Rule, Britannia!

[Knight of Heaven]

I disagree about the Portugese, I would argue the Dutch were at least as strong, if not stronger.

It depends, of the time frame, first the Portuguese had a great hegemony, in the orient, africa and brazil. only in 17 century that you can call the ducth a great power, even so, it didnt last long. Only maybe in the orient for some time, but they coulnt get the Portuguese out. And the Portuguese end up of reconquering again most of the colonies. Only in the orient was more even. So you can say the duch were stronger then the portuguese for a time period, and the portuguese were stronger then the duch for other time periods. As for the cultural hegemony, i would say the portuguese were always stronger, with efects on todays day.

If you want a hint, they you should know that the Portuguese language is more spoken then the duch, in the 4 corners of the world. Remember the portuguese colonial empire only end in 1999, with the restoring of Macau to the chinese again.

The biggest Empire of all times :

The mongols are you joking? they got a huge land mass to rule, but it wasnt an empire unlike Alexanders empire, the roman, or the british, or the portuguese, or spanish, or the the ducth. My meaning is it had a impact during the living time of his empire, but the cultural efects were few, the mongols were absorved culturaly by his conquered people, unlike the other empires in history. what im saying it was a empire with diferent caracteristics, then the others, naturaly.