How did the decline of the Byzantine Empire correlate with the growth in the power and prestige of the Holy Roman Empire in western Europe?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

ANSWER:
The Byzantine Empire considered itself the eastern Roman Empire after the western provinces of the Roman Empire clearly declined in the fourth to fifth centuries. The removal of the capital to Constantinople and the subsequent switch to a Greek-centered (rather than Latin) culture set the empire apart and in isolation from western Europe, which experienced the "Dark Ages" while the Byzantines continued to grow. However, the Byzantines faced significant conflict from both Islamic states in the post-Sasanid empires and from the Slavic and Bulgarian tribes pressing from the north and west, as well as from internal strife between a military and aristocratic bureaucracy from about the tenth century on. The attack by the Seljuq Turks in 1071 led the emperor Alexius Comnenus to appeal to the western Holy Roman Empire, and particularly to the pope, for assistance in battling against the Muslim forces. While he saw little intervention after his request, a mere twenty years later the Roman church "flexed its muscles" over the squabbling feudal societies of the Carolingian dynasties and successor states in the Holy Roman Empire by calling for the Crusades. The decline of the Byzantine Empire was a slow process and did not have the dramatic loss of infrastructure as did the fall of Rome in the west; however, western Europe's success at rebuilding and flourishing after the period of the Dark Ages came at the same time that the Byzantine Empire was significantly declining.