What is translatio imperii? What tradition did the Russian Empire inherit from Assyria, Persia and Rome? What is Russia's mission in world history?Konstantin Malofeev's book is dedicated to the Empire, its past, present and future. The author explores the interaction in world history of the imperial principle, based on religiously based power, and the beginning of trade and finance.A grandiose historical panorama unfolds before the reader - Assyria and Babylon, Greece and Persia, Rome and Carthage, and so on until of our time - the collapse of the Russian Empire, the rise and fall of the Soviet project, the establishment of the modern world order and attempts to counteract it. Great conquerors, prophets and saints, trading corporations and banking houses operate on these pages. The first volume examines the period of the Empire's birth until the fall of Constantinople in 1453.The study, on the one hand, is based on the best achievements of domestic and world historiography, and on the other hand, offers original historiosophical ideas developed by the author for decades. The book will be of interest to both historians, philosophers, political scientists, economists, as well as students and a wide range of history lovers.Editorial design preserved in PDF A4 format.