I must say that I disagree with the oft-repeated argument that America's only contribution to world culture and history has been its military dominance, in fact I would argue that this aspect is the least important aspect of America's influence. The internet, globalization, just about every supranational institution in existence, countless mass production techniques, mass marketing, consumerism, many advances in space flight, Hollywood, the American music industry, the American legal system, popular democracy, the victory of modern free-market capitalism over autarkic central-planning, the reinforcement of English as the global lingua franca (I can guarantee you that if Britain's empire crumbled as it did after WWII and America did not rise, students in China, Korea, Japan, Taiwan and the rest of the world would not be scrambling to learn English), the American university system and the tremendous production of scholarly work on a scale never before seen in human history in a dizzying variety of fields, Google, Facebook, Apple, Starbucks, McDonald's, YouTube, the integrated circuit, the airplane, the Bessemer process, ect.
So, I'm arriving to this quite late but I was reading from the start and I don't know why but this early post just... annoyed me!
You will see above that
@perennialurker listed the internet as an American innovation. This is true. You will also note that he listed it as of cultural significance to the rest of the world. That would be false! What you are currently on, my fellow history buffs, is the World Wide Web... a seperate entity from the internet! The internet is only used for American Military uses, only 8 computers in the world are hooked up to it. The World Wide Web is what we all use and it is an ENGLISH invention =)
As such, this leads me to my list:
1)
Brittish Empire - I'm sorry, but they just have had the biggest impact on the world in all fields! Military, Culturally, Technologically, Spiritually and Economically. The Brittish empire was massive, spanned hundreds of years and pretty much invented the modern world! Without Britian, I reckon we'd still be in the middle ages... admittedly the later part of it but my point still stands! =)
2)
Greek Empire - If you count all the city states as one empire then boom! You have yourself a hell of an Empire right there! The things the Greeks gave us, it's ridiculous! Philosophy, art, culture, FLAMETHROWERS! Yeah, thats right... Flamethrowers were an ancient Athenian invention... how badass do they seem now? =D
3)
Viking/Scandinavian "Empire" - This ones going to be a bit tricky to word but I definitely think that the Scandinavians have been massively overlooked in this debate! Apart from the obvious massive historical ramifications of the Viking raids on Medieval Europe, the vikings also gave us a massive contribution to the english language, re-introduced minted coins to the world, helped govern Britain through the dark ages (Part of the reason people use the term Anglo-Saxon to talk about the English) and, oh yeah, DISCOVERED AMERICA! What? You thought that was Christopher Columbus? He wishes! It was a viking called Leif Erikson who discovered America in the 1400's... SO TAKE THAT ITALY! =P
4)
Chinese Empire - In all its glory, the Chinese empire was just totally awesome! I don't really need to go into more detail than that, because nearly everyone has put them in their lists!
5)
Arab Empire - Lets get this straight... The Muslims had their heads screwed on! While the rest of us were too busy looking for witches or dying of the plague, the Arabs were being amazing at maths, inventing actual medicine that we still use to this day and just generally being badasses! One of my favourite history stories is of the battle of Jerusalem in the Crusades when Saladin (Pronounced Sala-ha-deen btw!) outsmarted the hell out of the crusaders! When Richard the Lionheart laid siege to Jerusalem, Saladin had a plan so awesome that women everywhere just became spontaneously pregnant from his sheer manliness! What he did was, he waited just out of sight of the Crusaders and watched the seige. He waited for the citizens and the garrison inside of Jerusalem to starve and completely run out of food. Then, Jerusalem surrendered! The triumphant crusaders marched in to claim there prize and thats when Saladin struck! The sneaky bastard ran up behind the crusaders and locked them in the city! Essentially strting a new siege in a town that already had sweet F-all in it! The seige lasted about a whole afternoon before the Crusaders realised that they had been well and truly defeated! So they surrendered... and like the awesome dude that he is, Saladin made peace with them and let them go back home to Europe... which was a mistake cause they came back again to kill some more, but thats a different story!
So thats my opinion! I discounted America from the running because I don't believe that they are an empire! In my opinon, an Empire is a country taking over other countries through force! No doubt America is a ridiculously super-powered, jacked up, machine-gun toting, cigar-smoking, badass motherf***er of a country... but its still just a country! =)
If I have made any huge, glaringly obvious historical, factual errors here then feel free to berate me for it because, to be fair, I have been really aggressive in this post and more than likely deserve it! But hey, what can I say? History is my passion! XD