Science, imperial

Imperial rulers have expanded, stabilized, and controlled empires by means of knowledge. Detailed and precise knowledge of the imperial territories have allowed imperial rulers to master the complexity, scale, and diversity of empires. This knowledge – initially in the form of cosmologies and geographies of the empire's cosmos, its nature, and its people – took up a position on a continuum of official and esoteric information, created by priests, scribes, historians, philosophers, and other scholars, that was valued by imperial elites. The value of empirical science lay in its ability to order the empire, creating maps and calculations that would guide rulers in handling future political and social problems. Institutions of imperial science date back to the early Babylonian Empire and the Han dynasty, and reached their zenith during the time of European territorial empires between 1700 and 1900.