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Pythagoras’ Greed Cup and Other Lesser-Known Ancient World Facts

Khalid Elhassan July 31, 2020 34 min

Roman Empire - Roman emperor — The assassination of Caligula. Quora

4. A Ruthless Ruler

Ancient China’s Chin Shi Huang (259 – 210 BC) was a megalomaniac who wanted to live forever. In a catastrophic twist, his megalomania ended up killing him, instead. The founder of the imperial Chin Dynasty, Shi Huang was king of the Chinese state of Chin during the Warring States Period. He ascended the throne as a child, and soon as he became a teenager, he wrested power from the regents who had governed during his minority.

Shi Huang consolidated his power by massacring palace plotters who sought to usurp his prerogatives, then went on the warpath. He pushed back the northern barbarians, conquered all neighboring Chinese states, and consolidated them under his rule. He capped that off by declaring himself the first emperor of a unified China.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.