Abstract
The following reflections develop the thesis that Europe's " identity " cannot be defined in essentialist terms, and can only be illuminated by a political-dramaturgical study.
The aim here is to refute the myth of the " decadence of Rome ". As an imperial script, theimperium romanum was not only preserved in the form of the Catholic Church ; it was also maintained until the 15th century in the Greek-Byzantine Empire, while in the Latin West a series of metamorphoses took place, from the era of the Carolingians and Ottos to the ultimate translatio imperii to the United States of America, via the empire-building of the Portuguese and British.
