Historical Empires

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An empire is a large political entity where one group of people gains the political, economic, and military muscle to unify a bunch of other groups of people under its banner and either lords over them or integrates them into a cohesive whole. Empire is derived from the Latin word Imperium, which means "Authority" and more specifically the authority to command numerous Roman legions.

Notable Real Life Empires

• The Akkadian Empire (circa 2234-2154 BC): The oldest known empire in human history, located within ancient Mesopotamia.
• The Neo-Assyrian Empire (911 BC–612 BC): An empire which had in its foundation a belief that if their army ever lost a battle, the world would end. Unsurprisingly, it lasted until slightly after they lost their first major battle.
• The Achaemenid or first Persian Empire (550–330 BC)
• The Roman Empire (27 BC – 476 AD (Western), 330–1204 AD (Eastern/Byzantine)): the trope codifier for fictional Empires everywhere, and (through borrowing/stealing Greek technology) largely blamed for turning Europe from a backwater land of barbarians into the home of the most ambitious superpowers in history. Has lots, and I mean LOTS, of children, whether it be the directly-descended Spanish and French Empires, or the more-religiously-oriented Roman Catholic Church, et cetera.
• The Chinese Empire: Going back to 2100 BC, they survived by making the Mandate of Heaven (if the dynasty turns into a bunch of idiots then your local emperor definitely isn't favoured by the gods and every peasant can hang them off), their equivalent of a constitution. Lasted until the fall of the Qing Dynasty in the early 20th century.
• The Portuguese Empire (1139-1975): the Western kingdom-turned-empire that hired Columbus, becoming the first global empire in the world. Notable for the founding of Nagasaki, moving their capital and court to Brazil to escape Napoleon, and coming back from the brink of dissolution three times. Also, their nicknames, Portugal Overseas: Ultramar Português or the Império Ultramarino Português has something to do with some smurfs made by a British company of Grimdark.
• The Spanish Empire (1402-1975, at its height 1516-1700): colonized huge swaths of the New World, making Spanish the official language of most of Central and South America and the Caribbean. Annihilated the Aztec empire in the process of plundering its gold and silver.
  • When talking about the Spanish and Portuguese empires the Treaty of Tordesillas is worth a mention. Created by Pope Alexander VI, the treaty split the New World between the Spanish and the Portuguese, which is why the Portuguese settled Brazil and got to Japan because that was east of the line.
• The Mongolian Empire (1206–1368 AD)
• The Aztec Empire (1428–1521)
• The Inca Empire (1438–1533)
• The Ottoman Empire (1299–1923): A vast and powerful Muslim empire which started out as a small Turkish state in Anatolia that conquered Constantinople, the Baklans, Middle East and North Africa. In it's heyday it was huge, technologically advanced, well governed and constantly driving forward, until the 1600s when it got stuck in a rut and overshadowed by the Europeans.
• The Empire of Japan (1868–1947): They've had an emperor since 538, but didn't actually make significant conquests of any sort or at all until 1894, and even from then through 1947 it is still debated whether the emperor or the military was running things/and or in conflict with each other, with notable incidents such as the military attacking the Imperial Palace after Emperor Hirohito made a public broadcast, his first broadcast, asking the Japanese people to surrender to the United States. Also, Japanese used to revere their Emperor as the descendant of Amaterasu and therefore the rightful God-Emperor of Mankind. And people say the Tau are space weeaboos *BLAM*
• The Mughal Empire (1526–1857): Technically spent its last century as a British vassal.
• The Tsardom of Russia (1547–1721): Renamed to the Russian Empire by Peter the Great)
• The Russian Empire (1721-1917): Big, powerful but often backwards in technology and social development.
• The British Empire (1583-1997): At its height, the British Empire ruled a quarter of the Earth's land. Began the decolonization process after World War II and the Empire is considered to have ceased to exist as such when Hong Kong was formally turned over to China. Even so they still have handful of oversees territory over which the sun has still yet to set. God Save the Queen.
• The First French Empire (1804–1815): "Vive la Napoleon!"
• Second French Empire (1852–1870): Mostly known for getting their ass kicked by Prussia, thus allowing Germany to be created.
• Austrian Empire (1804–1918, including time spent as Austria-Hungary)
• The Holy Roman Empire (962–1806): Sometimes called the first Reich. Started as a powerful medieval state, but ever since Charlemagne died devolved into something "neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire." (Voltaire)
• The Ethiopian Empire (1137-1935/1941-1974): an empire of Africans, and one of the only two African nations to remain independent of the West. Also used to have Judaism as the official religion and then switched to its own version of Christianity. Its last Emperor, Haile Selassie, was revered by a religious movement as God incarnate.
• The German Empire (1871–1918): The second Reich, put together by Otto von Bismarck's political genius and Prussian efficiency, it took a collection of feuding principalities and, in a few decades, turned them into the greatest industrial power in Europe until it was exhausted fighting pretty much every other industrial power that mattered, twice.
• Nazi Germany (1933-1945): The third and shortest Reich. Seriously, they thought a thousand years was likely? Everybody point and laugh.

Note that when WWI started, the crowned rulers of Russia, Great Britain, Denmark, Spain, Greece, Germany, Romania, and Norway were all related by blood or marriage.

Notable Fictional Empires

• The First Galactic Empire (Star Wars)
• The Galactic Empire (Isaac Asimov's Foundation series)
• The Galactic Empire (Legend of the Galactic Heroes, this name is fairly common)
• The Empire of the Known Universe (Dune)
• The Empire (Warhammer Fantasy)
• The Imperium of Man (Warhammer 40K)