为什么中国能延续2000年，但罗马帝国却不能？ [美国媒体]

Why did China survive for over 2000 years while the Roman empire did not?
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为什么中国能延续2000年，但罗马帝国却不能？


Kaiser Kuo, 从1996年到2016年，在北京生活了20年
The question is not technically accurate. The idea of China may have survived for over 2000 years—arguably, even longer—but the Chinese empire welded together in 221 BC by the First Emperor of Qin didn't by any means survive intact through this period.

从学术上说这个提问并不准确。中国这一概念可能已经存在了超过2000年，可能甚至更久，但是中华帝国在公元前221年由秦始皇开创，并没有在2000年里完整的延续下来。

From 220 AD, when the Han Dynasty formally collapsed, China was divided into three separate kingdoms, and though they were briefly unified in the late 3rd century, it wasn't long before incursions from the Xiongnu, the Xianbei, and other nomadic- and semi-nomadic people carved out numerous kingdoms in North China while the South saw a rapid series of messy dynastic changes lasting until the late 6th century. These nomadic incursions that sparked this long Era of Division (known in China as the "Six Dynasties and 16 Kingdoms" or the "Southern and Northern Dynasties") corresponds in many ways with the collapse of the Western Roman Empire under the pressure of the Vandals, the Alans, the Visigoths, and the Huns—the "crisis of classical civilization."

公元220年，当汉朝正式崩溃时，中国被分为三个独立的王国，虽然他们在第三世纪晚期被暂时地统一了，但不久之后，遭受了匈奴、鲜卑以及其他游牧民族和半游牧民族的入侵，这些民族在华北地区建立了许多王国，而中国南方则出现了一系列混乱的王朝变迁，这一情况持续到了六世纪晚期。这些游牧民族的入侵引发了这个时代的长期分裂（在中国被称为“六朝和五胡十六国”或者“南北朝”）。在很多方面就和西罗马帝国在汪达尔人，阿兰人，西哥特人，以及“古典文明的危机”——匈人这些压力下崩溃一样。

The major difference was that China was reunited in the late 6th century by the Sui Dynasty, which briefly ruled a unified China from 589 to 618 AD, followed by the Tang Dynasty, which solidified rule and oversaw a period of prosperity until the mid-8th century. A bitter civil war tore the country apart again at that time, but Tang recovered, limping along until 907.

主要的区别在于，在六世纪后期由隋朝统一了中国，隋朝从公元589年到公元618年暂时性的统一了中国，随后是唐朝，巩固了统治，并在公元8世纪中叶达到了繁荣时期。一场痛苦的内战使这个国家再次四分五裂，但是唐朝又恢复过来了，一瘸一跛地存活到了907年。

There followed yet another period of disunity, this one only spanning two generations; the "Five Dynasties and 10 Kingdoms" lasted until reunification once again under the Song dynasty in 960. Even after that, China rarely maintained real political integrity: The Khitan (Qidan) people from north of the Great Wall managed to carve out a substantial part of North China, including the city that is now Beijing, and held it through most of the 11th century and into the early 12th. They were superseded by the Jurchen (also Nuzhen) people from Manchuria, who conquered North China as far south as the Yangzi River. Throughout the 13th century, the Mongols made incursions into China, eventually conquering the entirety of the country by 1274 and incorporating it into their empire.

接着又出现了另一段不团结的时期，这一时期仅仅经历了两代人就结束了。“五代十国”一直延续到960年的宋朝统一。即使在那之后，中国也很少保持真正的政治大一统：长城以北的契丹人成功地统治了华北的大部分地区，包括现在的北京，并在11世纪的大部分时间里维持着统治，一直到12世纪早期。契丹人被来自东北地区的女真人所取代，他们征服了华北，统治地区远至长江流域。在整个13世纪，蒙古人入侵了中国，最终在1274年征服了整个国家，并将中国并入了他们的帝国。

The restoration of ethnic Chinese rule under Ming from 1368 to 1644 was followed by China's conquest by the Manchu Qing dynasty, but even then, its rule of China wasn't complete throughout its three centuries in power: we see yet another period of political division during the mid-19th century, when the quasi-Christian Taiping Rebels took control of much of South China between 1851 and 1863. Finally, shortly following the end of the Qing and the founding of the Republic, there was another era of division from 1916-1928 under the "Warlord Period," though even after 1928, when the Kuomintang (Nationalist) Party took control of the Lower Yangzi and ruled from Nanjing, it would be a great exaggeration to claim that China was in fact unified. Powerful warlords still controlled the north (Yan Xishan in Shanxi, Feng Yuxiang in Henan and Shaanxi, Zhang Xueliang in the Northeast) and control of the western provinces was in name only.

从1368年到1644年，在明朝之下中国人恢复了统治，随后是满清王朝对中国的征服，但即便如此，满族对中国的完全统治在三个世纪里都没有完成：我们看到了19世纪中期的另一段政治分裂时期，在1851年到1863年间，类似基督教的太平天国起义控制了中国南部的大部分地区。最后，清朝结束和民国建立后不久后，在“军阀时期”的统治下又出现了另一个分裂时期，虽然在1928年，国民党控制了长江下游，并占据了南京，宣称中国统一了，但这是一种夸张的说法。强大的军阀仍然控制着北方（山西的阎锡山，冯玉祥在河南和陕西，张学良在东北)，而对西部省份的控制只是名义上的。

Through this all, though, it could be argued that an "idea" of China survived. Chinese historiography, even at a popular level, understood that there was a cyclical process at work: "The empire long united must divide; long divided, must unite" was the saying (合久必分，分久必合). Obviously, the idea of Rome long outlived the collapse of the (Western) Roman empire, too: Germanic kings styled themselves Holy Roman Emperors, after all. Byzantium kept the idea of a united Rome alive too before it fell before the onslaught of first Crusaders (in the early 13th century) and finally, Ottoman Turks in the mid-15th. Never, though, in that whole time were either the Greek-speaking East or the Latin West able to effectively reunite politically, and that's ultimately why the idea of a Roman Empire didn't enjoy the longevity—interrupted many times though it may have been—that China did.

然而，虽然经历了这么多，但仍然可以认为“中国”这一“观念”一直幸存下来。中国的史学，就连一般民众也明白在中国的历史是循环的过程：合久必分，分久必合。显然，罗马这一观念在（西）罗马帝国灭亡后也存活了很久：毕竟，日耳曼的国王们还是把自己塑造成神圣罗马帝国的皇帝。拜占庭在第一次十字军（13世纪早期）的猛烈进攻之前还保留了一个统一的罗马帝国的观念，最后是15世纪中期的奥斯曼土耳其人。然而，在这一时段里，无论是在讲希腊语的东部还是讲拉丁语的西部，都成功地在政治上重新团结，这就是为什么罗马帝国无法一直维持下去的原因，中国的延续尽管可能有很多次被打断，但中国确实延续到了现在。

An Addendum: As Jireh Tan suggested in his comment, it might be useful to address the question of China's (supposed) linguistic unity as a factor in either its cohesion or its fissiparous nature. The languages spoken in different regions of China are not mere dialects: They don't pass the test of mutual intelligibility to this day, and must be considered separate languages. A guanyu or "official speech" of the court—what we call Mandarin is the latest example—has existed through much of Imperial (and Republican, and Communist) history, but the extent to which it was known or practiced outside of the court and the bureaucracy in the provinces and prefects was always very limited.

补充：就如Jireh Tan认为的，将中国（假定）的语言统一性作为其内聚性或分裂性的一个因素，或许有助于解决这个问题。在中国不同地区使用的语言不仅仅是方言：直到今天，这些语言仍无法做到相互沟通交流，被视为独立的语言。我们称之为“官语”或“官话”的语言是朝廷的语言，它在很大程度上存在于帝制（以及民国和共产主义）中国的历史中，但是，它在朝廷外被人所知或使用，而各省的官僚机构和官员则使用非常有限。

To this day there are a huge number of variants of Chinese, each with many sub-variants that often are not mutually intelligible either; "Mandarin" is spoken in the North China Plain and in the three Northeastern provinces, and in the southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan) where Han settlement was relatively late; the Wu "dialect" is spoken in the lower Yangi; the Gan dialect (assume the word dialect to be in quotes!) mainly spoken in Jiangxi; the Min dialect in Fujian province (though with very strong subregional dialects-cum-languages); and Yue in Guangdong and surrounding areas. Many of these are rooted in the far, far distant past and suggest the limited nature of the empire's cultural cohesiveness in even the times of greatest political unity. In times of fracture, the names given to geographically circumscribed dynasties or kingdoms by their various strongmen founders would often take the name of ancient feudal states or kingdoms from the Warring States period that flourished in a given geography in the distant past—arguably an indication that the separate identities of those states had survived in some cultural memory.

到今天，中文有大量的变种方言，每一种都有很多的子变体，这些变体往往也无法做到相互沟通；“普通话”流行于华北平原和东北三省及西南（四川、云南）地区，那里的汉族定居下来的时间相对较晚；吴语流行于长江下游；赣语主要流行于江西地区；闽语是福建省的方言（分区明显的方言）；广东及周边地区讲粤语。这些方言都植根于遥远的过去，表明了帝国文化凝聚力的局限性，即使是在最伟大的政治大一统的时代也是如此。在分裂时期，在地理上受限制的朝代或王国的不同铁腕人物会将国名取为战国时期的古代封建国家或王国的名字，这些战国时期的国家在古代繁荣昌盛过。可以说，这些国家的独立身份在某种文化记忆中保留了下来。

That said, the imposition of a standard writing system in the 3rd century BC by the founding emperor of Qin (秦始皇) went far toward knitting together the country into a single polity. As serving in the civil service—office holding was the sine qua non for membership in the elite, and was the only real ladder for success in imperial China—required passing a grueling series of written exams focused on one's knowledge of the Confucian canon, there was strong incentive to learn the orthodox writing system. This official written language proved a powerful force in the sinicization of conquest dynasties, none of whom ever successfully supplanted written Chinese as the dominant form of written communications.

即便如此，公元前3世纪，秦始皇强行推广书写体系大大有利于国家的单一政体化。在行政机构中当官，在朝廷中任职是获得精英身份的必要条件，是中华帝国时期唯一仕途攀升的途径，这要求通过一系列严格的书面考试，主要集中在对儒家经典的认识上，因此人们有了很强的动机去学习正统的书写体系。这种官方的书面语言被证明是各个王朝中国化的强大力量，这些王朝中没有出现能成功取代汉字成为书面交流主要形式的书写体系。

————

Panagiotis Limnios
During the First Balkan War in 1912 the Greek navy captured the island of Lemnos from the Ottoman Empire and promptly sent soldiers to every village and stationed them in the public squares. Children from all over the island ran to see what these so called Greeks looked like.

在1912年的第一次巴尔干战争中，希腊海军从奥斯曼帝国手中夺取了利姆诺斯岛并迅速派遣士兵到每个村庄，并让他们驻扎在公共广场。全岛的孩子们都跑去看这些所谓的希腊人长什么样。

"What are you looking at?" one of soldiers asked. "At you Greeks" one of the children replied. "Are you not Greek yourselves?" said the soldier. "No, we are Romans" replied the child.

“你们在看什么？”一名士兵问道，“看你们希腊人啊”其中一个小孩子回应。“你们不是希腊人吗？”士兵疑问。“不是，我们是罗马人”，小孩答道。

The above story was told by Peter Charanis, a well known historian, himself born in Lemnos in 1908. At that time, more than half of all Greeks still identified themselves as Romans and lived outside the official Hellenic Republic, in the Aegean, Thrace, but mostly in Asia Minor.

上面的故事是由着名的历史学家Peter Charanis讲述的，他在1908年出生在莱姆诺斯岛。当时有超过一半的希腊人仍然认为自己是罗马人，他们生活在希腊共和国之外的爱琴海和色雷斯，但主要是在小亚细亚。

In the following decade, as the Hellenic Republic expanded and encompassed those areas as well (and eventually lost them in 1923), every child was taught to think of itself as Greek, not Roman. Thus ended the world's most ancient national identity, over 2700 years old since the founding of Rome.

在接下来的十年里，随着希腊共和国的扩张和吞并这些地区（最终在1923年失去了这些地区），每个孩子都被教导要把自己看作是希腊人，而不是罗马人。由此结束了世界上最古老的民族身份认同，自罗马建立以来，已经有2700多年的历史了。

However, if the original author is inquiring as to why there is a Chinese nation-state in existence today but no Roman nation-state, then the answer interestingly enough may be found in medi and modern Greek history.

然而，如果提问者想知道为什么今天有一个中国人的单一民族国家存在，却不存在一个罗马民族国家，那么可以在中世纪和现代希腊历史中找到有趣的答案。

The gradual collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire forced the remaining East to redefine itself by a predominantly Greek population. Indeed, Roman citizens in the Middle Ages would commonly refer to themselves as Greeks as well as Romans and call their land Greece and Rome (Romania) alike.

罗马帝国西部分的崩溃迫使残存的东部重新定义自己，因为主要的居民是希腊人。
事实上，中世纪的罗马公民通常把自己称为希腊人，也称自己为罗马人，称他们的土地为希腊和罗马（罗马尼亚）。

This relatively homogeneous state with a sense of common identity among the people, stood in stark contrast to the earlier massive multi-ethnic Empire.

这个相对同质的国家，其人民有一种共同的身份认同，与早期很多多民族帝国形成了鲜明的对比。

This is the defining characteristic of nationalism, which was growing all over Europe during the middle ages and eventually culminated with the French Revolution in 1789 and the world's first nation-state, France. In Greece proper and Asia Minor however, the totalitarian rule of the Ottoman conquerors hindered Roman nationalism from maturing and prevented it materializing in a Roman nation-state.

这是民族主义的典型特征，中世纪期间这种民族主义在整个欧洲茁壮成长，最终在1789年的法国大革命及世界第一个民族国家——法兰西的建立中达到了顶点。然而，在希腊和小亚细亚，奥斯曼帝国的极权统治阻碍了罗马民族主义的成熟，使其无法建立一个罗马人的民族国家。

When the Ottoman Empire began dissolving in the early 19th century, the Roman people came together and finally did form their nation-state, which they named Greece instead Romania which was the de facto name the people used. 

当奥斯曼帝国在19世纪初开始解体时，罗马人聚在一起，最终形成了他们的民族国家，他们将其命名为希腊而不是罗马尼亚，而罗马尼亚则是当时人们使用的实际名称。

This break in tradition is attributed to the Renaissance on the one hand, which gave birth to admiration of the Classic era, and the increased reliance on the Great Powers for help on the other, who frankly found the prospect of aiding the descendants of Pericles and Leonidas far more appealing than helping the descendants of Basil and Constantine.

这一传统的打破一方面是由于文艺复兴，让人们对希腊古典时期产生了无尽的向往，另一方面罗马人对大国给予援助的依赖程度越来越大，各个大国坦率地发现，帮助列奥尼达和伯利克利的后代，远比帮助巴西流和君士坦丁的后代更有吸引力。
（注：列奥尼达和伯利克利分别是古希腊城邦斯巴达和雅典的领袖，巴西流和君士坦丁分别是罗马帝国有名的修道士和君主。）

More importantly, by identifying themselves as Greeks, they renounced their claims to all and any Roman lands and titles their forefathers held, which put the great monarchs of Europe a little bit more at ease and inclined to help.
Still, once the political integrity of this newborn state was no longer at stake, the Greeks began a series of all out wars against the Ottomans anyway, in an attempt to reclaim all remaining Greek speaking territories in Asia Minor. Had they been successful, the final form of modern Greece would look suprisingly similar to the medi Roman Empire on a map (The above is a real map published by the Hellenic Republic in 1920).

更重要的是，通过承认自己是希腊人，他们放弃了申索他们的祖先所拥有的罗马土地和头衔，这使得欧洲的君主们更加对他们放心，也乐于帮助他们。



然而，一旦这个新生国家的政治完整性不再受到威胁，希腊人就开始了一系列针对奥斯曼人的战争，试图夺回在小亚细亚说希腊语的领土。如果他们成功了，从地图上看，现代希腊的最终形式将会和中世纪的罗马帝国非常相似（上面是1920年希腊共和国出版的真实地图）。

————

Daniel Walker, 计算机程序设计员，养了一匹马.
China assimilates its past. John Man describes this rather nicely in his book Genghis Khan, where he describes the neatly circular logic, by which the official histories prove that China wasn't actually invaded.

中国同化了他的过去。John Man在他的专着《成吉思汗》中形象生动的形容。在书中他描述了一套简洁的循环逻辑，通过这套逻辑，中国的官方史书证明了中国实际上并没有被入侵。

Who attacked the Tanguts in the early Thirteenth century?
The Mongols under Genghis Khan.
Very good. What happened?
Genghis Khan won.
Excellent, and?
And eventually the Mongols defeated the rest of China.
They did, indeed. And?
And they set up the Yuan dynasty.
And the Yuan dynasty is an essential part of the history of which nation?
China.

谁在十三世纪早期袭击了党项人？
成吉思汗统帅下的蒙古人。
回答的很棒，那结果怎么样？
成吉思汗打赢了。
很好，还有呢？
最终蒙古人征服了中国的其他部分。
他们确实做到了，然后呢？
他们建立了元朝。
元朝是哪个国家历史的重要一部分？
中国。

————

Jay Liu, 我一直在说我是个中国人...
Most of the answers cite the fundamental differences between the two civilizations as the cause for the longevity of the Chinese over the Roman.  And while I agree that the cultural integrity of China is definitely stronger than that of Rome in most respects, this is not the reason why Rome collapsed while China did not.
I'll start by countering the 2 common explanations that are often brought up:

大多数的答案都说明了两种文明之间的根本差异，将这视为中国比罗马的更延续的原因。虽然我同意中国的文化完整性在很多方面都比罗马更强大，但这不是罗马崩溃而中国没有崩溃的原因。
我先来反驳通常提到的两种常见的解释：

Chinese civilization was better at integrating barbarians.
Not really.The Romans were masters of spreading their civilization and language.  There's a reason why the French and Spanish speak a Latin language and not a Celtic one despite the fact their DNA is probably still mostly Celtic.  The Western Roman Empire was the more culturally integrated half of the Empire, and it fell first.  The Eastern Roman Empire had influence from 3 major civilizations, and one of which was openly hostile towards Roman rule, that of the Persians.  But despite this lack of cultural cohesion, the ERE survived for 1,000 years after the WRE fell.

中华文明更善于同化蛮夷。
不完全是。罗马人十分擅长传播他们文明和语言。尽管法国人和西班牙人可能仍然大部分是凯尔特人血统，但他们说的是拉丁语，而不是凯尔特语，之所以这样是有原因的。西罗马帝国在文化上融合了大半个帝国，而它首先崩溃。东罗马帝国受到三个主要文明的影响，其中一个对罗马的统治有公开敌意的，就是波斯人。但是，尽管缺乏文化上的凝聚力，但在西罗马帝国倒下后，东罗马帝国仍然存活了1000多年。

Chinese geography is more suited for an enduring empire than that of the Mediterranean.
Definitely false. The Mediterranean made the Roman Empire possible in first place.  It's no coincidence that the Mediterranean became a Roman lake.  It meant that every major corner of the Empire was but a short sea journey from any other part.  The geography of the Roman Empire was pretty much ideal for empire building.
China, being almost circular, meant you had to cross long tracts of land if you wanted to travel beyond your own river.  This is why the Grand Canal had to be built.

中国的地理位置比地中海的地理位置更有利于帝国的延续。
完全错误。地中海让罗马帝国有了称霸的可能。地中海变成了一个罗马人的内湖，这并不是巧合。这意味着帝国的每一个主要位置的来往都只是短途海上旅行。罗马帝国的地理位置对于帝国的构建来说是非常理想的
中国几乎是圆弧型的，意味着如果你想要越过河流，你必须穿越大片土地。这就是为什么要建造大运河的原因。

The main reason is far more simplistic, and far more specific.
The Romans had to deal with the Germanic tribes, the Chinese did not.

主要的原因更简单，更具体的多。
罗马人必须处理日耳曼部族的问题，而中国人不需要。

The Germanic tribes represented a truly existential threat to any empire.  They were not simple steppe nomads who could be easily integrated into a settled civilization, which is what the Chinese mainly dealt with.  No, the Germans were a highly aggressive, highly adaptive, and highly organized civilization that could maintain its identity even within the cultural borders of the Roman Empire.  

日耳曼部落对任何帝国而言都是实打实的威胁。他们不是简单的草原游牧民族，可以很容易地融入到一个定居的文明中，这是中国人主要处理的问题。而罗马帝国却不能这样做，日耳曼人是一个具有强烈的侵略性，高度适应力和组织能力的文明，即使在罗马帝国的文化边界内也能保持它的身份认同。



Now, with the right preparation and strategy, the German migrants into the Empire in the 5th Century could have been properly integrated and the Western Roman Empire may have lived on.   But due to the circumstances of the time (the Romans were facing a far greater threat to the East against the Sassanid Persians), the process of integration was completely bungled and the German tribes migrated in as whole tribes, independent of Roman authority or civilization.

如果立即进行恰当的准备和策略，5世纪的日耳曼移民可以被适当地整合，那么西罗马帝国可能得以生存下来。但是由于当时的情况（罗马人面对的更大威胁来自对东方的波斯人），整合的过程完全失败了，整个日耳曼部落一起迁徙，在罗马的统治或文明下仍保持了独立性。

Ironically, the collapse of Roman Imperial authority in the Western Empire didn't stop the Romans from eventually integrating the Germans who crossed into Roman territory.  Britain, France, Spain, Italy and North Africa were all overrun by Germanic tribes at some point.  But with the exception of Britain, Germanic culture was successfully integrated into the native culture.  The problem was that the Roman Empire itself was already gone by the time that integration had completed.

讽刺的是，在西罗马帝国内罗马人统治的崩溃并没有阻止罗马人最终整合罗马帝国内的日耳曼人。在某种程度上，不列颠、法兰西、西班牙、意大利和北非都被日耳曼部落所占领。但除了不列颠外，日耳曼文化成功地融入了本土文化中。问题是在整合完成的时候罗马帝国已经灭亡了。



The barbarians that the Chinese had to deal with were an entirely different gang, and far easier to integrate.  
The Mongol and Turkic tribes of the eastern Steppe were indeed fierce and relentless.  But they were just too few of them to actually overwhelming the Chinese population, their culture, and civilization.  The fact that none of these tribes had a written language (prior to integrating with a settled civilization) or detailed set of religious beliefs didn't help their chances.

中国人要对付的野蛮人是一群完全不同的一伙人，而且要容易得多。
东部大草原上的蒙古和突厥部落确实凶猛也残忍的。但是他们的数量太少不足以征服中国的人口、文化和文明。事实上，没有一个部落有书面语言（在与定居形式的文明整合前）也没有建立起一套复杂的宗教信仰，这阻碍了他们。

Had China been confronted with the likes of the Germans or another collection of tribes who preferred to settle and farm rather than to ride and pillage, then Chinese history would be very different.

如果中国遇到的是像日耳曼人或者其他的部落那样更愿意定居和耕种而不是骑马和掠夺的蛮族，那么中国人的历史可能会被改写。

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Joe Rigodanzo, 主持人, "莱茵河" 播客
I would add one thing to some of the fantastic answers that mention the Germanic tribes being an altogether different threat than Steppe Nomads, the primary non-state actors that China faced throughout it's history.

我会对那些有意思的答案加以补充，这些回答认为与贯穿中国历史的非国家体——大草原游牧民族相比，日耳曼部族是个完全不同的威胁。

Tens of thousands of Germanic Warriors from various tribes crossed the Rhine in the year 406 of our common era.  These tribesmen were fundamentally different than, for example, the Germanii of 110 BCE, when two tribes invaded the Balkans, Gaul, and Spain and did a lot of damage.  The Germanic tribes of 406 were also different than the tribes led by Arminius - those tribes that handed Rome a pretty terrible defeat in the year 9 CE at Teutoberg Forest.

在公元406年，成千上万来自不同部落的日耳曼战士越过莱茵河。这些部族人与公元前110年的日耳曼人完全不同，后者的两个部落入侵过巴尔干半岛，高卢和西班牙，并造成了严重的破坏。406年的日耳曼部族也与阿米尼乌斯领导的部落不同，后者在公元9年的条顿堡森林一役中大败罗马。
（注：阿米尼乌斯是日耳曼部族切鲁西人的首领。西元9年在条顿堡森林里他大败罗马人，被推崇为日耳曼民族的英雄。）

Why?
Because by 406, the Germanic tribes had been living alongside the Romans on the Rhine and the Danube for 450 years.  The kingdoms opposite the Romans not only benefited from Roman subsidies, but from Roman technology and goods that spilled across the border.

为什么会不同？
因为到了406年，日耳曼部落和罗马人一起生活在莱茵河和多瑙河上已经长达450年了。与罗马相对的日耳曼王国不仅仅从罗马的补贴中获益，也从罗马技术和货物的边界流通
中受益

The Germanii of 406 had multi-crop farming.  Arminius's Germanii of the year 9 were largely cattle-herders and single-crop farmers.   Multi-crop farming can support a much larger population - and the tribes near the river were bigger and much more capable of sustaining a large warrior class.

公元406年的日耳曼人掌握了多农作物种植技术。而公元9年的阿米尼乌斯统领下的部族主要是牧民和只会单一耕作法的农民。多农作物种植能为大量人口提供食物，邻近河流的部族更庞大，更有能力维持其庞大的军人阶层。

The Germanii of 406 were well-equipped.  The amount of Roman-made swords found in Germany is staggering.  Compare to Arminius's Germanii of the year 9 - perhaps only 10% of these warriors had swords.

406年的日耳曼人装备精良。在德国发现了相当数量的罗马造的短剑，这让人惊讶。而阿米尼乌斯时期的日耳曼人，可能只有10%的战士装备了短剑。

The Germanii were well organized.  They'd borrowed a lot from the Roman military.  Many historians have commented on the porous nature of the frontier zones, especially in the late Empire.  This meant that many of the Germanic warriors who crossed the Rhine in 406 had served in the Roman military or against it - and the higher ranking chieftains knew how to use

日耳曼人组织有序。他们从罗马军队那里学会了很多。许多历史学家对前线地区的多孔性物质发表过看法，特别是在帝国晚期。这意味着很多日耳曼军人在406年越过莱茵河，在罗马军队中服役或起义反抗罗马——高层首领知道怎么做。



Left: An overly dramatic representation of the battle of Teutoberg Gap, 9 CE.  Note the scantily clad warriors with relatively weak weapons.  They had no choice but to try to ambush the Romans - they could never defeat them in open battle.  Compare to Right: a representation of Goths attacking the Romans in the late 300s, early 400s.  Wow, they sure are outfitted a lot like the Romans, with heavy armor, helmets, and swords.  These paintings are overdone but a good depiction of an overall trend.

左边：戏剧性的表现是在公元9年的条顿堡森林之战。注意那些衣不蔽体武器匮乏的战士。他们别无选择，只能去伏击罗马人——在面对面的战斗中，他们永远无法打败罗马人。和右边相比：这展现了哥特人在四世纪末，五世纪初袭击罗马人的画面。哇哦。哥特人武装的很像罗马人，装备有重甲、头盔和剑。这些画有些夸张但总体上描述的很贴切。

There was another way in which the Germanii of 406 were not the "simple barbarians" of centuries past.  They had developed political systems that could be extended to landed civilizations - in many ways,  they were more like highly mobile mini-states than they were like tribes. 

以上换个说法就是406年的日耳曼人并不是几个世纪以前的“简单野蛮人”。他们建立了政治制度，在很多方面，可以影响到陆地上的文明。他们更像是能够快速移动的迷你小国而不是部落。

As a result, the tribal confederations were able to establish themselves in Roman territory as semi-independent - and then fully independent - fiefdoms.  Compare to barbarians in the Chinese Empires - semi-independent fiefdoms almost never popped up.  In Western Roman territory, there were at least 5 major Germanic groups from 395 - 476 in Western Roman territory itself. (Franks, Western Goths, Eastern Goths, Vandal/Alan, Burgundian)

所以，日耳曼部落联盟能够在罗马地区建立自己半自治的领地，之后还获得了完全独立的封地。而中华帝国的蛮夷与之相比，基本上没有获得过半自治的封地。在西罗马的领土上，从395年到476年，至少存在过5个主要的日耳曼部落。（法兰克、西哥特、东哥特、汪达尔/阿兰王国、勃艮第）。

I recognize that there were a TON of other reasons Rome fell - including civil wars, disintegrating tax structure, and enemies in the east.  Without one, a few, or all of these negative drags, Rome might have been strong enough to hold off the Germanii, as they had done successfully for 500 years.

我知道罗马衰亡也有很多其他的原因，包括内战，瓦解的税收体制，以及东方的敌人。如果去除掉以上一个、几个或者所有的拖累，罗马可能强大到足以抵挡日耳曼人，就像他们在过去500年里成功做到的那样。

That said, it's hard to deny that the Germanic tribes put the nail in the coffin, or were the straw that broke the Camel's back, or whatever you want to say.

即便如此，不能否认的事实是日耳曼部落把钉子钉入了棺材，或者说日耳曼人是压垮骆驼（罗马）的最后一根稻草。

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M Markus Harrison.
If you say, "Why did China survive for over 2000 years while the Roman empire did not?", then I would answer, "And who says the Roman empire did not survive for 2000 years?"
What we can call Roman civilization and rule was in existence from 509 BC through to 1453 AD, or 1962 years.  Close enough for me.

如果你问的是“为什么中国存在了2000多年，但罗马帝国没有”的话，那么我的回答是“谁说罗马帝国没有存在2000年？”
我们所说的罗马文明和及其统治，从公元前509年开始到公元1453年结束，总计1962年。

The Roman Republic was the period of ancient Roman civilization beginning with the overthrow of Roman Kingdom, traditionally dated to 509 BC, and ending in 27 BC with the establishment of the Roman Empire.  The empire was eventually split in two, with two emperors, and the Western Roman Empire did eventually fall, but the Eastern empire did not fall for another 1,000 years!

罗马王政时代的瓦解导致了罗马共和国的开始，属于古罗马文明。传统上始于公元前509年，结束于公元前27年罗马帝国的建立。罗马帝国最终分裂为两个国家，有两个皇帝，西罗马帝国最终崩溃，但是，东罗马帝国延续了1000年。

Summarizing Wikipedia, theByzantine Empire was the predominantly Greek-speaking continuation of the eastern half of the Roman Empire during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Its capital city was Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul), originally known as Byzantium. Often called the Eastern Roman Empire in this context, it survived the 5th century fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empireand continued to exist for an additional thousand years until it fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire was the most powerful economic, cultural, and military force in Europe.(Please upvote if this answer was of interest)

维基百科总结，主要讲希腊语的拜占庭帝国，在古典时代晚期和中世纪期间，延续了罗马帝国在东部的统治。拜占庭帝国的首都是君士坦丁堡（现在叫伊斯坦布尔），最初以拜占庭为人所知，由此也可以称之为东罗马帝国，东罗马帝国经历了5世纪罗马帝国的分裂和西罗马帝国的灭亡，仍然延续了1000年，直到1453年被奥斯曼土耳其人灭亡。在东罗马帝国存在的时候，是欧洲经济、文化、军事最强大的国家。
（要是觉得回复有意思的话请点赞）

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Michael Cardinal, 一年四季都很爷们
As James indicates, location had a large role. The isolated nature of China made it difficult to invade. The distinction in the eyes of the Chinese between Inner China (where ethnic Chinese lived) and Outer China (wher non Chinese lived) created a core and buffer zone. Rome had this as well but being more open to invasion degraded the buffer areas (Northern and Eastern Europe).

如James所言，地理位置发挥了巨大的作用。中国的孤立于世的特点使其很难被侵略。在中国人看来，中国内部（中国人居住的地方）和中国外部（非中国人居住的地方）区别很明显，这提供了重要的缓冲地带。罗马也类似，但对入侵者的开放降低了缓冲区域（北欧和东欧）的作用。

But perhaps just as important is society and culture. The presence of philosophies like Confucianism, Taoism and Legalism each contributed to a communally focused society that could survive the ups and downs of politics and shifts of power. Citizens were not seen so much as individuals, rather part of the greater collective of China as a whole. History is seen as a cyclical flow, rather than points and periods in time. This gave the Chinese the perspective that if leaders changed, in general life would go on as it always had. In Rome (and in the larger Western civilization that emerged from Rome) citizens were seen as individuals. Each person was out for themselves (and in many ways still are in the West) rather than concerned with success of society as a whole. History for Rome was about power and control, not about a continuum of values, virtues, ethics and morals as it was seen in China.

同样重要的可能也有社会和文化。儒家、道家和法家等哲学思想的存在，都促成了社会在政权兴败国力转变时能够生存下来。中国公民不太被视为个体，而被看作是大中国这一集体的一部分。在中国人看来，历史是周期性流动着的，而不是时间点和某个阶段。这让中国人认识到，即使皇帝换人了，民众的普通生活也会一如既往地继续下去。在罗马（以及从罗马而出的更大的西方文明中），公民被视为个体。每个人都追求独立（在西方，很多方面仍然是这样）而不是关注整个社会的成功。罗马的历史是关于权力和控制的历史，而不像中国历史那样在价值观、美德、伦理和品行方面具有延续性。

A good work that helps to make this clear is Fire in the Lakeby Frances Fitzgerald. It is written about the Vietnam War, but the first few chapters are some of the best explanations of the difference between East and West I have encountered.

有一本很好的专着能帮我们更好理解这方面，就是Frances Fitzgerald着的《湖中之火》。该书写的是越南战争，但是前几章对于东西方差异的解释是我看过的最好解释。

————

ET
The book "The Confucian Mind" by Daniel Wang makes the very insightful and apt point that China is the only "empire" that ever expanded its territory by repeatedly being conquered by other nations.  

Daniel Wang着的《儒家思想》这本书，深刻地指出了中国是唯一一个通过不断被其他国家征服而扩张领土的“帝国”。

"China" historically has been more of a form of "civilization", i.e., a form of social organization based on culture, religion and written language used by whatever rulers are then in power as a means of unifying the east Asian landmass, than a historically contiguous political entity or "nation".  

在历史上“中国”更像是某种形式的“文明”，也就是说，是基于文化、宗教和文字的社会组织形式，这种社会组织形式被统治者所利用，作为一种将东亚地区统一起来的方式，而不是一个历史上连续的政治实体或“国家”。

Within "China" today, you will see numerous ethnicities, and even among the so-called "Han" Chinese, who like to imagine themselves as single ethinicity, you will see such regional variation that is tantamount to ethnicity, so that the idea of "China" cannot be an ethnicity-based nation, but rather is a civilization (as I previously stated).  

在今天的“中国”，你会看到许多民族，即使在视自己为单一民族的所谓“汉族人”中，你也会看到这样的等同于民族划分的区域差异，因此，“中国”不是以民族为基础的国家，而是一种文明（如我之前所言）。

Rome, as we understand it today, is a contiguous political entity from its founding to around 400 AD when it officially collapsed in the west.  However, if you think of Rome as a political idea, you will see that, like the idea of "China", it has continued throughout history in various forms until today.  

正如我们今天所理解的，从罗马建国开始到公元400年左右它在西方正式崩溃，罗马一直是一个连续的政治实体。但是，如果你把罗马视为一个政治观念，你会看到，就像中国这个概念一样，罗马在历史上一直延续到今天。

For example, in the west, the Roman Catholic Church, the Holy Roman Empire and now the EU, and in the east, the "Byzantine" Empire which was succeeded by Russia.  However, as a cultural civilization, we might observe the most notable features of Roman civilization (bloodsports and gladiator games, Apollo and Zeus worship, public baths, wearing togas, chariot races, etc. are some of the stereotypical ideas that come to mind) seemed to have largely vanished.

例如，在西方，有罗马天主教会，神圣罗马帝国，现在是欧盟，在东方，有拜占庭帝国，后来由俄罗斯继承。然而，作为一种文化意义上的文明，我们可能会观察到罗马文明最显着的特征（血腥运动和角斗士游戏，阿波罗和宙斯崇拜，公共澡堂，罗马宽外袍，战车比赛等等，这些都是能想到的陈规陋习）大部分都已经消失了。

But one might say the same of much of "old China" also (e.g., footbinding, kow towing, the Confucian scholar examination system, etc.), but those observations merely reflects outward norms of behavior.  The key to the survival of China, and why Rome disappeared, is the fact that the people of China continue to identify themselves as Chinese, whereas the people of Europe no longer identify themselves as Romans (but rather as French, British, Spanish, German, Italian, etc.).  So the difference between the idea of Rome and China is simply that the culture of China has had sufficient permanence in the minds of its people to remain a unifying basis for national identity to this day.

但也有人可能会说 “旧中国”（例如，磕头，拖拽，儒家考试制度等等）也没有了啊，但这些仅仅反映了外在的行为规范。中国能够生存到现在，而罗马消失的关键原因，是因为中国人继续将自己视为中国人，而欧洲人不再将自己视为罗马人（而是视自己为法国人、英国人、西班牙人、德国人和意大利人等）。所以，罗马和中国的区别仅仅在于，直到今天中国的文化在中国人思想中已经根深蒂固，这都保持了中国人统一的国家身份认同。

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Christos Antoniadis, 在伯罗奔尼撒大学学习历史
Actually, Rome did survive 2000 years (or, to be more exact, 2200 years); the most surprising fact is that the Roman state did not fracture like the Han Empire did into the the Three Kingdoms (AD 220–280) only to be reunited by the Sui Dynasty in 581 AD and then fractured again once the Tang Dynasty fell in 907 AD, then (after a Song reunification) be conquered by the Mongols in 1271 and the Manchus in 1644.

事实上，罗马存活了2000年（或者精确点是2200年）。让人吃惊的是罗马国家并没有像汉帝国那样分裂成三国（公元220—280）却又在581年被隋朝重新统一，之后随着997年唐朝灭亡又陷入分裂，然后（在宋朝重新统一）在1271年被蒙古人征服，在1644年被满族人征服。

Chinese civilization is continuous and lasts from ancient times until now. The different Chinese states claimed the Mandate of Heaven and organized their government according to an Imperial system that originated in the Qin Dynasty. Yet, there was no one Chinese Empire lasted from 221 BC to 1911 AD.

中国文明源远流长，从古代一直延续到了现在。中国的不同王朝声称天命所归，并根据秦朝建立的帝国体系组织他们的政府。然而，没有一个中国的王朝从公元前221年存活到1911年。

On the other hand, legally speaking, the Roman state survived from 753 BC to 1453 AD with only two ‘divisions’; the first one between East and West in 395 AD. Yet this was not considered to be a real division by the Romans themselves. According to them, the Roman Empire was one with two Emperors.

另一方面，从法律上讲，罗马国家从公元前753年存活到公元1453年，其间只经历了两次“分裂”。第一次是公元395年的东西罗马分治。然而在罗马人看来这不算真正的分裂。从罗马人角度看，罗马帝国是个整体，只是有两个皇帝。

The state continued to have two Consuls (one Easterner and one Westerner) and laws issued in one part of the Empire took effect in the other too. The deposition of the last Western Emperor was not considered that important by the Romans themselves exactly because of this reason.

国家一直有两个执政官（一个是帝国东部人，一个是帝国西部人），在帝国的某个地方颁布的法律也在另一个地方生效。正是因为这个原因，西罗马帝国的最后一任皇帝被废黜并没有被罗马人视为很严重的事情。

The second division was that of 1204, after the Fourth Crusade. Three Greek states emerged, yet the Empire of Nicaea managed to restore Constantinople to Roman rule and reasonably claim to be the legitimate successor of the Angeloi Emperors. Thus, Rome fell in 1453. Although its capital, language, religion, culture and system of government changed significantly in that 2200 years, legally and ideologically speaking Rome survived to 1453.

第二次分裂是1204年，在第四次十字军之后。出现了三个希腊人的国家，但尼西亚帝国设法让君士坦丁堡重归罗马统治，并合理地宣称是罗马帝国皇帝的合法继承者。因此，罗马灭亡于1453年。尽管在2200年的时间里，罗马的首都、语言、宗教、文化和政府体系发生了巨大的变化，但从法律和思想上讲，罗马仍活到了1453年。
（译注：第四次十字军东征中，西欧骑士和威尼斯人联合攻占了君士坦丁堡，从君士坦丁堡出逃的拜占廷贵族建立了三个希腊人主导的拜占廷流亡政权，分别是伊庇鲁斯专制君主国、特拉布松帝国和尼西亚帝国。）

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Jason St. Pierre, 带有痞子气的历史学家，过去是天文物理学家，时常无聊。
Your premise is flawed.  According to the Roman civil calendar, Rome was founded on April 21 in either 750 or 753 BC.  The last major city in the Roman Empire, Constantinople, didn't fall until 1453.  That works out to just over 2200 years where the Roman state existed in some form.
Now let's look at Chinese history:

你的前提就有问题。罗马民用历表明，罗马建于公元前750或者753的四月21日。罗马帝国最后的主要城市，君士坦丁堡沦陷于1453年。可以算出罗马国家以不同的形式存在超过了2200年。
让我们看下中国历史：

Shang Empire: c. 1600 - 1046 BC
Zhou Empire: c. 1045 - 256 BC
Qin Dynasty: 221 - 206 BC
Han Dynaty: 206 BC - AD 201
Jin Dynasty: 265 - 420
Sui Dynasty: 581 - 618
Tang Dynasty: 618 - 907
Song Dynasty: 960 - 1279
Yuan Dynasty: 1271 - 1368
Ming Dynasty: 1368 - 1644
Qing Dynasty: 1644 – 1911

商朝：公元前1600——公元前1046
周朝：公元前1045——公元前256
秦朝：公元前221——公元前206
汉朝：公元前206——公元201
晋朝：265——420
隋朝：581——618
唐朝：618——907
宋朝：960——1279
元朝：1271——1368
明朝：1368——1644
清朝：1644——1911

Each gap in there represents an era where either China had broken apart and the smaller successor kingdoms were no more China than the Frankish or Vandalic kingdoms were the same thing as the Roman Empire.  Going by this timeline, the longest continuous period of time where you had a unified China was from 1600 BC to 256 BC, some 1344 years under the Shang and the Zhou.

在这些朝代之间的每个缺口都代表了一段时期，中国处于分裂，更小的继承性的王朝不再是中国了，这类似于法兰克和汪达尔王国之于罗马帝国。按着这条时间线，你会发现统一中国时间最长的是从公元前1600年至公元前256年，商朝和周朝总共延续了1344年。

Thing is, that's not the whole story either.  The Shang and the Zhou were separate cultures, so you have to ask yourself whether or not the Zhou conquest of Shang represents a unified Chinese state or two different states that went to war.  You can ask yourself the same thing with the Yuan and the Qing.  The Yuan Dynasty saw China conquered by the Mongols and the Qing saw China conquered by the Manchus.  They both adopted large amounts of Chinese culture, but is this situation really any different than the Ottoman conquest of the Eastern Roman Empire?

还没说完。商和周有着不同的文化，所以你要问自己，周人征服商人是一个统一的中国国家还是两个不同国家之间发生的战争。元朝和清朝也是如此。元朝代表了蒙古人征服了中国，清朝代表了了满族人征服了中国。虽然他们都借鉴了很多的中国文化，但这种情况和奥斯曼帝国征服东罗马帝国有什么不同？

Edit: In response to the comments, let me pose a question of my own here: are we talking about the Chinese and the Romans or are we talking about China and the Roman Empire?  Cultural identification is trickier to define, but the original question seems to be asking about political continuity.

编辑：回复评论，我要问个问题：我们是在谈论中国人和罗马人，还是我们在谈论中国和罗马帝国？用文化认同来定义是很复杂的，但原本的问题就是在问政治的连续性。

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John Kuo, 失意的业余科学家
My own hypothesis to this (which I've discussed with my brother Kaiser) is that agricultural practices that are renewable and resilient have much to do with cultural/civilization longevity.
The only 'culture' that spans longer than Chinese is/was Egyptian, which 'ended' with the Arab conquests of North Africa.


我对此的假设（我和我的兄弟Kaiser的交流结果）是可持续和适应性强的农业耕作方式对文化/文明的寿命起到了很大作用。
唯一比中国人有更长“文明”的是埃及人，而阿拉伯人对北非的征服终结了这一文明。

Both Egyptian and Chinese cultures share in common a riverine based agriculture where fertile fields were renewed by annual flooding.  However, Chinese/Asian agriculture progressed to intensive terraced farming where fields do not lose their topsoil at the rate of Western flat-field practices, and are renewed with compost as well.  This allows stable, constant agriculture in the same location without farms turning to deserts, and no silting up of harbors, etc.  These issues plagued Roman cities throughout the Mediterranean.

埃及文明和中国文明的相同之处是他们都有一个沿河流发展而成的农业，在那里每年的河水泛滥使肥沃的土地得以恢复。然而，中国/亚洲的农业发展到了集约化的梯田农业，那里土地的土壤流失速度没有西方平场农田快，还能通过粪肥恢复土壤肥力。这使得中国在相同的地方保持稳定的、不变的农业，他们的农场不会变成沙漠，港口也不会淤塞，等等。而这些问题则困扰着整个地中海的罗马城市。