Check out AlexanderBall: A Countryball Tale here: store.steampowered.com/app/1944660/ And thank you sbnt for reaching out to me, I am happy to give an Indie developer a helping hand.
Hopefully y there can be more projects like these, just don’t overwork yourself, you’re making the best history videos on the site. If you want a break, take it. I personally think that Quality with forever be better than Quantity. Keep it up!
@Kraut_the_Parrot I would suggest you also look up the Italian empire more specifically it’s Dodecanese colony and the original idea of Roman reunification that fascism had opposed to nazi-fascism. The coverage on the situation there is mainly done by Greeks and Italians but It’s really interesting. The so called “ White colony” of Italy
Fun Fact: The legacy of Alexander the Great was also kept by Muslim emperors. Many great Islamic warriors like Nader Shah, Alauddin Khalji and Selim the Grim were known as Sikandar-i Sani which simply means Second/New Alexander .
I didn't think it was possible but somehow this video gave me even more newfound respect for Alexander's brilliance. The man was, in so many regards, a genius. He understood everything around him with such clarity, from animals, to people, to cultures, to geography. He had a novel way of being able to perceive the path of least resistance. And that above his swordswman ship or bravery or anything else, was his greatest strength.
I’m a American and I was surprised to first learn that, it if you think about it should be very obvious. Alexander’s empire went from Modern Egypt to Syria and Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and he went all the way to Punjab. He never even set foot in France, England, Germany or Russia
2:03 "... And you may as well all bow before the Canadian Empire, which is one of the greatest empires of our time and history..." - Kraut We made it, comrades! Hail, hail Canada!
I'm always so excited when a new Kraut video comes out, cant wait for when you can afford to go back to the big projects. Just don't overwork yourself, you're making these amazing videos available for free you have no obligation to us
@@Kraut_the_Parrot Have you tried cutting them in smaller parts and releasing them on a weekly basis? I really miss your two hours long essays and I get that cutting them into two parts didn't help much with algorithms, but what if you cut it into episodes 15-20 minutes long? You were structuring them into ~15 minutes chapters anyway, so you wouldn't have to change your workflow too much. Your recent videos are also interesting, but it always feels like you're barely touching the surface and want to say more, but in the end we only get only the most important stuff with little historical context.
@@Kraut_the_Parrot I don't know if you've already covered it, but I would LOVE a video talking about the good and the bad of British Empire and how its existence and ending influenced world history.
@@Kraut_the_Parrot But they are the best when it comes to offering insight. Your trio of Turkish History from Central Asia to Atatürk is probably second-to-none in RUclips when it comes to explaining how people lived and structured their systems, from nomads to current people.
One important point: you could certainly find many atrocities done by the French as by any other people on the planet but it was not French troops who burned the Summer Palace of China. The commander of the French troops, Charles Cousin-Montauban, was opposed to it, and so the burning of the Summer Palace, carried out by the British on the orders of Lord Elgin, happened without the French.
Even for rulers like Genghis Khan whose burial site hasn't been found yet, khans in Central-Asia often claimed to be the rightful ruler of their khanate because they were a descendant of Genghis. If you weren't one of his descendants, you either had to marry your way into being one (Timurids), or give up the title of khan altogether (Emirate of Bukhara). I wonder if the Mongol Empire is gonna get an episode in this series.
I am absolutely fascinated by institutions of power and what gives them legitimacy and psychological weight. This video was a blessing to my day, thank you for making it! I shall also take a look at AlexanderBall because it looks really cool.
When you said "Akbar the Great," I had to pause the video and search if that's real. I thought, "no way they call someone like that." Lo and behold, it is true and real. They really do call someone "Great the Great." I swear, some histories just comes with built-in humor.
My history professor defined an empire as an entity or society with a central core, that effectively projects a powerful, and _effective_ sphere of influence to the periphery. A society become an empire because it is able to dominate other societies for its own benefit. Like the USA - an empire doesn't need to conquer land; it can just exert overwhelming financial and military power --- do something they don't like, and what do you know, suddenly there is a coup by a newly enriched and well-equipped faction.
Not a bad definition, but it could also be a hegemony and not an empire than or the linchpin of an alliance. While imperialism usually suggest a greater level of exploitation.
Can you name any actial examples here? Hard to think of any historical alliance structures that had sufficient influence to constitute an exception to this definition and were not underpinned by an empire. MAYBE the Hellenic league, but then Athens was debateably an empire. I think a far better rebuttal to this definition is that many countries are empires by his definition. Iran is currently exerting what you could call an effective and powerful sphere of influence in the Middle East. Not many people currently consider Iran to be an empire (though maybe you could contend that). Turkey, Israel, Nigeria and Australia may also be relevant examples to varying degrees.
@@adavidavis2762 Under his definition the EU would be an empire because their self imposed regulations such as emissions standards get adopted globally.
@@hurrdurrmurrgurr I guess you could an Empire is an institution that doesn't respect it's boundaries and attempts to increase it's influence through economic and military pressure, has grown enough to encompass many cultures in it's influence and/or control, has a strong military and a culture that grows to dominate many others, being like the Bri'ish who destroyed other cultures in order to project theirs, or the Americans who simply do it through economic dominance and a dominance of entertainment, and everywhere in between.
I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say that Empires are a natural political development for all human civilization. They are as natural as any other policy or government. From the very primitive empires of tribal supremacy over close neighbors, to very sophisticated continent spanning or global empires. It’s always been with us and it will always be with us. The definition of empire I like most is: A polity, culture, or country that grows beyond its historic birth place to conquer or incorporate other countries and peoples of various religious, cultural, or ethnic backgrounds; forming a multicultural, or multiethnic, or cosmopolitan civilization. We should also remember that empires change even those who are the imperialists, that country which creates the empire is itself changed by it.
persian empire and chinese empire were both only filled with their own people and were still empires only late persia and china incorporated other cultures
@@randomguy6152 not true the ahamenidian empire was comprised of many different cultures in fact the later Persian empires were the ones which did not rule other cultures
The fact that the first bronze age civilizations we learn about in history were empires. Although in the bronze and iron ages, empires were different than modern empires because there was much more local autonomy. You had the dynamic where the subject peasant farmers really didn't care who sat on the throne in the capital, as long as they could continue doing their peasant stuff, and a king of kings didn't really care how local governance was conducted, as long as those territories paid taxes for the imperial treasury and mustered men for the imperial army.
@@helmutthat8331 limitations in communication, travel, and weaponry also play a big role. More efficient systems of communication and travel allow you to expand further and better weapons/discipline/organization relative to your rivals allow you to hold what you have and continue to expand.
@@randomguy6152 This completely ignore that the Chinese people weren’t always one single Chinese people Even today you can notice the difference between south Chinese and north Chinese, and those differences were even more notorious centuries ago And the same can be said about the 3 Iranian empires, the parthians weren’t considered persians for example, still they governed the second great iranian nation and were part of the third one
“A great day in Canada, and thus the world.” “As is tradition” Little did the meme creators realized, they have made Canada an imperialistic presence on the internet.
About the definition of empire : I think we tend to assume the meaning of words stem from an neat abstract, conceptual definition. It often works well, but some words, like "empire", instead are defined by a perceived commonality to a number of real world examples. An empire is a political entity that is similar in enough ways to the Roman empire, the archetypal empire from a western point of view. A good example of the distinction is with the meme "is a hot-dog a sandwich?". If we go by definition, as a piece of meat "sandwiched" in a piece of bread it is, but we know that when somebody asks for a sandwich, they are not expecting a hot-dog, because we really identify sandwiches as "anything that is similar enough to an ideal archetypal sandwich". The distinction is relevant because if we assume several things named "empire" all share a core set of features that defines the term, we might gloss over the possibility that they instead share a sufficient amount of a number of features that each empire may or may not posess. For example : feature 1 : large territory feature 2 : single powerful ruler feature 3 : expansionist feature 4 : rules over different peoples An first empire might display features 1, 2 & 3, a second 2, 3 & 4, a third 1, 3 & 4...
@@Noobs_of_GamingNot seem to come to mind as far as i am aware of. But i am sure all empires became empires through expansive conquests and subjugation of other people, their cultures and institutions by force. Whether they decide to assimilate those they have conquered or not, they are empires by the very definition. They just have different reasons "why"
You may say the mongols didnt have advanced systems, but for a time they were extremely effective. Those systems spanning such a massive empire changed the world just as much as western imperialism did centuries later.
6:55 "founds a new city, known as Alexandria" Fun fact: modern-day Egyptian Alexandria is just one of many cities that Alexander the Great founded and named Alexandria. Some others were Alexandria-on-the-Indus and Alexandria Eschatae, "Alexandria the Furthest"
This is the way I see the definition of “Empire” not a strict guideline of requirements that all must be completed but instead a list of things that can make an empire. Here are the main three I think we naturally associate with empires. 1. A state ruling over a diverse group of people (Most empires tbh) 2. A state which is simply “great” - Because of martial prowess (Rome) (Alexander) - Territorial Size - Cultural, technological, and economic strength (the Chinese empires) 3. A state that naturally favors the ruling class (and or ruling people) over its subjugated other people. (Mongols for example) An empire does not need to complete all 3 but at least one to be an « Empire » However here’s my main point. While I think this video was fantastic I think the question of what makes an empire is kind redundant and useless. When those with a good amount of experience look at a state in history they can call it an empire usually pretty easily by instinct due to the aforementioned things that we humans can train our brains to notice. Sure sometimes there are the big questions like is America an Empire? But I think the question « What is the definition of an Empire » Isn’t very important as if anything it’s just a broad statement like « A Great State that had Great influence » No matter how vague that definition is, that’s all that really matters when we use the word empire to describe states directly in their name (Roman Empire) so we can understand that they were no ordinary state and that they yes, we’re a great state with great influence on history. Great video!!!
Kruat I really appreciate the “Quid sum?” at the beginning. I expected a more detached and common use of sum, esse: “Quid est?” which made “quid sum” actually a pretty funny subversion of expectations
Hey man great video! Just wanted to clarify the tomb on the Turkish-Syrian border belongs to Suleiman Shah not Suleiman the Magnificent. Suleiman Shah was the grandfather of Osman I who is the founder of the Ottoman dynasty
An interesting thing to mention is the linguistic origin of the word empire, from imperator, just meaning commander in early rome. Later Augustus used it to refer to the ruler of Rome and everyone after used to title to claim legitimacy from some long ago era of greatness. Every region of the world has some story like this where the local dominate force creates a term that everyone uses to harken back to. When put into context, its clear anyone who wants to be called emperor wants to lay claim to legacy of power that came before them, and the right to rule that preceded them. This claim gives them justification to absorb and assimilate like talked about at 5:20
What makes Brahms' fourth such an apt music choice for this video is that no real historical empire can be summarized by the behavior of any single institution, ideology, market, or faith. In this way, empires are analogous to Brahms' technique of continuous development of thematic material, whereby even a short snippet of the music reveals a kaleidoscopic layering of themes, each under some kind of transformation.
Looking forward to the next couple of videos on this topic. One thing I’ve realised doing a political degree is that words, like empire, are not easy to define. Keep up the great work
The similarity between Alexander and Cyrus the Great's methods is interesting. When conquering Babylon he presented himself as restoring the gods and freeing the people from Nabonidus. Same for the Jews which came under his domain after taking over the Babylonian empire. He's the only foreign person to be presented as a messiah in the Old Testament. Would Alexander have had known about Cyrus' methods? If so, do you think he was taking inspiration from him? He evidently idolised the person to some extent given that he visited his tomb.
Good. I sometimes have questioned the importance of Alexander, as his empire and those of his Successors are long gone, with Greek no longer spoken in the Middle East, but you show why his legacy lives on through other Empires. Thank you again.
Tbh it makes me wonder why Belgium in the 19th century, whilst searching for its own soul of the nation, never claimed to be the ancestral state of the Charlemagne empire. Well now that I think of it, pissing off two powerful neighbours might not have been a good idea.
At the time they were trying to wrench themselves free from their Protestant rulers from the north, so doubling down on Catholicism as the basis for their nation was the most obvious option given the context by which the Belgian independence movement began.
I was looking for a very long time, but failed trying to find videos as good as yours. Simplicity and level of details in your videos is astonishing. Keep doing such a great job. Additionally a website with links, additional content would be great extension of your work.
I mostly agree, however in my opinion I find CaspianReports to be a tad too pessimistic. He views geopolitics through a realist lens (the international view, not the literal meaning of realism). Whilst it's still insightful, I think it sometimes gives too much of a binary worldview (either you win power or lose it, zero sum game).
@@quintiax So what if he leans more towards realism? Liberalism and realism should be treated as useful theories that can adequately explain certain geopolitical events better than each other at times, rather than as political labels that the terminally online use to facilitate their shouting matches.
@@TheAmericanPrometheus It's a preference. Personally I am not a big fan of realism, hence my preference not being KaspianReport and more towards the likes of PolyMatter (for example). It's not wrong to view international politics through a realist lens, but it's personally not for me. There are many ways to view international politics, liberalism and realism being only two of them. Neoliberalism on international politics can be seen as a compromise between realism and liberalism. Other worldviews include constructivism (our values shape the international stage), radicalism (a Marxist lens), institutionalism (we act according to the institutions we are part of) and functionalism (society is structured via substructures working together in collaboration to preserve the current society). The latter two however being more universal views rather than solely for international politics.
talking about alexander and the make Egypt great again (love how memetic the great again thing is), reminds me about the last emperor of India being king George.
Also an interesting point you make is about how, in a sense, this 'cult' of empire ended with the Third Reich as they represented the effects of imperialism at their worst, a far cry from the systems of Cyrus or Alexander.
I think the most interesting aspect of your definition of empire is the acceptance of the new conquerors as a continuation of that country's ruling tradition, though I believe you missed an opportunity to expound upon that with how the rejection of that claim can often dismantle that empire, with the Seleucid losing control of Persia rather quickly as the Iranians rejected their claims, while maintaining control of Babylonia and Syria, who they intermarried with rather frequently, much longer.
I like your new version of your channel now. I remember years ago back when you had been around the critic crowd and how that would be rather suffocating. This feels more refreshing and informative.
Kraut once again being the greatest creator on this platform. love the idea, and the game looks really good. both you amd the AlexanderBall developer keep up the great work!
It is cool seeing landmarks and tombs that have been around for 1000s of years. Like 'I wonder what Augustus thought when he saw the pyramids, the same object I am looking at right now in the flesh.'
it is amazing how influential singular figures can be in history. is it an organic process that societies have or just plain flukes? perhaps whats even more amazing is that almost all these legendary figures came very close to death before accomplishing their most remembered feats
Very good video analysis. Alexander's conquests are often misunderstood in the west as just "gobbling up land" but the reality is that in those times, unlike modern imperialism, honor and duty played a much bigger role in society than money. The Greeks were disunited for a long time, and the Panhellenic Idea was only a recent ideology. In Athens, while the orator Isocrates supported the Panhellenists, many others like Demosthenes were vehemently against it. The Macedonians were very supportive of Alexander, but only as long as he could make the Panhellenic Alliance reclaim Ionia. So, in conquering Persia, to take revenge not just for his father, but also the Persian (and to an extent, the Persian entanglement in the Peloponnesian) War, Alexander basically had no choice but to invade Persia anyway. As Arrian notes in his work, Alexander's Anabasis, he told the Persian king Xerxes "your ancestors came to Macedonia and the rest of Hellas/Greece, and caused us great harm, although we had never harmed them in the past. For that reason I have come to Asia, to take it from you".
Xerxes was long dead by the time Alexander was born and subsequently invaded Persia, so the notion that Alexander told Xerxes anything is just a myth. When Alexander invaded Persia, Darius III was the Achaemenid king.
@@MeanMachine1992 the letter Alexander wrote was to Darius , the guy above made a mistake while writing . In the letter he indeed tells Darius he is coming for revenge for what the Persians have been doing to the Greeks , he also told Darius that he was coming to capture all of Asia and from now on Alexander would be the king of Asia.
@@sars6224 Thanks for the correction, that sounds more plausible at least. He burnt Persepolis to the ground in response to Xerxes burning Athens, which was itself a response to the Athenians burning Sardis. Alexander did indeed dominate most of the then known world for a decade, only for his empire to collapse after his death.
@@MeanMachine1992 his empire might have collapsed but the lands he conquered were ruled by the Hellenistic Kings for in many cases centuries after his death
1:34 - You made a little mistake. The "Suleiman" that you were referring to here (the one whose tomb was between Turkey and Syria) was not the 10th Ottoman Sultan - Suleiman the Magnificent. No. The Suleiman whose tomb is on the border is the Suleiman who was the grandfather of the Osman bey (the guy who would yet to create the Ottoman state). For your information, that Suleiman is referred to as "Suleiman Shah" - as you can see in the photo of his tomb which you used in the video
tfw the advert at the beginning of the video I thought was just a tongue in cheek sarcastic parody of the prevelence of cheap shovelware games, but was actually a genuinely produced ad for a genuine not-shovelware game with a funny concept.
One definition of empire I got from a postcolonial African history professor was "Governing different people differently". I'm pretty sure someone famous said that before he did. I feel like it fits the mold fairly well, no?
Very solid work :) We could add more complexity to the empire debate with financial empires, fashion moguls who conquered competition or the like, perhaps overlap between that and Rupert's Land, geopolitics with Thomas Bata etc..
That’s easier said with hindsight. Is the modern USA one? It’s hard to agree on that because it’s so different to everything that’s come before it. China certainly used to be an empire, but is it now? After a certain period of time of dominance does empire just shift to the status quo? It all seems very present biased. The definition has changed throughout history, that was his whole point at the beginning of the video. Imo, each era’s empires should be viewed through the lens of their time. What empire means should be different depending on which time period you’re observing. For present day I think there can only be one empire at a time due to the winner take-all method of late state globalist capitalism. It has to be the country who’s interests are prioritized over all others(USA). For China to become a modern-day empire, the word (on average) must shift to their interests being prioritized over America’s.
@@Fractured_Unity wouldn't China fit the definition of an empire? The culture and ethnicity is Han, but they have Tibetans and Uyghirs they conquered and oppress
This is when i would then add the type of empire you are describing. America is an empire of some kind of course. Wouldn't have non-state territory like Puerto Rico or Guam, if it wasn't. America also has a desire to spread its ideals and values (although forever changing values) across the planet. This has led to global Americanization of the Western world and beyond it.
@@PAYTONLB999 That would certainly fit the old definition. But then America wouldn’t really fall into that. So just by doing those things doesn’t make you an empire by my arbitrary modern definition imo
Hello, @Kraut. Good video as always. It might me rude of me to ask you this, but I would really love for you to make a video about Romania, mostly about the unification in the 19th century, but maybe modern history too. You have a way of explaining history and events that would make my history professors blush. Keep up the good work!
As an Uruguayan and a fan of you, that reference took me by surpirse and made me smile haha (also...yeah, we kinda don´t talk enough about the genocid it was "salsipuedes" )
Just to add to your list of leaders visiting a past great leader's tomb, American Presidents travel to Mount Vernon to pay their respects at George Washington's tomb.
Interesting thing to think about is that the US ritual tomb is of all things the resting place of a politician instead of a general, a Marquise de Lafayette. We see a controversy whenever sitting presidents don't visit the grave site.
One way to define "empire" is by using the Danish word "underkaste" which can be translated as "to throw under". You can define empire as one group, cultural, political or other, throwing other groups under themselves by some means.
So every monarchy/oligarchy? Or democratic slave owning state. Wouldn't democratic states pre universal suffrage count as well? I mean you are using letter of law and state apparatus to throw pretty sizable portion of population under yourselfand deny them one of the most important right you have in a democratic state -- right to vote and be elected. Or if we go further down this rabbit hole. Every state ever, as in every state (if I remember Marxist ideology correctly) there is a rulling class and those who is under it in modern state case -- by controling means of production. In that case word loses any meaning beyond "state I don't like but can't call fascist/communist".
Thank you for the latest update. I being an American, still enjoy your analysis from as far back as your "Trumps Biggest Failure" video. Particularly, the scrutiny and deep delve into research of each topic. Please continue to make emphatic critique essays of geopolitics and history that leads to geopolitics. I tip my hat to you sir.
9:42 The fact that they DIDN'T marry Egyptians is one of the most famous things about the Ptolemaic Dynasty; they almost exclusively married within the family, and the only exogamous marriages they conducted (early in the dynasty, before incest had been cemented as the norm) were with Seleucids. They were also pretty selective with what parts of Egyptian culture they embraced; they had themselves depicted in the traditional style, but largely wore Greek fashion in actual practice, and not a single member of the dynasty bothered to learn the Egyptian language until Cleopatra VIII (the famous one).
although alexander definitely popularized it, i would argue that he was inspired to do this from the persians themselves. the persian empire was sort of the first empire in the ancient middle east who introduced the idea of the liberating empire, prior to them most empires (akkadian, assyrian, babylonian, egyptian, hittite) all ruled through the idea that their king came to sow destruction if his will was not obeyed by the locals. however the persian empire was the first empire that merely required a monetary tribute, no more no less, the shahanshah would come to the place and depict himself as the leader of the locals, to the egyptians, he was the pharaoh. the shahanshah would also be depicted being carried by his satrap underlings showing how his power was ultimately given to him by them unlike the babylonians or assyrians who would depict themselves sitting ontop and crushing their subjects.
Rather than visiting an earlier emperor's tomb, you could also incorporate it into your own tomb. The road of first Ming emperor's tomb makes a detour to loop around the first Wu emperor's tomb.
In a book im reading from Lawrence James he talks about how the British imperialists viewed the Romans as little people because they allowed there empire to be goverened by forces other than prosperity and growth.
Another exemple of the "Alexander reincarnated" is how Pompee the Great, right after he did a lot of prestigous stuff (like going on a conquering rampage in the Orient, submitting the last Marius' loyalists in Hispania or beating the pirates to a pulp) he had (like a lot of imperatores before him) a triumph set in Rome. Only after his campaign in the Orient the triumph he made was peculiar, as he made himself look like Alexander; Indeed, as he was warring in the east, he founded numerous cities (such as Nicopolis in the Pont, or even Pompeiopolis) like a certain individual. And when he got to triumph in Rome, he was on a chariot with the supposed (Appien, the source, isn't that sure of it) chlamys (type of cloak) of Alexander, which he, supposedly, found in Mithridate's palace. Another exemple would be the coins the son of Sylla had minted, in which you would see on one face the head of Alexander with the helmet of Hercules and right beside it the name of the family. However, for the Romans, I would argue that it was more of a prestige show off which was more in relation with the complex relationship the senators, magisters and knights had with their clients. Showing your wealth and, more importantly, your prestige, which would be increased even further by the name of the macedonian ruler, seeing as the bigger part of the roman elites were highly impressed and attracted to the hellenic culture (Cato is sad). So, for the republic times, more off a trick to win votes and influence back home than an imperialistic deed. As such, Caesar's move to visit the tomb is also more linked to the "I am bigger and better than my predecessors" which all imperatores tried to achieve (namely Marius, Sylla, Pompee, Caesar, Mark Antoine and Octavius), and the successes will lead to the slow but predictable death of the republic. As for the definition of "empire" i would argue it has to be linked with a wish of hegemony on a region, not having borders stated by the culural aspect (as opposed to nation-states) and, as such, having something of a diverse population and not having a strong centralized state revolving around the capital city and so having gouvernors or alike in provinces.
Agree with Chrysobubulle. While I usually enjoy his videos, such as the history of Mexico, even then he had inaccuracies (the Comanche were not easily beaten out of Apache territory, in fact many times the Comanche had pushed Apache bands into Mexican territory for protection against them). And more lately, it becomes worrying seeing more and more viewers saying things like “primitive” this or “backwards” that in relation to conquered cultures, as any anthropologist worth their salt would be allergic to such characterizations, even of smaller peoples. While I don’t see Kraut use much of that terminology, it does seem that sometimes his prescriptions become too broad or simply inaccurate.
I've myself been studying history again as I try to prepare for the history uni entrance exam owing to my highschool diploma not being good enough to get through that, and my 2016 education curriculum Finnish history textbook's definition of imperialism is "A country's* desire to expand its sphere of influence through violence or by the threatening of it", which I feel is a decent definition, though simultaneously I have run to the problem that the same book's definition of colonialism, which is "The establishment of a colony in another country, which often includes economic utilization**", feels like it overlaps with imperialism while supported by my understanding of different historical events. For example the Portuguese colonization through the establishment of trade posts along the Porutguese discovered sea route between India and Europe fits simultaneously the definitions of imperialism and colonialism of my history book. The Portuguese did colonisation through the establishment of trade posts which were colonies that featured economic utilization through them acting as the bases for Portuguese dominance of the trade route to India. Simultaneously the Portuguese act of dominating the trade route through gunboat policy of threatening to open fire on all coastal powers with its carrack class ships should they threaten their monopoly, in addition with the Mamluk-Portuguese war in which the Portuguese used war to force the trade of the Indian ocean to flow into Europe through its southern route around Africa fit both the definition of imperialism. These two definitions are both different yet in many ways the same. Just some rambling from me that got a bit out of hand, but whatever I'm posting it. *the definition in Finnish uses the word valtio, which can be translated to country, but also nation, state, government, polity, commonwealth and other less used definitions according to google translate, as in Finnish language singular words can mean multiple things depending on the context (famous example being kuusi palaa) **the definition in Finnish uses the word hyväksikäyttö, which can be translated as utilization, but also exploitation or abuse, again, depending on the context
One definition of empire I learnt was that in an empire you have a small preferential group of people that rule over a larger group of subjects. For example the romans in rome rule over their allies/subjects in other citystates. Or the han chinese ruling over the various other groups. Later the Italian romans that ruled over the roman provinces. In colonial empires you had the people in the heartland (like spain, great britain or france) ruling over subject people in the colonies. This preferential treatment of the core group can be seen in structures like citizenship giving you extra rights, or the overlord putting its own people in top positions and denying the locals top positions. It does seem to work fairly well for the examples of empires you've given. So I hope you could consider this definition of empire as well, and maybe find it useful. You mention Ptolemaic egypt. While ptolemy does take on a lot of the egyptian culture (becoming a pharaoh, following egyptian culture and marrying into egyptian nobility) he also keeps a lot of the top greek. Greek soldiers are paid more and the upper layer of society remains mostly greek. Also a lot of alexander's generals divorced the wives alexander forced on them. Seloikos keeping his wife was a powerplay to give him more legitimacy. While the conquerors had to change themselves a bit to better rule their subjects, a lot of empires had a ruling class and group of people that was quite distinct from their subjects.
@@Poctyk No, the king is of the same cultural group as the people he rules over. The ruling group should feel they are different than the rest. Like greeks ruling over egyptians.
@@anonvideo738 > No, the king is of the same cultural group as the people he rules over. Is he? The fact that we consider them to be same cultural group doesn't mean that they considered themselves to be same cultural group. (See Polish Wewuzing aka Polish Sarmatianism) What exactly makes you think say that King and his subject are of same cultural group? Before 20th century culture of the "elites" and of "common people" were 2 entirely different spheres. Language? Before standardization and enforcement by state of single "correct" version it was a bunch of vaguely similar dialects inside language family. Not to mention that educated people were more likely to use sacred languages such as Latin in communication. (Wiki says that in 15 century ~70% of all books were in Latin). Clothing, songs lifestyle all drastically differed. Opposite is also the case, see Roman Empire as by the time of the Imperial period most considered themselves to be Roman -- making Roman empire not empire. >Like greeks ruling over egyptians. But those Greeks were Pharaoh, culturally. That's like saying that German shouldn't be considered to be a Russian monarch beccause they she was German. Speaking of which. Russia is a very good example of what I was talking about. The cultural rift divide between elites and (Russian) peasants was unimaginably massive.
On tomb practise - something simmilar occured in China, though it was not as consistent. The emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty visited the tomb of the Hongwu Emperor of the Ming Dynasty. Qianlong wanted to be perceived as a legitimate emperor of China and not as a descendant of Manchu conquerors. After proclaiming the Republic, there was a mix of practises: the tomb of Cixi Empress was robbed and revolutionaries in general made a cut from the Imperial China heritage... but, when Sun Yat Sen died, his successors decided to found a tomb of his in Nanjing. The tomb was going to be later visited by the Kuomintang visitors (e.g. Chiang Kai-shek) and later, by the CPC officials. After Mao died, his body was mumified and it was put in a Mauzoleum. If we stretch a bit of using tombs as a source of legitimization - we may see that even Confucius receives simmilar interest by the Chinese leaders: Hu Jintao visited the tomb of the philosopher to signify the comeback of confucianism as an influential philosophy for the Chinese state. To this day, such sites play a role in defining the Chinese statehood, how much imperial the practise is - perhaps it is a topic for another video or discussion.
If you go to Rome, in the ancient forum, there is a place. A special one. It was where the pyre upon which Julius Caesar was cremated by the Roman crowd in stood. It doesn't look like much. It's now just a ruined piece of wall or foundation. This place still have flowers and money thrown on it every day.
One central country that took over multiple other separate countries? And ruled over them via delegating power to an appointed representative. (Although I suppose taking various annexations & changing geopolitics into account is a tricky grey-area)
Good video. I nevertheless have qualms with your claim that Alexander was the first to try to create a universal emperor. The Achaemenids were also pharaohs of Egypt. Alexander's political aim was in great part to be the second Cyrus, a ruler that was greatly praised in classical greek historiography and ethics. Cyrus in his babylonian cylinder used as his main title the very prestigious but quite unassuming title of "ruler of Anshan", which highlighted his prestigious origin while also creating a blend between elamite and iranian identity (Anshan was one of the twin capitals of ancient Elam). He also uses as secondary titles mesopotamian ones like "king of the four quarters" "king of the world" "great king" "king of Sumer and Akkad" and of course "king of Babylon", thus merging elamite and mesopotamian imperial legacies which had competed for hegemony during several millenia. This was thus quite groundbreaking, especially since the one achieving this was iranian thus tying Mesopotamia and the iranian plateau together, a transformation facilitated by the support of the influential babylonian clergy of Marduk. His son Cambyses would continue this legacy by making himself Pharaoh of Egypt. The universalist nature of the Achemenid empire would be somewhat reversed by Darius's coup, which would see iranian aristocrats gain more influence and a more centralized power but still Darius himself would closely tie himself to Cyrus's legacy. Still even Cyrus, who according to me was the first who really succeeded at creating a universal empire (in my view Alexander failed since he gave way too much power to his greek generals and neglected local institutions like the babylonian priesthood) wasn't the first to try. For example the rulers of Assyria who were at the same time the main example and the main antithesis of Achemenid imperial ideology (both relied on divine will and claimed world hegemony but the Achemenids claimed to be just liberators while the assyrians often quite openly acknowledged to be subjugators and destroyers), also tried to mesh Babylon together with Assyria by making themselves rulers of Babylon and by restoring local temples. The true invetors of this idea of a universal empire that transcends any single source of legitimacy and local power were people like Sargon of Akkad, Ur-Nammu and his less known elamite opponent Puzur-Inshushinak. Sargon despite being akkadian claimed the sumerian imperial legacy by underlining how he was chosen by Inanna, the patron godess of Unug, capital of his opponent Lugalzagezi and by using his former title of "king of Sumer and Akkad". Puzur-Inshushinak took an akkadian regnal name underlining how he was chosen by the patron god of the elamite city of Shushan, Inshushinak, he also called himself "governor of Shushan" which was ambiguous since it was an akkadian administrative title highlighting his position in Elam, he also took the title "lord of Awan" which was the name of the elamite rulers of Shushan before the akkadian conquest, and finally sumerians called him "man of Anshan" also tying him to the iranian highlands. Ur-Nammu would basically do the same as Sargon but backwards, adopting Akkadian imperial ideology in a sumerian framework. So a claim to universal rule but also universal legitimacy is actually built in the notion of empire. Most empires used it since it is convenient and even often necessary to justify imperial rule over foreigners. I also think you weren't honnest in your presentation of imperial power. An empire isn't always creating greater equality, one of the ways an empire can assert its power is by exploiting local social inequality and turning a dispriviledged social class against the local elites. Many historians claimed this was the case with muslim empires in India but that's a controversial statement, the soviets quite literally used this to conquer Azerbaijan, through a revolution of the workers of the Baku oilfields. Its simply that the more common tactic is to rely on local elites that are then made subservient to the imperial elite.
This was very interesting, I honestly never thought there was deeper political meaning to leaders visiting their forebears, but now the pattern is both obvious, and fascinating.
I love your channel, thanks for the great content. It’s amazing that you inspired someone to make a game from your videos. You also inspire me to read and learn more about history. It just so happens that your videos are just more interesting and fascinating. I found this one particularly interesting and was wondering if you could provide me with some reads that you used to make this video. Again, thanks for the great content, and in the future once I have more money saved I’ll contribute to your channel.
I just watched a video by a youtuber called Premodernist on the history of Persia, and Alexander featured in a piece of it. Was thinking it would be interesting to see more detail into that period, and a few hours later there is this!
An empire is when one ethnic group rules over a total population that is more than twice as much as its own. The tricky part is then moved to defining what an ethnic group is.
@@lukatomas9465 Yes that's right. Although, what even is a German anyway? Are Austrians Germans? Are Dutch Germans? Mostly though Germany was an empire because they claimed the title from the HRE. It's a similar thing with the Japanese and Vietnamese empires, just a naming quirk. With the Russian empire, at the time I think it would have qualified as an empire. I sceptical people in it were really Russians. These days though Russia and Brazil are borderline cases because they have a dominant core that contains most of the population but vast hinterlands where indigenous populations are much more significant. Kraut got one thing right: one definitions are perfect.
Wow, it's fascinating how the tombs of former imperial leaders gained such a cult-like status from those who came after, from Alexander, to Augustus, to Charlemagne, to Frederick, to Napoleon.
Check out AlexanderBall: A Countryball Tale here: store.steampowered.com/app/1944660/
And thank you sbnt for reaching out to me, I am happy to give an Indie developer a helping hand.
1st show love
Are you secretly Vlad Vexler?
Hopefully y there can be more projects like these, just don’t overwork yourself, you’re making the best history videos on the site. If you want a break, take it. I personally think that Quality with forever be better than Quantity. Keep it up!
@Kraut_the_Parrot I would suggest you also look up the Italian empire more specifically it’s Dodecanese colony and the original idea of Roman reunification that fascism had opposed to nazi-fascism. The coverage on the situation there is mainly done by Greeks and Italians but It’s really interesting. The so called “ White colony” of Italy
Empires by their natures are evil.
The answer is so simple, to be an empire you just need to have at least 1000 development and 50 prestige
This guy gets it
no u need 3 kindom title or 100 county + 1000 gold then u can form empire
Or just form an endgame tag like hindustan or russia
VERY NICE!
No, you need to own at least 80% of the de jure land and have 500 gold and own at least 2 kingdom tier titles within the de jure empire.
Fun Fact: The legacy of Alexander the Great was also kept by Muslim emperors. Many great Islamic warriors like Nader Shah, Alauddin Khalji and Selim the Grim were known as Sikandar-i Sani which simply means Second/New Alexander .
That's actually awesome! Glad to see his legacy lived on, and his legacy of multiculturalism with it
Awesome!
I didn't think it was possible but somehow this video gave me even more newfound respect for Alexander's brilliance. The man was, in so many regards, a genius. He understood everything around him with such clarity, from animals, to people, to cultures, to geography. He had a novel way of being able to perceive the path of least resistance. And that above his swordswman ship or bravery or anything else, was his greatest strength.
Not only that ... Alexander actually made it into the Quran as "Dhu al-Qarnayn".🤔
I’m a American and I was surprised to first learn that, it if you think about it should be very obvious.
Alexander’s empire went from Modern Egypt to Syria and Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and he went all the way to Punjab.
He never even set foot in France, England, Germany or Russia
2:03 "... And you may as well all bow before the Canadian Empire, which is one of the greatest empires of our time and history..." - Kraut
We made it, comrades! Hail, hail Canada!
When Canada Rules the World!
You’re going to be annexed in 10 years
America lite is getting ambitious 😂😂
@@Otterdisappointment Relax, we're not next to Russia.
All shall be one under leaf !
I'm always so excited when a new Kraut video comes out, cant wait for when you can afford to go back to the big projects. Just don't overwork yourself, you're making these amazing videos available for free you have no obligation to us
it really annoys me that big videos are unprofitable and that I have to slowly work on them on the side.
@@Kraut_the_Parrot Have you tried cutting them in smaller parts and releasing them on a weekly basis? I really miss your two hours long essays and I get that cutting them into two parts didn't help much with algorithms, but what if you cut it into episodes 15-20 minutes long? You were structuring them into ~15 minutes chapters anyway, so you wouldn't have to change your workflow too much.
Your recent videos are also interesting, but it always feels like you're barely touching the surface and want to say more, but in the end we only get only the most important stuff with little historical context.
@@Kraut_the_Parrot I don't know if you've already covered it, but I would LOVE a video talking about the good and the bad of British Empire and how its existence and ending influenced world history.
@@Kraut_the_Parrot can you please do more videos on the European union? / can you do a small video about Cyprus maybe?
@@Kraut_the_Parrot But they are the best when it comes to offering insight. Your trio of Turkish History from Central Asia to Atatürk is probably second-to-none in RUclips when it comes to explaining how people lived and structured their systems, from nomads to current people.
The game looks decently well made
Can't wait to conquer and burn some balls
Yea the game actually looks really good. Will have to try it out!
@@shittinontheceiling3474fr i love burning peoples balls *the game dose look well made tho*
Oh boy I can't wait to shuffle my balls into ideal position.
Looks great, especially if it’s in early access!
One important point: you could certainly find many atrocities done by the French as by any other people on the planet but it was not French troops who burned the Summer Palace of China. The commander of the French troops, Charles Cousin-Montauban, was opposed to it, and so the burning of the Summer Palace, carried out by the British on the orders of Lord Elgin, happened without the French.
I was about to say, I thought it was the British who did that, not the French
Yep, the brits did it
Kraut is very consistant with his anti french biases
is this the same lord Elgin of the Elgin Marbles fame?
@@Chrysobubulle with a name like Kraut would you be surprised by that haha
Even for rulers like Genghis Khan whose burial site hasn't been found yet, khans in Central-Asia often claimed to be the rightful ruler of their khanate because they were a descendant of Genghis. If you weren't one of his descendants, you either had to marry your way into being one (Timurids), or give up the title of khan altogether (Emirate of Bukhara). I wonder if the Mongol Empire is gonna get an episode in this series.
Yeah I hope he does do an episode on Genghis Khan/Mongol empire and it's lasting legacy in Central Asia/South Asia and the world in general.
@@miserablySleepy I mean, some of that was covered tangentially in the videos on Russia
@@connormclernon26 honestly I don't remember that because i watch a lot of videos Man to the point where they become one big video in my brain.
ayo, love your videos! great to see you here!
Actually didn’t know his grave has yet to be found. Thanks for the info.
I am absolutely fascinated by institutions of power and what gives them legitimacy and psychological weight. This video was a blessing to my day, thank you for making it! I shall also take a look at AlexanderBall because it looks really cool.
Common Stoney W
"To get political..."
Give me money IGN SuperStriker7US
Stoneworks....
Ngl stoney Velerin was kinda like Alexander's empire.
When you said "Akbar the Great," I had to pause the video and search if that's real. I thought, "no way they call someone like that." Lo and behold, it is true and real. They really do call someone "Great the Great." I swear, some histories just comes with built-in humor.
Charlemagne was obviously Flemish
Charlemagne was obviously a baddie (Flemish)
No he wasn’t obviously
@@Max-nt5zs that's the joke
lmao 🤣
kek
My history professor defined an empire as an entity or society with a central core, that effectively projects a powerful, and _effective_ sphere of influence to the periphery. A society become an empire because it is able to dominate other societies for its own benefit.
Like the USA - an empire doesn't need to conquer land; it can just exert overwhelming financial and military power --- do something they don't like, and what do you know, suddenly there is a coup by a newly enriched and well-equipped faction.
Not a bad definition, but it could also be a hegemony and not an empire than or the linchpin of an alliance. While imperialism usually suggest a greater level of exploitation.
Can you name any actial examples here? Hard to think of any historical alliance structures that had sufficient influence to constitute an exception to this definition and were not underpinned by an empire. MAYBE the Hellenic league, but then Athens was debateably an empire.
I think a far better rebuttal to this definition is that many countries are empires by his definition. Iran is currently exerting what you could call an effective and powerful sphere of influence in the Middle East. Not many people currently consider Iran to be an empire (though maybe you could contend that). Turkey, Israel, Nigeria and Australia may also be relevant examples to varying degrees.
I mean, the US DID conquer land.. lots of land
@@adavidavis2762 Under his definition the EU would be an empire because their self imposed regulations such as emissions standards get adopted globally.
@@hurrdurrmurrgurr I guess you could an Empire is an institution that doesn't respect it's boundaries and attempts to increase it's influence through economic and military pressure, has grown enough to encompass many cultures in it's influence and/or control, has a strong military and a culture that grows to dominate many others, being like the Bri'ish who destroyed other cultures in order to project theirs, or the Americans who simply do it through economic dominance and a dominance of entertainment, and everywhere in between.
Palpatine was very fond of defining an empire by himself
I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say that Empires are a natural political development for all human civilization. They are as natural as any other policy or government. From the very primitive empires of tribal supremacy over close neighbors, to very sophisticated continent spanning or global empires. It’s always been with us and it will always be with us.
The definition of empire I like most is: A polity, culture, or country that grows beyond its historic birth place to conquer or incorporate other countries and peoples of various religious, cultural, or ethnic backgrounds; forming a multicultural, or multiethnic, or cosmopolitan civilization.
We should also remember that empires change even those who are the imperialists, that country which creates the empire is itself changed by it.
persian empire and chinese empire were both only filled with their own people and were still empires
only late persia and china incorporated other cultures
@@randomguy6152 not true the ahamenidian empire was comprised of many different cultures in fact the later Persian empires were the ones which did not rule other cultures
The fact that the first bronze age civilizations we learn about in history were empires. Although in the bronze and iron ages, empires were different than modern empires because there was much more local autonomy. You had the dynamic where the subject peasant farmers really didn't care who sat on the throne in the capital, as long as they could continue doing their peasant stuff, and a king of kings didn't really care how local governance was conducted, as long as those territories paid taxes for the imperial treasury and mustered men for the imperial army.
@@helmutthat8331 limitations in communication, travel, and weaponry also play a big role. More efficient systems of communication and travel allow you to expand further and better weapons/discipline/organization relative to your rivals allow you to hold what you have and continue to expand.
@@randomguy6152
This completely ignore that the Chinese people weren’t always one single Chinese people
Even today you can notice the difference between south Chinese and north Chinese, and those differences were even more notorious centuries ago
And the same can be said about the 3 Iranian empires, the parthians weren’t considered persians for example, still they governed the second great iranian nation and were part of the third one
When Kraut releases, it's a good day.
“A great day in Canada, and thus the world.”
“As is tradition”
Little did the meme creators realized, they have made Canada an imperialistic presence on the internet.
Ave Canuckistani!
uif only that meme spread outside of canada like ever
Canada is the true North American power
Which is ironic because those two lines quote southpark which was made by two americans
i often use your videos to help me come up with lore for fictional nations i sometimes make. i am glad i am not alone
Alexander really did manage to make himself a god.
He actually did it, the absolute madlad.
So you are telling me that to become your merciful god-emperor I'd just need to visit all of those graves?
And have a big army, lead in the front of the attack, and never lose. Very simple.
And have a big army, lead in the front of the attack, and never lose. Very simple.
About the definition of empire : I think we tend to assume the meaning of words stem from an neat abstract, conceptual definition. It often works well, but some words, like "empire", instead are defined by a perceived commonality to a number of real world examples. An empire is a political entity that is similar in enough ways to the Roman empire, the archetypal empire from a western point of view.
A good example of the distinction is with the meme "is a hot-dog a sandwich?". If we go by definition, as a piece of meat "sandwiched" in a piece of bread it is, but we know that when somebody asks for a sandwich, they are not expecting a hot-dog, because we really identify sandwiches as "anything that is similar enough to an ideal archetypal sandwich".
The distinction is relevant because if we assume several things named "empire" all share a core set of features that defines the term, we might gloss over the possibility that they instead share a sufficient amount of a number of features that each empire may or may not posess.
For example :
feature 1 : large territory
feature 2 : single powerful ruler
feature 3 : expansionist
feature 4 : rules over different peoples
An first empire might display features 1, 2 & 3, a second 2, 3 & 4, a third 1, 3 & 4...
The first sentence of Wikipedia says feature 4. Is there a Empire without a diversified Population?
@@Noobs_of_GamingNot seem to come to mind as far as i am aware of. But i am sure all empires became empires through expansive conquests and subjugation of other people, their cultures and institutions by force. Whether they decide to assimilate those they have conquered or not, they are empires by the very definition.
They just have different reasons "why"
You may say the mongols didnt have advanced systems, but for a time they were extremely effective. Those systems spanning such a massive empire changed the world just as much as western imperialism did centuries later.
6:55 "founds a new city, known as Alexandria"
Fun fact: modern-day Egyptian Alexandria is just one of many cities that Alexander the Great founded and named Alexandria. Some others were Alexandria-on-the-Indus and Alexandria Eschatae, "Alexandria the Furthest"
He founded so many cities that he literally named one of them after his horse.
Happy to support this channel! I'd love to see more!
This is the way I see the definition of “Empire” not a strict guideline of requirements that all must be completed but instead a list of things that can make an empire. Here are the main three I think we naturally associate with empires.
1. A state ruling over a diverse group of people (Most empires tbh)
2. A state which is simply “great”
- Because of martial prowess (Rome) (Alexander)
- Territorial Size
- Cultural, technological, and economic strength (the Chinese empires)
3. A state that naturally favors the ruling class (and or ruling people) over its subjugated other people. (Mongols for example)
An empire does not need to complete all 3 but at least one to be an « Empire »
However here’s my main point. While I think this video was fantastic I think the question of what makes an empire is kind redundant and useless. When those with a good amount of experience look at a state in history they can call it an empire usually pretty easily by instinct due to the aforementioned things that we humans can train our brains to notice. Sure sometimes there are the big questions like is America an Empire? But I think the question « What is the definition of an Empire » Isn’t very important as if anything it’s just a broad statement like « A Great State that had Great influence » No matter how vague that definition is, that’s all that really matters when we use the word empire to describe states directly in their name (Roman Empire) so we can understand that they were no ordinary state and that they yes, we’re a great state with great influence on history. Great video!!!
Kruat I really appreciate the “Quid sum?” at the beginning. I expected a more detached and common use of sum, esse: “Quid est?” which made “quid sum” actually a pretty funny subversion of expectations
Aww. You're so cool Kraut! Thank you for supporting game devs (every gamedev deserves love)
Hey man great video! Just wanted to clarify the tomb on the Turkish-Syrian border belongs to Suleiman Shah not Suleiman the Magnificent. Suleiman Shah was the grandfather of Osman I who is the founder of the Ottoman dynasty
An interesting thing to mention is the linguistic origin of the word empire, from imperator, just meaning commander in early rome. Later Augustus used it to refer to the ruler of Rome and everyone after used to title to claim legitimacy from some long ago era of greatness. Every region of the world has some story like this where the local dominate force creates a term that everyone uses to harken back to.
When put into context, its clear anyone who wants to be called emperor wants to lay claim to legacy of power that came before them, and the right to rule that preceded them. This claim gives them justification to absorb and assimilate like talked about at 5:20
What makes Brahms' fourth such an apt music choice for this video is that no real historical empire can be summarized by the behavior of any single institution, ideology, market, or faith. In this way, empires are analogous to Brahms' technique of continuous development of thematic material, whereby even a short snippet of the music reveals a kaleidoscopic layering of themes, each under some kind of transformation.
Looking forward to the next couple of videos on this topic. One thing I’ve realised doing a political degree is that words, like empire, are not easy to define. Keep up the great work
The similarity between Alexander and Cyrus the Great's methods is interesting. When conquering Babylon he presented himself as restoring the gods and freeing the people from Nabonidus. Same for the Jews which came under his domain after taking over the Babylonian empire. He's the only foreign person to be presented as a messiah in the Old Testament.
Would Alexander have had known about Cyrus' methods? If so, do you think he was taking inspiration from him? He evidently idolised the person to some extent given that he visited his tomb.
Good. I sometimes have questioned the importance of Alexander, as his empire and those of his Successors are long gone, with Greek no longer spoken in the Middle East, but you show why his legacy lives on through other Empires. Thank you again.
You really have a way of finding new lenses to look at history through. The definition of empire, what an interesting video. Bravo once again.
Great video and analysis man, you never fail to teach me something new and interesting! ❤🇬🇷🇪🇺
Tbh it makes me wonder why Belgium in the 19th century, whilst searching for its own soul of the nation, never claimed to be the ancestral state of the Charlemagne empire. Well now that I think of it, pissing off two powerful neighbours might not have been a good idea.
Belgium is an invented concept made up by the French and Germans and Austrians to prevent conflict in the region.
At the time they were trying to wrench themselves free from their Protestant rulers from the north, so doubling down on Catholicism as the basis for their nation was the most obvious option given the context by which the Belgian independence movement began.
Because the languages had no connection to carry the culture after that much migration of peoples
I was looking for a very long time, but failed trying to find videos as good as yours. Simplicity and level of details in your videos is astonishing. Keep doing such a great job. Additionally a website with links, additional content would be great extension of your work.
Imperial Legacies, I've been waiting for a Kraut video on this. LET'S GO!!!
Kraut, CaspianReport, Mr. Mitchell History. RUclips be providing us with way better global commentary than mainstream news.
I mostly agree, however in my opinion I find CaspianReports to be a tad too pessimistic. He views geopolitics through a realist lens (the international view, not the literal meaning of realism). Whilst it's still insightful, I think it sometimes gives too much of a binary worldview (either you win power or lose it, zero sum game).
They are all idealists. I still laugh at the video where the Caspianreport tells how independent Mongolia is, because it is a democracy.
@@quintiax So what if he leans more towards realism? Liberalism and realism should be treated as useful theories that can adequately explain certain geopolitical events better than each other at times, rather than as political labels that the terminally online use to facilitate their shouting matches.
@@TheAmericanPrometheus It's a preference. Personally I am not a big fan of realism, hence my preference not being KaspianReport and more towards the likes of PolyMatter (for example). It's not wrong to view international politics through a realist lens, but it's personally not for me.
There are many ways to view international politics, liberalism and realism being only two of them. Neoliberalism on international politics can be seen as a compromise between realism and liberalism. Other worldviews include constructivism (our values shape the international stage), radicalism (a Marxist lens), institutionalism (we act according to the institutions we are part of) and functionalism (society is structured via substructures working together in collaboration to preserve the current society). The latter two however being more universal views rather than solely for international politics.
And always misleading ones
Funny how people with snobbish accent and good elocution can say pretty much whatever they want and never be questionned
talking about alexander and the make Egypt great again (love how memetic the great again thing is), reminds me about the last emperor of India being king George.
Also an interesting point you make is about how, in a sense, this 'cult' of empire ended with the Third Reich as they represented the effects of imperialism at their worst, a far cry from the systems of Cyrus or Alexander.
I think the most interesting aspect of your definition of empire is the acceptance of the new conquerors as a continuation of that country's ruling tradition, though I believe you missed an opportunity to expound upon that with how the rejection of that claim can often dismantle that empire, with the Seleucid losing control of Persia rather quickly as the Iranians rejected their claims, while maintaining control of Babylonia and Syria, who they intermarried with rather frequently, much longer.
I like your new version of your channel now. I remember years ago back when you had been around the critic crowd and how that would be rather suffocating. This feels more refreshing and informative.
Kraut once again being the greatest creator on this platform.
love the idea, and the game looks really good. both you amd the AlexanderBall developer keep up the great work!
Honestly, one of the best videos we’ve watched in this genre of content. Cheers man!
It is cool seeing landmarks and tombs that have been around for 1000s of years. Like 'I wonder what Augustus thought when he saw the pyramids, the same object I am looking at right now in the flesh.'
Considering at the time of Cleopatra they were already ancient and were tourist attractions even then, he probably thought the same ;p
Thank you for all you do, sir. We appreciate it.
Hey Kraut, did you ever end up making these other videos? I checked the description, but don’t see any new “Imperial Legacies” videos
Learing something new about the world we live in is quite nice, thank you mr. Kraut!
it is amazing how influential singular figures can be in history. is it an organic process that societies have or just plain flukes? perhaps whats even more amazing is that almost all these legendary figures came very close to death before accomplishing their most remembered feats
Very good video analysis. Alexander's conquests are often misunderstood in the west as just "gobbling up land" but the reality is that in those times, unlike modern imperialism, honor and duty played a much bigger role in society than money. The Greeks were disunited for a long time, and the Panhellenic Idea was only a recent ideology. In Athens, while the orator Isocrates supported the Panhellenists, many others like Demosthenes were vehemently against it. The Macedonians were very supportive of Alexander, but only as long as he could make the Panhellenic Alliance reclaim Ionia. So, in conquering Persia, to take revenge not just for his father, but also the Persian (and to an extent, the Persian entanglement in the Peloponnesian) War, Alexander basically had no choice but to invade Persia anyway. As Arrian notes in his work, Alexander's Anabasis, he told the Persian king Xerxes "your ancestors came to Macedonia and the rest of Hellas/Greece, and caused us great harm, although we had never harmed them in the past. For that reason I have come to Asia, to take it from you".
Xerxes was long dead by the time Alexander was born and subsequently invaded Persia, so the notion that Alexander told Xerxes anything is just a myth. When Alexander invaded Persia, Darius III was the Achaemenid king.
@@MeanMachine1992 the letter Alexander wrote was to Darius , the guy above made a mistake while writing . In the letter he indeed tells Darius he is coming for revenge for what the Persians have been doing to the Greeks , he also told Darius that he was coming to capture all of Asia and from now on Alexander would be the king of Asia.
@@sars6224 Thanks for the correction, that sounds more plausible at least. He burnt Persepolis to the ground in response to Xerxes burning Athens, which was itself a response to the Athenians burning Sardis.
Alexander did indeed dominate most of the then known world for a decade, only for his empire to collapse after his death.
@@MeanMachine1992 his empire might have collapsed but the lands he conquered were ruled by the Hellenistic Kings for in many cases centuries after his death
1:34 - You made a little mistake. The "Suleiman" that you were referring to here (the one whose tomb was between Turkey and Syria) was not the 10th Ottoman Sultan - Suleiman the Magnificent. No. The Suleiman whose tomb is on the border is the Suleiman who was the grandfather of the Osman bey (the guy who would yet to create the Ottoman state). For your information, that Suleiman is referred to as "Suleiman Shah" - as you can see in the photo of his tomb which you used in the video
It bothers me that youtube does not recommend me this video and I have to go out of my way to look at your channel every 2 months. But its worth it.
Probably the best Sponsorship that i have Seen. I Hope the Game is as fun as it Looks👍
tfw the advert at the beginning of the video I thought was just a tongue in cheek sarcastic parody of the prevelence of cheap shovelware games, but was actually a genuinely produced ad for a genuine not-shovelware game with a funny concept.
One definition of empire I got from a postcolonial African history professor was "Governing different people differently". I'm pretty sure someone famous said that before he did. I feel like it fits the mold fairly well, no?
Very solid work :)
We could add more complexity to the empire debate with financial empires, fashion moguls who conquered competition or the like, perhaps overlap between that and Rupert's Land, geopolitics with Thomas Bata etc..
the way you pronounce a lot of words is already very german but Seloicus was the most german of them all
not only is your content fascinating, well researched and presented, you now show your great community attitude. Hats off sir.
Definition of Empire. You know it when you see it.
That’s easier said with hindsight. Is the modern USA one? It’s hard to agree on that because it’s so different to everything that’s come before it. China certainly used to be an empire, but is it now? After a certain period of time of dominance does empire just shift to the status quo? It all seems very present biased. The definition has changed throughout history, that was his whole point at the beginning of the video. Imo, each era’s empires should be viewed through the lens of their time. What empire means should be different depending on which time period you’re observing. For present day I think there can only be one empire at a time due to the winner take-all method of late state globalist capitalism. It has to be the country who’s interests are prioritized over all others(USA). For China to become a modern-day empire, the word (on average) must shift to their interests being prioritized over America’s.
@@Fractured_Unity wouldn't China fit the definition of an empire? The culture and ethnicity is Han, but they have Tibetans and Uyghirs they conquered and oppress
This is when i would then add the type of empire you are describing. America is an empire of some kind of course. Wouldn't have non-state territory like Puerto Rico or Guam, if it wasn't. America also has a desire to spread its ideals and values (although forever changing values) across the planet. This has led to global Americanization of the Western world and beyond it.
@@PAYTONLB999 That would certainly fit the old definition. But then America wouldn’t really fall into that. So just by doing those things doesn’t make you an empire by my arbitrary modern definition imo
Hello, @Kraut. Good video as always. It might me rude of me to ask you this, but I would really love for you to make a video about Romania, mostly about the unification in the 19th century, but maybe modern history too. You have a way of explaining history and events that would make my history professors blush. Keep up the good work!
very kind of you to support the guy, for that reason I shall try out the game.
As an Uruguayan and a fan of you, that reference took me by surpirse and made me smile haha (also...yeah, we kinda don´t talk enough about the genocid it was "salsipuedes" )
An empire is a large sovereign country with political influence that extends beyond what would or should be it's natural boundaries
Kraut's videos have such quality that i wait an entire day for the right moment to properly enjoy them
Just to add to your list of leaders visiting a past great leader's tomb, American Presidents travel to Mount Vernon to pay their respects at George Washington's tomb.
That's really nice of you to shout out other creators my friend. Absolute legend 🙌
Normally I don't care much for strategy games -because I suck at them- but AlexanderBall has me pretty intrigued!
Interesting thing to think about is that the US ritual tomb is of all things the resting place of a politician instead of a general, a Marquise de Lafayette. We see a controversy whenever sitting presidents don't visit the grave site.
One way to define "empire" is by using the Danish word "underkaste" which can be translated as "to throw under". You can define empire as one group, cultural, political or other, throwing other groups under themselves by some means.
So every monarchy/oligarchy?
Or democratic slave owning state.
Wouldn't democratic states pre universal suffrage count as well? I mean you are using letter of law and state apparatus to throw pretty sizable portion of population under yourselfand deny them one of the most important right you have in a democratic state -- right to vote and be elected.
Or if we go further down this rabbit hole. Every state ever, as in every state (if I remember Marxist ideology correctly) there is a rulling class and those who is under it in modern state case -- by controling means of production. In that case word loses any meaning beyond "state I don't like but can't call fascist/communist".
That was really interesting. A fresh perspective. Well done 👏
This 'imperial legacies' series is going to be GOATED
BAAAAAAAA
The mutual sponsorship is very heartwarming to see on youtube.
Thank you for the latest update. I being an American, still enjoy your analysis from as far back as your "Trumps Biggest Failure" video. Particularly, the scrutiny and deep delve into research of each topic. Please continue to make emphatic critique essays of geopolitics and history that leads to geopolitics. I tip my hat to you sir.
One of the few game promotions that actually caught my interest
9:42 The fact that they DIDN'T marry Egyptians is one of the most famous things about the Ptolemaic Dynasty; they almost exclusively married within the family, and the only exogamous marriages they conducted (early in the dynasty, before incest had been cemented as the norm) were with Seleucids. They were also pretty selective with what parts of Egyptian culture they embraced; they had themselves depicted in the traditional style, but largely wore Greek fashion in actual practice, and not a single member of the dynasty bothered to learn the Egyptian language until Cleopatra VIII (the famous one).
Is that true second farow of ptolemaic dynasty name was sister lover?
@@krushnaji4940 He was given the epithet Philadelphos, "sibling-lover," yes.
@@SomasAcademy thanks 👍 So I was slightly wrong .
although alexander definitely popularized it, i would argue that he was inspired to do this from the persians themselves.
the persian empire was sort of the first empire in the ancient middle east who introduced the idea of the liberating empire, prior to them most empires (akkadian, assyrian, babylonian, egyptian, hittite) all ruled through the idea that their king came to sow destruction if his will was not obeyed by the locals.
however the persian empire was the first empire that merely required a monetary tribute, no more no less, the shahanshah would come to the place and depict himself as the leader of the locals, to the egyptians, he was the pharaoh. the shahanshah would also be depicted being carried by his satrap underlings showing how his power was ultimately given to him by them unlike the babylonians or assyrians who would depict themselves sitting ontop and crushing their subjects.
As an Uruguayan im just shocked at the mention of our name
Rather than visiting an earlier emperor's tomb, you could also incorporate it into your own tomb. The road of first Ming emperor's tomb makes a detour to loop around the first Wu emperor's tomb.
>you can go around and build new ones like Alexandria
do you have any idea how little that narrows it down?
I'm excited for the upcoming videos. This one was wildly fascinating.
In a book im reading from Lawrence James he talks about how the British imperialists viewed the Romans as little people because they allowed there empire to be goverened by forces other than prosperity and growth.
Another exemple of the "Alexander reincarnated" is how Pompee the Great, right after he did a lot of prestigous stuff (like going on a conquering rampage in the Orient, submitting the last Marius' loyalists in Hispania or beating the pirates to a pulp) he had (like a lot of imperatores before him) a triumph set in Rome.
Only after his campaign in the Orient the triumph he made was peculiar, as he made himself look like Alexander; Indeed, as he was warring in the east, he founded numerous cities (such as Nicopolis in the Pont, or even Pompeiopolis) like a certain individual. And when he got to triumph in Rome, he was on a chariot with the supposed (Appien, the source, isn't that sure of it) chlamys (type of cloak) of Alexander, which he, supposedly, found in Mithridate's palace.
Another exemple would be the coins the son of Sylla had minted, in which you would see on one face the head of Alexander with the helmet of Hercules and right beside it the name of the family.
However, for the Romans, I would argue that it was more of a prestige show off which was more in relation with the complex relationship the senators, magisters and knights had with their clients. Showing your wealth and, more importantly, your prestige, which would be increased even further by the name of the macedonian ruler, seeing as the bigger part of the roman elites were highly impressed and attracted to the hellenic culture (Cato is sad).
So, for the republic times, more off a trick to win votes and influence back home than an imperialistic deed. As such, Caesar's move to visit the tomb is also more linked to the "I am bigger and better than my predecessors" which all imperatores tried to achieve (namely Marius, Sylla, Pompee, Caesar, Mark Antoine and Octavius), and the successes will lead to the slow but predictable death of the republic.
As for the definition of "empire" i would argue it has to be linked with a wish of hegemony on a region, not having borders stated by the culural aspect (as opposed to nation-states) and, as such, having something of a diverse population and not having a strong centralized state revolving around the capital city and so having gouvernors or alike in provinces.
Kraut is the peak historical content.
He really isn’t. His videos are full of inaccuracies
@@Chrysobubulle for example: it was the British that burned that palace in China, not the French
Agree with Chrysobubulle. While I usually enjoy his videos, such as the history of Mexico, even then he had inaccuracies (the Comanche were not easily beaten out of Apache territory, in fact many times the Comanche had pushed Apache bands into Mexican territory for protection against them).
And more lately, it becomes worrying seeing more and more viewers saying things like “primitive” this or “backwards” that in relation to conquered cultures, as any anthropologist worth their salt would be allergic to such characterizations, even of smaller peoples. While I don’t see Kraut use much of that terminology, it does seem that sometimes his prescriptions become too broad or simply inaccurate.
I've myself been studying history again as I try to prepare for the history uni entrance exam owing to my highschool diploma not being good enough to get through that, and my 2016 education curriculum Finnish history textbook's definition of imperialism is "A country's* desire to expand its sphere of influence through violence or by the threatening of it", which I feel is a decent definition, though simultaneously I have run to the problem that the same book's definition of colonialism, which is "The establishment of a colony in another country, which often includes economic utilization**", feels like it overlaps with imperialism while supported by my understanding of different historical events. For example the Portuguese colonization through the establishment of trade posts along the Porutguese discovered sea route between India and Europe fits simultaneously the definitions of imperialism and colonialism of my history book. The Portuguese did colonisation through the establishment of trade posts which were colonies that featured economic utilization through them acting as the bases for Portuguese dominance of the trade route to India. Simultaneously the Portuguese act of dominating the trade route through gunboat policy of threatening to open fire on all coastal powers with its carrack class ships should they threaten their monopoly, in addition with the Mamluk-Portuguese war in which the Portuguese used war to force the trade of the Indian ocean to flow into Europe through its southern route around Africa fit both the definition of imperialism. These two definitions are both different yet in many ways the same.
Just some rambling from me that got a bit out of hand, but whatever I'm posting it.
*the definition in Finnish uses the word valtio, which can be translated to country, but also nation, state, government, polity, commonwealth and other less used definitions according to google translate, as in Finnish language singular words can mean multiple things depending on the context (famous example being kuusi palaa)
**the definition in Finnish uses the word hyväksikäyttö, which can be translated as utilization, but also exploitation or abuse, again, depending on the context
One definition of empire I learnt was that in an empire you have a small preferential group of people that rule over a larger group of subjects. For example the romans in rome rule over their allies/subjects in other citystates. Or the han chinese ruling over the various other groups. Later the Italian romans that ruled over the roman provinces. In colonial empires you had the people in the heartland (like spain, great britain or france) ruling over subject people in the colonies. This preferential treatment of the core group can be seen in structures like citizenship giving you extra rights, or the overlord putting its own people in top positions and denying the locals top positions.
It does seem to work fairly well for the examples of empires you've given. So I hope you could consider this definition of empire as well, and maybe find it useful.
You mention Ptolemaic egypt. While ptolemy does take on a lot of the egyptian culture (becoming a pharaoh, following egyptian culture and marrying into egyptian nobility) he also keeps a lot of the top greek. Greek soldiers are paid more and the upper layer of society remains mostly greek.
Also a lot of alexander's generals divorced the wives alexander forced on them. Seloikos keeping his wife was a powerplay to give him more legitimacy. While the conquerors had to change themselves a bit to better rule their subjects, a lot of empires had a ruling class and group of people that was quite distinct from their subjects.
Yes it was funny how he said there were no especially good candidates for the definition of empire while not mentioning the most common one...
> a small preferential group of people that rule over a larger group of subjects.
So every monarchy/oligarchy ever is an empire?
@@Poctyk No, the king is of the same cultural group as the people he rules over. The ruling group should feel they are different than the rest. Like greeks ruling over egyptians.
@@anonvideo738 > No, the king is of the same cultural group as the people he rules over.
Is he? The fact that we consider them to be same cultural group doesn't mean that they considered themselves to be same cultural group. (See Polish Wewuzing aka Polish Sarmatianism)
What exactly makes you think say that King and his subject are of same cultural group? Before 20th century culture of the "elites" and of "common people" were 2 entirely different spheres.
Language? Before standardization and enforcement by state of single "correct" version it was a bunch of vaguely similar dialects inside language family. Not to mention that educated people were more likely to use sacred languages such as Latin in communication. (Wiki says that in 15 century ~70% of all books were in Latin). Clothing, songs lifestyle all drastically differed.
Opposite is also the case, see Roman Empire as by the time of the Imperial period most considered themselves to be Roman -- making Roman empire not empire.
>Like greeks ruling over egyptians.
But those Greeks were Pharaoh, culturally. That's like saying that German shouldn't be considered to be a Russian monarch beccause they she was German.
Speaking of which. Russia is a very good example of what I was talking about. The cultural rift divide between elites and (Russian) peasants was unimaginably massive.
On tomb practise - something simmilar occured in China, though it was not as consistent. The emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty visited the tomb of the Hongwu Emperor of the Ming Dynasty. Qianlong wanted to be perceived as a legitimate emperor of China and not as a descendant of Manchu conquerors. After proclaiming the Republic, there was a mix of practises: the tomb of Cixi Empress was robbed and revolutionaries in general made a cut from the Imperial China heritage... but, when Sun Yat Sen died, his successors decided to found a tomb of his in Nanjing. The tomb was going to be later visited by the Kuomintang visitors (e.g. Chiang Kai-shek) and later, by the CPC officials. After Mao died, his body was mumified and it was put in a Mauzoleum. If we stretch a bit of using tombs as a source of legitimization - we may see that even Confucius receives simmilar interest by the Chinese leaders: Hu Jintao visited the tomb of the philosopher to signify the comeback of confucianism as an influential philosophy for the Chinese state.
To this day, such sites play a role in defining the Chinese statehood, how much imperial the practise is - perhaps it is a topic for another video or discussion.
Honestly, the game is a p cool concept! It's a nice change of pace and a charming style.
Holy hell that game is something alright. First time in my life to actually do something an advert in a video says.
Empire is a system ruled by an Emperor
If you go to Rome, in the ancient forum, there is a place. A special one. It was where the pyre upon which Julius Caesar was cremated by the Roman crowd in stood.
It doesn't look like much. It's now just a ruined piece of wall or foundation.
This place still have flowers and money thrown on it every day.
One central country that took over multiple other separate countries? And ruled over them via delegating power to an appointed representative.
(Although I suppose taking various annexations & changing geopolitics into account is a tricky grey-area)
This would make the Achemenid Empire not an empire since it only took over one country, the Umayyads.
- "Founds a new city known as Alexander"
- *zooms on Memphis*
Good video. I nevertheless have qualms with your claim that Alexander was the first to try to create a universal emperor. The Achaemenids were also pharaohs of Egypt. Alexander's political aim was in great part to be the second Cyrus, a ruler that was greatly praised in classical greek historiography and ethics. Cyrus in his babylonian cylinder used as his main title the very prestigious but quite unassuming title of "ruler of Anshan", which highlighted his prestigious origin while also creating a blend between elamite and iranian identity (Anshan was one of the twin capitals of ancient Elam).
He also uses as secondary titles mesopotamian ones like "king of the four quarters" "king of the world" "great king" "king of Sumer and Akkad" and of course "king of Babylon", thus merging elamite and mesopotamian imperial legacies which had competed for hegemony during several millenia. This was thus quite groundbreaking, especially since the one achieving this was iranian thus tying Mesopotamia and the iranian plateau together, a transformation facilitated by the support of the influential babylonian clergy of Marduk. His son Cambyses would continue this legacy by making himself Pharaoh of Egypt. The universalist nature of the Achemenid empire would be somewhat reversed by Darius's coup, which would see iranian aristocrats gain more influence and a more centralized power but still Darius himself would closely tie himself to Cyrus's legacy.
Still even Cyrus, who according to me was the first who really succeeded at creating a universal empire (in my view Alexander failed since he gave way too much power to his greek generals and neglected local institutions like the babylonian priesthood) wasn't the first to try.
For example the rulers of Assyria who were at the same time the main example and the main antithesis of Achemenid imperial ideology (both relied on divine will and claimed world hegemony but the Achemenids claimed to be just liberators while the assyrians often quite openly acknowledged to be subjugators and destroyers), also tried to mesh Babylon together with Assyria by making themselves rulers of Babylon and by restoring local temples.
The true invetors of this idea of a universal empire that transcends any single source of legitimacy and local power were people like Sargon of Akkad, Ur-Nammu and his less known elamite opponent Puzur-Inshushinak. Sargon despite being akkadian claimed the sumerian imperial legacy by underlining how he was chosen by Inanna, the patron godess of Unug, capital of his opponent Lugalzagezi and by using his former title of "king of Sumer and Akkad". Puzur-Inshushinak took an akkadian regnal name underlining how he was chosen by the patron god of the elamite city of Shushan, Inshushinak, he also called himself "governor of Shushan" which was ambiguous since it was an akkadian administrative title highlighting his position in Elam, he also took the title "lord of Awan" which was the name of the elamite rulers of Shushan before the akkadian conquest, and finally sumerians called him "man of Anshan" also tying him to the iranian highlands. Ur-Nammu would basically do the same as Sargon but backwards, adopting Akkadian imperial ideology in a sumerian framework.
So a claim to universal rule but also universal legitimacy is actually built in the notion of empire. Most empires used it since it is convenient and even often necessary to justify imperial rule over foreigners. I also think you weren't honnest in your presentation of imperial power. An empire isn't always creating greater equality, one of the ways an empire can assert its power is by exploiting local social inequality and turning a dispriviledged social class against the local elites. Many historians claimed this was the case with muslim empires in India but that's a controversial statement, the soviets quite literally used this to conquer Azerbaijan, through a revolution of the workers of the Baku oilfields. Its simply that the more common tactic is to rely on local elites that are then made subservient to the imperial elite.
I really appreciate this
Kraut is great but some of his claims on history can really make me 😞
This was very interesting, I honestly never thought there was deeper political meaning to leaders visiting their forebears, but now the pattern is both obvious, and fascinating.
I love your channel, thanks for the great content. It’s amazing that you inspired someone to make a game from your videos. You also inspire me to read and learn more about history. It just so happens that your videos are just more interesting and fascinating. I found this one particularly interesting and was wondering if you could provide me with some reads that you used to make this video. Again, thanks for the great content, and in the future once I have more money saved I’ll contribute to your channel.
I just watched a video by a youtuber called Premodernist on the history of Persia, and Alexander featured in a piece of it. Was thinking it would be interesting to see more detail into that period, and a few hours later there is this!
An empire is when one ethnic group rules over a total population that is more than twice as much as its own. The tricky part is then moved to defining what an ethnic group is.
Than neither the Russian or German Empores could be considered empires.
@@lukatomas9465 Yes that's right. Although, what even is a German anyway? Are Austrians Germans? Are Dutch Germans? Mostly though Germany was an empire because they claimed the title from the HRE. It's a similar thing with the Japanese and Vietnamese empires, just a naming quirk.
With the Russian empire, at the time I think it would have qualified as an empire. I sceptical people in it were really Russians. These days though Russia and Brazil are borderline cases because they have a dominant core that contains most of the population but vast hinterlands where indigenous populations are much more significant.
Kraut got one thing right: one definitions are perfect.
@@korakys At the time of the German Empire most Austrians considered themselves German.
The definition of Empire that i grew up with was "a country that rules over other countries"
That combined Iranian /Greek symbol looks cool
Wow, it's fascinating how the tombs of former imperial leaders gained such a cult-like status from those who came after, from Alexander, to Augustus, to Charlemagne, to Frederick, to Napoleon.