What was in your opinion greatest Empire in human history and why?

I’d say the British Empire because they were everywhere. They influence many parts of the world.

The British empire. Because I’m British.

The British Empire. At least they tried to improve things for their dependencies.

The Romans.

Unlike many empires (British, China, Russians) the romans did not subjugate their acquired territories, they strove to assimilate them into Roman ways. The almost 400 years in which Britain was a Roman Province was mostly peaceful. Same with the Romans in Judea, Gaul, and Iberia.

@Nomore the Brits were strictly colonialist overlords who wanted nothing more than to squeeze everything they could from the subjects.

I dont like personally in British Empire that it did became an Empire overnight. And it didnt have any practical changes over Kingdom before it, which in theory Still was part of the Empire

@zenvelo I disagree. Many of the cultural norms in their former dependencies were directly adopted from the Brits. Parliamentary government, public schools (not in the American sense) military form and procedures, numerous other things. Much preferable to our own type of colonialism, where we march in, stay a decade or so, install a puppet ruler amenable to doing Uncle Sams bidding, and then bail. After making the world safe for the Yankee Dollar.

The Roman Empire over any other hands down in my opinion.
Not only did they spread their dominance for 2000 years but had no others take them out. Complete dominance. They were extremely advanced for their time. They were architectural geniuses when other civilization was living in huts and houses made of paper. They had running water in their cities hundred’s of years before London in the 1800’s.
The fall of the Roman Empire plunged Europe into the Dark Ages and reverted many cultures backwards.
They were also tolerant of customs, traditions and religious beliefs. Quite different that the backstabbing British Empire.
They inspired the other great empires which wouldn’t have even been possible without the Roman Empire.

“The British Empire. At least they tried to improve things for their dependencies.”

This is wildly and fantastically wrong.

Clearly ancient Rome. Why? length of time, footprint and use of resources.

Oooh. Interesting. IMHO, it can’t be the Hellenistic or Mongol empire because while they were big, neither lasted long enough to matter.

I have a soft spot for the Abassid Caliphate centered in Baghdad as they’re the ones that translated and preserved most of the ancient greek and roman knowledge that survived into the modern day as well as persian. So much of what fueled the renaissance and enlightenment was only possible because of the Abassids. Unfortunately, the rise of Islamic mysticism, the Ottoman Turks, and the onslaught of the Mongols ended them.

I actually think the Roman empire is overrated in terms of scientific advances. Yes, they had a huge influence, but they built alot on the ideas of the Greeks. They were great in some ways, I just think there’s a romanticism that people have about them that doesn’t really line up with the reality.

The British Empire deserves some praise. Contrary to what DigDug said, they did not treat their colonies well at all. But many of the innovations of the enlightenment did come out of it. The Scots deserve alot of the credit, but the modern iteration of democracy was kind of birthed out of this Empire.

But I have to pick one right? I guess I’ll go with the Abassids just to be contrarian.

The glimpses I have seen of China around 600 to 900AD endear me to it. Not an aggressive expansionist empire but a centre of civilization and culture.

@Entropy Romans Loving Greeks is half because of Greeks themselfs, Rome was born with Greece loving Etruscans in north and Greek colonise in south. Some of things which made Romans love Greek culture more than they would otherwise was fact of them beliving that city of Rome was Founded by society of people which all came from fugitive of city of Troy. The myth which was created by Greeks themselfs, Greeks loved creating mythical stories that were explaining how each town was created. Greeks were outstanding in terms of culture and sience. However their idea of town nations was dying after big threats to Greece region showed up. And Empire of Alexander the great was dead right after his death. Only Greek United Empire which actually lasted long was Eastern Roman Empire better know as Byzantine Empire. Which was based on Roman laws and Goverment

The German Empire, of course.

Would we be better off if there had been no empires ever?

I hate being boring, and conforming. But. It was probably Rome….

Midian after the exodus. Great things came out of that place!