What is an empire?
By now, you have learned about several major empires. Just to review, the term empire refers to a central state that exercises political control over a large amount of territory containing many diverse groups. Often, this centralized power rules from one or several capital cities. We usually refer to an empire as if it were a single unit. But, because empires are so large, they are often divided into smaller, more manageable political units, usually called provinces.
