Who had more money, John D. Rockefeller or Genghis Khan? It’s a simple question with a very difficult answer, TIME reports.
This ranking of the richest people of all time is based on hours of interviews with academic economists and historians. To read more about how the order was determined despite the difficulty of comparing wealth across a wide range of time periods and economic systems, read this.
But for now, suffice to say that the following is a rigorous but highly debatable attempt to list the wealthiest historical figures in order of their economic influence.
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10. Genghis Khan

Lived: 1162-1227
Country: Mongolian Empire
Wealth: Lots of land, not much else

Genghis Khan is undoubtedly one of the most successful military leaders of all time. As leader of the Mongol Empire, which at its height stretched from China to Europe, he controlled the largest contiguous empire in history.

Mongol soldiers were banned from taking personal loot. After an area was conquered, every item taken was inventoried by official clerks and then later distributed amongst the military and their families. Genghis still received a share of the spoils, but that hardly made him rich.

9. Bill Gates

Lived: 1955-present
Country: United States
Wealth: $78.9 billion

As the richest living person, Bill Gates has about $8 billion more than Zara co-founder Amancio Ortega, the second-richest person in the world.

8. Alan Rufus (a.k.a. Alan the Red)
Lived: 1040–1093
Country: England
Wealth: $194 billion

The nephew of William the Conqueror died with £11,000, which amounted to 7% of England’s GDP at the time. That would amount to $194 billion in 2014 dollars.

7. John D. Rockefeller

Lived: 1839–1937
Country: United States
Wealth: $341 billion

By 1880 his Standard Oil company controlled 90% of American oil production. Rockefeller was valued at about $1.5 billion based on a 1918 federal income tax return —the equivalent of almost 2% of U.S. economic output that year.

6. Andrew Carnegie

Lived: 1835–1919
Country: United States
Wealth: $372 billion

Andrew Carnegie sold his company, U.S. Steel, to J.P. Morgan for $480 million in 1901. That sum equates to about slightly over 2.1% of U.S. GDP at the time.

5. Joseph Stalin

Lived: 1878–1953
Country: USSR
Wealth: Complete control of a nation with 9.6% of global GDP

While that money didn’t belong directly to Stalin, he had the ability to leverage Soviet economic might for any reason he chose. As of 2014, that level of production would be equivalent to nearly $7.5 trillion dollars.

4. Akbar I

Lived: 1542–1605
Country: India
Wealth: Ruled empire with 25% of global GDP

3. Emperor Shenzong

Lived: 1048–1085
Country: China
Wealth: Ruled empire with 25% to 30% of global GDP

2. Augustus Caesar
Lived: 63 BC–14 AD
Country: Rome
Wealth: In charge of an empire that accounted for 25% to 30% of the world’s economic output.

Augustus at one point held personal wealth equivalent to one-fifth of his empire’s economy. For a while Augustus personally owned all of Egypt.

1. Mansa Musa
Year: 1280–1337
Country: Mali
Wealth: Richer than anyone could describe

Mansa Musa was the king of Timbuktu. Musa’s west African kingdom was likely the largest producer of gold in the world—at a time when gold was especially high in demand. Some tales of his famous pilgrimage to Mecca—during which Musa’s spending was so lavish that it caused a currency crisis in Egypt—mention dozens of camels each carrying hundreds of pounds of gold.


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