MovieChat Forums > Di Renjie zhi Tongtian diguo (2010) Discussion > where is the diplomat at the beginning o...

where is the diplomat at the beginning of film from?

posted 13 years ago by shwen
13 replies | jump to latest

it says 'Da Qin'

i figured it meant Romans? but at that time, did Tang Dynasty and Roman exchange diplomats?

confused:

[–] Happy_Evil_Dude 13 years ago

They're not Romans they're Spanish emissaries from the Umayyad Caliphate. This was an empire that, at its peak, stretched from Spain to Pakistan.

Drop it like it's legal precedent!

[–] shwen 13 years ago

are you sure about this?

if you followed the wiki link, clearly 'da qin' refers to romans

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daqin

[–] Happy_Evil_Dude 13 years ago

100% sure. I don't know where you got "da qin" from, but during the end credits they are credited as Umayyad ambassadors. Besides, the film takes place in 690 AD, whereas the Roman Empire collapsed in 476 AD, more than two centuries before. Finally, the men spoke Spanish, which makes sense for the Umayyad empire as it engulfed Spain, but in no way for the Roman Empires, where envoys would speak latin.

Drop it like it's legal precedent!

[–] shwen 13 years ago

well, i speak mandarin

in the film, they referred to him as 'general from Da Qin'

and Eastern Roman empire still existed then

judging from his dressing, he didn't look like arabian to me

thanks for the explanation though, i'll have to watch it again to be sure, it's a good movie IMO:)

[–] lexvanderwal 13 years ago

I guess it's not historically accurate, and since this a movie and not a documentary I don't mind.

Yes, there was an Eastern Roman Empire in 690 AD, but they spoke Greek and Latin and certainly no Spanish.

Indeed they are listed in the credits as Umayyads, and Spain was a part of that Empire, but the Spanish spoke Vulgar Latin at that time, because Spanish didn't exist yet. Also, a diplomat of the Umayyad Empire would most likely have been an Arab from Damascus, Syria.

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http://gweilo.nl

[–] Bob_Schaaf 11 years ago

In the period of the film, 689, the Umayyad Caliphate was centered in Damascus and ended in 750 AD. Only later did a reborn Umayyad Emirate and later Caliphate extend to North Africa and the Iberian Peninsula, lasting until 1031, when a newer system of autonomous emirates ruled. Of course, Islamic rule ended in Spain in 1492. That the Umayyad ambassador in the film speaks Spanish is a harmless historical error.

[–] Abraxas88 10 years ago

Why was he speaking 21st century Spanish? He should have been speaking Arabic or Latin.

[–] phantomF-12 13 years ago

In the italian dub, it says "General Flavius who came from Rome" therefore Roman, though considering that at that time (around 690 AD) the Western Roman Empire didn't exist anymore, he probably is East Roman (Byzantine/Constantinople). The Byzantine's were known in the Arab world, and probably also in the East as Ruma (Romans).

And he does speak latin.

[–] nyjack 13 years ago

I thought it sounded like Spanish, but then Spanish didn't exist yet, so a kind of Latin would make sense, and it would be odd to find someone in the court who could speak Spanish. I wonder if it could be poor writing; they did not get their facts all right. Umayyads would be the next big power worthy of an emissary on the Silk Road but the ambassador's clothing looked almost Renaissance.

[–] denniskriz 13 years ago

The diplomat definitely spoke Castillian Spanish (Philip II lisp and all ;-). I also thought that the ships in the harbor were a bit anachronistic, many looking like European ships of the 1500s). I thought this might have been "a bone" thrown to the Western/European audiences of the movie (as Europe was _really in the dark ages_ at the time of the Tang Dynasty. It was only at the time of Marco Polo that Europe was beginning to return to civilization.

(Fr) Dennis Kriz, OSM
http://frdennismoviereviews.blogspot.com/2011/10/detective-dee-and-pha nton-flame-orig-di.html

[–] PastichioRocker 12 years ago

Really, who cares where this dude was from? This movie is not historically accurate in any way and the character is not of any importance to the plot.

[–] lord_kobel 12 years ago

The version I saw had subbing that said something like "Umayyads"

[–] gregforttmags 12 years ago

The Umayyads were the big fish on the otherside of Eurasia in the 7th century, the Romans based around Constantinople were a relatively small realm fighting for their survival by that point, but the Umayyads looking European and not very Arab or Persian could be because they could also be Romanised North Africans (that were subjects of the Umayyads)?