World empires timeline

Akkadian Empire

c. 2334 to 2154 BCE. about 180 years. capital Akkad. Mesopotamia, Middle East.

Sargon of Akkad united Sumer and northern Mesopotamia in what is often seen as the first empire, and his grandson Naram-Sin declared himself a living god. Revolts, a major drought and Gutian, Amorite and Elamite pressure brought it down.

Old Babylonian Empire

c. 1894 to 1595 BCE. about 299 years. capital Babylon. Mesopotamia, Middle East.

Amorite dynasty that Hammurabi made master of Mesopotamia, carving his law code on a stone stele. The Hittite king Mursili I sacked Babylon in 1595 BCE.

New Kingdom of Egypt

c. 1550 to 1069 BCE. about 481 years. capital Thebes, Amarna, Memphis, Pi-Ramesses. Egypt, North and West Africa.

Egypt's imperial age, ruling Nubia and Canaan under pharaohs such as Hatshepsut, Thutmose III, Akhenaten, Tutankhamun and Ramesses II. It faded after the Sea Peoples and the loss of its empire.

Hittite Empire (New Kingdom)

c. 1400 to 1190 BCE. about 210 years. capital Hattusa, briefly Tarhuntassa. Anatolia, Middle East.

Suppiluliuma I broke Mitanni and took northern Syria, making the Hittites Egypt's great rival. After Kadesh they signed one of the oldest surviving treaties, then Hattusa was gradually abandoned around 1190 BCE.

Neo-Assyrian Empire

911 to 609 BCE. about 302 years. capital Assur, then Nimrud, then Nineveh. Mesopotamia, Middle East.

Largest empire of its time, ruling all of Mesopotamia, the Levant and Egypt with a standing army and mass resettlement of conquered peoples. Ashurbanipal gathered a great library at Nineveh, which the Medes and Babylonians captured in 612 BCE.

Achaemenid Empire

550 to 330 BCE. about 220 years. capital Pasargadae, Persepolis, Susa, Babylon. Iran, Middle East.

Cyrus the Great and his successors built the largest empire of its time, from Egypt and Thrace to the Indus, joined by the Royal Road and run by satraps. Alexander conquered it by 330 BCE after Gaugamela.

Empire of Alexander the Great

336 to 323 BCE. about 13 years. capital Pella (Babylon planned). Balkans and Greece, Europe.

Alexander III conquered the Persian Empire, from Egypt to the Indus, in ten years of campaigns. After his death in Babylon in 323 BCE civil wars among his generals, the Diadochi, broke it apart.

Maurya Empire

c. 322 to 185 BCE. about 137 years. capital Pataliputra. Gangetic plain and Nepal, South Asia.

Chandragupta Maurya, by tradition counselled by Chanakya, overthrew the Nandas and ruled from Pataliputra to Afghanistan. His grandson Ashoka turned to Buddhism after the Kalinga war and set up edicts across South Asia; the last emperor was killed by his general Pushyamitra.

Parthian Empire

247 BCE to 224 CE. about 470 years. capital Nisa, Hecatompylos, Ctesiphon. Iran, Middle East.

Arsacid dynasty founded by Arsaces I, chief of the Parni, who conquered Parthia in Iran's northeast. It destroyed Crassus's Roman army at Carrhae in 53 BCE and became a centre of trade on the Silk Road between Rome and Han China.

Qin dynasty

221 to 206 BCE. about 15 years. capital Xianyang. North China, East Asia.

Qin Shi Huang, the First Emperor, standardized script, coins, weights and axle widths, linked the northern walls and was buried with the Terracotta Army. Revolts broke out after his death and the dynasty fell within four years.

Xiongnu Empire

c. 209 BCE to 93 CE. about 301 years. capital Longcheng (mobile court). Mongolian plateau, Central and North Asia.

A nomadic empire founded by Modu Chanyu after 209 BCE. For decades the Han sent brides and gifts of silk to keep the peace, until Han campaigns pushed it back. It split in 48 CE and the Xianbei took over its lands from 91. Its language is unknown and debated.

Western Han

202 BCE to 9 CE. about 210 years. capital Chang'an. North China, East Asia.

Founded by the commoner Liu Bang. Emperor Wu sponsored Confucianism at court, fought the Xiongnu and pushed into Central Asia, Korea and Vietnam; the regent Wang Mang usurped the throne in 9 CE.

Roman Empire

27 BCE to 395 CE. about 421 years. capital Rome, later Constantinople. Italy, Europe.

In 27 BCE the Senate gave Octavian the title Augustus, marking him as the first emperor. The empire reached its greatest extent under Trajan and encircled the Mediterranean. Theodosius I, the last emperor to rule both East and West, died in 395.

Eastern Han

25 to 220 CE. about 195 years. capital Luoyang. North China, East Asia.

Liu Xiu restored the Han with its capital at Luoyang. Cai Lun refined papermaking in 105 and Buddhism first entered China in this era; court eunuchs, the Yellow Turban revolt and warlords tore it apart.

Kushan Empire

c. 30 to 375 CE. about 345 years. capital Kapisa, then Purushapura (Peshawar) and Mathura. Afghanistan and the northwest, South Asia.

Kujula Kadphises united the Yuezhi clans and his heirs ruled from the Oxus to the Ganges. Under Kanishka it sat at the hub of Silk Road trade and spread Mahayana Buddhism and Gandharan art. Sasanian Persia and the Guptas broke it up.

Kingdom of Aksum

c. 100 to 960 CE. about 860 years. capital Aksum. Horn of Africa, North and West Africa.

Red Sea trading power that minted its own coins and raised giant stone stelae. King Ezana adopted Christianity in the 4th century and Kaleb invaded Yemen around 520. Aksum declined from the 7th century and collapsed around 960.

Sasanian Empire

224 to 651 CE. about 427 years. capital Ctesiphon. Iran, Middle East.

Persian dynasty that revived Zoroastrianism as its official religion and fought repeated wars with Rome and Byzantium. Exhausted by the war of 602 to 628, it fell to the Muslim conquest, and the last shah, Yazdegerd III, was killed in 651.

Ghana Empire (Wagadu)

c. 300 to 1200 CE. about 900 years. capital Koumbi Saleh (probably). Sahara and Sahel, North and West Africa.

Soninke empire between the Senegal and Niger rivers that held a monopoly on gold heading north and salt heading south. Arab writers called it the land of gold. An Almoravid conquest in 1076 is now doubted, and the Sosso took Ghana by 1203.

Gupta Empire

c. 320 to 550 CE. about 230 years. capital Pataliputra, Ujjain. Gangetic plain and Nepal, South Asia.

Founded in the 3rd century, the dynasty built an empire across north India under Chandragupta I (from about 320), Samudragupta and Chandragupta II. The age of Kalidasa and Aryabhata ended with Hun invasions and breakaway feudatories.

Hunnic Empire

c. 370 to 469 CE. about 99 years. capital Attila's court. Russia and the Steppe, Europe.

Steppe nomads who reached the Volga by 370, set off the westward movement of the Goths and under Attila took gold tribute from the Eastern Roman Empire and invaded Gaul and Italy. Their empire broke up after Attila died in 453.

Byzantine Empire

395 to 1453 CE. about 1,058 years. capital Constantinople. Balkans and Greece, Europe.

The eastern Roman Empire, centred on Constantinople, where Greek gradually replaced Latin for official use. Justinian briefly retook much of Italy, and the city withstood Arab sieges until the Ottomans took it in 1453.

First Turkic Khaganate

552 to 603 CE. about 51 years. capital Otuken. Mongolian plateau, Central and North Asia.

Founded by Bumin of the Ashina clan, who defeated the Rouran in 552. It became the first Central Asian transcontinental empire, from Manchuria to the Black Sea, and sent silk embassies to Byzantium. Civil wars split it into eastern and western khaganates.

Tang dynasty

618 to 907 CE. about 289 years. capital Chang'an, Luoyang. North China, East Asia.

A cosmopolitan empire whose capital Chang'an was the world's most populous city for much of the era, the age of the poets Li Bai and Du Fu and of woodblock printing. The An Lushan rebellion of 755 began a long decline, and the warlord Zhu Wen ended it in 907.

Rashidun Caliphate

632 to 661 CE. about 29 years. capital Medina, later Kufa. Arabia, Middle East.

The first four caliphs conquered the Sasanian Empire and Byzantine Syria and Egypt in two decades. Uthman's murder in 656 set off a civil war between Ali and Mu'awiya, who founded the Umayyad Caliphate in 661.

Srivijaya

c. 650 to 1377 CE. about 727 years. capital Palembang, later Jambi. Malay Peninsula and Sumatra, Southeast Asia.

A Malay Buddhist empire based at Palembang that dominated much of western maritime Southeast Asia and was a centre of Buddhist learning. Chola raids in 1025 weakened it, power shifted to Jambi, and a Majapahit attack on Palembang in 1377 ended its last successor.

Umayyad Caliphate

661 to 750 CE. about 89 years. capital Damascus. Levant, Middle East.

First hereditary caliphate, ruling from Damascus over lands from Spain to Sindh. It built the Dome of the Rock and made Arabic the language of government before the Abbasids overthrew it in 750.

Abbasid Caliphate

750 to 1258 CE. about 508 years. capital Kufa, then Baghdad (briefly Samarra). Mesopotamia, Middle East.

Caliphs who founded Baghdad in 762 and made it a centre of learning with the House of Wisdom. After 945 real power passed to Buyid and Seljuk sultans, and the Mongols killed the last caliph of Baghdad in 1258.

Carolingian Empire

751 to 843 CE. about 92 years. capital Aachen. France and the Low Countries, Europe.

Pepin the Short's dynasty. His son Charlemagne conquered Saxony, Lombardy and Bavaria and was crowned emperor in Rome in 800. His grandsons divided the empire at Verdun in 843.

Khmer Empire

802 to 1431 CE. about 629 years. capital Angkor (Yasodharapura). Cambodia, Southeast Asia.

Jayavarman II proclaimed himself universal ruler in 802. His successors built Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom and ruled or held as vassals most of mainland Southeast Asia, until in 1431, under Siamese pressure, the court left Angkor for the Phnom Penh area.

Chola Empire

848 to 1279 CE. about 431 years. capital Thanjavur, later Gangaikonda Cholapuram. Tamil south and Sri Lanka, South Asia.

Rajaraja I and Rajendra I conquered the south, Sri Lanka and the Maldives, raided the Ganges, sent a fleet against Srivijaya in 1025 and built the Brihadeeswara temple at Thanjavur. Pandya victories ended the dynasty in 1279.

Fatimid Caliphate

909 to 1171 CE. about 262 years. capital Mahdia, then Cairo. Egypt, North and West Africa.

Ismaili Shia caliphate founded in Ifriqiya in 909 that conquered Egypt in 969, founding Cairo and al-Azhar. At its height it ruled from Sicily to the Hejaz. Saladin abolished it in 1171.

Northern Song

960 to 1127 CE. about 167 years. capital Kaifeng. North China, East Asia.

A state run by examination-trained scholar officials, with paper money, movable type, gunpowder weapons and a commercial boom. It paid tribute to the Liao, and the Jurchens captured Kaifeng and two emperors in 1127.

Holy Roman Empire

962 to 1806 CE. about 844 years. capital None fixed (imperial seats at Prague, later Vienna). Central Europe, Europe.

Dated from Otto I's imperial coronation in 962 (some date it from 800), a decentralised empire of German, Italian and Burgundian lands under an elected emperor. The Thirty Years' War devastated it, and Francis II dissolved it in 1806.

Great Seljuk Empire

1037 to 1194 CE. about 157 years. capital Nishapur, Rayy, Isfahan, Merv. Iran, Middle East.

Oghuz Turks who took Baghdad in 1055, beat Byzantium at Manzikert in 1071 and ruled from Central Asia to Syria. The vizier Nizam al-Mulk founded the Nizamiyya madrasas, and the empire split after Malik-Shah I died in 1092.

Almoravid dynasty

c. 1040 to 1147 CE. about 107 years. capital Marrakesh. Maghreb, North and West Africa.

Sanhaja Berber reform movement from the western Sahara that founded Marrakesh around 1070 and united the western Maghreb and al-Andalus, defeating Castile at Sagrajas in 1086. The Almohads took Marrakesh in 1147.

Mongol Empire

1206 to 1368 CE. about 162 years. capital Karakorum, later Khanbaliq. Mongolian plateau, Central and North Asia.

Genghis Khan united the steppe in 1206, and he and his heirs built the largest contiguous empire in history, from the Sea of Japan to Eastern Europe. After 1260 it split into the Yuan, Chagatai, Golden Horde and Ilkhanate.

Mali Empire

c. 1235 to 1610 CE. about 375 years. capital Disputed (traditionally Niani). Sahara and Sahel, North and West Africa.

Mandinka empire founded by Sundiata Keita, at its peak the largest in West Africa. Mansa Musa's pilgrimage of 1324 to 1326 spent enough gold to cause inflation in Egypt, and Timbuktu, annexed in 1324, became a centre of learning.

Ethiopian Empire (Solomonic dynasty)

1270 to 1974 CE. about 704 years. capital Mobile courts, Gondar, later Addis Ababa. Horn of Africa, North and West Africa.

Christian empire whose kings claimed descent from Solomon and Sheba. It survived Adal's jihad, built castles at Gondar, beat Italy at Adwa in 1896 and ended with Haile Selassie's overthrow in 1974.

Yuan dynasty

1271 to 1368 CE. about 97 years. capital Shangdu, then Khanbaliq (Beijing). North China, East Asia.

Kublai Khan's dynasty, the first founded by a non-Han people to rule all of China proper. It welcomed visitors such as Marco Polo and twice failed to invade Japan; famines and the Red Turban Rebellion drove it north from Khanbaliq in 1368.

Majapahit Empire

c. 1293 to 1527 CE. about 234 years. capital Trowulan. Java and Eastern Indonesia, Southeast Asia.

Raden Wijaya used a Mongol invasion force to defeat his rivals and then drove it out in 1293. Under Hayam Wuruk and his minister Gajah Mada it claimed overlordship of most of the archipelago, before a civil war weakened it and Demak conquered it in 1527.

Ottoman Empire

1299 to 1922 CE. about 623 years. capital Bursa, Edirne, then Constantinople. Balkans and Greece, Europe.

From Anatolia the Ottomans crossed into Europe at Gallipoli in 1354 and ruled the Balkans for five centuries, besieging Vienna in 1529 and 1683. Defeat in 1918 led to the sultanate's abolition in 1922.

Ming dynasty

1368 to 1644 CE. about 276 years. capital Nanjing, then Beijing (from 1420). North China, East Asia.

Founded by the peasant rebel Zhu Yuanzhang. The Yongle Emperor built the Forbidden City and sent Zheng He's fleets as far as East Africa, the Great Wall was fortified into its modern form, and the rebel Li Zicheng took Beijing in 1644.

Timurid Empire

1370 to 1507 CE. about 137 years. capital Samarkand, later Herat. Transoxiana and Khwarazm, Central and North Asia.

Timur, ruling from Samarkand, defeated the Golden Horde, the Mamluks, the Ottomans and the Delhi Sultanate. His grandson Ulugh Beg built madrasas and an observatory at Samarkand, and the Uzbeks under Muhammad Shaybani took almost all Timurid lands by 1507.

Portuguese Empire

1415 to 1999 CE. about 584 years. capital Lisbon. Iberia, Europe.

Starting with the capture of Ceuta in 1415, Portugal built the first and longest-lasting European colonial empire, from Brazil to Goa, Malacca and Macau. It ended with the handover of Macau to China in 1999.

Aztec Empire (Triple Alliance)

1428 to 1521 CE. about 93 years. capital Tenochtitlan. Central and West Mexico, Mesoamerica and Caribbean.

Alliance of Tenochtitlan, Texcoco and Tlacopan that took tribute from about 38 provinces. Tenochtitlan held some 200,000 people when Cortés and his Tlaxcalan allies captured it in 1521.

Inca Empire (Tawantinsuyu)

c. 1438 to 1533 CE. about 95 years. capital Cusco. Central Andean Highlands, South America.

The largest empire of pre-Columbian America, reaching from Ecuador to central Chile, with around 10 million people and some 40,000 km of roads. Weakened by civil war and probably smallpox, it fell to Pizarro after Atahualpa's capture in 1532.

Songhai Empire

1464 to 1591 CE. about 127 years. capital Gao. Sahara and Sahel, North and West Africa.

One of the largest African empires, built by Sonni Ali and Askia Muhammad along the Niger from Gao. A Moroccan army with arquebuses and cannon routed it at Tondibi in 1591.

Safavid Empire

1501 to 1736 CE. about 235 years. capital Tabriz, Qazvin, Isfahan. Iran, Middle East.

Dynasty of a Sufi order of Iranian (possibly Kurdish) origin, carried to power by Turkoman Qizilbash tribes. Ismail I made Twelver Shi'ism the state religion, Shah Abbas I remade Isfahan as his capital from 1598, and Afghans took Isfahan in 1722.

Spanish Empire (Habsburg Spain)

1516 to 1700 CE. about 184 years. capital Madrid (from 1561). Iberia, Europe.

Charles V and Philip II ruled Castile, Aragon, the Netherlands, much of Italy and the Americas, and fought long wars with France, the Dutch and England. The line ended with the death of Charles II in 1700.

Habsburg Monarchy

1526 to 1804 CE. about 278 years. capital Vienna. Central Europe, Europe.

Ferdinand I was elected king of Bohemia and Hungary in 1526. Vienna withstood Ottoman attacks in 1529 and 1683, and Maria Theresa fought to keep her inheritance in the 1740s, losing most of Silesia to Prussia.

Mughal Empire

1526 to 1857 CE. about 331 years. capital Agra, Fatehpur Sikri, Lahore, Delhi. Gangetic plain and Nepal, South Asia.

Founded in 1526 by Babur, a Timurid prince from Fergana. Under Akbar, Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb it ruled most of the subcontinent and built monuments such as the Taj Mahal; by 1760 it was reduced to the area around Delhi, and the British dissolved it after 1857.

Qing dynasty

1636 to 1912 CE. about 276 years. capital Mukden, then Beijing (from 1644). North China, East Asia.

The Manchu dynasty that took Beijing in 1644 and ruled the most territory of any Chinese dynasty, peaking in the High Qing era that began under the Kangxi Emperor. The Opium Wars, unequal treaties and the Taiping Rebellion weakened it, and the 1911 revolution ended it.

Russian Empire

1721 to 1917 CE. about 196 years. capital Saint Petersburg. Russia and the Steppe, Europe.

Peter the Great proclaimed the empire after defeating Sweden. It spanned Europe and northern Asia, beat Napoleon in 1812 and freed the serfs in 1861, then collapsed in revolution in 1917.

First French Empire

1804 to 1815 CE. about 11 years. capital Paris. France and the Low Countries, Europe.

Napoleon was proclaimed emperor in 1804 and dominated the continent from Spain to Poland after Austerlitz. The Russian disaster of 1812 and Waterloo in 1815 ended it.

Empire of Japan

1868 to 1947 CE. about 79 years. capital Tokyo. Japan, East Asia.

The Meiji Restoration launched rapid industrialization and militarization, and Japan beat China in 1895 and Russia in 1905. Militarists led it into war with China and the United States, ending in defeat and the atomic bombings of 1945.

German Empire

1871 to 1918 CE. about 47 years. capital Berlin. Central Europe, Europe.

Proclaimed at Versailles in 1871 under the Prussian king, it became the largest economy in continental Europe and gained colonies in Africa and the Pacific. Defeat in 1918 ended the monarchy.