Bismark and Lenin

[Ninja_Sher]

You just won't give up will you?

Lothar was the grandson of Karl the Great. Karl's only surviving heir was Louis so he received the whole empire, but Lois had three sons who outlived him and the empire was split in a western, midle and an eastern part. The middle one had Aken and Rome within its borders and was therefore the continuation of the empire, but was soon usurped by the eastern kingdom. This would become the HRE, and the western realm would become France.

But enough useless facts. Nothing you said changes the fact that the HRE has been dissolved by its last formal leader, and that the Austro-Hungarian empire is a different entity alltoghether.

True, Austro-Hungarian Empire existed even when Holy Roman Empire was on. Though I wonder the eastern part's capital was Constantinople right?

[Caid Ivik]

This is exactly the confusing moment I tried to avoid, but dutch hardheadness prevented me... Holy Empire had five main stages: 1.Karl's empire (800-814; capital Aachen), 2.Ottonic dynasty (962-1014; Bamberg), 3.Hohenstauff dynasty (1036-1268; without fixed capital), 4.kurfurst elections (until 1437; emperors ruled from personal centers, ie Luxembourgs from Prague), 5.Habsburg dynasty (1508-1812/1918; ruled from Wien). All where chronologically and technically separate states with imperial title as a fixing tradition. First fell with its founder, fourth under chaos caused by internal chaos, when virtually no successive country remained loyal to the next formal emperor. Ottons' and Hohenstauffs' extinction was followed by destructive civil war.

Very important point was then the 30-years war, where Habsburgs failed to reconquer german states for the empire, so de facto since 1648 was HRE identical with Austrohungary. Eastern Empire had nothing with it, as it accepted only Karl as "western roman emperor".

[Anathema]

Ninja Sher, I think you're confused.

To get the whole picture we first have to go back to 330AD. It's obvious that Rome was the capitol of the Roman empire, but in 330 a second capitol was built in what is now Turkey. That city is called Constantinople.

Gradually the two cities started drifting apart and Rome ruled the west, Constantinople the east, each with its own emperor. It's important to note that formally the empire was still whole. Formally the two emperors ruled the entire empire together.

Latin was the language of government and of science. However in the east, nearly everyone spoke Greek in daily life. The east had an advantage of linguistic unity though. The west was populated by many barbarian tribes who spoke their own different languages. This was one of the reasons Rome declined so rapidly

Eventually Rome fell, in 476. The last western emperor Romulus Augustus was killed by a barbarian chieftain named Odaecar.

What remained was the eastern half of the empire, or the Eastern Roman empire. More commonly called the Byzantine empire from this moment forward.

With the Holy Roman emperors, well that's a bit complicated.

Karl the Great was a barbarian (Frankish) king that had conquered what is now France and most of Germany, as well as Italian territories. The Pope crowned Karl the Great as simply emperor (imperator et augustus in latin tongue)

The emperor in Constantinople never recognised Karl or any of his successors as co-emperor. The Byzantine emperors considered themselves to be the only true "Roman" emperors, and in my opinion rightly so. Barbarossa invented the name Holy Roman Empire, but there wasn't really anything Roman about it.

EDIT

The full name by the way is "Holy Roman Empire of the German nation". However Germany didn't become a real country until the Franco-Prussian war in the 19th century.

[Edric O]

I'd like to make an addition to what Anathema said.

The "Holy Roman Empire" was, from beginning to end, a mostly German empire. Its founder, Karl the Great (Charlemagne) was Frankish, and the Franks were a Germanic tribe. So, you might ask, why was it called "Holy Roman" if it was in fact German? That's simple: The Roman Empire was held in very high regard during the dark ages. When the Roman Empire fell, Europe fell into chaos and civilization collapsed. So, naturally, people dreamed of going back to the Roman golden age. But, more importantly, the Roman Emperor was seen as the rightful ruler of the entire universe. So anyone taking for himself the title of "Roman Emperor" was in fact saying "I want to rule the world". That's a powerful statement to make.

[Caid Ivik]

Frankish Empire was yet a partly romanized state. Its largest part remained as France with a roman language. German HRE was the empire founded by Ottons.

[Mahdi]

An arguement could be made that many of today's states are still partly romanized.

[Ninja_Sher]

Charlemagne was though considered to be Roman Emperor by many states.

So Turkey was the eastern empire, that suggests why they were Deutsch allies in the world wars, and also they were called ottoman. I think they are kind of related ...

[Mahdi]

The Eastern Empire and the Ottoman Empire were two seperate empires.  The Ottomans defeated the Byzantine Empire, which is why Constantinople is now Istanbul.