What were all roman empires called?

Answer 1

There was only one Roman Empire. The terms Western Roman Empire, Eastern Roman Empire and Byzantine Empire have been coined by historians. The Romans did not use them.

The emperor Diocletian initially created two administrative divisions (east and west) which were then subdivided, creating the praetorian prefectures of Galliae, Italia et Africa, Illyricum and Oriens. Initially he created a co-emperorship with fellow general Maximian who took charge of the west, while he took charge of the east. Then he created the tetrarchy (rule by four). Diocletian and Maximian became senior emperors (Augusti) and two junior emperors (Caesar) who were subordinates of the Augusti were appointed. Constantius took charge of Galliae (in the west) and Galerius took charge of Illyricum (in the east), while Maximian took charge of Italia et Africa (in the west) and Diocletian took charge of Oriens (in the east). Four imperial capitals were also created. Diocletian stressed that these were administrative units and that the empire was indivisible.

The tetrarchy then fell apart. After this there was an alternation of periods of rule by sole emperors and period of co-emperorship by two emperors, one in the east and one in the west. Only two imperial capitals remained: Constantinople in the east and Milan in the west.

Byzantine Empire is a term which has been coined by historians to indicate the eastern part of the Roman Empire after the fall of the western part. The Romans did not use this term, they called it Roman Empire or Romania (this referred to this empire and not the country which was later called Romania).

The term Byzantine is derived from Byzantium, the Greek city which was redeveloped, turned into the imperial capital of the eastern part of the Roman Empire and renamed Constantinople by the emperor Constantine the Great in 330. It is used to indicate the fact that not long after the fall of the west, this empire became centred on Greece and Greek in character after it lost most of its non-Greek territories. Greek replaced Latin as the official language of this empire in 620, some 150 years after the fall of the west.