Did any of the "post-Roman" Empires (e.g. HRE, Byzantine, Carolingian) ever have an event like a Roman Triumph?

by Silentarrowz

I'm aware of some of the modern connections, some of the fascist leaders of the early 20th century mimicked Roman aesthetics, but I was wondering if any of the pre-modern states that modeled themselves after Rome ever made an attempt at a Triumphal march?

Felczer

Hi, I'm not a professional historian by any means but I do like to read about Byzantine history a lot and there are no answers to this question, so here I go :)
First of all I'd like to contest the notion that Byzantine Empire is somehow a "post-Roman" empire. For all intentes and puproses it was a direct political successor of Roman Empire. It's ruller called himself Augustus, like all Roman Emperors did, it's citizens called themselves Roman citizens ( Ρωμιοί or Ῥωμαῖοι Rhomaioi ) and followed Roman law. In addition almost all contemporary political entities refered to the Byzantines as the Romans (for example Arabs called them the Rûm which obviously is derived from the word Romans) - the only notable exemption from it were Holy Roman Emperors and their subjects which tended to call Byzantine Emperor "Emperors of the Greeks". This is because they had a conflict of interest - there can be only one Roman Empire, so in order to claim the title Holy Roman Emperors had to denounce Byzantine rights to it.The empire also inherted political structure of Roman Empire, where hereditary rule was only a custom, not a principle, much like in Ancient Rome the rise to Emperorship was often quite an opportunistic endeavour, who became Emperor was often decided by pure luck when someone found themselves in the right place and time - Michael IV can serve as a good example of this, despite suffering poor health and having no claims to throne whatsoever he became Emperor after death of Romanos III purerly because he was lover of emperor's wife - Zoe. But I digress.
Byzantines indeed held triumphs, altough the tradition was not nearly as common as it was in the ancient times. One of the reasons for this decline is stated at the end of my post. An Example of Byzantine Triumph can be found in Procopius History of the Wars where we can read about triumph held for Roman general Belisarius after his succesful campaign which resulted in restoring province of Africa to Byzantine rule. Procopius notes that the Triumph had a few significant differences from the traditional Roman triumph. Balisarius traveled from his house on foot (as opposed to using a chariot) to the hippodrome (a stadium used for horse and chariot races), specifically to the Imperial seat - where all the loot from his campaign was located including ancient treasures first stolen from the Jews by the Emperor Titus, which then in turn were stolen by the Vandals during their sack of Rome. The triumph also included slave procession, including Vandal king Gelimer who was forced to kneel before the emperor together with Balisarius, who after all was Emperor's subject.
It is important to remember that military conquest was always a huge source of legitimacy, or right to rule and giving a Triumph to one of your generals was a risky thing to do, as it increased the propability of him becoming pretendent to the Imperial throne. At the same time Roman emperors rarerly led armies themselves. When they did they often held triumphs for themselves, an example of this can be Basil II the Bulgarslayer celebrating triumph Ivan Vladislav, king of Bulgaria, in Athens, after his death, that's described in John Skylitzes' "A Synopsis Of Byzantine History" - this time the procession, which includes Ivan's wife, Bulgarian Archbishop and "the rest of the Bulgars" entered "the Great Church where he sang hymns of thanksgiving to God". As we can see the Byzantines held the tradition of the triumph with addition of Christian elements to it.
Sources:History of the Wars - Procopius
A Synopsis Of Byzantine History - John Skylitzes
Streams of Gold, Rivers of Blood - Anthony Kaldellis

BlotPot

Felczer gave a great answer, just to touch up on it a bit.

Triumphs in the Republic often consisted of dawning kingly regalia, a tunic in all purple, which was the color of royalty. They painted their face red to represent Jupiter, their top God. After their triumph they would pay for games and feasts, and would be celebrated by the people for days after. When the Empire started, and the tone of shift changed from competing politicians to all heir Caesar, the idea of a King like figure, portraying themself as a God, and being the most popular person in town for a few days clashed heavily with the symbolism of the emperor. So they lost favor throughout the empire gradually.