Guy Gavriel Kay wrote several books about a fictional China, I haven't found the time to read it yet. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Under_Heaven_%28book%29

There are several books about chinese history written by westerners but it does not compare to the number of books about the British Empire and most of these concentrate all their energy into the 200 last years.
Example: Fairbank, China A new history. A book of history but has only 15 pages on the Han dynasty. Don't read that book if your into history.

About the Romans, it's not true. Latin language, roman law and Christianity (maybe that's not really related) are all part of their legacy.