Hey a history post. I love me some history. I love talking about history. Let’s dig in here.
You got the broad point right. Noxus is fairly clearly inspired by Rome. Not only Rome, there’s a little Holy Roman Empire thrown in there. And more than a dash of generic evil fantasy empire as well. That I think is fairly obvious, with some blatant parallels. Triumvirate becomes Trifarix, for example.
And that’s a pretty standard way for creating a fantasy world. Lord of the Rings is inspired by Anglo-Saxon Britain. Westeros is based on the War of the Roses. And so on.
That said there are some quibbles in your post that should be pointed out.
Roman Italy actually had fairly fine soil. However, there is evidence that they did not adequately crop rotate which drained the soil of nutrients over time. However, this was never really the reason for expansion outside of a few iffy examples. Really as long as you have Egypt as a trade partner your agricultural needs dwindled dramatically. And if Egypt would ever get uppity they were pretty easy conquest all things considered.
The real reason for Roman expansion was actually more economic than agricultural. Though they were tied together. Frankly, Roman court spent far more than they made, and wealth had a habit of being centralized under wealthy leaders. This leads to a often repeated cycle, where the Roman government would go outrageously in debt only for some civil war or political upset to happen and the wealth of the upper classes were redistributed. Or, they conquered more land and then used this new territory as a means to pay their debts. The second choice is usually the more preferable. Though even this is a ridiculously oversimplified version of events.
Then we get to the idea of Rome not carrying who you were. And that’s a hard point to defend, the inclusivity of Rome also varried wildly over the centuries. Rome was quick to accept Greeks and Egyptians as basically Roman. But they basically committed genocide against the Gauls. And by the late century the Goths and other barbarians were seen as a distinct “other” that lived within their borders. There are examples of the Roman people massacring Gothic families during what can be considered pseudo-racist rioting (there is a lot of study arguing whether or not the Goths can really be seen as an ethnicity. It’s long and boring, and ultimately irrelevant. But I bring it up to point out what I mean by pseudo-racist. It is not the most accurate description, but gets the point across).
You are completely right that Rome lost. A lot. There’s actually a fun study a few years back that during the major early period of expansion when Rome conquered Italy, Greece, and Carthage. They actually lost more battles than they won. Truly interesting stuff.
Anyway, this was a fun post. And I hope you continue to enjoy and study history. Always more complex and interesting than any fantasy world I’ve ever read.
Though I would suggest if you decide to post more, maybe pick a less aggressive tone. Everyone already knows that Riot draws from history. So your style makes it seem like you’re trying to chastise Riot’s writers rather than using their writing to talk about interesting historic parallels and exciting trivia.
