The opposite would then happen, to the discontent of European imperialists waiting for the occasion.

FORBES: The U.S. and the Euro

English has been a language of occupiers and imperialists, but also one of insurgents and democrats.

NEWYORKER: Globish For Beginners

Mapmakers may be geographers and cartographers, but they can also be artists and imperialists, storytellers and propagandists.

ECONOMIST: There is no such thing as an objective map

Neo-imperialists worry that America has the responsibilities of a global superpower, but an electorate unwilling to shoulder them.

ECONOMIST: Invading Iraq

From then on European merchants and imperialists invaded the Indian Ocean, grabbed much of its trade and began to take over its most valuable centres of production.

ECONOMIST: Historical geography

Mr Garten is oddly insistent, despite this, that American CEOs should pursue a broader agenda on the global stage even if they are regarded in some quarters as imperialists.

ECONOMIST: How corporate bosses think

But on any interpretation, it is hard to resist the conclusion that the Athenian imperialists were using monetary union to display their political muscle - and hard not to imagine that vengeance for that has finally come, 25 centuries later.

BBC: A Point of View: The euro's strange stories

Both during the post-World War I breakup of the Ottoman Empire and with the breakup of the British and French empires after World War II, British and French imperial authorities colluded with Arab imperialists to guarantee the latter's nearly uninhibited control over the Middle East.

CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Sudanese crossroads