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What if any are some examples of groups of peoples or civilizations that have had more than one DISTINCT period of global dominance, or had distinct periods of regional power or prosperous civilization. Maybe a better way to phrase the ? is can anyone name a culture that had two periods of world dominance.
You would have to define global dominance first... How much of the globe do you have to control to be such?
There are many examples historically of a state gaining and losing influence. In 1454 England was perhaps the strongest power in Western Europe. By 1554 it was one of the less powerful ones. By 1854 it had the greatest empire in history.
Similarly the Chinese empire was destroyed by the Mongols, rose again under the Ming and fell to the Manchu again. Is that going through periods of global dominance in your model?
I knew I'd have a hard time defining the specs of my question. My first thought was the Chinese, but then I got to thinking that they never really expanded their borders to ecompass other parts of their known world (actually maybe they did, I know not enough about chinese history to say)
For sake of argument lets say a true dominant empire, how far they would have needed to expand their borders or conquor other peoples is up for interpretation. For example back to the chineese, how much would they need to take over when they already had a huge land area.
Basically the point of the thread I'm trying to get accross is that I've not really noticed too many previous times in history where One group of people came to dominate an entire region/area, fell off of power and then came back to prominence. Seems to me power is very fluid.
For such a vague question, I'm not sure if I'm giving you the answer you're looking for.
But, I think the easiest and most recent example of world dominance is clearly the US. Given the mix of political, economic and military influence on this earth which is more globalized than ever, it's an easy choice.
Economics alone, the US accounts for 1/4 of the commerce on earth with only 1/21th of the worlds population. Granted, we have some debt/deficit issues looming which can mean a number of things.
Three possible states meet the model, depending on how you want to define global dominance. The English were the greatest power in the Western Europe in the 14th and 15th century. Then they faded into relative obscurity from the 1450's on. Starting about 1750 they went on to create the greatest land empire in history, ruling about a fourth of the globe.
The German Holy Roman Empire (and more generally the German people) ruled much of central Europe and had broad influence on commerce and policy in much of Eastern Europe for centuries. Than in the 15th century it became so fragmented that its influence was replaced first by Spanish, then French influence. Also by a rising Russia in the east. By 1800 it was essentially powerless. By 1942 a new German state ruled much of Europe (if temporarily).
One can argue that this was true with the Muslim empires as well, although the people who fought under its banner varied. At the height of the original Muslim Empire in the 8th century they ruled most of the Mediterean from first Damascus then Baghdad. Then the empire fragmented and declined. In the 15th century the Empire rose again, this time under the Ottomans. They created a vast empire over the next two centuries.
That's a difficult question to answer without a definition of "dominate" and "the world". There have been many different powers over time that could claim to dominate the "world" in the military sense:
-The Persian Empire
-The Greek Empire
-The Roman Empire
-The Mongols
-The Spanish Empire
-The British Empire
Of all of them the only one that comes the closest to dominating the world in a real sense is The British Empire and none of them were dominant for more than one period of history.
The other dominance could be taken to mean cultural dominance. There has been several nations/peoples that could claim cultural world dominance:
Of those the British and U.S. have had the most impact on the world and one could argue it is really the British as the U.S. was a former colony and even though we have morphed into something else, basic culture is still relatively similar.
The common thread throughout all of this, with the exception of the Mongols, is Western Civilization. I think that really is the answer to the question. No other group of people has dominated the world more than Western Europeans and the civilization that they created. The nation in power has shifted many times and the overall influence has waxed and waned, but no civilization has done more to export it's culture and project it's power.
I in no way mean to degrade other civilizations and cultures, particularly the Chinese, but no other group has tried or been as succesful as the west in dominating the world.
What if any are some examples of groups of peoples or civilizations that have had more than one DISTINCT period of global dominance, or had distinct periods of regional power or prosperous civilization.
The Romans
As the Western and Eastern empires would come close to what the OP was asking about.
Three possible states meet the model, depending on how you want to define global dominance. The English were the greatest power in the Western Europe in the 14th and 15th century. Then they faded into relative obscurity from the 1450's on. Starting about 1750 they went on to create the greatest land empire in history, ruling about a fourth of the globe.
The German Holy Roman Empire (and more generally the German people) ruled much of central Europe and had broad influence on commerce and policy in much of Eastern Europe for centuries. Than in the 15th century it became so fragmented that its influence was replaced first by Spanish, then French influence. Also by a rising Russia in the east. By 1800 it was essentially powerless. By 1942 a new German state ruled much of Europe (if temporarily).
One can argue that this was true with the Muslim empires as well, although the people who fought under its banner varied. At the height of the original Muslim Empire in the 8th century they ruled most of the Mediterean from first Damascus then Baghdad. Then the empire fragmented and declined. In the 15th century the Empire rose again, this time under the Ottomans. They created a vast empire over the next two centuries.
These are the type of answers I was interested in. World dominance was probably not the best wording to use. As in its all relative to what people considered their world and could be argued and argued upon.
A follow up ? How Similar were the Cultures of the Original prosperous people compared with the peoples that would have emerged the second time around?
I am not sure what you mean by the original prosperous people. Over time economic gains have been signficant so any state that rose centuries after another state, as in my examples, would have been more prosperous. Well this is true for all states after say 1500. Plagues, wars, and weather commonly disrupted previous gains.
Incidently, if you want to view the Byzatine Empire as Roman (whic they did for a long time) then the Roman Empire could be added to my example. As we all know the empire essentially collapsed in the 4th century. But under Justinian in the 6th century much of the territory lost was regained, for a relatively short period admitedly
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