Tolkien's annotated map of Middle-earth discovered in copy of Lord of the Rings

Re:Tolkien's annotated map of Middle-earth discovered in cop... by mmanfrin on Friday October 23, 2015 @04:21PM (#10441077)

Wouldn't have made much of a difference as Odoacer simply bypassed Ravenna (and would have bypassed San Marino) on his way to sacking Rome. Rome at that time had fallen far from grace, but the sacking was the nail on the coffin.

The true strength of Rome had already left, gone east to Constantinople. 4th/5th century western Rome was just a slow and painful decay. The East survived until 1453.

Fun little fact: the Roman Empire existed until 1453 and was finally destroyed by the Ottomans; the Ottomans existed until the end of WW1; the Cubbies last won the world series in 1908; which all means: the last time the Cubs won the world series, the empire that destroyed the Roman empire was still around.

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Re:Tolkien's annotated map of Middle-earth discovered in cop... by baghira on Friday October 23, 2015 @04:33PM (#10441131)

I can't recall a sack of Rome by Odoacer, nor can I find after a quick search, but my memory may be lasping here. FWIW, Odoacer did escape to Ravenna to escape Theoderic and the siege lasted circa 3 years, so it did prove to be a reasonable location from that point of view.

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Re:Tolkien's annotated map of Middle-earth discovered in cop... by azernik on Friday October 23, 2015 @06:24PM (#10441577)

Which was the point - Rome was too easy to attack, so the government moved to Ravenna so that when it happened, at least the emperor and bureaucracy wouldn't be at risk.

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