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I'm gonna say Alexander the Great. He conquered the world before he was thirty, and on foot, to boot. And he was honourable and chivalrous and compassionate toward prisoners; forget those stupid Arthurian knights, they were just thugs in armour. Alexander was a gentleman. And we know quite a bit about his personal relationships; he was deeply in love with his childhood friend Hephaestion, but when Hephaestion died, Alexander was so devastated by his death that he tried to have him made into a god. When I read of it, that was the first time that I was moved to near tears by a history textbook. It just seemed so desperately sad, and it really showed that Alexander was human, that he had human frailties and joys and sorrows, that he fell in love and suffered the pain of loss.

Alexander amassed a huge portion of land, mostly by defeating the Persians. First, he captured Egypt away from the Persians, much to the relief of the beleagured Egyptians, then he worked his way up into the Middle East along the coast. From there, he turned east, across deserts and treacherous mountains, until he finally reached India, far from the Persian borders. He had intended to go as far as the "end of the world" but decided to return home after despairing that the earth just continued to stretch out as a seemingly illimitable expanse before him. He went far beyond lands Greece had heard of in even the wildest stories. What he had swallowed the Persian empire and added much more onto it. Unfortunately, I don't have the numbers, but he was one impressive bird!

Wow. This is tough.

It's hard for me, because I enjoy so many. I'll list some and my reasons why:

Adolf Hitler: Now before you all thump me as a Nazi, let's be honest. He was a genius militaristicly, until he decide invading Russia was smart.

Ulysses S. Grant: Sure he was a drunkard, but his taking of Vicksburg (I think it was Vicksburg. I haven't read up on him for years) won the American Civil War.

I'll list more later. I can't think of one particular favorite.

I like Emperor Asoka of the Maurya Dynasty in ancient India. He started out as a successful conqueror in India, but he supposedly ventured through an area he conquered and was horrified to find many burning buildings and corpses. After that he gave up violence and war, and returned the land he'd taken. Asoka allied weaker kingdoms that could have been easily conquered and unified the area through diplomacy. It's also believed he did a lot to build up India's infrastructure and was a strong supporter of religious toleration.

I don't know much of Asian history either to be honest. sweatdrop
I know a little bit of ancient Indian and Chinese, but not much else.

Same here. Minus the Mongols. I don't know much about them.

I read in a book of Famous Deaths that the most popular and well believed theory that he was poisoned by his generals at a drinking party.

I do know for a fact that they filled his casket with honey. Honey never spoils, so I guess it could be considered pure. What a sweet burial. xD