Augustus Caesar, founder of the Roman Empire, in "August" by Neil Gaiman;
Manuel Argos, founder of the Terran Empire, in "The Star Plunderer" by Poul Anderson.
The Terran Empire did not last because it was a stage in the decline of a civilization as analysed by John K. Hord and Chunderban Desai.
The Roman Empire did not last because Terminus, god of boundaries, asked Morpheus to visit Augustus in a dream.
Speculative fiction as against fantasy but both make a serious point. Expressed mythologically, even Jupiter must bow to Terminus.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
I agree some historians, like John Hord, can make shrewd and interesting speculations on how and why civilizations rise and fall. But Stirling's comments on how CONTINGENT, unpredictable, human affairs are is worth taking to heart. It was not inevitable that the civil wars of the dying Roman Republic would have ended with the triumph of Octavian, a man of such rare and unusual abilities that as Augustus he remolded the Roman state into a form, the Empire, that it lasted for centuries.
A similar reasoning seems applicable to the career of Manuel Argos. With abilities equal to those of Augustus, I can see the Founder of the Terran Empire not just blindly copying what the Roman had done, but creatively reshaping the forms offered by Rome to fit the needs of Technic civilization. And striving to learn from and avoid the mistakes of Augustus. Manuel Argos' success can be seen by noting how long the Empire lasted before the first real signs of breakdown appeared, after the death of Joip.
Ad astra! Sean
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