to measure vís-a-vís the Han. The Romans were lucky that they didn't border on Han Empire really.

Quoted for the sheer stupidity and an incredible lack of any sort of knowledge. On China, Rome, modern manufacture processes (yes, Toyota factory has 8.000 standard parts)

Can you show us some built monument/building from the Han dynasty? No? How come?

If a Roman army ever came close to a bamboo and brick Han town, what do you think they would do?

 

[Aepsilons]

China got westernized. Communism itself is a german invention (Karl Marx). China bases its current society completly on western values, business methods and technology. China exists as our cheap market place. Beside that...China never achieved the technological level of rome...and also not the military one. It is also strange that rome did influence China...But china had zero impact on rome.

compass and stern mounted rudder exist in europe since 4000 years. Way before china even existed. Beside that Europa had understanding about the celestial movements, orbits and so on. China never had an Aristoteles. There is a reason why chinese history is completly ignored in the world.

Misericordia! Misericordia!

Quoted for the sheer stupidity and an incredible lack of any sort of knowledge. On China, Rome, modern manufacture processes (yes, Toyota factory has 8.000 standard parts)

Can you show us some built monument/building from the Han dynasty? No? How come?

The Romans did have impressive engineering apparatus , many of their technological feats do remain to this day throughout the Roman / Western World.

Rome's legacy is , to refer to @MarkusS ' comment , the spread of Christianity. When Constantine the Great declared Christianity of the Roman Empire, it not only legitimized it, but it catalyze do the spread of Christian Theology throuhout Europe. From Europe it would spread into the New World, and the colonial possessions of European Empires.

 

[Audio]

The Romans did have impressive engineering apparatus , many of their technological feats do remain to this day throughout the Roman / Western World.

I have great respect for ancient Chinese, when i was a kid i had a couple of books from Asia, folk tales, a Chinese, Japanese and a Korean one, full of lovely stories with life lessons.

However, the modern Chinese, at least the ones here with an exception here and there...LOL! I understand they need to eat and that's why they post such easily debunked stories, but still.....a little less history revision would be nice.
The problem here is they actually think (and have been instructed to disseminate this opinion) they were once this awesome civilization above all rest and nothing like it ever existed before and that now they are returning to that status. I bet they also have wet dreams how they will replace the vassal attitude of neighbouring states vis a vis ancient China with a vassal attitude of much of the countries in the world.

 

[MarkusS]

I have great respect for ancient Chinese, when i was a kid i had a couple of books from Asia, folk tales, a Chinese, Japanese and a Korean one, full of lovely stories with life lessons.

However, the modern Chinese, at least the ones here with an exception here and there...LOL! I understand they need to eat and that's why they post such easily debunked stories, but still.....a little less history revision would be nice.
The problem here is they actually think (and have been instructed to disseminate this opinion) they were once this awesome civilization above all rest and nothing like it ever existed before and that now they are returning to that status. I bet they also have wet dreams how they will replace the vassal attitude of neighbouring states vis a vis ancient China with a vassal attitude of much of the countries in the world.

The basic fact is that when China was visited from a delegation send from roman emperor marcus aurelius, that the chinese were in absolute awe. They even created a place for rome in their philosophy. They believed that rome is the western counterweight of their own empire. Like a Ying and Yang. Rome is the center of western culture and basicly all western nations. We have roman law, our architecture is based on it as well, so is our entire sport culture, military and way of thinking. The western soul was born in greece and its body build in rome. I can evryone give the strong advice to visit rome once in his life. I simply love our capital. It is also interesting to see much older artifacts in italian culture. When you visit tuscany you can see so much cultural things that go back to etruskian times. It is hard to tell a non italian. But you can feel the influence from it evrywhere. The influence of the roman empire is heavy evrywhere. But there you can see etruskian influence till today.

 

[TheTruth]

@MarkusS nope. Get over yourself. Rome influenced China 0%, Chinese exports imploded Rome's economy and China swept the Huns away only for them to crush Rome like a maggot. If Romans spent more money on defenses and not orgies and useless monuments there still might be a Roman Empire today. Without Ancient Chinese technology, there would be no "Western" technology. There would be no West. No Western history. You'd be plowing a field somewhere by hand, living in rags, subsisting on miserable rations, relieving yourselves in the bushes like an animal while your master beat you and raped your sister - locked in this sad, primitive state for eternity.

The connection between Ancient Rome and the Modern West is a myth invented my insecure Europeans who knew they have no real history aside from copying and stealing from superior cultures such as Arabia, Egypt, India, China, etc. China and Chinese run almost autonomously with only Confucian teachings - domestically, overseas, under authoritarianism or anarchy. Communism was just a brief episode that evolved once again into a more or less typical Chinese state.

 

[Aepsilons]

Armor of the Roman Legionnaire: