Your favourite historic empire

[LAKISYLVANIA]

Your favourite historic empire... Probably very Eurocentric... But i'm not knowledgeable enough about other nation's history, and didn't feel like i want to include all of India's Empires and Chinese empires, and I know absolutely not about their history.

Sorry if i forgot a nation that you like to be included (or simply forgot).

[Antonio the Sixth]

Rome (Italian, normal)

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Throwing a bone to the HRE, what might be the most under-appreciated empire on this list, at least among Americans.

[Lechasseur]

British Empire (British descent, descended of loyalists, Anglophile)

Honorable mentions to the French, Roman, Byzantine, Holy Roman and Austrian Empires though.

I also find the various empires of the Middle East quite interesting.

[Wikipedia delenda est]

As a Swedophile whose favorite historical period is the late 17th century, definitely the Swedish Empire. Also, it's bizarre to leave the various Persian Empires off the list but have on countries that were never really empires like Scotland, Cuba, and Argentina.

[LAKISYLVANIA]

Aztecs for me!

[LAKISYLVANIA]

As a Swedophile whose favorite historical period is the late 17th century, definitely the Swedish Empire. Also, it's bizarre to leave the various Persian Empires off the list but have on countries that were never really empires like Scotland, Cuba, and Argentina.

Forgot them

[RINO Tom]

Alexander's Empire, as it is too often glossed over in haste to get from Classical Greece to the Hellenistic Age to the rise of Rome ... it's pretty much "Alexander was a great conqueror, but he died!"  I also get annoyed with the revisionist takes RE: alternate history that Rome's rise was inevitable, and there was no real alternate history that would involve an independent Greece.  I agree Alexander's empire could not have stayed together long term due to its size and makeup, but a series of successor states that had a succession plan could have taken Rome for sure.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Khmer Empire's got some aesthetic.

[buritobr]

Palpatine Galactic Empire

[brucejoel99]

I'm inclined to say (&, thus, voted for) the British Empire, since it grew from a small island nation that relied heavily on trade & never truly 'fell,' but rather evolved & adapted to the new realities that the 20th century presented.

The Iroquois Confederacy would certainly still have to be up there, though. The idea that there was a functional democratic republic in North America while feudal Europe was getting reamed by the Mongols just blows my f**king mind.

[Antonio the Sixth]

The Iroquois Confederacy would certainly still have to be up there, though. The idea that there was a functional democratic republic in North America while feudal Europe was getting reamed by the Mongols just blows my f**king mind.

It shouldn't be that surprising. Hunter-gatherer societies are often much more egalitarian than agricultural ones, and sedentarization and division of labor tends to go along with the rise of a strict socioeconomic hierarchy. While I do want to believe that, in the long run, economic development and political freedom go hand in hand, there's no denying that, at this early stage, they actually run counter to one another.

[Lechasseur]

Alexander's Empire, as it is too often glossed over in haste to get from Classical Greece to the Hellenistic Age to the rise of Rome ... it's pretty much "Alexander was a great conqueror, but he died!"  I also get annoyed with the revisionist takes RE: alternate history that Rome's rise was inevitable, and there was no real alternate history that would involve an independent Greece.  I agree Alexander's empire could not have stayed together long term due to its size and makeup, but a series of successor states that had a succession plan could have taken Rome for sure.

Im personally more interesting in the Hellenistic states that rode after Alexander than I am in Classical Greece tbh.

[Frozen Sky Ever Why]

Ancient Greece is most fascinating to me. Old Egypt would compete but we don't know as much about it.

[Storr]

I find the Dutch very interesting. They were almost a mini British Empire for a while, and that was soon after being under Spainsh rule for centuries. Think about what they were involved in: they started the colonization of South Africa, ruled the current fourth largest country by population in Indonesia, founded New Amsterdam which became the powerhouse that is modern New York, were able to heavily disrupt and pressure the Spanish gold trade by raiding their Treasure fleet, and the Dutch Confederation even influenced the writing of the US Constitution to have a stronger federal government (Madison wrote in Federalist 20 that the Dutch Republic had "Imbecility in the government; discord among the provinces; foreign influence and indignities; a precarious existence in peace, and peculiar calamities from war").

[Del Tachi]

The Inca