American (USA) Empire 12 (+1)
British Empire 16
Roman Empire 22
Mongolian Empire 13
(generic) Chinese Empire 14
Achaemenid Persian Empire 12
Japanese Empire 5
Ottoman Empire 11
Akkadian Empire 8
(pre-Ptolemy) Egyptian Empire 9
(generic) Islamic Empire 11
Byzantine Empire 10
Mughal Empire 10
Comanche Indian Empire 1 (-1)

Continuing on with RUFFHAUS:

+1 to the US: The US has been the sole unquestioned global superpower for 20+ years now (realistically longer probably but we'll go from the dissolution of the USSR). While that is not enough to make them "greatest", we need to consider context. Pretty much every other Empire on this list was in an era where you could simply take whatever land you wanted through force. The US? Not so much. The US rose to it's prime in an era where winning in battle did not mean you got to keep the land. If the US was in a different era, we would have to consider Japan a part of the US (conquered in WWII obviously), Mexico (Mexican-American war), parts of Germany and Italy (again WWII), Iraq and Afghanistan (however debatable the wars were, we conquered and have given back the land) and any other territory we fought in, won, and ended up not keeping. Our "Empire" would span the globe much like the British Empire.

As for the Commanche, RUFFHAUS pretty much sums it up for me. Don't know how much else there is to say.

@drano, we almost took over Mexico during the Mexican-American War, but we were stopped by the fact that we didn't want any darkies in the country, so they just settled for taking the upper third of the country.

American (USA) Empire 12 (+1)
British Empire 16
Roman Empire 22
Mongolian Empire 13
(generic) Chinese Empire 14
Achaemenid Persian Empire 12
Japanese Empire 5
Ottoman Empire 11
Akkadian Empire 8
(pre-Ptolemy) Egyptian Empire 9
(generic) Islamic Empire 11
Byzantine Empire 10
Mughal Empire 10
-1 to the Camanche, not really an empire. Took them off the list, since they now have 0.
+1 to Mongolia, largest continential empire ever. Did it through conquest.

@Drano: In the Mexican-America. Mexico had to cede half of Texas, California, Nevada and New Mexico in exchance for peace. America got to keep the land that they took from Mexico. Same thing with the Spanish war. Those were military conquests.

In WW2 America didn't come as conquerors, but liberators.

But I agree with you and have plussed America in the past for that. America is an empire with past imperial ambitions and a modern global hegemony. They are one of the greatest empires in history and certainly the greatest empire today.

Racism! Sometimes it solves problems. Buuuuut...only like, one time out of a billion.

Fasces -

What I was referring to was the fact that we could have taken ALL of Mexico. Yet we didn't. The Romans would have. The Mongols would have. The Greeks would have. The Byzantines would have. The Chinese would have. The Japanese would have. Point being that we were different from in the past.

As for WWII, we liberated a lot, but what about the Japanese islands? Or Italy proper? Or Germany? Seems to me we didn't "liberate" Germany from the Germans. We attacked (with help), conquered, and could have kept (if we were in a different time period).

That's just not true. Many of those ancient empires preffered dependancy over territorial control in some cases. China in particular. So saying that China would annex Mexico in its entirety is not true.

My apologies, I got a little carried away with the naming. To be truthful, I don't know much about ancient China.

Could you elaborate on what you mean by dependancy? Do you mean something similar to the Romans where they had governors in outlying territories that technically were in control but left most of the actual governing to the locals?

@fasces
Mexico had an unending civil war at those times, gave up a state that was de facto independent, and huge amounts of mainly desert lands.

On the other hand, btw, the rush for the west was an impressive campaing of lies and genocide against native americans, who had much poorer weapons.

Certainly USA had past imperial ambitions, and maybe still have some ridiculous imperial ambitions. they are doing a good bussiness keeping Afghanistan as one the most wretched places of the world. But I would have doubts about USA global hegemony. At least in a political sense, that just doesn't exist.

(or if exists, we'd need to clarify what exactly USA global hegemony means)

That is one form of dependency and probably most popular in any ancient empire. The border regions were usually semi-autonomous and the empire's ability to mobilize its resources was quite low.

The Chinese championed the tributary system, which was changing throughout its history, but in its purest form meant the tributary states surrendered their independent foreign policy and paid tribute to the Chinese emperor. On our maps, those states are not painted in the same colour as the Chinese empire but were pretty much its satellites. China had no intention to actually rule in those stats, because it would be too much of a hassle, but they were firmly in its sphere of influence.

BTW what happened to the Greek Empire? a bad copy -paste perhaps?

Greek (Athenian and Macedonian) Empires 10
British Empire 16
Roman Empire 22
Mongolian Empire 13
(generic) Chinese Empire 14
Achaemenid Persian Empire 12
Japanese Empire 5
Ottoman Empire 11
Akkadian Empire 8
(pre-Ptolemy) Egyptian Empire 9
(generic) Islamic Empire 11
Byzantine Empire 10
Mughal Empire 10

Well spotted it was a bad copy and paste. Here is the list with Greece readded.

About the "American Empire" thing: First of all: In a different era the USA would not exist at all, the only reason they could exist at all is because of modernization and industrialisation, and because of that they can't hold the territories mentioned before. If the USA would try to hold on to any of the lands mentioned before they wouldn't have been the "sole unquestioned superpower" for 20 years...
That's the problem, yeah they're strong, but they can't take territory unless the territory wants to be taken by the USA... The USA is strong because it has a united people behind it, if it starts conquering unwilling countries they would have an unwilling people behind them and they would fall apart, or give the territories back...

I agree they're a superpower, I agree they're the strongest superpower out there right now, but they're just not an empire. They're strong because their people wants it, there's no way they could expand unless the conquered want it, no matter what's the era.

That being said I like the USA and hate European countries, especially my own, and I'm happy they can protect, and I'm sure they can destroy, but they just can't conquer and that and the fact that it's ruled by the people (which is in fact pretty much the same argument, but who cares :P) means it's in my opinion not an empire.

Now America is gone : )

^ at fasces

That's also why I'm not voting against them either, because they're powerful and such, but they're just not an empire in my opinion...

that's meant to be added to my own post :)

Greek (Athenian and Macedonian) Empires 10
American (USA) Empire 12
British Empire 16
Roman Empire 22
Mongolian Empire 14
(generic) Chinese Empire 14
Achaemenid Persian Empire 12
Japanese Empire 5
Ottoman Empire 11
Akkadian Empire 8
(pre-Ptolemy) Egyptian Empire 9
(generic) Islamic Empire 11
Byzantine Empire 10
Mughal Empire 10

lets hope I didn't make a mistake this time, lol

@kaner.....Heraclius largely changed the orientation of the Byzantine Empire from Rome to Greece. While I'd agree with you that one could reasonably view Byzantium in the beginning as a continuation of the Roman Empire, I think one has to view the Greek Emperors as a separate lineage eventually. I've recently been having some really interesting conversations with a Classicist friend of mine about the really massive structural changes in Byzantine Egypt in the lead up to the Arab conquest.

You are correct in that Byzantium slowly but steadily got rid off of the Roman cloak and forged a new identity. One that had as its basis Orthodoxy, Greek speaking people and an emperor with a reformed army -system

Byzantium was only by name a continuation of Rome. effectively Constantinople carried the torch of western civilisation, gathering all scholars scientists, doctors, and most importantly this reformed army stopped at Constantinople's gates two, probably teh most formidable enemies. First the Arabs and then the Ottomans. This allowed Europe 700 more years to evolve, rise to power, betray and then abandon Byzantium.

For me Constantinople reprsents another Thermopylae. Can you imagine how Europe would have turned out if the Arabs in the 7th c A.D (or 480 BC for the matter) got through?

*on the importance of Thermopylae, western way of war, western power see the books by Victor Davis Hanson -just in case anyone accuses me of bias :P

Greek (Athenian and Macedonian) Empires 10
American (USA) Empire 12
British Empire 16
Roman Empire 22
Mongolian Empire 14
(generic) Chinese Empire 14
Achaemenid Persian Empire 12
Japanese Empire 5
Ottoman Empire 12 (+1)
Akkadian Empire 7 (-1)
(pre-Ptolemy) Egyptian Empire 9
(generic) Islamic Empire 11
Byzantine Empire 10
Mughal Empire 10

@cypeg, Carnage and Culture, by Victor Davis Hanson? I loved that book. But I kind of look back at it differently now after reading some of the stuff he's written for the National Review...

I havent kept touch with his writings, but I like his view angle of things. "the Western way of war' and Carnage and Culture" have a thorough argument on how we westerns developed our understanding of war on the basis of the ancient Greeks norms and ideals. I find him often spot on. But back to the point.
Greek (Athenian and Macedonian) Empires 11 (+1)
American (USA) Empire 12
British Empire 16
Roman Empire 22
Mongolian Empire 14
(generic) Chinese Empire 14
Achaemenid Persian Empire 12
Japanese Empire 4 (-1)
Ottoman Empire 12
Akkadian Empire 7 (-1)
(pre-Ptolemy) Egyptian Empire 9
(generic) Islamic Empire 11
Byzantine Empire 10
Mughal Empire 10