I always thought it was the Byzantines who preserved the Roman and Greek works, and that the sack of Constantinople during the 4th crusade led to a lot of those ancient works being brought back to the West.

I guess if we want to talk civilization/culture group then I would say the Hebrews/Jews I mean three major world religions came out of them. Christianity being an offshoot of Judaism and Islam was influenced bey it. Plus they were able to keep their identity despite persecution and being driven from there traditional homeland. Only to make a comeback in the mid 1900s. despite how you feel about any modern controversies, you gotta admit that's impressive. To top it off many great thinkers, inventors, and even politicians have been Jews.

@ Fasces: Actually, I am in complete agreement with you on China, Egypt, and the U.S. and Britain (as well as with xSMTx on the Islamic empire) . All should be considered for number one. However, I think it's worth mentioning that both China and Egypt are really the ancient roots of civilization in general and nearly the only major things going in their age. We also know somewhat less about these pre-Roman empires given the time in which they existed, all of which makes it harder to gauge their achievements vs. the achievements of later empires that we know more about, since later empires have more concurrent societies to be judged against. China also was extremely insular for most of its history.

@goldfinger, Generally, an empire is defined as consisting of multiple ethnic groups, while at this time, Egypt was relatively homogeneous. The Akkadian Empire is considered the first empire because Sargon conquered other peoples. I think. Someone feel free to correct me on that.

The question wasn't list great empires and their achievements. The question was who is the greatest civilization, and for that reason I would argue against Ottoman or Byzantium.

British, Mongolian and Roman are the 3 that top my list.

@Goldfinger: "China was at the very least at Europe's level until the Industrial Revolution"
I wouldn't go that far, but if we look at gunpowder, printing press, compass etc. China was far a head of Europe for most of history.

If we assume that Rome was on par with the Han Dynasty (its a tough call because you can look at amazing innovations from both Europe and Asia leading up to the Rise of both Rome and Han). Europe then regressed in the dark ages while China continued to progress. Europe turned around in the 14th century and started playing catch up to China.

Following the fall of the Yuan dynasty came the Ming Dynasty, a racist, xenophobic leadership. This was a turning point in history because under the Ming China saw innovation come to a halt, meanwhile at the same time Europe had its Renaissance. Prior to the 14th century China was arguably the center of the world in influence and technology, however Europe in the Renaissance and China under Ming pushed the center of the world from Asia to Europe, where we have seen it for the last few centuries.

While I am not going to give an exact date as to when Europe over took Asia (mainly because I don't know one), it was a gradual change but the difference was clear even prior to the industrial revolution.

The industrial revolution wasn't this sudden, out of no where event. It happened in England because England was easily the most advanced nation in the world prior to the revolution.

The next thing to point out was stability. China and Japan were much more stable and saw fewer dynasty changes and revolts then in Europe. However I would argue this held them back. China, especially under the Qing, had an emphasis on stability that prevented any change, either for the good or bad.

The Ming and Qing focused too much on stability, and that lead to the downfall of China, as while China was stable, little progress was seen.

The exact same thing happened to Japan during the Edo Period.

Meanwhile Europe became an increasingly liberal society. (I mean that in the classical sense, liberal meaning free, not liberal meaning progressive as it does today).

With regards to "the first empire," it's so long ago that it's hard to gauge how the uniting of upper and lower Egypt by the first pharaoh, Menes, compares to Akkad. And also, it should be noted that Egyptian scrolls state that Kush pre-dated Egypt, along with a couple of other societies, and that they may have had what amounts to an empire in their time.

"scrolls state that Kush pre-dated Egypt"
Citation needed.

That said the Akkadian empire was predated by Egypt but there were Mesopotamian cities that predated the Egyptian ones.

And if we want to talk about really old civilizations then what about Indus?

As for definition of empire:
/ˈempī(ə)r/
(Noun) An extensive group of states or countries under a single supreme authority, formerly esp. an emperor or empress.

Egypt was an empire under this definition. Lower and Upper Egypt united by the Pharaoh Menes I.

@goldenfinger It was the Byzantines would first recovered it, but it was the Islamic Empire that really took it, improved it and remodeled it. I probably could've made that more clear.

@fasces well I do understand your point, as the Islamic Empire is often neglected in school systems in basic history (at least here in Canada; I was blessed with taking advanced stuff), then I figured I should give a brief rundown of their accomplishments. As for why I think they were the greatest, is in fact, based on these achievements. To me, the issue of "best" boils down to the empire that not only expanded their influence over a large area, but did so not only through conquest, but through trade and a general embracing of their culture. This is not to say that the British and Mongols did not do this, and in fact, I am not so sure that the Muslim did this better. My whole point in bringing them up was to add their name to the discussion (also I find the Islamic world to be vastly more interesting then that of Europe). The Muslim were able to rise from humble beginnings, much like the Mongols and Romans, and grow from a formidable regional power to a world power. Although there is no doubt that Islam was spread by the sword, their merchants were some of the greatest of all time. And their desire to learn and embrace new culture is unparalleled. Look at the example of Ibn Battuta: a great Muslim scholar who traveled the world, seeking out new knowledge to expand that of the empire as a whole. Also, as people saw the wealth and equality of the Muslims, they would often join without the need on conflict. Muslims could be found far outside the borders of the formal empire (like Mali).

And as this expansion was taking place, internally, scholars and mathematicians were making amazing leaps forward (Arabic numerals), and medicine was being developed at an incredibly more efficient rate. As well, as the Islamic Empire came to dominant that part of the world, Arabic became the central language in trade; a role it wouldnt fully loss until the 19th century. Say what you want, but those are certainly the characteristics of greatness, if ever I saw them

"to me, the issue of "best" boils down to the empire that not only expanded their influence over a large area, but did so not only through conquest, but through trade and a general embracing of their culture."
You should chose America as your greatest civilization ever then. As they did this better then anyone else. But in the modern world of globalization it isn't as hard as it once was to do this.

I agree with Islam is neglected in modern history. But everywhere outside of Europe and North America are neglected in American and Canadian schools.

Man, even Europe is neglected. It's Britain, France, Spain, Italy, and the Netherlands, and that's it. Very little, if anything, about Germany, Russia, the Balkans, &c. I mean, I know there's limited time, but I spent way more time on the US Civil War than I did on entire continents.

Wow, mine wasn't nearly that bad! I actually had a fairly good high school history curriculum, but from people I've met since, that was certainly not universal!

@fasces like I said, I am not necessarily claiming the Muslims to be the best, just including them in the conversation. I just so happen to find them extremely interesting, so I have some bias. But don't we all? As for globalisation, I don't see this neo-colonialism to be the same as classic imperialism. Empire is dying, and although they tend to bounce back throughout history, so far, they haven't

The American Empire is an empire with a global hegemony and is the undisputed world power right now. I would put the American Empire near the top of the list of greatest empires of all time.

@Mertvaya: Your an American then. History classes prior to grade 11 in highschool generally teach about the history of your own country.

Since I moved to Canada I was taught about the Romans and the Renaissance in Grade 7, the colonization of North America in grade 8 and the 20th Century in grade 10 (with an emphasis on Canada's involvement. Like WW1 was entirely about the western front and world was 2 was talked about the controversial decision of whether or not Canada needed conscription).

So history has been entirely westernized simply because we took over the world, and not to sound racist here, especially with a name like fasces, but western culture played a significant part in the success of western empires.

I guess for that reason you could play the Greek card, and talk about how Greece was kinda the founder of western civilization and therefore deserves to be mentioned as the greatest empire ever. But then again Greece never was an empire, only Macedon was.

Attica had a brief colonial presence in Southern Italy and southern France but these were rather insignificant (to Athens) and they didn't coincide with the democracy or emphasis on philosophy that G-man claims made Greece great.

I guess what I am trying to get at is that Greece can't be considered the greatest empire of all time because Greece cant even be considered an empire.

@ Fasces: I believe the "Cush" were actually a little later, but here is the society I was thinking of that seems to have likely pre-dated the Egyptians:

http://www.amazon.com/Black-Genesis-Prehistoric-Origins-Ancient/dp/159143114X/ref=pd_rhf_dp_s_cp_3

Economic/ corporate empires just aren't equivalent to political empires. Just I see this as more of an apples to oranges comparison. No doubt that the Americans have the greatest economic empire, but they just aren't the same entity as the great political empires of history. At least in my opinion

@G-man: fair enough, I hadn't heard of Kush before today and wikipedia said that they cam after the Egyptians.

@xSMTx: America is not just an economic empire. It is an empire in every traditional sense of the world.

Re. the Greeks: In terms of the history of the Ancient Kingdom of Macedon, there is strong historical evidence which suggests that the ancient Macedonians were of Doric origin, which would make them Greek. The ancient Macedonians competed in the ancient Olympics, self identified themselves as Greeks and spread Greek culture/language during the Hellenistic period during the conquests of Alexander the Great. It is now debated amongst scholars if they were originally Greek or became Greek after contact with colonies from the south Greek city-states, still evidence such as the Pella curse Tablet suggests that at least from the 5th century B.C. the Kingdom of Macedon was Greek speaking and worshiped the Greek Pantheon - in contradiction with the Kingdom of Paeonia in the north which practised pagan religions. Evidence of this can be found in archeological sites around mt. Olympus in the city of Dion, where a large number of inscriptions have been found written by Macedonian nobility as a tribute to victories in the Olympic Games, which in antiquity only Greeks could compete.

I am not saying that Macedon wasn't greek, what I am saying is that the Greek empire you claimed was the greatest empire in history and that you described in your first few posts never actually existed.

I like the Romans. Just Something about they way they exicuted thier prisoners with no mercy whatsoever just makes me kinda warm inside xDD

@ Fasces: I see what you are referring to with regards to the different types of Greek culture here, but then there is a similar issue with regards the other empires we are speaking of, like which Chinese or Egyptian dynasty are we talking about? Also, though the Macedonians differ greatly from the classical Greeks in many aspects, like democracy and philosophy, they also spread and advanced other achievements of classical Greek culture during the Hellenistic period.

I think Mongols due to the fact that they had the larges land based empire in history. The whole thing connected and wasn't split at any point. They also had many vassal states. Not to mention they protected trading merchants and promoted ideas in their empire to flourish. So i think its the Mongols.

Whether it was Macedon or Sparta or Athens or any other city-state or mongol tribe. or Latin city the essence is the same.

Secondly the variables to choose from the greatest empire differ greatly + gaps in historical accounts -) especially for mongols, china thus downgrading the importance of those powers)

So the only variable that I think is acceptable is HOW they rose to power and WHO did they overcome.

Therefore for me the no.1 is the Greek-Macedonian empire since they went up against the strongest and richest empire at the time, and though heavily outnumbered they were able to defeat the Persians in several real battles by applying outstanding strategy. Second I rank the Romans for they had to deal several formidable enemies.

Mongols had to overcome the Chinese. They also conquered many enemies. All of which were strong. They conquered Persia as well, Or the empire that controlled that area. Another thing. the enemies that the Mongols faced always outnumbered them.

oh and there is also the time it took each to knock down there enemies! Neither the Egyptians, the americans, the mongols nor the romans had done that as swiftly and effectively as the Macedonias. The latter had knocked down the greatest army-empire-enemy in no more than 4 years!

@G-Man, the co-author of that book also wrote this one: http://www.amazon.com/Origin-Map-Prehistoric-Megalithic-Astrophysical/dp/0595241220/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1356707078&sr=1-1&keywords=origin+map about how ancient peoples had an accurate star map of the galaxy... I might take him with a grain of salt...

@Cypeg: The Greeks had been beating the shit out of the Persians for 150 years by then. Battle of Thermopylae and Battle of Marathon were 2 battles were the number were more one sided then any battles that Alexander had to face and most of the battles that Alexander fought against the Persians and in reality in the Persian invasion there were only 2 battles were Alexander was outnumbered, battle of Issus and battle of Gaugamela.

Persia had been on the decline for 150 years before the war and Greece was on the rise.

Stop treating Alexander like a god, he was still human just like you or me. (granted a very impressive specimen)

Continuing the Greeks over Persians thing: check out the Spartan King Agesilaus. He was in Persia, handing the Persians their asses, before being recalled by his government to deal with problems in Greece. Or check out the Ten Thousand: a bunch of leaderless Greek mercenaries who had just fought a battle against the Persian emperor, lost, and still made it back home alive, having fought their way there from the Persian capital.

Alexander was definitely a capable general and leader, but he was far from unique among the Greeks in being able to defeat the Persians on their own turf.

Hence my:
"The Greeks had been beating the shit out of the Persians for 150 years by then"

Persia was already on the decline by that point, Macedon just came about at the right place at the right time, it wasn't as impressive as the Greek fans make it out to be.

@ Mertvaya Ruka: Agreed, though he is not the only source to "infer" that there were earlier civilizations and, perhaps, empires that pre-date the Egyptians, which is why I only mentioned it as a footnote of a possibility. But given the state of Egyptian accomplishments, I don't think it's too hard to believe that there were civilizations that pre-dated them. They just existed so long ago, and in such early times, that I think it will be hard to find more evidence to support how advanced they were at this point.