Peter Heather

They don't have a chance.

Okay.

you will be dead in no time at all.

So we get lots of coups at the center for control of that potent military force, but you don't see anyone challenging it, trying to fragment it.

Yes, he does.

And that's a huge space.

It is a huge space.

And this, I think, is the...

great downside of the third century crisis is that it becomes clear that if you've got enough force to counter the Persian threat, and Persia doesn't go away, it's countered, but it's not destroyed, then you've got to have an emperor in the east close to that concentration of military force.

And if you've got an emperor in the east, he's too far away from the west to control political developments there.

So it's often talked about as a system.

It's not really a system.

It's a series of improvisations in each political generation.

But we usually end up with more than one emperor because of that.

You've got to have one in the East.

And if you've got one in the East, the West is too far away.

It is broadly if you started at the northern end of Greece and went straight up.

It's more or less there.

Yeah.

Yeah.