Talk:List of largest empires

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Empires with sourced areas but without dates

Latest comment: 2 years ago5 comments2 people in discussion

I figured I'd make a section for empires where sources have been found for the maximum extent but with no year specified (meaning they can't be included in the list). My hope is that this will be helpful when people try to locate sources. Feel free to add entries of your own to the list below. TompaDompa (talk) 23:38, 3 July 2020 (UTC)Reply

Ashanti Empire: 100,000 square miles^[1] – since added using this source which provides the corresponding figure of 250,000 km² and the year 1820.^[2] TompaDompa (talk) 21:05, 18 November 2022 (UTC)Reply
Balhae: 438,000 km²^[3]
Đại Cồ Việt: 110,000 km²^[4]
Durrani Empire: 780,000 square miles/2,000,000 km²^[5]
Dzungar Khanate: 3,600,000 km²^[3] – since added using this source which provides the same figure and the year 1650.^[6] TompaDompa (talk) 03:03, 18 January 2021 (UTC)Reply
Kanem Empire: 300,000 square miles^[7]
Nguyễn dynasty: 370,000 km²^[8]
Southern Qi: 2,147,000 km²^[3]
Phoenicia: 250,000 square miles^[9]
Vijayanagara Empire: 360,000 km²^[10]
Wari Empire: 320,000 km²^[11]
Wuhuan: 400,000 km²^[3]
Xianbei state: 4,500,000 km²^[3] – since added using this source which provides the same figure and the year 200.^[6] TompaDompa (talk) 03:03, 18 January 2021 (UTC)Reply
Grand Duchy of Lithuania: 930,000 km²^[12] (TTioCrocEzatu)

I think we can add those empires in the list, I would only noted in the time cell "unknown". Janos Neman (talk) 12:09, 16 November 2023 (UTC)Reply

This article is about largest empires, as such they might not have been at the time they existed. Slatersteven (talk)

References

↑ Obeng, J. Pashington (1996). Asante Catholicism: Religious and Cultural Reproduction Among the Akan of Ghana. BRILL. p. 20. ISBN 978-90-04-10631-4. An empire of a hundred thousand square miles, occupied by about three million people from different ethnic groups, made it imperative for the Asante to evolve sophisticated statal and parastatal institutions [...]
↑ Iliffe, John (1995-08-25). Africans: The History of a Continent. Cambridge University Press. p. 143. ISBN 978-0-521-48422-0. At its peak around 1820 the empire embraced over 250,000 square kilometres [...]
1 2 3 4 5 Cioffi-Revilla, Claudio; Rogers, J. Daniel; Wilcox, Steven P.; Alterman, Jai (2008). "Computing the Steppes: Data Analysis for Agent-Based Modeling of Polities in Inner Asia" (PDF). Proceedings of the 104th Annual Meeting of the American Political Scientific Association. pp. 8–9. Retrieved 2020-07-13.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
↑ Wade, Geoff (2014-10-17). Asian Expansions: The Historical Experiences of Polity Expansion in Asia. Routledge. p. 144. ISBN 978-1-135-04353-7. [T]he state of Đại Cồ Việt was established in the tenth century [...] The maximum extent of the territory at that time was around 110,000 square kilometres.
↑ Bosin, Yury V. (2009), "Durrani Empire, Popular Protests, 1747–1823" (PDF), The International Encyclopedia of Revolution and Protest, p. 1029, doi:10.1002/9781405198073.wbierp0481, ISBN 978-1-4051-9807-3, retrieved 2020-07-14{{citation}}: CS1 maint: work parameter with ISBN (link)
1 2 Bang, Peter Fibiger; Bayly, C. A.; Scheidel, Walter (2020-12-02). The Oxford World History of Empire: Volume One: The Imperial Experience. Oxford University Press. pp. 92–94. ISBN 978-0-19-977311-4.
↑ Shillington, Kevin (2013-07-04). Encyclopedia of African History 3-Volume Set. Routledge. p. 733. ISBN 978-1-135-45670-2. The limits of the empire correspond approximately with the boundaries of the Chad Basin, an area of more than 300,000 square miles.
↑ Wade, Geoff (2014-10-17). Asian Expansions: The Historical Experiences of Polity Expansion in Asia. Routledge. p. 144. ISBN 978-1-135-04353-7. [W]hen Nguyễn Vietnam surrendered to France in the late nineteenth century the territory it claimed to control had more than tripled to over 370,000 square kilometres
↑ Hart, Hornell (1948). "The Logistic Growth of Political Areas". Social Forces. 26 (4): 402. doi:10.2307/2571873. ISSN 0037-7732. In the Mediterranean area the earliest historic governments which extended their territory by major use of fleets were the Greek and the Phoenecian, reaching areas of approximately 250,000 square miles each
↑ Morrison, Kathleen D.; Sinopoli, Carla M. (1992). "Economic Diversity and Integration in a Pre-Colonial Indian Empire". World Archaeology. 23 (3): 336. ISSN 0043-8243. At its maximal extent the Vijayanagara empire encompassed some 360,000 square kilometers
↑ Alcock, Susan E.; D'Altroy, Terence N.; Morrison, Kathleen D.; Sinopoli, Carla M. (2001-08-09). Empires: Perspectives from Archaeology and History. Cambridge University Press. p. 85. ISBN 978-0-521-77020-0. The total spatial extent of the empire, not including the north coast, I estimate to have been some 320,000 square kilometers.
↑ Vaitekūnas, Stasys. "Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės gyventojai". VLE.lt (in Lithuanian). Retrieved 19 September 2021.

Proposal to switch comparison map to Equal Earth projection

Latest comment: 2 months ago7 comments3 people in discussion

I’m proposing to update the comparison map from Robinson to the Equal Earth projection. Since this article focuses on "land area," using an equal-area projection is the technically superior choice for accurate visual representation.

Regarding the borders:

Mongol Empire:' I have updated the boundaries based on The Cambridge History of the Mongol Empire (2023) (page 27), which provides a more precise administrative extent compared to the 2002 illustrative atlas currently used.
British Empire: Any minor technical discrepancies (such as the Sarra Triangle) will be corrected to ensure consistency with the existing version.

This update prioritizes both cartographic accuracy and modern academic scholarship. Any objections? TompaDompa HistoryHubArchive (talk) 16:51, 13 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

I gather that page 27 means page 27 of the pdf, i.e. page 3 of the cited book. That map comes from the following source:

Biran, Michal (2021). "The Mongol Imperial Space: From Universalism to Glocalization". In Pines, Yuri; Biran, Michal; Rüpke, Jörg (eds.). The Limits of Universal Rule: Eurasian Empires Compared. Cambridge University Press. p. 238. doi:10.1017/9781108771061.008. ISBN 978-1-108-48863-1.

The original source is the one that should be cited. The author Michal Biran is not the politician Michal Biran, but the historian Michal Biran (historian) [he; ru]. I think this is a high-quality (top-tier?) source on the subject, but let's ask an editor who is knowledgable about sources on the Mongols: AirshipJungleman29. TompaDompa (talk) 21:21, 13 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Yes, Michal Biran is a top-quality source on the Mongol Empire, being a co-editor of the Cambridge History mentioned above. Although I don’t particularly want to slog through the walls of AI-smoothened text above, I gather the discussion is about depiction of the borders of the Mongol Empire? If so, this recent paper may be relevant. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 21:34, 13 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thanks TompaDompa for formatting the citation; I will use the Biran (2021) reference for the file description. And thanks AirshipJungleman29 for confirming the source quality and sharing the Pow paper. Pow's re-evaluation of the northern frontier perfectly explains why the boundaries need this update. I will fix the British Empire's Sarra Triangle to match the previous version, and finalize the Mongol borders using Biran and Pow's findings on the Equal Earth projection. I'll upload the adjusted version shortly. HistoryHubArchive (talk) 04:50, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Suffice it to say that Pow's conception of the northern border of the Mongol Empire does not represent the consensus position among academics, and that our map should therefore not be based on it. TompaDompa (talk) 13:27, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Fair point on the northern frontier consensus. However, the updated boundaries I'm proposing primarily follow Biran (2021), which we’ve already agreed is a top-tier academic source. Pow's paper simply provides the technical context for why modern scholarship (like Biran) moves away from the older, more generalized borders of the 2002 atlas. I will stick to the Biran (2021) depiction for the final map. Any objections to using Biran's borders? HistoryHubArchive (talk) 02:23, 15 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Since it has been a week without further objections regarding the Biran (2021) boundaries, I assume we have reached a consensus. I will proceed with updating the comparison map to the Equal Earth projection using these academic borders shortly. Thanks all for the input. TompaDompa AirshipJungleman29 HistoryHubArchive (talk) 14:00, 22 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

[1] Obeng, J. Pashington (1996). Asante Catholicism: Religious and Cultural Reproduction Among the Akan of Ghana. BRILL. p. 20. ISBN 978-90-04-10631-4. An empire of a hundred thousand square miles, occupied by about three million people from different ethnic groups, made it imperative for the Asante to evolve sophisticated statal and parastatal institutions [...]

[IlliffeAsante-2] Iliffe, John (1995-08-25). Africans: The History of a Continent. Cambridge University Press. p. 143. ISBN 978-0-521-48422-0. At its peak around 1820 the empire embraced over 250,000 square kilometres [...]

[Steppes-3] 1 2 3 4 5 Cioffi-Revilla, Claudio; Rogers, J. Daniel; Wilcox, Steven P.; Alterman, Jai (2008). "Computing the Steppes: Data Analysis for Agent-Based Modeling of Polities in Inner Asia" (PDF). Proceedings of the 104th Annual Meeting of the American Political Scientific Association. pp. 8–9. Retrieved 2020-07-13.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)

[4] Wade, Geoff (2014-10-17). Asian Expansions: The Historical Experiences of Polity Expansion in Asia. Routledge. p. 144. ISBN 978-1-135-04353-7. [T]he state of Đại Cồ Việt was established in the tenth century [...] The maximum extent of the territory at that time was around 110,000 square kilometres.

[5] Bosin, Yury V. (2009), "Durrani Empire, Popular Protests, 1747–1823" (PDF), The International Encyclopedia of Revolution and Protest, p. 1029, doi:10.1002/9781405198073.wbierp0481, ISBN 978-1-4051-9807-3, retrieved 2020-07-14{{citation}}: CS1 maint: work parameter with ISBN (link)

[Oxford-6] 1 2 Bang, Peter Fibiger; Bayly, C. A.; Scheidel, Walter (2020-12-02). The Oxford World History of Empire: Volume One: The Imperial Experience. Oxford University Press. pp. 92–94. ISBN 978-0-19-977311-4.

[7] Shillington, Kevin (2013-07-04). Encyclopedia of African History 3-Volume Set. Routledge. p. 733. ISBN 978-1-135-45670-2. The limits of the empire correspond approximately with the boundaries of the Chad Basin, an area of more than 300,000 square miles.

[8] Wade, Geoff (2014-10-17). Asian Expansions: The Historical Experiences of Polity Expansion in Asia. Routledge. p. 144. ISBN 978-1-135-04353-7. [W]hen Nguyễn Vietnam surrendered to France in the late nineteenth century the territory it claimed to control had more than tripled to over 370,000 square kilometres

[9] Hart, Hornell (1948). "The Logistic Growth of Political Areas". Social Forces. 26 (4): 402. doi:10.2307/2571873. ISSN 0037-7732. In the Mediterranean area the earliest historic governments which extended their territory by major use of fleets were the Greek and the Phoenecian, reaching areas of approximately 250,000 square miles each

[10] Morrison, Kathleen D.; Sinopoli, Carla M. (1992). "Economic Diversity and Integration in a Pre-Colonial Indian Empire". World Archaeology. 23 (3): 336. ISSN 0043-8243. At its maximal extent the Vijayanagara empire encompassed some 360,000 square kilometers

[11] Alcock, Susan E.; D'Altroy, Terence N.; Morrison, Kathleen D.; Sinopoli, Carla M. (2001-08-09). Empires: Perspectives from Archaeology and History. Cambridge University Press. p. 85. ISBN 978-0-521-77020-0. The total spatial extent of the empire, not including the north coast, I estimate to have been some 320,000 square kilometers.

[12] Vaitekūnas, Stasys. "Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės gyventojai". VLE.lt (in Lithuanian). Retrieved 19 September 2021.

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A page that knows where it met you.

Empires with sourced areas but without dates

Proposal to switch comparison map to Equal Earth projection