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Notes -
Even Putin doesn't quite have the ancient-style control, though.
I would argue that the wealthiest person on Earth to date was the former (de facto) king of Iraq, Saddam Hussein.
Surely the king of Saudi Arabia beats him on that metric.
In any case I’d point to Xi Jinping as a very reasonable candidate for de facto wealthiest man in world history.
I was considering adding the Chinese Emperors [specifically, the Mao Dynasty] to the list, but I think Xi is constrained in how he uses/possesses that wealth in a way that Saddam (and the other ME kings to a lesser extent) are not. He is a very powerful man, but I'm not convinced he's very wealthy (for the same reasons, and in the same ways, that most leaders in the free world are not).
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