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| Largest Empires of All-Time By Landmass |  | | Largest empires or all-time ranked by total landmass |
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British Empire
36.6 million kmē (20th century)
The British Empire was the most extensive empire in world history and for a substantial time was not only a major power but the foremost power in the world. It was a product of the European age of discovery, which began with the global maritime explorations of the Iberian states in the late 15th century, that inaugurated the era of the European global empires.
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3
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Russian Empire
22.8 million kmē (19th century)
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until it was declared a republic in August 1917.
The Russian Empire also has a cult following on MySpace.com
See External Links section on the bottom of the page to view.
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4
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Spanish Empire
19 million kmē (16th century)
The Spanish Empire was the first truly global empire. It was also one of the largest empires in world history. During the 16th century Spain and Portugal were in the vanguard of European global exploration and colonial expansion and the opening of trade routes across the oceans, with trade flourishing across the Atlantic between Spain and the Americas and across the Pacific between East Asia and Mexico via the Philippines.
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6
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Qing Dynasty
12 million kmē (18th century)
The Qing Dynasty , occasionally known as the Manchu Dynasty, was a dynasty founded by the Manchu clan Aisin Gioro, in what is today northeast China, expanded into China and the surrounding territories, establishing the Empire of the Great Qing . According to Chinese tradition, the Qing Dynasty was the last Imperial dynasty of China.
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7
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French colonial empires
12 million kmē (20th century)
France had colonial possessions, in various forms, since the beginning of the 17th century until the 1960s. In the 19th and 20th centuries, its global colonial empire was the second largest in the world behind the British Empire. At its peak, between 1919 and 1939, the second French colonial empire extended over 12,347,000 km of land.
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8
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Portuguese Empire
10.4 million kmē (16th century)
The Portuguese Empire was the first Global empire in history and also the earliest and longest lived of the western european colonial empires.
The conquest of Ceuta in 1415 and the exploration of the Atlantic Ocean in the early 15th century was a consequence of the kingdom's connection to the sea.
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9
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American Empire
10 million kmē (20th century)
American Empire is a term sometimes used to describe the historical expansionism and the current political, economic, and cultural influence of the United States on a global scale.
It is usually part of a politically charged debate which involves three basic questions:
# Is the United States currently an empire?
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10
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Persian Empire
7.5 million kmē (5th century BC)
The Persian Empire was a series of historical empires that ruled over the Iranian plateau and beyond. Generally, the earliest entity considered a part of the Persian Empire is Persia's Achaemenid dynasty , a united Aryan kingdom that originated in the region now known as Pars province of Iran and was formed under Cyrus the Great.
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